July 20, 2025, marks the 20^th anniversary of the legalization of same-sex marriage in Canada. How did we get here? How prevalent is same-sex marriage today? What are the prospects for a return to a traditional definition of marriage? And how might the definition of marriage change in the next twenty years? 

In the Beginning 

In the beginning, God had a design for marriage. Right after creating man and woman, God instituted the first social institution: marriage. God created humanity male and female, then made it clear that it was not good for man to be alone; man needed a helper, and woman was created from man. “Therefore,” Genesis 2:23 records, “a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.”  

Although the fall into sin led to all sorts of sexual temptations and sins (examples of which are littered throughout Scripture), Jesus re-affirms the institution of marriage as being between one man and one woman for life. Just as “what God has joined together, let not man separate” (Matthew 19:6), so also what God has instituted, let not man redefine. 

God knew the fall into sin would lead to humanity trying to redefine God’s created norms. That’s why God explicitly outlaws same-sex activity in the Mosaic law (Leviticus 20:13). Paul describes same-sex activity as a “dishonorable passion” (Romans 1:26-27) and includes homosexuality in two of his lists of sins in his letters (1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:10). Both Jews and Christians have upheld the biblical definition of marriage in custom and in law for millennia.  

Britain’s Lord Penzance, deciding the legal case Hyde v. Hyde and Woodmansee in 1866, clearly articulated the common law definition of marriage: “I conceive that marriage, as understood in Christendom, may for this purpose be defined as the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman, to the exclusion of all others.” That definition of marriage guided the United Kingdom and Canada into the twenty-first century. 

But as western society, and Canada specifically, has cast off the Christian faith and Christian morals, that definition of marriage has been abandoned. 

The Path to Legalization 

In 2000, Rev. Brent Hawkes of the Metropolitan Community Church of Toronto solemnized a religious marriage for two same-sex couples. Those same-sex couples then demanded that the province of Ontario issue them marriage certificates, despite the fact that same-sex marriages were not recognized by any level of government. When the province refused to grant them marriage certificates, the same-sex couples took the province to court, seeking the legalization of same-sex marriage. 

The opening paragraph of the Ontario Court of Appeal’s decision in Halpern v Canada in 2003 set the stage for the central question of the case:  

The definition of marriage in Canada, for all of the nation’s 136 years, has been based on the classic formulation of Lord Penzance in Hyde v. Hyde and Woodmansee (1866): “I conceive that marriage, as understood in Christendom, may for this purpose be defined as the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman, to the exclusion of all others.” The central question in this appeal is whether the exclusion of same-sex couples from this common law definition of marriage breaches ss. 2(a) [the guarantee of freedom of religion] or 15(1) [the guarantee of equality rights] of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (“the Charter”) in a manner that is not justified in a free and democratic society under s. 1 of the Charter. 

In its reasoning, the Court found that only recognizing opposite-sex marriages, but not same-sex marriages, was discriminatory and violated the equality rights of same-sex couples. Rather than striking down Canada’s definition of marriage and leaving it to Parliament to enact a new law or definition (as the courts did on the issues of abortion, prostitution, and euthanasia), the Court unilaterally changed the definition of marriage away from the “the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others” to “the voluntary union for life of two persons to the exclusion of all others.” 

This ruling legalized same-sex marriage solely in the province of Ontario. The federal government, however, chose not to appeal the decision, effectively stating that it accepted the redefinition of marriage. 

With the Ontario Court of Appeal changing the definition of marriage and the federal government showing itself unwilling to defend traditional marriage, similar cases cropped up in most other provinces and territories. Other provincial courts quickly followed Ontario’s lead in legalizing same-sex marriage. British Columbia was next (July 8, 2003), followed by Quebec (March 19, 2004), Yukon (July 14, 2004), Manitoba (September 16, 2004), Nova Scotia (September 24, 2004), Saskatchewan (November 5, 2004), Newfoundland and Labrador (December 21, 2004), and New Brunswick (June 23, 2005). 

By mid-2005, only Alberta, Prince Edward Island, Nunavut, and the Northwest Territories had not legalized same-sex marriage.  

