Tag Archives: marriage equality

Late fall

I drove up to Boston today to take part in the demonstration in support of same-sex marriage. The state legislature was meeting in joint session today to consider whether to put same-sex marriage to a state-wide ballot test. Personally, I don’t want same-sex marriage on the ballot. It would be one thing if the ballot question could be fairly and honestly decided, but that wouldn’t happen. Opponents of same-sex marriage from out of the state would swoop in like vultures to try to subvert our state’s decision-making process, spending huge amounts of money. Money is not democracy. When you’re trying to decide whether or not to remove a fundamental right enshrined in your state’s constitution (in this case, the right to marriage for all persons), you don’t want to say that whoever has the most money gets to decide.

So I drove up to participate in the demonstration. I knew there would be no parking in Boston. I knew that the parking lots at the Riverside and Alewife subway stations would be full. So I decided to try a few secret parking places we have discovered in Cambridge, where you can park within a ten-minute’s walk of a subway station for several hours for free. I drove around for forty-five minutes, but our secret parking places were all full today. And by that time, it was just too late — I had to be back in New Bedford in the afternoon — so I gave up.

On the way back home, I stopped in for a quick walk in the Blue Hills Reservation. The footing was bad:– everything was still wet from last night’s rain, and the wet leaves on the rocks made for slippery walking. I had to keep my eyes on the trail pretty much the whole time: the golden-brown of white oak leaves, the rusty red oak leaves, the golden beech leaves, the wet stones all blue-gray with bright green lichen. The sun came out while I was walking, and the warmth made me remove my coat and tie it around my waist. I walked up one of the lesser hills, stopped for a minute, and I could see Mount Wachusett to the west, Mount Mondanock to the northwest, and Boston Harbor to the north east, with dark clouds moving far away to the east. By the time I got back to the car, I had forgotten everything:– my frustration with politics, problems at work, worries about a family member;– all fallen away, leaving nothing behind but the bare bones of life: earth, sky, mountains, downed leaves, putting one foot in front of the other.

This just in…

This just in from the folks at Mass Equality:

This morning, Massachusetts Superior Court Judge Thomas Connolly ruled that same-sex couples from Rhode Island can marry in Massachusetts.

Earlier this year, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that a 1913 law used to stop same-sex couples from outside Massachusetts marrying here could be applied only if a couple’s home state expressly forbids same-sex marriage. While most states do expressly forbid same-sex couples from marrying, Judge Connolly ruled today that nothing in Rhode Island law “explicitly deems void or otherwise expressly forbids same-sex marriage.” With this ruling, Rhode Island couples can now marry in Massachusetts….

Which is very good news indeed.

For more info, visist GLAD’s news room. GLAD also has a summary of how to get married in Massachusetts here. My church, First Unitarian in New Bedford, supports equal marriage and same sex marriage ceremonies as a part of our religious witness to the world.

Those Brits

BBC News is, of course, covering the legalization of same sex unions in the U.K. today. Headlines on the front page of their Web site? — “Stars pack Elton ‘wedding’ party.” followed by “First in queue, Roger and Keith tie the knot after 14 years of waiting.” Clearly, BBC is playing up the human interest factor, especially the celeb factor.

Does BBC include any video coverage of same sex unions on their Web site? Why, yes they do: “Paparazzi make most of celebrity traffic jam at Sir Elton’s party ” (go to their main page and look at the lower right for “Video and Audio”; video clips usually stay up for less than 24 hours). The story begins this way:

“An extraordinary sight,” says BBC’s in-studio news reader, as we see video footage of expensive cars surrounded by photographers and videographers. “A whole load of celebrities, stuck in a traffic jam, to get into Elton John’s party…. and smiling for the cameras, for you haven’t really got much choice, have you?” Michael Caine, Liz Hurley, Ringo Starr, and more are all captured on BBC’s cameras, sitting in their Bentleys and Rolls Royces. Unfortunately, Duncan Kennedy, the BBC reporter on the scene, has no idea who he’s looking at….

“Yes, it’s Donatello Versace,” begins Mr. Kennedy as he mistakenly identifies one celeb, then corrects himself: “I’m told it’s someone else. Yes, it’s someone else. It’s a blonde lady. We’ve got that one wrong. [pause] I’ve just been told, it’s Claudia Schiffer in fact.”

The BBC news reader in the studio finds this mistake quite amusing, and says, “Duncan, we’ve all decided here that you really need to read the tabloids a little more.” Mr. Kennedy just smiles politely into the camera, clutching his earpiece. “All right, Duncan, that’s right, just pretend you can’t hear me.”

So you see, it’s all about the celebrities. (Advocates for same sex marriage in the United States might wish to take note of this.)

Candlelight vigil

First Unitarian hosted a candlelight vigil this evening, sponsored by the Religious Coalition for the Freedom to Marry (RCFM). The Traviglini/Lees amendment is being voted on tomorrow by the state legislature, and there were eight such candlelight vigils around the state to show that there are lots of religious people in Massachusetts who support equal marriage rights. Over a thousand people showed up at the Boston vigil.

