Marriage has been defiled, not only in Maine but all over the United States. The culprit? Yes, same-sex marriage is a major culprit, but it isn’t the only one. National divorce rates and 30-minute marriages in  Las Vegas are just as bad.

A marriage is a religious ceremony and should be kept that way.

Same-sex marriage laws should be repealed. Same-sex marriages have already hurt freedom of religion. Why is it right that if I host weddings for a living, I have to host same-sex ones? That is like shoving the concept in Christians’ faces that they have to do something that goes against what they believe in.

Civil union laws should be promoted. Let’s take a look at France’s structure on civil unions. According to an article in the N.Y. Times, for every three marriages, there are two civil unions (95 percent of those are opposite-sex couples). Not only do the French ban same-sex marriages, they also encourage not entering into a marriage lightly. The U.S. could really learn a thing or two from them.

Keep marriage traditional, and don’t enter into one lightly. Marriages were meant to be life-long partnerships between a man and a woman in holy matrimony. This is “One nation under God,” after all.

Let’s put a little God back into our lives, our country and our marriages.

Justin Campbell, Lisbon