By then, the federal government was willing to step in. After the Supreme Court affirmed in Reference Re Same-Sex Marriage that changing the definition of marriage did indeed fall under the jurisdiction of the federal government and that legalizing same-sex marriage was consistent with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the federal government introduced Bill C-38. That bill redefined marriage as “the lawful union of two persons to the exclusion of all others.” 

With the passage of this bill and its royal assent on July 20, 2005, same-sex marriage became legal across Canada, making Canada the fourth country in the world (after the Netherlands, Belgium, and Spain) to recognize same-sex marriage. Since then, same-sex marriage has become solidly entrenched in Canada in both practice and in public opinion.  

Demographics of Same-Sex Marriage 

The number of same-sex couples has increased dramatically in the past quarter century. According to the Cardus Marriage Map, which uses data gleaned from the 2021 Canadian Census, there were 95,440 same-sex couples across Canada in 2021. Since 2001 (the first year that data on same-sex unions was collected), the number of same-sex couples has increased by an average of 30% per decade, far outstripping the growth in the number of opposite-sex marriages or growth in the general population.  

Even with this increase, this chart also shows that men and women who are attracted to members of the same sex don’t all make use of same-sex marriage. While over 50% of heterosexual men and women are married, only 25.3% of same-sex attracted women and 12.5% of same-sex attracted men end up marrying. Nearly twice as many same-sex couples live common law compared to opposite-sex couples. Over 55% of all gay men and 45% of lesbian women are single, compared to just under 30% for men and women who are attracted to the opposite sex. 

Political and Public Opinion on Same-Sex Marriage 

Political support for same sex marriage changed quickly.  

In 1999, there was a motion in Parliament in support of keeping the definition of marriage as “the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others.” That motion passed by a vote of 216-55. A similar motion was introduced in 2003, with the initial vote ending in a 134-134 tie. In 2005, when the Liberal government introduced its legislation to legalize same-sex marriage, it passed 158-133. After the Conservatives won a minority government in 2006, they introduced a motion to return to a traditional definition of marriage. It was defeated 123-175. No vote on the definition of marriage has been held since.  

Table 1: Number of MPs in favour (yes) and opposed (no) to legalizing same-sex marriage 

The first time Parliament voted on retaining the traditional definition of marriage, there were MPs in every party – Conservative, Liberal, NDP, and Bloc Quebecois – that opposed redefining marriage, though each had a clear majority position on the issue. Over the next few votes, the Conservatives continued to overwhelmingly oppose the recognition of same-sex marriage while the NDP were nearly unanimous in their support of it. However, a greater and greater proportion of Liberal and Bloc Quebecois MPs supported same-sex marriage with every vote. In 1999, only 7% of Liberal MPs voted to redefine marriage. Just four years later, 64% of Liberal MPs voted this way. If a vote were taken now, it’s highly unlikely any Liberal (much less any NDP or Bloc MP) would oppose same-sex marriage. 

Even the Conservative Party has abandoned the defence of traditional marriage. While almost 90% of the Conservative caucus opposed same-sex marriage in the latest vote in 2006, the party removed its pro-traditional marriage stance from its Policy Declaration at its 2016 Convention, by a vote of 1,036-462. At the time, prominent Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner lauded the decision, saying “I think our party got a little more Canadian today. It’s a milestone and it’s not just a milestone for our party, it’s a milestone for all Canadians. Yes, it took us 10 years to get to this point, but I think this is something that is a beacon for people around the world who are looking at equality rights. Canada is a place where we celebrate equality.” 

The change in public opinion has been similarly stark. In the decade leading up to 2005, public opinion on same-sex marriage was evenly split. After legalization, support for same-sex marriage surged, standing at about 80% in 2023. Canada now widely celebrates same-sex relationships through publicly funded “Pride” events, changes to school curricula, and many other ways.  

The abrupt change demonstrates how powerful the law can be in shaping public opinion. While in many ways politics is downstream from culture, this is a clear example of culture being downstream from politics. In a democracy, only politicians who generally follow the cultural weathervane get elected. But at the same time, our politicians – and, even more importantly, the law – are guideposts for public morality. The fact that something is illegal creates a negative stigma or public opinion around it for many people, regardless of how well that opinion fits into their worldview. Legalize something and remove the stigma and public opinion changes, often drastically.  

