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FL, USA: Methodists to Debate Marriage Equality

Friday, April 27th, 2012

As nearly 1,000 delegates from across the world gather in Tampa, Fla., for the United Methodist Church’s General Conference, gay and lesbian activists have printed pamphlets promoting their cause in five languages, including Portuguese and Swahili.

The UMC’s global reach, stretching from the Philippines to Philadelphia, compels the multilingual lobbying. Nearly 40 percent of the delegates, who meet through May 4, live outside the United States, according to church leaders.

“We see it as a challenge to deal with the cultural differences,” said Bishop Rosemarie Wenner of Germany, who will be installed in Tampa as president of the UMC’s Council of Bishops. “But we also see it as a gift.”

Full Story from The Washington Post

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Tags: florida, general conference, marriage equality, methodist church, tampa

DC, USA: Methodist Church Leads the Way to Allowing Gay Weddings in Churches

Saturday, April 7th, 2012

A Washington church hopes a campaign using video testimonials from gay and lesbian Methodists will help push through a resolution sanctioning marriage equality in the church later this month, reversing more than 30 years of anti-gay sentiment in the nation’s third largest denomination.

DoorsToEquality.org, described as a national, laity-led campaign for marriage equality, uses personalized stories and grassroots advocacy to encourage church leadership to revise what some are calling discriminatory language included in the Book of Discipline, according to organizers at Foundry United Methodist Church.

The book, which lays out the tenets of the faith, prohibits United Methodist ministers from performing same-sex marriages and churches from hosting them. Foundry leaders and campaign supporters say they don’t want a sweeping change to the tenets, rather, a compromise.

Full Story from The Washington Blade

Click here for gay wedding resources in Washington, DC.

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Tags: Gay Marriage, gay weddings, marriage equality, methodist church, washington dc

Pro Gay Methodists to Challenge Church on Marriage Equality Stance

Friday, August 26th, 2011

Activists for LGBT equality within the United Methodist Church are meeting in Ohio this weekend to make plans to challenge church policy on homosexuality and same-sex marriage.

The Reconciling Ministries Network and the Methodist Federation for Social Action are holding their first joint meeting as they prepare to lobby the denomination to ordain openly gay clergy, bless same-sex unions, and discard its tenet that “the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching.”

Nearly 700 Methodist clergy and laypeople from around the nation are attending the four-day gathering, called Sing a New Song, which opened Thursday in Huron, Ohio. They are strategizing for the Methodists’ General Conference, a policy-making meeting that convenes once every four years; the next one will be held in April in Tampa, Fla.

Full Story from The Advocate

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Tags: activists, Gay Marriage, methodist church

WI: Suspended Lesbian Pastor Would Perform a Gay Wedding Again

Tuesday, June 28th, 2011

A gay Wisconsin pastor suspended for officiating a same-sex marriage says she would do it all over again in heartbeat.

Last Friday, a clergy jury found Rev. Amy DeLong guilty of conducting a 2009 lesbian union. Her church trial lasted nearly three days but she was all smiles the entire time. DeLong said she had to be jubilant because she believed her trial was breaking a long silence within the United Methodist Church.

“As a gay person in the church, we’re always asked to compromise about our relationships,” DeLong said. The 44-year-old said for a long time she was torn between obeying the church and obeying herself. But now she is done compromising.

Full Story from KARE

Click here for gay marriage resources in Wisconsin.

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Tags: gay wedding, methodist church, pastor, wisconsin

Methodist Ministers in New England to Defy Church, Marry Gay, Lesbian Couples

Monday, June 27th, 2011

More than 100 Methodist ministers in New England have pledged to marry gay couples in defiance of the denomination’s national leadership, which maintains a ban on same-sex unions.

Roughly 1 out of 9 Methodist clergy in the region signed a statement this month pledging to open their churches to gay and lesbian couples.

“We repent that it has taken us so long to act,” they wrote in the statement.

Full Story from Boston.com

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Tags: clergy, gay weddings, methodist church

DC Church Pushes for Marriage Equality Throughout Methodist Church

Tuesday, May 31st, 2011

DC’s Foundry United Methodist Church has a rich history. It’s the church attended by the Clintons when Bill was president. And, the Church and its Senior Minister, Rev. Dean Snyder, are now taking a leading role in changing the United Methodist Church’s position on same sex-marriage. There was major progress in that direction over the weekend. From Washington Post:

The Baltimore-Washington Conference of the United Methodist Church narrowly approved a groundbreaking same-sex marriage resolution Saturday, setting the stage for a high-stakes vote on the matter at the national conference next year.

The resolution, passed at the church’s annual local conference, would amend the church’s Book of Discipline to allow pastors to perform same-sex marriages and ceremonies in member churches in jurisdictions where legislatures already have approved gay marriage laws, such as the District.

Full Story from AmericaBlog

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Tags: marriage equality, methodist church, washington dc

DC: Methodist Church Votes to Allow Gat Weddings

Thursday, September 30th, 2010

The Washington, D.C. based Foundry United Methodist Church has voted to oppose official UM doctrine on the incompatibility of same-sex sexual relationships and Christian sexual ethics and to allow its sanctuary to be used for same-sex marriage ceremonies and its clergy to perform same-sex marriage ceremonies. According to the church’s website:

“On Sunday, September 26, 2010, the members of Foundry United Methodist Church voted to allow same-gender marriages performed in its building, and to support any member of the Foundry clergy who chooses to celebrate a same-gender marriage at Foundry or elsewhere.”

The vote to adopt this policy was 367 to 8. It took place at a Church Conference duly convened under the Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church. The vote was preceded by a four-month-long period of discernment during which the congregation spent much time considering this policy in prayer, study, discussion and congregational conversations.

Full Story from The Examiner

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Tags: Gay Marriage, gay weddings, marriage equality, methodist church, same sex marriage, washington dc