Catholics for Marriage Equality

categories: 2009 Election, Gay Rights and Religion, Religion and LGBT Rights, State LGBT News

Published September 17, 2009 @ 08:53AM PT

Catholic Church

Much has been said about just how heavily involved the Roman Catholic Church in Maine is with trying to take away marriage rights for gays and lesbians in the state. The Maine Church has lent their public relations guru, Marc Mutty, to help direct efforts to repeal rights from gays and lesbians, and has helped fundraise for discrimination by hosting special collections in churches up and down the coast. Thankfully, not all Catholics are siding with the official church line.

A smaller but outspoken group of Catholics are starting to organize in Maine to push back against the discriminatory rhetoric coming out of the official church in Maine. As SeacoastOnline points out, these Catholics are trying to reclaim a bit of their Church identity, by pointing out that "God is love," not "God is discriminatory."

The group has started to circulate a petition to organize Catholics around the issue of marriage equality and equal rights. Part of the petition reads: "As faithful Roman Catholics and citizens of the state of Maine, we believe that the right of every citizen to practice freedom of religion is based on the principle of respect for the dignity of each individual."

Better yet, the petition points out that Catholics were once denied certain civil rights because of their identity. For the Catholic Church to now push discrimination instead of acceptance is an ugly ironic twist.

Finally there's an alternative storyline coming out of Maine that says, a) not all Catholics are bigots, and b) while the official Church might like to muddy the waters between church and state, not all Catholics are on board.

Meanwhile, the No on 1 campaign continues to run a wonderful campaign to try and preserve rights for gays and lesbians in Maine. Their commercial this week hitting back at lies and smears coming from anti-gay organizers is fantastic. Together, folks from across all religious stripes are supporting the No on 1 campaign. You can, too.

(Photo courtesy of HouseofSims' photostream on Flickr.)

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Comments (25)

What is this Catholic group in maine called? My family did not attend church last week due to the second collection. Just wondering how to get involved in this effort.

Posted by Billi Blanchard on 09/17/2009 @ 12:21PM PT
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Hey there Billi, here are a few link from one of the articles listed above (my guess is you would be looking for either the first or second one, but they all are related to this cause:)

www.religiouscoalition.org

www.catholicsformarriageequality.org

www.standformarriagemaine.com

www.mainefreedomtomarry.com

Posted by Dave Hershey on 09/21/2009 @ 07:06PM PT
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Thank you for the links! :)

Posted by Billi Blanchard on 09/22/2009 @ 06:54AM PT
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Thank you for the links! :)

Posted by Billi Blanchard on 09/22/2009 @ 06:54AM PT
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It's good that there are Catholics in Maine who support the important right of same-sex marriage. The official Catholic Church of Maine is an intolerant organization which is being helped by the intolerant Marc Mutty, but the No on 1 campaign is great campaign for protecting the bill in Maine which recognized same-sex marriage. Catholics who support same-sex marriage are better Catholics than those who are intolerant because tolerance is part of Catholic belief.

Posted by Edwin Bonilla on 09/17/2009 @ 03:02PM PT
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What people don't seem to take into account is that there is no Jesus. The character of Jesus was derived from older mythologies . The book THE JESUS MYSTERIES by Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy show the verifiable facts that the Jesus story in the Christian bible was taken directly from Egypt (Osiris), Greece (Dionysus), Persia (Mithras), Rome (Bacchus), etc. So people, Catholic or otherwise, don't realize that their bigoted beliefs come from a bible that is just retellings of older homophobic myths. Everything from Jesus' being born of a virgin in a cave and son of a god, being killed on a tree, rising on the 3rd day, even the very dates all come from older myths as do the bits about a star guiding wise men to the child, all of it comes from other myths and are just stories. Most of the old testament were also borrowed from other older cultures. Why transport old bigotries to 21st century America. My husband and I are atheists. He is a "recovering" Catholic.

Posted by Terri Merritts on 09/17/2009 @ 04:52PM PT
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These so-called faithful Catholics have a very poor understanding of their faith and its teachings. The very phrase gay marriage is an oxymoron. And Terri, many of us are aware of the claims that Jesus never existed. Of course, they ignore the writings of Josephus.

Posted by Thomas Berg on 09/17/2009 @ 05:28PM PT
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No mr. berg...

You and every other bible thumper who professes love and loyalty for jesus while being prejudiced against a group of people who has a different sexual orientation than you are oxy morons...Emphasis on moron.

Posted by Thomas McHugh on 09/18/2009 @ 03:50PM PT
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Ah. Hello again Mr. Berg,

Please continue your campaign. It will only make it that much easier to regulate the public practice of the rampant cancer you proselytize from we call fundamentalism. So keep on disrespecting peoples faiths who don't conform exactly to yours and soon we can put this whole mythology of religion thing behind us and mentally evolve to be better human beings.

