Doing it before you say "I Do"

This morning, the Boars Head Tavern had a discussion going on about sex and marriage going. Here is a letter I sent to add fule to the fire:

If sex is a sin outside of marriage, we have to ask ourselves what is marriage. I would argue that sex it’s self it the act of marriage, the act of two people becoming one flesh, cleaving to each other and forsaking all others. Now, just because some people cleave for a drunken 15 min to someone one wild night doesn’t change that fact. I would argue that the perversion of sex in our culture is actually the perversion of marriage.

So, with that ramble in mind, think about this: what if the government took it’s hand out of the marriage pot, and simply granted civil unions (which is what a marriage license actually is in the eyes of uncle Sam) to couples no matter there sexual orientation (except those who like the goats, that’s just weird). Would that mean that mean that sex in those unions was sin or not?

If marriage is a divine pronouncement that these two are now one, and let no man rent apart what God has joined, then the church can’t ever say that we actually pronounce people married or not. We can only recognize a marriage that God has ordained, and in this land pronounce a civil union of said marriage.

So, my point in all this idea throwing is this: when can you say the sex is out side of marriage if God is the one who ordains the marriage in the first place?