Five stories from five years of same-sex marriage
Cambridge, Mass. - Susan Shepherd looks up at the rough-hewn pink granite of City Hall, just across the Charles River from downtown Boston. An American flag ripples in the wind. Inside the building, a plaque commemorates Cambridge as America’s birthplace of legal same-sex marriage.
“I can’t believe it’s been five years,” Shepherd says, hugging her wife. “I feel like I just met her yesterday.”
Nor can gay marriage opponents believe what’s happened in Massachusetts since, in their view, traditional marriage came to an end.
Yet in the past five years as same-sex marriage became part of Massachusetts’ landscape, many Bay Staters say something unexpected has happened: Life is as it always was.
Just after midnight on May 17, 2004, Shepherd and Marcia Hams, a Cambridge couple who’d been together three decades and raised a son, became Massachusetts’ first same-sex couple to get a marriage license. They had waited 24 hours in rain and cold, and by the time they got the license, 10,000 supporters gathered on the front lawn of City Hall.
Five years later and 1,300 miles away, Iowa on Monday will allow same-sex marriages. As Iowa enters into uncharted territory for the Midwest, the Bay State may serve as a sign of what may come.
Since same-sex marriage became legal in Massachusetts, about 12,000 same-sex couples have applied for marriage licenses. Gay marriages now comprise about 4 percent of all marriages performed in the state, meaning there are about 1,500 a year.
There have been some same-sex divorces, too, most notably by the couple whose name was on the court case that legalized same-sex marriage.
To be sure, a sizable chunk of Massachusetts’ 6.3 million residents remain opposed to same-sex marriage, mostly on religious grounds. Some say legal same-sex marriage has led to censorship of those who remain opposed, to infringement on the rights of parents who object to same-sex marriage being taught in schools, and to Catholic Charities of Boston ending adoption work because it refused to allow same-sex couples to adopt.
But polling results show a shift toward acceptance of gay marriage. A 2004 survey by the Suffolk University Political Research Center in Boston found the state split: 42 percent supported gay marriage, 44 percent opposed it. A similar survey in 2008 found 59 percent in support of gay marriage, 37 percent opposed.
As Iowa enters a new era, a drive through Massachusetts and into Maine shows how same-sex marriage has changed life - for better, for worse or, as many say, hardly at all.
See Five stories from five years of same-sex marriage
DesMoinesRegister.com - Des Moines,IA,USA
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New era begins in Ft. Lauderdale
(Fort Lauderdale, Florida) Jack Seiler began his first full day as Fort Lauderdale mayor Wednesday, putting an official end to the 18-year, polarizing term of Jim Naugle.
During his term in the mayor’s chair Naugle had been blamed for divisive anti-gay rhetoric.
Naugle, who was prevented from running last month by term …
Tags: Fort Lauderdale, Ft Lauderdale, Jim Naugle, Lauderdale Florida, New Era, Rhetoric, SeilerIntegrity Applauds Robinson Inauguration Role
Integrity is delighted at today’s announcement of New Hampshire Bishop Gene Robinson’s role in the upcoming Inaugural celebrations. Following on the heels of yesterday’s selection of the Rev. Sharon E. Watkins as the first woman preacher for the January 21st National Prayer Service, today’s news is yet another indication that we are entering an historic era of diversity and inclusion.
“Bishop Robinson’s selection by the President-elect to pray God’s blessings on the opening event of the Inaugural week is good news not only for gay and lesbian Americans but for all who share the audacious hope of a nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all are created equal,” said Integrity President Susan Russell.
“It also gives us hope that the age of an ‘America’s Pastor’ is behind us and that we enter a new era where diverse voices of faith speak from the particularity of their own experience of God’s grace, love and power. While there are many miles to go before we are done with racism, sexism and homophobia in this country, we look forward to Barack Obama’s inauguration, to Sharon Watkins’ sermon and to Gene Robinson’s prayers as signs of great progress and profound hope.
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