Gay Marriage

What is the privileged status of male-female marriage?

I will say from the beginning that it has no intrinsically privileged status.  During the present gay marriage debate in the United States I've heard the phrase "sanctity of marriage" used by religious factions, without a single definition of what this means, other than the formula: "One man, one woman."  This formula doesn't give us the meaning of the term "sanctity" but it must be related to it.  I think when a Christian speaks about the sanctity of marriage what they must really mean is that in its founding moment (think Adam and Eve), God blessed the union of a man and a woman, i.e. his intention was that this fundamental relationship be comprised of male and female.  Furthermore, from the theology of the Christian scriptures one can derive a notion of marriage whereby the partners in a relationship have analogical significance, i.e. man=Christ, woman=Church etc.  Christian marriage is the sign of some greater spiritual reality.  Insofar as a Christian believes this it is sanctified, though a Christian will maintain that whether or not they believe it it is still sanctified.  This is their belief.

So a marriage that is sanctified is one that is pleasing to God (and therefore blessed by him).  What is pleasing to God?  What scriptures tell us is pleasing to God, what pattern one sees there, what tradition holds to be the case.  One who opposes gay marriage will not say love sanctifies a marriage, because obviously gay couples love one another, or one will qualify love by adding a "male-female" in front of it.  But we now know that gender is to a large extent socially-culturally constructed, and I don't know many Christians who would want to reduce the sanctity of marriage to the interaction of sexual organs (or at least admit to it).  No, marriage for these is about God, a qualified kind of love, and scripture.  I won't waste my time commenting on how a qualified love is a rather sad pretender to the real thing.   When you look into the eyes of your beloved, tell me, is the first thing that comes to mind "thank God you're the proper sexual orientation"? 

This still doesn't answer the question asked at the beginning.  "Sanctity of marriage" turns out to mean little more than "sanctity of my definition of marriage."  This can never be the ground for a universal determination or privileged status.