A big thanks to Ann for some positive action suggestions of how we can register our dismay at the Obama team's "no you can't" attitude. The GLBT community is conspicuously missing from the transition and the cabinet. Go to the post below this one and DO SOMETHING.Saturday night Beloved and I went to our local Light up the night candlelight vigil for gay rights. That's us on the right of this frame from a local news video. As has been our experience of nearly all the recent protests, it was very positive. We met many nice people, and what was astonishing to us was at our local protest at the local mall, more than half the participants were straights supporting their gay friends and family. You straight allies rock. (And a big hand for our local San Diego police, who have been present yet positive at all these events, and clearly there to protect everyone. You guys rock too.)
When we were there, we thought they were filming US, but they were actually filming my T-shirt that says "We will not give up and we are not done". I've heard that straight guys are only interested in women from the neck down, but really! ;-) I sent this to my mom and told her my !@#s made it to TV.Sunday, BP and I continued our exploration of various Episcopal churches. We visited to what we discovered to be a very friendly local parish. BP recognized someone in the choir from her former Catholic parish (decades ago) and said hello after the service. He commented that post-prop 8, there were a number of Catholic refugees looking for a welcoming church. Sadly, I suspect the likes of Rick and Paul will not miss BP and others like her. I thought it was interesting that BP's old colleague said, "we welcome everyone. This is a CHRISTIAN church." Folks there were very nice. I think we might go back.
12 comments:
/me wonders how you pronounce "!@#s" ;->
Hummmmmmm a five letter four letter word. I'll have to get my dictionary of sweary words out. :0
Thanks for this report, IT. I'm glad your visit to an EC was positive.
I think of you two so often. Yesterday at the church job a female same-gender couple was the appointed family to light the advent wreath. They with their two angelic adopted sons were up front doing it all. And one of the woman's mother (who has Alzheimer) was with them. This is a congregation where the age of 50 is considered an adolescent. The usual sunday announcement is who has been married 50+ years. And, not one person gave the same-gender family being up in the front a second thought.
Yes, IT, the times, they are a-changing.
I thought of you and BP and said a prayer that you two will find the perfect parish where you are as welcomed as this couple is here.
Hey, IT: nice rack! *LOL* (And could you email me? Thanks.)
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Yeah, James, in my dad's VERY suburban Sacramento TEC parish (the one I grew up in), a woman who was clearly half of a f/f couple went up yesterday morning for her birthday blessing. Everyone seemed kewl. :-)
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As I said below, I was oh-so-pleased to learn that my 16 year-old namesake participated in her local Light-Up-the-Night event. To kids today, ssm isn't even an issue---just an OUTRAGE, that it could be taken away.
Today the California Supreme Court posted the brief that California Attorney General filed on Friday, which surprisingly argued that Prop. 8 should be found invalid. If you want, you can read it here.
The most interesting argument, and the one that got the most press, starts on page 75. The argument in a nutshell is that "the initiative power could never have been intended to give the voters an unfettered prerogative to amend the Constitution for the purpose of depriving a disfavored group of rights determined by the Supreme Court to be part of fundamental human liberty."
I think this is one of the truly disturbing things about the passage of Prop. 8. As the brief notes, the precedent of Prop. 8 could be used to deprive all kinds of disfavored groups of all kinds of fundamental rights. Personally, I find this argument more persuasive than the constitutional amendment versus constitutional revision argument that has previously been the primarily argument against Prop. 8.
It's also an argument that should be very appealing to Justice Kennard, who voted in favor of marriage equality last May but voted not to hear the petitions challenging Prop. 8. It will be very interesting to see what the Supreme Court does.
I'm a bit more hopeful that I was before.
A couple of interesting articles in Sunday's Los Angeles Times on the effect of Prop. 8. (This issue is still going full force in California!)
The first is Gay couple won't let Proposition 8 steal their dream: Two men who moved from Ohio to California to marry continue to protest the measure's passage.
The story begins:
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Fearing taunts and disapproval, they kept their love hidden for nearly two years. But with the Nov. 4 election looming, Christopher Lewis and Cody Horton resolved to take a leap of faith.
Following in the footsteps of generations of adventurers and romantics, the shy young couple from Ohio announced they were heading west to marry and begin a new life in California. They put on dark suits and exchanged vows on an unseasonably balmy afternoon in late October, before family, friends and the wide Pacific Ocean.
Wanting to give back to the state that recognized his union, Lewis took a job as a physician's assistant at a community health center in Tehachapi, southeast of Bakersfield, caring for migrant farm workers. But by the time they had packed up their apartment in Ohio and returned to California, voters had approved a change to the state Constitution that put their marriage in doubt.
Before they moved here, the self-effacing couple had never even seen a demonstration, much less protested themselves. But two days after the election, they drove two hours into Los Angeles and nervously joined the throngs marching in protest against Proposition 8. The next night, they were back on the streets in Long Beach. The night after, in Silver Lake, then Westwood and downtown L.A.
"It just hurt so bad; it's all we could think of doing," Lewis said. "It's all we have left."
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Then, there's the story on the other side -- Proposition 8 moves Christian couple to action: The Ferreiras did what they could in their eastern San Diego suburb to ensure the ban on gay marriage prevailed. Their fight continues as its passage is contested.
Sorry for hogging the thread. As an update to my comments about the Prop. 8 case, the Supreme Court entered an order this afternoon giving the intervenors (a/k/a the bad guys) permission to file a brief in response to this "new" argument raised by the California Attorney General.
I think this is good sign. The argument got the Court's immediate attention!
"Sadly, I suspect the likes of Rick and Paul will not miss BP and others like her."
IT, I thought that you told me that I should stop posting here, lest I become troll like and unwelcome. If I correctly interpreted that, then it would be unfair to take pot shots at me when I'm not looking.
For the record, while you and BP would make me uncomfortable, perhaps, at my parish, I would certainly welcome you and regret your leaving if you decided to go elsewhere.
I think I would find you both very engaging, but, of course, that would not be the point. The point would be that it's not MY Catholic Church, it is God's, and you are both God's children (even if you personally don't believe that).
However, just as I am challenged in how to live my life, I would expect that BP would take on that challenge as well.
Oh Primrose, I can't take much more of this back and forth---I'm as raw as a side of beef. Ah, to be numb to all this...! What's your lawyerly instinct telling you?
Still here, Paul?Lurking isn't a bad thing, as I keep hoping you will LEARN something. But you misunderstand BP. She DOES take it as a challenge, (as we all do, truth be told regardless of religion) to live a good and moral life. You and she (and most of our friends here) just disagree as to exactly what that challenge is and how to meet it. And there isn't much point in rehashing that disagreement.
James, dear, I left you hugs at your blog.
IT
IT,
We shall overcome. I see a day no one will care that the couple hugging or walking hand in hand in a park appear to be two men, two women, or a man and a woman. No one will blink when a woman asks to see a woman patient in a hospital on the grounds that she is her spouse. No one will wonder when two men show up at a parent teacher meeting. I see a day a President's daughter will marry the one she loves in the White House and the press will be most concerned with the details about the wedding gowns they are wearing.
May your beloved find a church which will give her the sweet succor she and you need rather than sap her spirit with loveless words and deeds. Do not be downcast, as James said, times are changing.
You people are always so upbeat,...I just wonder how you maintain it?
The pope now says gays are as dangerous as the destruction of the rainforests. Some thoughts about hate speech on my new diary at dailykos.
IT
This afternoon, the Los Angeles Times posted an analysis of the brief that California Attorney General filed last Friday in the Prop. 8 case. It says that it helps both sides. You can read it here.
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