Christians renege on promise

Christian couple, Nick and Sarah Jensen stated that if same sex marriage was legalised in Australia, they would divorce. This is not quite what most normal people mean by divorce. Their plan was to have a civil divorce, but continue living together¹. Well, same sex marriage is now legal in Australia, after it passed both houses of Parliament, and received royal assent soon after. So what are the Jensens going to do? They have chickened out².

Rob Stott, for Junkee, interviewed Nick Jensen who said in a text message “My previous public comments regarding civil divorce never envisaged me separating from my wife, but rather our marriage from the state.” He followed this with: “The legislation currently makes it untenable for us to do this under the law”². That legislation hasn’t changed since the original statement was made, and so the original statement was made in ignorance or was disingenuous. Marriage is a civil contract, and whether it occurs in a church or a back yard and is presided over by a priest or a civil celebrant is immaterial. If Jensen didn’t know that then he is profoundly, even monumentally, ignorant. Could anyone be that ignorant? I doubt it. Could it have been an attempt to try to sway the vote in what was then going to be a plebiscite? Possibly, but that would require the Jensens to believe that what they say is important, and that people would listen to them. Given the vanity of the religious, this is a possibility. Whichever it was, there was no chance that they were ever going to divorce.

This will be a disappointment to the 140,000+ people who expressed interest in a Facebook event called ‘Celebrating Nick and Sarah Jensen’s divorce’³.

Sources

1. http://www.blotreport.com/australian-politics/those-diminishing-a-marriage-are-those-in-it/
2. http://junkee.com/marriage-equality-couple-divorce/138460
3. http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2017/11/14/australian-couple-who-vowed-to-divorce-if-same-sex-marriage-is-legalised-unsure-of-future/