We got a late start planning our vigil here in New Bedford. We had managed to get the word out to a few sympathetic local religious groups, and I was hoping for at least fifty people. But yesterday (Monday), there were reports in the media that the amendment was not going to pass — after those reports I fielded one phone call from someone who wanted to know whether or not they should even show up, and I’m sure there were people who just decided to not come.

At 5:45 p.m., fifteen minutes before the vigil was supposed to begin, I went out to unlock the front gates, and I saw city workers blocking off Union Street and County Street in front of the church property. Now, RCFM had pulled a permit for us to use the sidewalk, but we had not expected to have the streets blocked off — in fact the whole point for having the vigil on the sidewalk was to make sure people saw us. I didn’t pull the permit, so maybe there was confusion and we got a permit for a street demonstration or something — or maybe it’s just a standard public safety measure — or maybe someone thought we were too controversial and wanted to protect us. Who knows. But traffic sure got backed up, and if you got stuck in traffic because of our little candlelight vigil, you have my sincere apologies — it wasn’t supposed to be that way!

With traffic getting backed up, nearly everyone was late to the vigil, including the field coordinator for RCFM. But we got going at 6:15.

Rev. Ann Fox, minister of the Fairhaven Unitarian Universalist church, gave the opening words. Mark Montigny, our state senator, spoke about his support for equal marriage rights. He said he sees no reason to mess with our “beautiful state constitution,” which has upheld human rights for centuries. Tony Cabral, another one of our legislators, showed up unexpectedly, and he told us that the fight to preserve equal marriage rights has just begun, for even though it’s likely the Traviglini/Lees amendment will go down tomorrow, the next step will be a voter referendum that will be heavily financed by rich interest groups from outside Massachusetts. John Bullard, former mayor of New Bedford, spoke next, telling us that equal marriage rights is one of the inalienable rights, a part of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Of the nine mayoral candidates here in New Bedford, only Matt Morrisey showed up to voice his support for equal marriage rights, saying that he felt all New Bedford citizens deserved the right to marriage. Amy Mello, field coordinator for RCFM, finally made it by about 6:30, and she filled us in about what RCFM is doing (and to find out more about RCFM, visit www.rcfm.org).

By the time everyone who wanted to got to talk, it was 6:40, and dark enough to light the candles and stand out on the corner of Union and County Streets. I should say, the blocked-off and eerily quiet corner of Union and County Streets. We had about 35 people by that time, far fewer than I had expected, but a nice group — Catholics, Congregationalists, Episcopalians, Jews, Pagans, Unitarian Universalists, and maybe some others that I missed — ages from 13 to 70’s — women and men, gay and straight.

Right at seven o’clock, we put out our candles (we wanted to be good citizens, and end right on time so the city could open up the roads again). Rev. Karen McArthur, the pastor at Pilgrim Congregational Church, offered the closing words, pointing out that while some states still had laws prohibiting interracial marriages up into the 1960’s, Massachusetts ended those laws in the 1840’s. Massachusetts, said Karen, has often been at the forefront of equal rights issues.

It wasn’t the most organized candlelight vigil I’ve ever been to (you could say that it was an improvisational event rather than strictly choreographed). But I felt it was well worth my while. We may not have made much of a public statement, but the fact that people from so many different faith traditions got together to support equal marriage rights made it worth my while. And it was good to have politicians, an ex-politician, and an aspiring politician with us. Seems like there is hope for equal marriage rights in this state.

By the way, no one from the press showed up (and yes, RCFM did send out press releases). So this blog entry may be the only report you will read of this event.

Organizing

Just got a call from the Religious Coalition for Freedom to Marry, to discuss the candlelight vigil that will happen out in front of First Unitarian on Tuesday (Sept. 13, 6-7 p.m.). Looks like Mark Montigny, the state senator for this area, will be speaking, but that’s not quite definite yet. It’ll be nice if he’s there, but it doesn’t matter as much as getting people to come down, light a candle, and stand in public witness for marriage equality.

And I’ve been spending so much time thinking about Hurricane Katrina that I’ve let other issues slip from my mind. I should be thinking about Hurricane Katrina — but can’t lose sight of the ongoing issues — marriage equality, peace abroad and in our streets, economic justice, everything we keep working for and hoping for.

And in amongst all the organizing, you have to reserve some time for personal renewal — which I’ve been neglecting recently — time to go for a nice, long walk.

Happy same-sex-marriage day

In case you had forgotten, today is the first anniversary of legal marriage for gays and lesbians in the United States. We’re still working on getting states other than Massachusetts to do same sex marriage, but now that Connecticut has legalized same sex unions, with basically all the rights of marriage, we’re making progress.

Good article on the topic on the UUA Web site today, at http://www.uua.org/news/freedomtomarry/hearts2005/index.html. Check out the great picture of Cel and Meg’s marriage at First Parish of Lexington, almost a year ago today. When I served at the Lexington church, Cel was the treasurer for the religious education committee. I always said the coolest people at church wind up on the religious education committee.