Public opinion changed drastically on same-sex marriage after its legal recognition, but the same dynamic has also occurred with abortion and euthanasia. In a society that is rapidly abandoning the Christian religion and the moral precepts attached to it, people are looking elsewhere for a moral compass. In many cases, they latch on to the law for moral direction. 

Further decline  

The societal recognition of marriage as “the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others” has crumbled. Canada undermined the “for life” component of this definition when it legalized no-fault divorce in 1986. The recognition that marriage is between “one man and one woman” was removed through the legal redefinition of marriage in 2005. These changes were possible because marriage has been untethered from its moral foundation in Christianity.  

Once untethered, there is no reason – aside from the fact that public opinion isn’t quite there yet – why the definition of marriage cannot drift further away. Without its foundation in God’s institution of marriage, why leave “to the exclusion of all others” in the definition of marriage? Why not legalize polyamory as well and simply define marriage as the “union of [any number of] persons?” There is little public opinion polling around polygamy, but a 2018 poll found that 36% of Canadians favour decriminalizing polygamy (i.e. not making it a crime to have multiple spouses) and 25% favour legalizing polygamy (i.e. Having the government legally recognize polygamous marriages).  

The judicial precedents for legalizing polygamy are already starting. In 2016, Ontario’s All Families Are Equal Act allowed up to four people to be the legal parents of a child. A Quebec court just struck down the limit that a child can have only two parents. If more than two people can be the parents of a child, why couldn’t more than two people be married to each other? 

Twenty years removed from the legalization of same-sex marriage in Canada, it seems far more likely that the erosion of God’s creational pattern for marriage will continue than that a traditional definition of marriage will be restored in Canadian law. Reformed Christians should be on guard for what might happen in the next twenty years.  

Conclusion 

The decline of traditional marriage in our culture testifies to how our society has moved further and further from God and his law. Thankfully, the architect of marriage is God, not man. While our society may twist and pervert love and marriage, God still calls many of His children to a marriage that reflects the relationship between Christ and His Church. Marriage is an opportunity for Christians to model faithfulness, loyalty, sacrificial love, and care for another. The fact that this model of marriage has become countercultural should make it shine all the brighter. Christian marriages can stand out as beacons of light that cause people around us to ask questions, giving us opportunity to talk about our faithful, sacrificial Saviour who has such great love for His Church that nothing – neither good times nor bad, riches nor poverty, sickness nor health – can separate us.

ARPA Canada has filed its arguments to the Ontario Court of Appeal

June is Pride month across Canada and the Western world. It seems that everywhere you look, people are celebrating the right of people to identify themselves as whatever gender they want and marry a member of whichever sex they want. You simply need to walk down the street to see homeowners flying rainbow flags on their front porches, corporations changing their logos to celebrate Pride, or a city installing rainbow sidewalks around town.

So how can orthodox Christians respond to this pervasive celebration of Pride, and everything it stands for?

It’s relatively easy to respond within our Christian churches, homes, and schools, where we affirm the truth of Scripture (although even here Christians increasingly differ). We can reference Proverbs 16:18 and explain how pride is not something to celebrate, but an attitude of the heart that goes before a fall. It’s easy to quote Romans 1 and explain how same-sex activity violates God’s norm for creation. It’s standard to read through the creation account in Genesis 1 and see how God created humanity as male and female.

But how can we push back against the celebration of LGBTQ2S+ identities in a culture that no longer recognizes God’s Word as authoritative and may even call the biblical prescriptions bigoted and harmful?

Arguing Against the Celebration of Pride

One strategy is to push back against the celebration of Pride. This approach suggests that governments and major corporations should strive for neutrality in our diverse country. For instance, we could argue that, if a local government isn’t willing to fly a Christian flag or install a pro-life sidewalk, then they shouldn’t choose to fly a rainbow flag. We can argue that supporting some political causes and not others is a form of discrimination that governments, in particular, ought not to participate in. One municipal government in British Columbia recently followed this line of logic of their own accord when presented with a request to fly a rainbow flag during Pride month.

This can be an effective argument because its fundamental premise – that all people and groups should be treated equally – is largely shared throughout Canadian culture. Treating people and groups equally and trying to be neutral in a diverse and multicultural country is an easier course of action than trying to decide which causes to support and explaining the rationale for why one is better than another.

