At 9:02 AM -0500 1/6/06, Sandy Wills wrote: >When you got married, did you want every person in the audience to stand up and say "I'm okay with this marriage!"? No, you wanted the entire room silent, so that you could hear any objection. Hi, This is a digression. Hit delete now unless you're willing to digress. Speaking as a liturgical die-hard, let me just note that the affirmative *is* asked in many forms of the marriage ceremony. In the Episcopal church, for example, the question takes this form: (Celebrant) Will all of you witnessing these promises do all in your power to uphold these two persons in their marriage? (People) We will. (see http://vidicon.dandello.net/bocp/bocp4.htm for the full text) This requires that those who are present at the wedding take the affirmative step of saying they will support the marriage, which is considerably more than "I'm okay with this". For many who see marriage in sacramental terms, this single statement is why the sacrament is a public one, rather than a private one. The key sacramental act here is the commitment of the two people to throw their lot in together and be a family; it does not need onlookers (or even a celebrant, as the individuals can exchange vows without one). But the public act is a request for the support of the community for the marriage and is the public participation in the sacrament. I think there is far too much treating of IETF documents like holy writ now, so I not only would not draw a parallel here, I actively discourage any one else from doing so. This, in other words, is pure digression. Don't say I didn't warn you. Ted _______________________________________________ Ietf@xxxxxxxx https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf