01:00 AM EST on Saturday, February 14, 2004

IT'S VALENTINE'S DAY, the time each year when we celebrate hearts and flowers and love and marriage.

There was a time in our society when love and marriage did not necessarily go together. For a long time, marriage primarily served political or economic purposes, such as forging alliances between two nations (hence, marriages often made between 12-year-olds!).

But our concept of marriage has evolved and now, at least in the Western world, marriage means a voluntary union between two adults who promise before all the world to live in a relationship of exclusivity, acceptance, mutual support and commitment -- in other words, a relationship based upon love.

This Valentine's Day, we are in a conversation about whether to deny the right of marriage to same-sex couples. (Not long ago in America we had a similar conversation about denying marriage to couples from different races -- remember?) There is talk about setting up a parallel structure of some sort, such as civil unions ordomestic partnerships. There is also talk about how marriage is essentially for procreation (at least wehave come a long way from marrying for political alliances). And, finally, God's name and word have entered into the discussions.

The truth is (and I can say this because I am a minister and a lawyer), marriage is a unique legal relationship that simply cannot be duplicated by civil unions, domestic partnerships or any other contracts or agreements. And limiting marriage to those who can procreate would eliminate a lot of infertile couples, as well as those wonderful 80-year-olds who fall madly in love in the nursing-home parlor.

As for God: God knows that God does not belong in the conversation -- after all, we still have separation of church and state in our nation.

What we are talking about here is civil marriage. We clergy will always have the right to perform only those marriages that conform to our religious beliefs and practices.

The right to marry the person we love is a fundamental human right -- perhaps the most fundamental human right. Same-sex couples in love are members of our families and our communities. They are our neighbors, our co-workers, our friends. They deserve a full acceptance and respect for their loving, committed relationship. They represent a minority, not an abnormality. Homosexuality occurs among us about 10 percent of the time -- the same percentage that left-handednessoccurs. Should we ban a left-handed couple from marriage?

This Valentine's Day, let us remember that marriage is first and foremost about love -- not sex. Let us also urge our Massachusetts neighbors not to use their power to amend the state constitution to abridge a fundamental human right. (Last time I looked, constitutions were made for protecting civil rights, not curtailing them.)

And let us do what we can here in Rhode Island to preserve and protect the right of our same-sex citizens to marry.

This Valentine's Day, may all our hearts be filled with acceptance, understanding -- and lots and lots of love!

The Rev. Catherine Cullen lives in Duxbury, Mass., and serves in Rhode Island as the interim minister of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of South County, in Wakefield.