The problem with this approach is that it fundamentally agrees with the core value of Pride month itself: that all people should be treated equally even when it comes to allowing or celebrating immoral things such as same-sex marriage or gender-transition surgeries. It doesn’t break with liberalism’s god of freedom and choice, but simply uses their own argument against them.

Arguing Against the Celebration of Pride

A much more challenging, but a more biblical, response to the celebration of Pride is to focus on the Pride itself rather than the celebration of it. We shouldn’t simply try to prevent the celebration of a worldview but push back against the worldview itself. Doing this with speech that is always “gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person” (Colossians 4:6) is a difficult task in a post-Christian society, but here are some suggestions:

• The feminist argument: The LGBTQ2+ movement seeks to discard the characteristics and identities that make women unique and different from men. Men and women are equal in the sense that they both, as human beings, should have the same rights and freedoms, but men and women are not interchangeable. There are biological, psychological, and ontological differences between men and women that we must preserve, rather than blurring the line between men and women. For instance, boys can like the colour pink and girls the colour blue without suggesting to each child that they must be transgender. We can see these concerns bubble up when biological men who self-identify as women compete in women’s sports or when a Supreme Court nominee can’t define what a woman is.
• The teleological (purpose) argument: Human reproductive systems and sexual activity have a natural purpose to it, namely procreation. The purpose of sex, either from a religious or an evolutionary perspective, is ultimately propagation. Of course, human reproduction can only arise naturally in a relationship between a male and a female; the male and female reproductive systems are meant to complement each other for the purpose of procreation. To put it even more provocatively, each human being only has half of a complete reproductive system; the “other half” of the reproductive system lies in another person of the opposite sex. Same-sex relationships are entirely incapable of natural reproduction because two male or two female reproductive systems are not designed to work together. Same-sex sexual activity by its very nature rejects this teleological purpose of sex and for human bodies.
• The child welfare argument: Children have a natural right to be raised by their biological mother and father. Both parents – the mother and the father – are distinct and irreplaceable to their children. Couples with same-sex relationships and transgender identities deprive their children of the leadership, nurturing, and care that a fully male father and fully female mother provide.
• The biblical argument: God created humanity in the binary categories of man and woman, male and female, and intended sexual activity to be exclusively within the bonds of a heterosexual marriage (e.g. Genesis 1:27, Romans 1). He created each human being to be unique, but he did not create each person’s gender or sexual orientation to be unique. Holding people to rigid gender stereotypes can lead to gender dysphoria. Any sexual activity or even desire for someone apart from your opposite-sex spouse and any self-professed gender identity violates God’s standards for creation and is morally wrong. For further resources on the biblical argument, see The New Reformation Catechism on Human Sexuality.

Countering LGBTQ2S+ Defenses of Pride

Chances are, if you raise any of these arguments with members or allies of the LGBTQ2S+ community, they will respond by saying that your position undermines their equality, rights, and/or freedom. Here are some suggestions of how to respond to these accusations:

• Equality, rights, and freedoms have limits. Complete marriage equality would naturally require the allowance of polyamory, incestuous marriages, and potential child marriage, yet Canadian society opposes all three on the grounds that someone cannot marry absolutely anyone they want. Constitutionally, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms states that all rights and freedoms are subject to “such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”
• No one has the legal right or freedom to require someone else to affirm their chosen identity. For instance, there are no “identity rights” in the Charter that require the state, much less a private citizen or institution, to recognize a given identity. The Charter gives people limited rights to “do” things; it does not give them any right to “be recognized as” something.

