You are right. Like Doug, I've been married twice, both without any religious sanction. My marriages were as real as anybody's. In our epoch, marriage is a state-granted institution. Despite what the kooky half of our population thinks, religion is now less than frosting on the cake -- it's a meaningless ideological envelope for the thing that really counts.
Our semi-confusion on this shows how much we've been put on the defensive by the tidal wave of fundamentalist shit that has followed the collapse of the 1960s movements.
Not all is hopeless, though. I actually think the whole disgusting constitutional amendment thing is a sign of the right's slow defeat in the "culture wars." It's only been very recently that this topic would even be mentionable and controversial, not to mention hotly contested. With an ounce of liberal leadership, I actually think this could be made into another big advance against fundamentalist demogoguery. That's why Kerry's twisted shit is so fucked up. He won't risk his little pinky to help anybody who actually needs help, despite his self-delusions about being a JFK Big Leader. I know this is par for the course now, but I refuse to accept it any longer.