When I found the story of Amy and Jessica I was immediately transported to grade school Valentine Days. The teacher had a big decorated box on her desk, and we children deposited our Valentines in a slot in the top. In the afternoon we had a “party”, fancy heart-shaped cookies baked by some dedicated mother, and a sticky cup of punch. Other mothers distributed the cards while we sat in our seats in a state of great excitement, composed equally of fear and anticipation.
My family moved frequently when I was attending school, so I was often in the role of Jessica—a new kid in town. Thus I asked myself the same sorts of questions she did. Would the popular kids include me in their list of those deserving of cards? Would the girl I was carefully cultivating as a possible best friend send me a message of acceptance? And, most especially, would the cute boy in the seat two rows up recognize that his card from me was special? And, would he respond?
I wonder now what Valentine’s Day meant to my classmates who were more interested in same gender special friendships. I was extremely slow in learning about same-gender relationships. My Methodist church certainly did not mention the possibility. And the small Illinois towns in which I lived certainly did not have gay bars. And my mother was very shy about talking about anything having to do with sex, so I was ignorant about many things.
However, when I was in high school, one of the boys in the band that I admired from a distance had an older sister I shall call Gert. While the rest of us were wearing wool skirts that reached to our white bobby sox, Gert wore blue jeans. While most of us were wearing sweater sets, Gert wore white tee shirts. While some of us experimented with an occasional cigarette, hiding from all sources of authority, Gert rolled a pack of cigarettes in her tee shirt sleeve—just like the bad boys did!
Gert was different. I was out of high school before I had a name for that difference. Even today I can’t remember when I learned the word lesbian. But I remember making the connection to Gert, and finally understanding why she did not attend proms or sock hops. I wonder what happened to her. I hope she found the love that must have been very difficult to find in our small town. I hope she experienced a Valentine’s Day that had meaning for her.
The Sunday morning service at General Assembly last year featured Jason Shelton’s wonderful song, “Standing on the Side of Love.” Shelton composed this song in response to the adoption by the General Assembly of a resolution in favor of equal marriage laws, and the subsequent advocacy of President Bill Sinkford and the UUA Board and Staff in the Massachusetts campaign to enact them.
I think it is a beautiful song. It brings tears to my eyes, movement to my feet and lifts my heart in joy. When we sing of “the truth in our hearts”, I want to cry “Yes!” The truth in our hearts affirms faith, hope and love in relationships, without asserting they can only be present in different gender relationships. The truth in our heart knows that we celebrate faithful partners in same gender as well as different gender relationships. The truth in our hearts knows that this inclusive, diverse faith community is “Standing on the Side of Love.”
Shelton addresses the fear that is constant companion to those people whose heart leads them to a relationship that is not approved by a vociferous minority. This minority managed to persuade a majority of voters to enact damaging, demeaning legislation through employing fear tactics. They are unwilling to hear the voices of our lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered people who seek only the common right to legalize their relationships. Our faith community has sacralized such relationships for years, naming them sacred in the eyes of the holy and our community.
The fearful minority, playing upon fear of difference, seeks to keep love bound into a narrow path. They idealize a past that never was and wish to legalize it into existence. The reality of our lives in the 21st Century means they are doomed to failure, but in the meantime they demonize same gender couples, forcing our brothers and sisters to live truncated lives, denied the many rights of legal spouses.
They—this vociferous, narrow-minded minority—deny the reality of loving, long-lasting, beautiful same gender relationships. We, whose sons and daughters, brothers and sisters are in such relationships, stand in frustration beside them, hoping for their eventual freedom to marry, working to make it happen.
We Unitarian Universalists are truly “Standing on the Side of Love”, for we know this is the way in which we can live and love equally. Our faith covenant, which we call the Purposes and Principles, is based on our affirmation that all people have worth and dignity.
We do not limit our claim to those who are Anglo-American, or white, or North American, or male, or fully abled, or upper-class, or heterosexual. We say that all people have worth and dignity. It is innate in their humanity. And we affirm that justice and equality are for all people.
Justice demands that loving, adult, long-term relationships, that harm no one, be granted the option of legal and/or sacred affirmation. This does not mean that those faiths who object to same-gender relationships would be forced to perform weddings against their traditions. It does mean that those same-gender couples who wish to marry legally be allowed to do so. And, it means that those clergy, who perform sacred ceremonies for such couples, (and I am one) may now add the words that make them legal.
There are many benefits to legal unions. I had often heard that there were over 1000 benefits that accrue to legally wedded couples. So I researched the Lamda Legal site to find more information. I learned that there are “more than 1,138 automatic federal and additional state protections, benefits and responsibilities designed to support and protect family life.” They add:
Nationwide lesbian and gay couples are spending their lives together with the same love and commitment as heterosexual couples: raising children, sharing a home, providing for each other. But they are doing it without the same legal protections and support as other Americans, simply because they cannot legally marry. As a result, lesbian and gay couples are left vulnerable, as they try to piece together a patchwork of legal and financial documents to protect each other and their children. Or worse, they must remain at risk since many benefits from marriage cannot be created through other means. (Lambda Legal Site) (Following facts drawn from this site.)
