c. 2006 Religion News Service
Mass. High Court Upholds Limits on Gay Marriage
BOSTON (RNS) Massachusetts’ highest court on Thursday (March 30) upheld a 1913 law that bans same-sex couples from other states from marrying here, but left open the possibility that gay couples from Rhode Island and New York could wed in this state.
The state Supreme Judicial Court ruled on a lawsuit lodged by eight gay couples from Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine and New York and by 13 municipal clerks. The suits sought to declare the 1913 law unconstitutional and to stop the state from enforcing it for same-sex couples from other states.
When gay marriages began in May 2004, Gov. W. Mitt Romney ordered the clerks to deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples from other states. Under the 1913 law, nonresidents cannot marry in the state if their union would be banned in their home state and they have no intention of moving to Massachusetts.
A majority of the seven justices said the 1913 law can be used to prohibit marriage by gay couples from Connecticut, Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont because it’s clear that same-sex marriage is prohibited in those states.
The majority said suits filed by a gay couple from New York and two gay couples from Rhode Island can move ahead on an expedited basis in a Superior Court in Massachusetts to determine if gay marriage is banned or allowed in those two states.
Mark R. Pearsall, of Lebanon, Conn., who filed suit with his partner, Paul E. Trubey, told reporters he was disappointed in the decision. Pearsall and Trubey were among five out-of-state couples who filed suit after the state refused to certify their marriage licenses.
“It’s sad from a legal standpoint, but it doesn’t change our lives on a day-to-day basis,” he said.
Another couple in the lawsuit, Mary E. Norton, 46, and Wendy L. Becker, 45, of Providence, R.I., vowed to extend their battle for marriage rights in the Superior Court in Massachusetts.
“We will continue to do that,” Becker said. “We will fight for our rights.”
Romney cheered the ruling, saying it will help prevent Massachusetts from becoming “the Las Vegas of same-sex marriage.”
“The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court was in error when it concluded that our constitution required same-sex marriage,” said Romney, a possible candidate for president in 2008 who opposes gay marriage and civil unions. “I think that was an error in their judgment. But the idea that based on that error, that people could then come from all over the country and get married here, and then go back to their homes, would be compounding that error.”
_ Dan Ring
Presbyterians Stage Sit-in to Save Ontario Church
WINDSOR, Ontario (RNS) Some two dozen members of a church in this southwestern Ontario city are occupying their house of worship in a last-ditch effort to keep it open and financially afloat.
As of Friday (March 31), the dissident members, mostly in their 70s and 80s, were in their sixth day of an around-the-clock occupation of Riverside Presbyterian Church. They vow to continue their protest despite an April 1 deadline that will see the transfer of the church’s assets to its national governing body, the Presbyterian Church in Canada.
The congregants say they’ll stay in the 240-seat church, even rotate overnight shifts, until the national body agrees to listen to their demands to keep Riverside Presbyterian open.
The 77-year-old church, which has battled the local presbytery since last November, held its final service March 26. Some worshippers never left, and they plan to hold a service Sunday.
The presbytery says it can’t afford to keep the church open. Riverside once counted 128 members on its rolls; current attendance hovers around 50.
With a debt of $25,000, it was ordered to shut its doors in January. Cliff Terry, an 80-year-old retired corporate accountant, prefers to call the action a “pray-in.”
“We’re not leaving until the national church agrees to listen to us,” he told the Windsor Star. “We want to kick the devil out of the hearts of the ones who want to kick us out.”
The protesters say a pending $175,000 bequest from a local man who died recently would solve their financial problems.
The Rev. Joan Ashley, moderator of the presbytery, said the Riverside congregation is no longer “viable.”
She said the bequest came after the presbytery’s decision to close the church. She added it could still take a year to 18 months before those funds are processed. “It’s only a Band-aid,” she said.
The church is valued at about $637,000 and a manse on the property has a value of more than $170,000, Terry said.
He said the occupation will continue as long as it takes the national church to hear the parishioners’ case. He said members of other churches have brought the protesters food. “We’re not leaving until someone hears us.”