Finally, when voicing opposition to LGBTQ2S+ expression or identities, it is quite likely that Christians will be accused of being homophobic or transphobic. These accusations are easier to respond to (even if the commenter doesn’t agree with them):

• As Christians, we should never hate people because each person’s identity is fundamentally an image-bearer of God. We hate activities and even identities that God declared sinful, just as many other people hate activities or identities that they consider wrong. Environmentalists hate coal mining (but hopefully not coal miners) and try to eliminate the practice. Policemen hate drunk driving (but hopefully not the drunk drivers) and try to reduce the incidence of drunk driving. Liberals may hate conservative policies (but hopefully not conservatives) and strive to advance Liberal policies. In the same way, Christians ought to hate gender dysphoria and how it hurts the person experiencing it (but not hate the person experiencing it) and strive to resolve it according to God’s good prescription for humanity.
• Disapproval does not equal hatred. Christian love requires communicating disapproval for what is wrong because love does not “rejoice at wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth” (1 Corinthians 13:6). We can explain how this has an eternal dimension to it, how we don’t simply call out sinful behaviour because it is wrong at the moment but because each person will eventually have to give an account for their actions to a perfectly just Judge. Letting people merrily walk the road to eternal punishment is the most unloving thing a Christian can do.

Conclusion

ARPA’s mission is to “educate, equip, and encourage Reformed Christians to political action and to bring a biblical perspective to our civil authorities.” This requires us not to hide the light of truth under a basket on challenging topics such as gender identity or sexual orientation but to prepare each person to speak to these topics in a biblical and loving way. We hope that suggestions like these help you in this calling.

PARIS, June 14, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – French legislators rejected a bill to legalize “homosexual marriage” today in a decisive vote by the National Assembly, the nation’s lower legislative house. Assembly representatives voted against the bill, proposed by socialists, by a majority of 293 to 222.  The vote follows a ruling in January by the nation’s highest court, the Constitutional Council, stating that homosexual “marriage” is not a constitutional right.

Although a recent and much-cited poll found that a majority of French voters, 58 percent, favor the creation of homosexual “marriage,” Michel Difenbacher of the majority Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) party said he thought it not necessary “to go with the wind nor to cede to fashion” with regard to the issue. Keep reading

For Immediate Release – January 18, 2011: Ottawa, ON – David Anderson, MP (Cypress Hills-Grasslands) today opposed the Saskatchewan Government’s announcement that it will accept the Court of Appeal’s ruling requiring marriage commissioners to perform civil marriage ceremonies for all couples, including same-sex couples.

“The court’s conclusion that forcing Commissioners to perform marriages was appropriate because it did not threaten their private religious beliefs or their right to worship, guarantees that religious/faith rights will be treated as a second tier human right in the future. This decision will ensure the ongoing denigration of a right that has played a major role in creating the country we have today,” Anderson said.

(more…)

In light of the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal’s ruling that laws which would allow provincial officials to refuse to perform marriages against their religious beliefs would be unconstitutional, Member of Parliament Maurice Vellacott (from Saskatoon) wrote the following letter to the provinces Minister of Justice, urging him to consider Ontario’s example. What follows is the letter:

(more…)

ARPA Note: Read EFC’s quality commentary on this decision here, which notes that the court “stated that government practices and policies could be put in place that would ensure that both the constitutional rights of marriage commissioners and the legal rights of couples to access marriage services would be respected.”

Toronto Sun, Jan 10, 2011: A Saskatchewan court has determined that, regardless of personal religious beliefs, civil commissioners in the province must marry gay couples when asked to do so. Following proposed legislation that would allow provincial officials the right to refuse to perform marriages that conflict with their religious beliefs, the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal was asked to rule on whether the very idea of such amendments would be constitutional. Read more

Globe & Mail, June 25, 2010: The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that countries are not obliged to allow gay marriage, rejecting a bid by an Austrian couple to force the state to let them wed. The court said the rights of Horst Michael Schalk and Johann Franz Kopf had not been violated by their inability to get married. [Keep reading here.]

Update: Former social-conservative MP Jason Kenney now claims that the removal of “gay rights” from the guide was a mistake and should be fixed. Consider sending a note of support to Mr. Kenney – [email protected] (CC Stephen Harper [email protected]).

Immigration Minister pulled gay rights from citizenship guide, documents show, Globe and Mail, March 2, 2010: Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney blocked any reference to gay rights in a new study guide for immigrants applying for Canadian citizenship, The Canadian Press has learned. [Keep reading this article here.]

February 1, 2010, OTTAWA – The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada (EFC) has received intervenor status in the Saskatchewan marriage commissioner reference. In July, the Justice Minister of Saskatchewan asked the Court of Appeal for an opinion on potential legislation which would permit marriage commissioners to decline performing same-sex marriages if contrary to their religious beliefs. (more…)