As our friends in evangelical churches point out, marriage provides the best context in which to rear children and build a healthy family life.
· It establishes an automatic right to joint parenting, including joint adoption, joint foster care, custody and visitation for non-biological parents.
· Immigration and residency are open to spouses from other countries.
· When a spouse dies, marriage entitles the surviving spouse to bereavement leave from work, to file wrongful death claims and to decide numerous other legal rights and protections.
· When marriages end, divorce protections covers shared property, child support and alimony.
· Spousal privilege protects married couples from being forced to testify against each other.
Legalizing relationships help couples and families to ensure their financial stability.
· Married couples can sign up for joint home and auto insurance policies and joint rental leases with automatic renewal rights if a spouse dies or leaves.
· In the case of death, a spouse can draw on the Social Security of the deceased husband or wife, automatically inherit a shared home, assets and personal items in absence of a will, inherit retirement savings tax free, and be exempt from property tax increases.
· Married couples can file joint tax returns and are eligible for additional tax benefits and claims.
In addition, legal relationships help support family health.
· Spouses are automatically next of kin for the purposes of hospital visits and emergency medical decisions.
· Employers often cover spouses of employees through health insurance.
· Spouses are entitled to family medical leave to care for a sick husband or wife.
These benefits are available to any heterosexual couple who weds. However, they are unavailable to most homosexual couples, unless they live in Massachusetts or Vermont.
Currently our state of Michigan provides a stark contrast to Massachusetts, in which the headquarters of our Association has offices. Massachusetts passed an equal marriage law two years ago with the strong support of our Association. Our headquarters is located next to the state capitol of Massachusetts on Beacon Street in Boston. Draped prominently from the windows of our building was a large banner, which read, “Standing on the Side of Love.” Our president joined with the leaders of other liberal faith communities to lobby legislators to adopt the proposed law. Following its acceptance, the Unitarian lawyer who argued the case was legally united in marriage with her long-time partner by Bill Sinkford in the chapel in our headquarters. Across the street, at historic Arlington Street Church, fifty couples were united in marriage.
Here in Michigan, the 2004 election found our state passing an amendment to the constitution stipulating that marriage was only legal between one man and one woman. This same amendment is proposed for our national constitution. The forces of hate and bigotry, which arise from fear, triumphed in Michigan. I pray they will not triumph in our nation.
At a social function this week I fell into conversation with a friend, a member of another liberal church in our area. She told me that her church, like this one, was in the midst of discussing gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered issues. They were trying to decide whether they wanted to become “open and affirming”, or their version of that phrase.
Her concern and that of her husband’s, she told me, was that they would make the homophobic members of their congregation feel unwelcome. Now, I was not at my best at that moment. There is nothing like injustice to trigger my indignation button. Instead of saying something comforting that would still prod her to move off this excuse for standing still, … something like--“Hopefully, during the discussion, those of you who embrace justice and equality will influence those who don’t,”--I said, “Well, I think that homophobic people are not really Christian, anyway.” I’m sure that really helped her to meet the challenge in her congregation!
This concern for the feelings of others, who espouse ideas and values that damage other people, was the excuse for allowing Jim Crow laws to dominate the South. It was the excuse for allowing sexist practices to dominate our institutions for centuries. We, who espouse equality and justice, must not allow such concerns to keep us from acting on our values and principles.
We can work to become a completely Welcoming Congregation while loving those for whom this may be a challenge. We can champion equal marriage laws without attempting to force other faiths to change their beliefs. We can love family members who succumb to fear of difference without yielding to their demands to conform to their prejudices. We can support our friends who are in or seek same-gender relationships. We can pray that they too, may experience the true Valentine experience of loving openly the one who gives their life meaning.
Those of us who love the poetry of Mary Oliver read her work with admiration, and a yearning to know more about the person behind the poetry. Centered always in the natural world, one can still pick up hints of the life that shaped the literature. In the last few years, it seems that life has expanded to include another person, a partner. Oliver is a private person, and I do not wish to invade that privacy. However, she now writes of love, a new subject for her.
West Wind begins with an invitation to join her in “life after earth-life.” The invitation is delivered to an anonymous “you.” Then she turns her imagination loose, evoking paired stones, fleas, or grass. She even envisions snowflakes marrying pine trees.
During the long poem, she returns to images of love and passion. At one point she admits that “lovers meet, quarrel, sicken, break apart, cry out.” Then she returns to the image of wind, and details what happens when it “flows itself over the windowsill and into the room.” It is, she says, “in love with disorganization.” She concludes the poem, and the book with this short stanza.
“In my room, after such disturbances I sit, smiling.
I pick up a pencil. I put it down. I pick it up again.
I am thinking of you.
I am always thinking of you.”
I pray that Mary Oliver will be treated equally in her living and loving.
I pray that Gert found a love that brought her happiness.
I pray that Jason Shelton, who gave us an anthem, will find a way to legalize his relationship.
I pray that all our friends and family can partake equally of this abundant society.
I pray that we liberal religionists will not falter in our task as we struggle to bring justice and equity to our society.
Shalom and Saalat.
Blessed Be and Amen.