What Colson does not say is that passing a marriage amendment is futile. At most it will slow the Court down, but eventually -- for all the same reasons Colson details -- the Court will simply nullify the amendment even if duly passed. Don't get me wrong, I think that it is important to pass the amendment, and to do so quickly, before the Court takes pre-emptive action. However the recent Court has shown an increasing willingness to ignore the express will of the American people, and to look for precedent in other countries, not just any countries, nor the average of all of them, but rather to those particular countries whose novel laws support their personal agenda. The Constitution no longer means anything at all.
When -- not if, but when -- that happens to marriage, I think the churches in America should rise up and refuse to participate in anything to do with this newly redefined label. We should boycott the whole idea of government-sanctioned marriage. We can still have weddings in the church, but as a religious ceremony only, where the pastors simply refuse to sign any state marriage certificate. It would be meaningless anyway. If people want tax benefits (what benefits? there is a marriage penalty tax) or hospital access or inheritance rights, they can sign up for "domestic partnerships." Leave "marriage" to the homosexuals -- they don't want it anyway, as can be seen in Norway, where this has already happened.
We would need a new name for our religious union -- how about "religious union" -- to distinguish it from the Court-enforced counterfeit, but eventually the whole counterfeit idea will disappear, and we can go back to doing marriage God's way.
In the mean time, support the Federal Marriage Amendment. It probably
won't stop the Court, but there's a chance it could.