Lutheran gay clergy proposal passes 1st hurdle
(Minneapolis) Leaders of the country’s largest Lutheran denomination prayed for unity Monday as they waded into a weeklong debate over homosexuality and the clergy, while a rule change that would allow people in same-sex relationships to serve cleared its first hurdle.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, which is meeting this …
Tags: Evangelical Lutheran Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church In America, Gay Minneapolis, Homosexuality, Hurdle, Lutheran Denomination, Lutheran Gay Clergy, Proposal, Same Sex Relationships, UnityLutherans begin gay clergy discussion in Minn.
(Minneapolis) Leaders of the country’s largest Lutheran denomination began discussing Monday whether or not to allow people in same-sex relationships to serve as clergy.
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, which is meeting this week in Minneapolis, plans to decide whether to approve a proposal that would allow individual congregations to …
Tags: Congregations, Evangelical Lutheran Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church In America, Gay Clergy, Gay Minneapolis, Lutheran Denomination, People Relationships, Proposal, Same Sex RelationshipsReligious groups in India have warned they will…
Religious groups in India have warned they will oppose any move to legalize homosexuality as the federal government prepares to hold talks on a law that classifies same-sex acts as crimes.
India’s Hindu nationalist main opposition has in the meantime called for a national debate on the legislation that law minister M. Veerappa Moily last week said would come up for a discussion within the government.
“This is a sensitive issue and warrants a debate within the Indian society at large before arriving at any decision,” said Sidharth Nath Singh, spokesman for the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party.
An Indian court is due to give its judgment on a petition filed by a nonprofit group that has challenged the anti-gay provision of the penal code.
In a news conference last week, Moily refused to spell out his government’s stand on it because it awaits judicial determination. But his comments that the federal home minister was “contemplating” a meeting with his Cabinet colleagues on the law drew widespread coverage in the largely conservative country.
“Hope floats at rainbow parades,” read a caption on a front-page picture from a gay parade in New Delhi in Monday’s Times of India newspaper.
Participants in that march demanded repeal of Section 377 of the penal code, which criminalizes private consensual sex between adults of the same gender in the country. 
Watch a New Delhi march in support of gay rights »
Religious leaders, however, oppose any suggestion to scrap 377, describing homosexuality as “unnatural.”
“We are against calling homosexuality a criminal activity, but we are certainly in principle against legalizing it, because that would mean the state endorsing same-sex relationships,” said Babu Joseph, spokesman for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India.
Homosexuality “violates fundamental norms of a family,” he said.
See India faith leaders: Anti-gay law must stay CNN International
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Fresno Hospital Bars Lesbian From Visiting Partner And Giving Advice About Her Treatment, ACLU and NCLR Urge Hospital To Adopt Policies Respecting Same-Sex Relationships
“We just couldn’t believe this was happening to us. This was the nightmare that we hoped we’d never have to live through,” said Teresa Rowe, who grew up in Clovis, California, but now lives in the Bay Area with her partner of four years, Kristin Orbin. “Unfortunately, because Kristin suffers from epilepsy, trips to the hospital are pretty common for us, which is why we filled out the legal paper work to make sure I would be able to be with her and make emergency decisions about her care. But the hospital wouldn’t let me see Kristen and ignored my advice about her treatment. They ended up giving her the exact medication I repeatedly asked them not to give her.”
On May 29, 2009, Rowe and Orbin attended the “Meet in the Middle” rally in support of marriage for same-sex couples in Fresno. After the couple completed a 14-mile march in 90 degree heat, Orbin, who suffers from epilepsy, collapsed in a seizure. The couple experienced hostility from the ambulance driver, but Rowe was ultimately allowed to accompany Orbin to Community Regional Medical Center in Fresno. However, when the couple got the hospital, the driver would not allow Rowe to accompany Orbin into the emergency room even though Orbin had been in and out of consciousness, and Rowe was familiar with her medical history and care.