_ Ron Csillag
Ousted Ala. Chief Justice Joins Navy Chaplain in Protest
WASHINGTON (RNS) Former Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore joined a Navy chaplain on Thursday (March 30) to protest a Pentagon policy they believe prohibits clergy in the military from using sectarian prayer in military events that are not religious services.
“We’ve got to recognize that the law does not forbid our chaplains in the military, in the Air Force, in the Navy, from praying in the name of Jesus. Indeed, it contradicts our entire history and our law and it should be stopped and this president is responsible if it is not,” Moore said in a news conference outside the White House.
Moore, who lost his job as chief justice of Alabama after disobeying a court order to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the courthouse, appeared with Lt. Gordon James Klingenschmitt, who himself disobeyed an order to not appear at the news conference in his Navy uniform.
Klingenschmitt says a Navy policy violates his First Amendment rights by prohibiting him from reciting Christian prayer at non-religious events. To make his point, Klingenschmitt, wearing his uniform with a stole around his neck, specifically invoked Jesus Christ in prayer during the news conference and invited reprimand.
“Chaplain Klingenschmitt fully expects the Navy to punish him, as they properly should do, if they intend to enforce their own rules,” said the Rev. Rob Schenck, who spoke on the chaplain’s behalf. Later, Klingenschmitt changed into civilian clothes and a clerical collar and personally criticized the policy.
Moore, a Republican candidate for governor of Alabama, argued that Klingenschmitt is morally bound to pray according to his specific faith and break any rules or orders that say otherwise.
“You do not follow unlawful orders,” said Moore, a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy and veteran of the Vietnam War. Individual members of the military are capable of determining which orders are unlawful, Moore said, and they “must” disobey them.
The section of the U.S. Code regarding divine or religious services says a military chaplain “may conduct public worship according to the manner and forms of the church of which he is a member.”
But the controversy is over non-religious events, such as promotion ceremonies, in which a chaplain would be asked to deliver a non-sectarian prayer.
Chaplains “must be willing to function in a pluralistic environment in the military, where diverse religious traditions exist side-by-side with tolerance and respect,” according to a Feb. 21 policy from the secretary of the Navy.
“There is nothing in this policy that strictly forbids praying to Jesus. It’s just not in there. It is fair to say that we ask they be inclusive,” Navy spokesman Lt. William Marks said.
_ Mary Orndorff
Seminary President Criticizes Abortion Opponents
WASHINGTON (RNS) The president of a United Church of Christ-affiliated seminary on Friday (March 31) cited restrictions on abortion as evidence that America has “lost its soul.”
The Rev. Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, president of the Chicago Theological Seminary, told a prayer breakfast sponsored by the Planned Parenthood Federation of America Clergy Advisory Board that abortion is the “end product of a society that often fails to protect women from violence.”
Thistlethwaite was discussing the question of when an embryo should be considered human. This question has been a topic of intense debate among many religious leaders who oppose abortion on the premise that life begins at conception and clergy members, such as Thistlethwaite, who say life begins at birth.
“The only way we can function in a democratic society with this Constitution is to recognize and accept that we differ in our beliefs in this matter,” said Thistlethwaite. “If we ever again make abortion completely illegal, we will have established one religion’s view on when the human being becomes human, i.e., one religion’s view of ensoulment.”
A vocal peace activist and biblical scholar, Thistlethwaite testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee last year in opposition to the appointment of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.
Dialogue between abortion advocates and opponents such as the Catholic Church is crucial, said Thistlethwaite, if the United States is to maintain its democratic identity.
“Ensoulment is a lifelong project but individuals and nations can not only gain their souls but lose it,“ said Thistlethwaite. “The U.S. no longer knows who it is or what it stands for.”
_ Anne Pessala
Quote of the Day: Religious Historian and Author Karen Armstrong
(RNS) “Jesus was very uncomfortable for me. I find him a bit daunting and scary. He was always gazing at me reproachfully from a crown of thorns. I believed that I had done this to him. He had died for me. That’s a heavy trip for an 8-year-old.”
_ Religious historian Karen Armstrong, author of “Islam, a Short History” and, most recently, “The Great Transformation: The Beginning of Our Religious Traditions.” She was quoted by the Washington Post.
KRE/PH END RNS
