The Times Record

Except in retrospect, it’s hard to say when an idea goes from outside the mainstream to something most people can get comfortable with.

Back in the 1980s, I first came across the notion that same-sex marriage was a radical idea for straight people, but a conservative idea for gay people. It seemed true at the time.

Ronald Reagan was president, AIDS was unmentionable and many gay men, in particular, were trying out public identities for the first time. The idea that they would want to settle down in quiet domesticity, raise children and plan for retirement seemed odd indeed.

It no longer seems odd. It turns out that there were many gay and lesbian couples all along, but we pretended not to notice. It is the presence of gray-haired couples in the “No on 1” ads that is perhaps the most touching aspect of the current campaign, which has been blessedly free of the veiled hatred and menace that used to attend debates about “gay rights” — by which we really mean civil rights, and human rights.

It took 25 years for Maine to enact, and then defend at referendum, the original “gay rights” bill against discrimination in the public sector. By the time we finally created those protections, most states in New England had had such laws for 15 years, and the idea was no longer radical.

The passage toward equal marriage rights came faster. When the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled in 2004, by a 4-3 margin, that prohibiting same-sex couples from marrying was unconstitutional, it created a broad but shallow backlash. Most states, and Congress, responded with “defense of marriage” acts that will, in retrospect, seem faintly absurd. Why do we think we have to “save” marriage from upstanding adults who want to get married?

As in many past episodes — equal rights for women, blacks, Irish-Americans, French-Canadians, Japanese-Americans and others almost too numerous to mention — we were asking the wrong questions, and citing the wrong texts or, as with the Bible, the wrong parts.

Over the last five years, we have come to realize that gay marriage is indeed a conservative idea. It conserves the best parts of what we have learned about families, about raising children, about taking care of aging parents and preparing the way for our own passage through later life.

Marriage has been under challenge over the past half century, but the challenge does not come from people wanting to get married, but from the many pressures that drive couples apart. Some are said to come from other developments that, in themselves, are welcome — such as the more nearly equal place of women, their ability to choose their education and careers for themselves, and the necessity for men to adapt to these changes.

It’s too soon to say that we have successfully created a new model of marriage and family life, but we’re working on it. Welcoming our gay and lesbian friends and neighbors into the institution can only strengthen it and underline what such commitments mean to our larger communities.

The campaign goes on, but it has already changed. There is none of the weirdness of Michael Heath, who was not only denied leadership of the people’s veto campaign this year, but removed from his long-time post at the Maine Christian Civic League. Pastor Bob Emrich, who led the signature drive to get the veto question on the ballot, seems lower-key and sincere, though he keeps trying to change the subject from marriage itself to what kids might, theoretically, learn about it in school.

Such “change the subject” campaigning usually indicates the main idea isn’t working. Memo to Pastor Bob: The kids can handle it, too, probably more easily than their elders.

It’s even harder to watch the veto campaign chairman, Mark Mutty, who has done yeoman service over the years in defending the rights of society’s least fortunate people — the poor, the imprisoned, the sick. He’s said that he’s chairing the veto campaign because his boss, Bishop Richard Malone, told him to.

Fair enough. The official Catholic position won’t change any time soon, even though large numbers of Catholics disagree, just as they do with official church positions on divorce, contraception and abortion. Churches will retain marriage as a sacrament; they just can’t monopolize the civil institution for those of different faiths and persuasions.

The outcome of the vote on Nov. 3 is still uncertain, but the tide of history has turned. And if the people united say “No on 1” then one of the landmarks will have occurred in Maine — a proud moment in a difficult time.

Douglas Rooks can be reached at drooks@tds.net