Rowe repeatedly asked hospital employees to allow her to see Orbin and talk to a physician about her care but was refused. She volunteered to have Orbin’s legal paperwork naming Rowe as her health care agent faxed to the hospital but was told that it wouldn’t do any good. When she asked that she at least be allowed to pass along the message that Orbin not be given the drug Ativan, she was told the message would be conveyed. If the message was given to those treating Orbin, it was ignored because Orbin was given the drug, which she didn’t need and which causes her unnecessary pain. Meanwhile, when she was awake, Orbin was also asking to be allowed to see Rowe. Although they were both told that no visitors were allowed in the area where Orbin was being treated, other patients were receiving guests. After being separated for several hours, Orbin finally saw her doctor. She complained to him, and Rowe was eventually allowed to be with her.
“Until the California Supreme Court upheld Prop 8, Kristen and Teresa were planning to get married. In this climate, hospitals must be especially diligent to protect same-sex couples from discrimination,” said Elizabeth Gill, a staff attorney with the ACLU of Northern California. “As these events so painfully demonstrate, no matter what hoops same-sex couples jump through to protect their relationships, these kinds of horrible things will continue to happen as long as couples are denied the recognition and respect that only comes with marriage.”
The letter sent by the ACLU and NCLR charges that it was a violation of state law for the hospital to discriminate against the couple based on their sexual orientation, as well as to refuse to recognize Rowe’s legal authority, which was authorized by Orbin’s advance health care directive. The letter also notes that hospitals must post and follow a patient’s bill of rights that bars discrimination based on sexual orientation and grants patients the ability to designate visitors of their choosing and to decide who is able to make emergency decision about their care. The letter urges Community Medical Centers immediately to affirm their commitment to inclusive and sensitive medical care for LGBT patients, and to take a number of steps to carry out that commitment.
“Discrimination in healthcare settings is still far too common for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people,” said Jason Schneider, MD, President of the Gay and Lesbian Medical Association (GLMA). “No one is served when partners are barred from visitation and kept from participating in conversations about their loved one’s care. It’s bad for doctors who are kept from potentially life threatening information, it’s bad for partners who are left waiting hopelessly in the waiting rooms and it’s especially traumatic for patients who need the love and support that only their partners can provide to help them through health care emergencies.”
A copy of the letter, which gives the hospital until June 22nd to respond, is available at http://www.aclu.org/lgbt/discrim/39854res20090615.html.
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Pennsylvania extends medical benefits to partners of state employees
Pennsylvania state employees in same-sex relationships will now be able to obtain the same medical benefits for their partners as heterosexual married employees.
The Pennsylvania Employees Benefit Trust Fund, a non-governmental agency that oversees the state benefits programs, will offer medical, prescription drug, dental, vision and hearing-aid benefits to the same- and opposite-sex domestic partners of all PEBTF-eligible employees, which amounts to about 81,000 individuals.
The approximately 60,000 retired state employees eligible for the Retired Employees Health Program will also be able to extend their benefits to domestic partners.
The policy change additionally allows children of domestic partners to be included on benefits plans. See Pennsylvania extends medical benefits to partners of state employees
Philadelphia Gay News (* Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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Mass. couples cheer gay marriage, 5 years later
BOSTON - Every year, the couples who led the fight for gay marriage in Massachusetts get together privately to celebrate both their own weddings and the marriages of thousands more couples who followed them.
But this year, the celebration feels a little bit sweeter for the six couples who will gather Sunday to mark the fifth anniversary of Massachusetts becoming the first state to legalize same-sex marriage. This year, they will also be celebrating the legalization of gay marriage in four other states.
“We’ve been very happy that it’s started to be accepted in other places,” said Maureen Brodoff, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit that led to a Supreme Judicial Court decision legalizing gay marriage.
