What indeed. This may be yet another reason to decouple marriage from being both a civil ceremony and a religious one. Perhaps both will end up being judged as “legitimate, but not the same”. Allowing both sides to move on without constant tort and litigation. Perhaps the only thing both will demand is a ‘marriage license’ so that it becomes a publicly known fact, known by Health Insurers and the IRS, in particular.
i think you are on to something profound. If the “legal agreement’ of civil “marriage” is separated completely from all religion then we may have a solution. The legal agreement is one thing. Sanctified “marriage” is another. we should all have the same legal rights but churches have the ability to sanctify or not.