re: "Civil Union" versus "Religious Marriage"

I'll never understand why people care what marriage is called in a legal context.

The state letting two gays enter into a community property regime and letting them file a joint tax return has no bearing on what any religious group calls marriage, or the sanctity of religious marriages. Even in practice--one does not confer the other. You cannot get religiously married at the courthouse, and you still have to do the marriage certificate/legal paperwork after a religious marriage ceremony in order to be legally married. The concepts are already split.

I think splitting the concepts further as you suggest leads to unintended consequences. It would be much easier if the religious right just got over the semantics of using the word "marriage."