What such responses fail to recognize (and what even the original First Things article fails to note) is that divorcing religious and civil marriage is not retreat but reform. It is not a new idea, but a return to the way Christian marriage operated for 1,500 years. And it is thoroughly orthodox, if the endorsement of no less a figure than C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity carries any weight.

It wasn't until the 16th (or even 18th) century in Europe that the government had any involvement in deciding who was or wasn't married. In early American history, too, marriage requirements were largely decentralized. Couples typically wed in church and were supposed to register their marriages with the government, but "common law marriages," a sort of automatic marital status based on long-term cohabitation, were widely recognized.

In the years after the Civil War, however, marriage laws in the United States changed dramatically, as marriage licenses were introduced as a racist method of social control. Nearly 40 states used marriage licenses to outlaw unions between whites and non-whites, legally reinforcing the racism of the day. Likewise, some states refused to grant licenses to prisoners, divorced people, addicts, and those deemed mentally ill.

Thus, when the First Things article states that, "In the past, the state recognized marriage, giving it legal forms to reinforce its historic norms," it operates from a post-Civil War view of an institution which has existed for millennia.

And while First Things worries about allowing the government to "redefine marriage," I'd suggest that redefinition already happened -- and it started hundreds of years ago. What was supposed to be a covenant between two people, their families, and God has become a legal formality that can only occur with the state's permission.

By putting marriage in the hands of the government, we've already said that God's perspective isn't the last word. By taking marriage out of the church and into the halls of Congress, we make a sacred covenant into a secular contract. And by legislating marriage in any way, we cede this holy ground to the state.

But theology aside, there is a strong political argument for re-privatizing marriage, which we libertarians have been making for years. If we take the state out of marriage entirely, we allow each side of the gay marriage fight to make their own decisions for their own lives. Neither side is required to recognize relationships they don't support. Neither side is able to tell the other what to believe. Neither side "wins" the culture war -- and neither side loses.

On a practical level, this move would require decoupling marriage from the many legal shortcuts it boasts today, on issues like taxes, parenting, and hospital visitation. These have become issues which, understandably, motivate much of the push for legalizing gay marriage. This is a significant project, certainly, but it should not be an overwhelming objection. Plus, those wishing to include a legal contract in their marriage could still do so; standardized, legally-binding forms would undoubtedly be just a Google search away.