Czuch:

>  there are people born hard wired to be sexually attracted to children,
can anyone explain to me
>  how that is really any different than being
hard wired to be sexually attracted to someone of the same sex?

Isn't age of consent a factor?  Adult homosexuals are old enough to make a decision about what they want in their lives.  Children do not have the knowledge or experience to make that decision.

I think that ultimately it comes to whether people are free to do what they want or not.  If a homosexual couple wants to marry, it is their choice as free individuals.

Homophobic people are insecure.  They think that if homosexuals marry, it somehow diminishes heterosexual marriage.  "There is no way my heterosexual marriage is in the same league as the marriage among homosexuals."  It is all fear and insecurity.  Homophobic people hide that fear behind the veil of morality.  It can be Christian morality, or morality imposed by the state.  It is much easier to say that "marriage should be as defined in the Bible" rather than "I fear homosexuals and I fear that we are becoming like them."  Those that protest the hardest against homosexuality are often those that fear it the most, and in some cases they are homosexuals who hide their true nature out of fear and shame.

>  I am not sure why the government is in the marriage business in the first place?

It has to do with money and property mostly.  For example, in the US there are 1138 statutes in the law concerning marriage rights and responsibilities and the vast majority of them have to do with property, division of assets, survivor benefits, etc.  Governments around the world have passed marriage legislation to clarify how all that money and property should be distributed, divided, managed or inherited.  This is true also of legal codes outside of modern governments.  Much of the Bible's and the Koran's law on marriage is related to property.