With legal same-sex marriages now being performed up and down the Golden State today, conservative opponents of such unions are scrambling to re-frame their opposition in a way that doesn’t make them sound like, well, party-pooping nasties.

This fall, an initiative on the California ballot will seek to undo what has already been done, and declare that marriage is reserved for a man and a woman. The task for the right-wing is tough, and Maggie Gallagher takes it on in today’s National Review, trying to make the case that the fight over gay marriage isn’t really about, uh marriage. You see, conservatives know that the more the public sees of elderly women tying the knot, or of two handsome grooms exchanging vows, the greater the reluctance on the part of California voters to “rain on the love parade.” Someone who votes “Yes” on the November initiative will be voting to invalidate same-sex marriages that have already taken place — which is, in effect, the same thing as walking up to Phyllis and Del and saying, “I don’t accept that you can pledge your love to each other in the same way that a man and a woman can.”

A certain percentage of the California public will vote against same-sex marriage no matter what, but that percentage is far from a majority. Perhaps only a third of Californians have strong religious objections to same-sex unions. Another third of Californians are enthusiastic about the idea of gays and lesbians getting married, believing that the sex of a couple has no real bearing on the real issue, which is one of love and commitment. And a middle third is ambivalent. That middle third is, perhaps, caught between a vague discomfort with the idea of “calling it marriage” and a strong desire not to be judgmental. That middle third strongly supports civil unions and domestic partnerships; that middle third, at the same time, clings to some old-fashioned ideas about the privileged position heterosexual love ought to occupy. Whoever wins the hearts and minds of that middle third wins the ballot initiative.

For those of us who support these unions, it is absolutely vital that we personalize this battle. Each and every voter who goes into a booth in November needs to understand that they are taking part in a referendum on the rights of other human beings to pursue happiness. They need to be viscerally aware that a “Yes” vote on this initiative is, in effect, a deliberate and conscious choice to invalidate the joyous marriages that have already taken place. If we can make this case, then I suspect that most of the middle third will say something like “You know, in my gut I still am uncomfortable with same-sex marriages. But these folks seem so happy, and I’m just not willing to stop anyone from a shot at a lifetime of joy together.” That’s the reasoning we want to foster. And I’m willing to bet that when forced to make a decision, 51% of California voters are unwilling to break the hearts and shatter the dreams of so many of their neighbors — and family members.

I don’t think marriage should be entered into lightly or inadvisedly, as the BCP says. But the more same-sex couples wed, the better. It’s easy to oppose gay marriage when it’s an unreal abstraction — it’s harder to undo what has already been done. Most voters don’t want to be the “bad guy”, even when they remain troubled to one degree or another by homosexuality. So the more happy, smiling faces we can put out there, the more examples of gay and lesbian couples embracing domestic bliss and fidelity we can sear into the consciousness of Californians, the more reluctant many of those voters will be to undo what has already been so joyously done.

It’s a battle for hearts and minds, baby, and with civility and grace towards those on the other side, I’m ready to fight it.

We’re gonna win, 51-49. Bank it.

Starting next week, same-sex marriage will be legal here in California. Despite the reluctance of a few registrars in inland, more conservative areas, each of California’s 58 counties will be issuing marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples next week. I know several couples who will be getting married soon, including some who were wed in San Francisco four years ago during the brief period in which same-sex licenses were issued in that city.

And of course, I’m thinking about the fascinating conservative argument that allowing gays and lesbians to marry is somehow bad for marriage as an institution. I’m quite confident that my marriage — to a woman — will be just as strong next week as it is today, and most honest heterosexual married folks would say the same.

I work a lot with young people. I got married to my third wife in May 2001, and we separated just over a year later. The kids in my youth group threw a shower for us before we were married, and they — especially the girls — wanted stories about the proposal, the ceremony, the honeymoon, the dress, and so forth. My third wife and I indulged them. When I announced our separation in October 2002, many of these same kids were devastated. I remember that night in youth group vividly: several teens wept. Two of the girls were furious with me, one choosing not to speak to me for several months. When she finally did want to talk, she told me that my divorce had made her feel hopeless and bereft. She told me she was much more cynical about marriage as a consequence.

What this painful experience taught me is this: heterosexual divorce disillusions a hell of a lot more kids than will homosexual marriage. I’ve seen how my divorce(s) hurt the young people in my life; I’ve never seen any evidence of a young person being “damaged” by their awareness of a same-sex union. Yet no religious conservative tried to stop me from marrying again (and again, and again.) The divorce rate among evangelical Protestants in this country is famously as high as it is for their secular brethren, of course, so most pastors are keenly aware that the condemnation of remarriage after divorce will lose them their congregation lickety-split. Gays and lesbians are a safer target. In this sense, those within the Catholic tradition who refuse remarriage after divorce are on more consistent ground when they oppose gay marriage than those within most branches of American Protestantism, who allow multiple “do-overs”.

Of course, I’m a fan of multiple do-overs. And so too is the God I worship, a God whose grace and whose table are open to all who have stumbled again, and again, and again, and again. That grace is alive and well in this, my fourth and final marriage. If I can be wed four times, despite the chaos inflicted by three earlier divorces, surely my gay and lesbian brothers and sisters deserve a chance to treat the institution of marriage with more care than I until recently evinced.