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Here is a sampling of reports of local MCC participation in events and activities supporting the right of same-sex couples to marry during Valentines Week 2004 . This is only a partial list and will be added to as info becomes available to us. We are proud of the broad range of actions in which our local churches participated, and the amount of media coverage these churches generated -- both for their local churches and for social justice.
On Saturday, Feb. 14, Rev. Susan Heiskell (left) Pastor of MCC New Haven speaking to the crowd of about 300 at the Freedom to Marry Rally on the steps of the Capitol in Hartford, CT. After her speech, all the couples who went to their Town Halls to ask for a marriage license were asked to come forward. Click here for full article...
On February 12, Rev. Troy Perry, Founder and Moderator of Metropolitan Community Churches, and his partner Phillip Ray DeBlieck (right), along with Robin Tyler and her partner Diane Olson, and famed attorney Gloria Allred, participated in a public marriage license action at the Beverly Hills Courthouse in Los Angeles. Click here for more...
Michigan gay couples denied licenses:
Jennifer and Erin Adriel were married in Canada last year after law changes there allowed for same-gender unions. What the Ferndale couple wants is the same right to legally marry in the United States. Mark Bidwell, a minister for the Metropolitan Community Church of Detroit,
was also turned away at the clerk's counter for a marriage license for himself and his partner. "We'll be back next year and the year after," Bidwell said. "Perseverance is very important for us."
Click here for full article...
My Daddy and Papa are getting
married -- at church
First same-sex
wedding with license held in a California church
San Francisco - "My Daddy and Papa are getting married," said D.J.,
who
is just five years old, when the Pastor asked her if she understood what
was happening on Thursday afternoon last week in the Sanctuary at MCC
San Francisco (MCCSF).
While hundreds of same-sex couples took their vows at City Hall, Rusty
Davis and Mark Clem felt compelled to take their license, and their
daughter D.J. to their church and have their union blessed. Theirs is
the first same-sex wedding license to be solemnized in a California
church.
"MCCSF has been doing same-sex weddings for over 30 years, but never
with a civil marriage license to sign," said Rev. Dr. G. Penny Nixon,
MCCSF's Senior Pastor. Click here for full article...
Same-sex couples receive blessing
Freedom to Marry Week at Eternal Joy MCC:
Dayton Daily News
DAYTON -- Ken McLaughlin and Ted Tredick have been together for nearly 25 years, but on Sunday they stood in front of their congregation and 13 other couples who joined them to receive blessings of their relationships at the Eternal Joy Metropolitan Community Church. Click here for full article...
Freedom to Marry Announces Voices of Equality:
Freedom to Marry Coalition chose today – National (US) Freedom to Marry Day – to announce its initial slate of Voices of Equality. The group includes two members of Congress, a Pulitzer and Tony award winning playwright, and five clergypersons, including MCC's Founder and Moderator, Rev. Troy D. Perry.
Freedom to Marry is the gay/non-gay partnership working to win marriage equality for same-sex couples in the U.S. The group’s Voices of Equality “speak out for an end to discrimination in civil marriage and bring the weight of their influence and expertise to the fight,” says Evan Wolfson, Exec Dir. Click here for more....
Bureau turns away gay marriage ban protesters
No attempts made for license in Ross County
by Carrie Spencer and Daniel Prazer - Associated Press Writer and Gazette Staff Writer
A half-dozen gay couples joined the pre-Valentine's rush to get marriage licenses Friday at Franklin County Probate Court but, as they expected, were turned away. They then joined about several dozen demonstrators outside the courthouse, saying Ohio's recently enacted ban on gay marriage promotes bigotry. One picket sign read, "No special rights for heterosexuals."
Ohio's ban increased participation in this year's protest, said the Rev. Margaret Hawk, pastor of the church's 60-member downtown congregation. Last year, one couple sought a marriage license. The protest was one of several across the country. The Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, a denomination ministering to gay Christians, declares the week of Valentine's Day each year as "Freedom to Marry Week."
Click here for more...
Celebrating Commitment -37 Same-Sex Couples Exchange
Pledges as Debate over Gay Marriage Intensifies.
Philadelphia Inquirer, February 15, 2004 -By Gaiutra Bahadur, Inquirer Staff Writer
"......We are only here to celebrate their commitment to each other," said the Rev. Jeffrey Jordan, of Philadelphia's Metropolitan Community Church. "We cannot marry them." That legal right may exist as early as May only in Massachusetts, where the state's Supreme Court ruled earlier this month that denying same-sex couples a marriage license violates the state constitution's equal protection clause......"What you are standing for here today is not only your covenant relationship," the Rev. Karla Fleshman, of the Imago Dei Metropolitan Community Church in Media, told the couples. "Same-sex couples are having holy unions regardless of what legislatures and courts do. We have our families," she said later. "What we don't have is equal protection under the law to keep our families protected." Click here for full article
Rally Musters Support for Gay, Lesbian Cause
Protest at the State House Focuses on Advocating Same-Sex Marriage
by Christina Lee Knauss, Staff Writer- The State, Columbia, SC February 15, 2004
Cold rain did not keep about 70 people from turning out at the State House Saturday morning to show their support for allowing same-sex couples to marry. The "Freedom to Marry" rally was organized by the South Carolina Gay and Lesbian Pride Movement as part of local observances of Freedom to Marry Week, a national initiative to raise awareness about marriage for same-sex couples. Two ministers and local gay-rights ctivists spoke at the rally. The general themes were support of gays and lesbians in committed relationships and criticism of state and federal lawmakers who want to ban gay marriage.
"The love we bring to the altar is already equal - what we ask for is equality in marriage from our government," said the Rev. Andy Sidden, pastor of Metropolitan Community Church of Columbia, which ministers extensively to the gay and lesbian community. Sidden planned to officiate at the wedding of two Columbia men Saturday afternoon. Click here for full article
NOTE: Thanks to everyone who is taking part of this week's Freedom To Marry events. Thanks, too, for sending your event updates and news clippings to become part of our historic archive of the struggle for same-sex marriage rights.
As you may know, MCC's Rev. Troy Perry performed the first recorded, public same-sex wedding in the United States in 1969. In 1970, MCC filed the first-ever court suit seeking legal recognition for same-sex marriages in California. That lawsuit was lost -- but it launched the movement for same-sex marriage rights. And in 2003, a lawsuit brought by Metropolitan Community Church of Toronto resulted in the establishment of legal LGBT marriages in Canada. Your efforts during Valentine's Day Week 2004 -- and your efforts in the days ahead -- will help bring marriage equality to all LGBT people.
For Additional Information, Contact:
Jim Birkitt, Director of Communications
MCC Communications Department
8704 Santa Monica Boulevard, Second Floor
West Hollywood, CA 90069
Tel. (310) 360-8640, Ext. 226 or 228
E-Mail:
info@MCCchurch.org
Website:
www.MCCchurch.org