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

Published by

Original source : http://gay_blog.blogspot.com/2009/04/five-stories-…

How Dumb IS THis? Church: Florists Should Be Allowed To Say No To Gay Weddings

So CT lawmakers are considering some changes to old state laws that were passed before the state supreme court made gay marriage legal. Unable to overturn that action, the “Connecticut Catholic Conference” are now embarrassing themselves with arguments like the one below. Like any of us would want to pay an anti-gay florist to do flowers for our wedding! DO these so-called Catholics realize how dumb they look?

Concerned that the state’s new same-sex marriage law would infringe on religious liberties, the Connecticut Catholic Conference today proposed some broad exemptions which it believes are necessary to protect those rights.

The law does not require Catholic priests — or any other clergy member — to preside over same-sex weddings.

However, the church is seeking additional exemptions. For instance, it wants to ensure that a florist opposed to gay marriage on religious grounds not be forced to sell flowers to a same-sex couple.

“Same-sex couples have their liberties protected fully. Religious people are wondering ‘how is this going to effect me?”‘ David Reynolds, lobbyist for the Catholic Church, told members of the legislature’s judiciary committee. Ee Church: Florists Should Be Allowed To Say No To Gay Weddings

Hartford Courant