To me, one of St. Paul's most valuable pieces of advice is that people remain single if they have good control over their sexual urges. The issue here is not celibacy -- it's personal happiness for the individual, and it's especially true for women given St. Paul's recommendation that women submit to their husbands.

There are many Christian folks who apparently haven't developed a proper cognization skill and read that as "all women should submit to all men" WHICH IS CERTAINLY NOT TRUE - women should not be deceived on that matter.

Back to the issue of personal happiness - Many marriages become a tug of war for seeing who gets what they want and some very selfish people don't feel they've made a gain until the other partner loses everything. It's very common and apparently St. Paul recognized that. He isn't the poster child for celibacy so much as trying to warn folks that their lives would most likely be more blissful if they remained single.

The celibacy issue only factors in because the church does not approve of sex outside marriage. So, St. Paul certainly does not push celibacy as his special topic, in fact he frequently states to by all means get married and have sex as much as you want if that's all you've got on your mind. He certainly does not recommend marriage if you'd like to be happy though.

Matter of fact, Jesus himself wasn't exactly pushing the marriage topic either, reminding the Pharisees and Saducees that there is no marriage in heaven and praying that God's kingdom come to earth as in heaven as well.

People that say St. Paul pushes the idea of celibacy really are missing something important. The divorce rate is about 50% most likely because people do realize they would rather be happy than married.

Essentially, St. Paul's work is about showing the ways to happiness, i.e. getting married and having sex or staying single and not being constrained by a marriage partner. St. Paul's work is not about forcing people to be celibate or about women submitting to anyone other than their husbands.

As for gay people who want to get "married" in the church, maybe a couple could decide between themselves which partner becomes the "woman" who is supposed to "submit herself" to her husband - but I don't see gay people being particularly interested in that aspect of it. Legalized civil unions and nice ceremonies should be fine for most of them, although those who are more serious about doing everything according to God's word may wish to pursue "church weddings" further, perhaps explaining to their priests and pastors exactly which partner is playing the "submissive wife" role.

Of course, St. Paul's recommendation would be to all of them, "You'd probably be happier single."