[159]Reading-in of the words “or spouse” has the advantage of being simple and direct. It involves minimal textual alteration. The values of the Constitution would be upheld. The existing institutional mechanisms for the celebration of marriage would remain the same. Budgetary implications would be minimal.[1] The long-standing policy of the law to protect and enhance family life would be sustained and extended.[2] Negative stereotypes would be undermined.[3] Religious institutions would remain undisturbed in their ability to perform marriage ceremonies according to their own tenets, and thus if they wished, to celebrate heterosexual marriages only. The principle of reasonable accommodation could be applied by the state to ensure that civil marriage officers who had sincere religious objections to officiating at same-sex marriages would not themselves be obliged to do so if this resulted in a violation of their conscience.[4] If Parliament wished to refine or replace the remedy with another legal arrangement that met constitutional standards, it could still have the last word.[5]
- ↑ Home Affairs above n 44 at para 74.
- ↑ Id at paras 74–5.
- ↑ Id
- ↑ In Christian Education above n 73 at para 35, this Court held that:
“The underlying problem in any open and democratic society based on human dignity, equality and freedom in which conscientious and religious freedom has to be regarded with appropriate seriousness, is how far such democracy can and must go in allowing members of religious communities to define for themselves which laws they will obey and which not. Such a society can cohere only if all its participants accept that certain basic norms and standards are binding. Accordingly, believers cannot claim an automatic right to be exempted by their beliefs from the laws of the land. At the same time, the State should, wherever reasonably possible, seek to avoid putting believers to extremely painful and intensely burdensome choices of either being true to their faith or else respectful of the law.” (My emphasis.)
- ↑ Home Affairs above n 44 at para 76.
