Rochester Friends Meeting Endorses "Equal Marriage" Statement


The Rochester Friends Meeting has passed a Minute endorsing the statement put forward by The Rochester Religious Coalition for Equal Marriage. Text of the statement included here, as well as a little commentary by me.

The Rochester Friends Meeting (officially The Rochester Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends) passed a Minute at their April 11, 2004, monthly business meeting supporting the following statement put forward by The Rochester Religious Coalition for Equal Marriage:

We, the undersigned, draw on our many faith traditions to arrive at a common conviction: we are resolved that the state should not interfere with same-sex couples who choose to marry and share fully and equally in the rights, responsibilities, and commitments of civil marriage. We, therefore, oppose a constitutional amendment defining marriage as only between a man and a woman.

A constitutional amendment denying the legal rights and privileges of civil marriage to an entire group of people would signal a step backward in the continuing struggle for justice for all. We respect the fact that debate and discussion continue in many of our religious communities as to the theological and liturgical issues involved and we affirm the right to religious groups to freedom of conscience in this matter. We recognize that the state must not require religious groups to officiate at, or bless, same-sex marriages. By the same token, the state may not favor the convictions of one religious group over another to deny individuals their fundamental right to marry and have those marriages recognized by civil law.

As people of diverse faith, as lay people, religious leadership, and clergy in Greater Rochester we call upon all people, including our elected leaders, to oppose any constitutional amendment denying the rights of civil marriage to same-sex couples. Religious marriage should be left to religious institutions. Civil marriage is a civil right which should be available to all.

I was present at the business meeting where discussion of this statement occurred. Among Quakers, passage of endorsements like these, as well as other matters of concern to the Meeting community, require a full consensus on decisions made by the Meeting as a whole. Consensus is also used in decisions made by committees. If there is any strong dissenting opinion -- that is, if there is anyone who feels so strongly that a decision is wrong that she or he will stand in the way -- discussion continues until everyone is on board. Although occasionally Meetings do make mistakes, the process generally has stood Quakers in good stead for more than 350 years.

I am pleased -- though not at all surprised -- that the Rochester Friends Meeting has chosen to endorse this statement. The Meeting has a long history of supporting equal rights for gays, lesbians, and transgendered people. In 1989, the Meeting passed a Minute on marriage, which supported marriage within the Meeting for all regardless of sexual orientation. (The text of that Minute will be put here as soon as I can get my hands on it.)

Quakers in general (at least, those connected with the Friends General Conference) have been at the forefront of recognizing same-sex relationships, beginning in the early 1970s.

The following is a passage from an article on the FGC website by Jerry Frost:

Friends began to discuss openly homosexuality around 1970 at a Conference on Sexuality of the New Swarthmore movement, in articles in the Friends Journal, written by gays using pseudonyms, and in young men's declaring that they were gay in meetings for worship. An ad which appeared in the Journal and New Republic brought a hundred responses. At the FGC Ithaca conference in 1972 gay Friends roomed in a dorm reserved for old folks (away from children) and had their own worship sharing groups.

The executive committee planning the 1972 conference had agreed that unmarried couples could be housed together because Friends had no basis to judge who was married and who was not. This policy was highly controversial and was rescinded after a threshing session of the executive committee. Mixed housing would be provided only for married couples. By 1975 the executive committee recommended that Friends be "sensitive" in making roommate selections, but that their preference would be granted. The high schoolers had separate dorms for girls and boys. College age students were treated as adults.

The decision of gay and lesbian Friends to form a caucus in 1971 and to confront meetings with their presence forced many straight Quakers who might have preferred for the whole subject to go away to face the issue. The alternatives became: do we drive these people away and, in essence, deny that they are children of God, or do we include them and learn to deal with their definition of sexuality?

A weighty Friend told me she began attending the worship periods sponsored by the Friends for Gay Concerns at FGC because she found the larger services too often became "popcorn" meetings. She and others found the gays had a depth of spirituality, perhaps occasioned by their sense of suffering, that was authentic. Friends soon realized that there were a substantial number of gay and lesbians attending FGC, and that they liked and admired them.

FGC always took pride in its sense of inclusiveness, and the decision to provide a supportive environment came with what for Friends was surprising speed. In 1972, after Quaker Mary Calderone lectured, New York Yearly Meeting endorsed equal civil rights for gay and lesbians. In 1973 PYM [Pacific Yearly Meeting] authored an ad hoc Committee of Gay and Lesbian Concerns which became a standing committee in 1976. In 1974 Young Friends of North America issued a declaration calling for the "equality of All persons before the Eternal in matters Spiritual regardless of their sexual orientation." In 1975, when the FCGC began issuing a newsletter, FGC had decided that gay couples could room together and pay the same lower room rate as married couples; the next year it scheduled the first discussion group. In the fall of 1975 four AFSC staffers publicly announced they were gay; in 1978 eighteen more came out and received a letter of support from 250 people in the organization. This letter called the treatment of homosexuals a civil rights issue and demanded that within five years there be on all AFSC committees 20% Third World people, 40% women, and a gay presence.

The Religious Society of Friends has also been in the forefront of other progressive movements, including the abolition of slavery and equal rights for women. Long before there were female ministers in other congregations, women spoke in Quaker meetings in response to the leadings of their spirits.

So it is with great pride that I publicize my Meeting's endorsement of equal marriage rights for all. And it is with deep respect for one of my brothers who is gay, and for my many friends who are gay, lesbian or transgendered that I add my own, hear, hear!!


Posted: Tue - April 27, 2004 at 09:24 AM          

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