“It’s important to us that same-sex relationships get recognition outside of our home state, and I think that that is happening slowly as people look to the Massachusetts example and see that, you know, the sky didn’t fall, that it’s strengthened families, that it’s brought joy to a lot of families,” Brodoff said. See Mass. couples cheer gay marriage, 5 years later Chicago Tribune * Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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LGBT Domestic Violence Services Bill Passes State Assembly
“By passing this bill, we are expanding innovative and proven program models already being pioneered by LGBT centers and organizations across the state,” said Assemblymember John A. Pérez (D-Los Angeles), the author of the bill. “Now more people will have greater access to the services they need – in a safe, comfortable environment.”
Rates of domestic violence in same-sex relationships are equivalent to those in opposite-sex relationships. However, support for LGBT survivors continues to lag far behind those available to non-LGBT couples.
“We must do all in our power to ensure that LGBT survivors of domestic violence have access to culturally competent services and resources,” Geoff Kors, executive director of EQCA. “EQCA is extremely grateful to Assemblymember Pérez for his leadership on this important issue and thank the California Assembly for helping move us one step closer to making this goal a reality.”
The LGBT Domestic Violence Services Bill is designed to correct this inequity by expanding access for LGBT service providers to a state fund within the California Emergency Management Agency, which supports LGBT-specific domestic violence programs across the state. The fund, originally established as part of another EQCA-sponsored bill in 2006, is subsidized by a $23 fee on domestic partner registrations. The new bill also eliminates the requirement for providers to offer shelter – an impediment to many smaller LGBT organizations that inadvertently keeps several California communities from providing any services for LGBT survivors of domestic violence. The bill previously passed the Assembly Public Safety Committee by a vote of 5-2.
More information about EQCA’s other current legislation can be found at www.eqca.org/legislation.
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Support grows for federal DOMA repeal
(Washington) Support is slowly growing in Congress for repeal of the federal Defense of Marriage Act, but a bill has yet to be filed in either the House or the Senate.
The Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA, was passed in 1998 and bars the federal government from recognizing same-sex relationships.
The …
Tags: Congress, Defense Of Marriage Act, Federal Government, marriage, Same Sex Relationships, SenateSame-Sex Marriage Approved In Maine: What It Means For One Couple …
With Maine becoming the fifth state in the union to approve same-sex marriage, our former Jaime McLeod, a member of MTV’s Street Team ‘08, wrote a blog for us about what the ruling means to her …
Five years ago, my partner and I stood up in front of our families, our friends and our God, and pledged to walk together and care for one another, no matter what life brings. Though it wasn’t legally binding, we meant it, and we still mean it today.
In 89 days, we will finally be able to make the vows we made to one another official. It won’t change the way we see our relationship. It won’t change the way those who love us see our relationship. And, for that matter, it won’t change the way those who hate us see our relationship. As some of my gay friends keep pointing out, gay marriage won’t cure homophobia. It won’t cure AIDS. It won’t keep queer kids from getting bullied in school. But it’s a step. It ensures that the relationship my partner and I have worked so hard on for the last eight years doesn’t receive fewer protections under the law than the drunken Vegas wedding of a pop starlet to some guy she hardly knows. It means our friends won’t have to go through a ridiculously difficult legal process so that their kids can have two legal parents. And it means that a majority of legislators in my state were willing to stand up and acknowledge that same-sex relationships are just as valid as heterosexual ones.
Thank you, Maine State Legislature, and Gov. Baldacci, for doing the right thing and affirming the rights of all Mainers. You’re all invited to my second wedding! See Same-Sex Marriage Approved In Maine: What It Means For One Couple …
MTV.com* Tags = gay men gay news lesbian news transgender bisexual
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Study examines effect of marriage on gay couples
(San Francisco, California) The legal recognition of same-sex relationships, including marriage, influences how gay and lesbian baby boomers prepare for late life and end of life issues, a new study has found.
Unmarried same-sex couples may suffer greater fear and anxiety around end of life issues than those in state-sanctioned unions, …
Tags: Anxiety, Baby Boomers, Fear, Gay And Lesbian, Gay California, Gay Couples, Gay Lesbian, Legal Recognition, marriage, Same Sex Couples, Same Sex Relationships, San Francisco California, Sex Gay, Sex Marriage, Unions