You know what those two word mean right Mr. Berg; mentally evolve. Its intellectual for, mature thy self. To put it bluntly GROW UP!

Have a nice night.

Posted by Chris Marshall on 09/18/2009 @ 09:27PM PT
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Every person on this planet has the Right to be Safe, Respected and Free. Religion is meant to be an 'enhancement, enrichment, enlightenment; and entrusting, enveloping,encouraging' those who need and believe..it is 'people' that require these things..if nothing is said about their faith, politics, origin, nationality, race, creed, or anything else that makes us all different, then we all have something in common; we all were born, we have have necessities, we all die...what about the rights to knowledge and the Right to be 'Loved'..

FYI: Gay is males having too many female hormones and not enough male..God doesn't make mistakes..Protect each other, ok?!

__ Humanitarianism First..

Posted by gwenn meltzer on 09/17/2009 @ 09:06PM PT
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Um... no Meltzer Gay does not mean males dont have enough hormones to be male. I am severely offended by this. I am a male, I take pride that I am a male. I dont speak with a lisp, or wave my hands like a fairy, or look anorexic.

I am a scientist and a martial artist, who gets pissed if I miss my favorite team, the Red Wings on TV. My hormone levels are absolutely the same as a heterosexual male. I paintball and air-soft regularly. I bungee jump every Saturday morning with my jumping buddies. I am not a female, nor do I know any gay male who is "not enough to be male." There is no such thing as gender roles for LGBT couples and that is why the science confirms why our relationships are much stronger and longer lasting than heterosexuals. I am insulted that even people like you who are supporters of LGBT think that everything is still black and white. Well guess what its not. There is only grey. And FYI there are also many females who do the same things I do and I mean "straight females," who have enough hormones, like I have hormones, to be the sex that we are.

Please inform yourself on sexual orientation from this link from my constituents the American Psychological Association. Just because some gay males are feministic does not mean we are all feministic, nor does that mean that straight males can't be feministic either.

LINK: http://www.apahelpcenter.org/articles/article.php?id=31

And from Religious Tolerance.ORG

http://www.religioustolerance.org/homosexu.htm

Posted by Chris Marshall on 09/18/2009 @ 09:41PM PT
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When religion is used to restrict the rights of other consenting adults something has to give. Gay marriage in no way restricts the rights of straight people. You can believe anything you want, Mr. Berg but you have no right to have those rights restrict the civil rights of LGBTQ people and that includes the right to marry.

Posted by Ioan Lightoller on 09/18/2009 @ 07:24AM PT
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Actually, society has a right to restrict things like who can marry who. Hence we have rules on age of consent, cousins, etc. I know you all leap to Loving, but the Loving decision did not completely redefine marriage. This gay marriage nonsense does.

Posted by Thomas Berg on 09/18/2009 @ 07:54AM PT
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1 : Marriage has been continualy redefined for centuries...And inter racial marriage was the latest redefinition of it across the board.

2 : The reasons you cite such as age of consent and familial relations are logical while denying equality to homosexuals isnt.

Posted by Thomas McHugh on 09/18/2009 @ 03:54PM PT
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Gay marriage doesn't redefine marriage. Please. There's absolutely no evidence to show that gay marriage has a negative impact on society. Far from it. Massachusetts, which has had legal gay marriage for nearly five years, has the lowest divorce rates in the country. That's some negative impact.

I grow completely impatient with people who say that gay marriage redefines marriage. The only thing we're redefining is a society that says treating people like second-class citizens is OK. Otherwise, give me one example of how gay marriage affects your marriage. I'm assuming you can't, although I'll be waiting with baited breath.

Posted by Michael Jones on 09/18/2009 @ 08:03AM PT
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I too would like very much to hear an intelligent and logical example of how same sex marriage harms heterosexual marriage...

Posted by Thomas McHugh on 09/18/2009 @ 03:57PM PT
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Actually, I'd like to hear that, too. Problem is, whenever the question of homosexual marriage harming heterosexual marriages comes up, it gets shrugged off.

Then again, let's get to the real meat of the matter: what gays want is access to a legal contract that has nothing to do with churches, religion or anything else.

A marriage is a spiritual institution. Legally, it means nothing, until a piece of paper is signed. This piece of paper can be obtained by going to the justice of the peace and circumventing churches entirely.

There is nothing logical about keeping a piece of paper away from one group of people. Churches, as private institutions, can refuse to marry certain people, even straight couples. But it's wrong to keep the legal stuff from certain groups.

Let me sign my piece of paper, and Mr. Berg and anyone else who's against it can just not enter into that contract with someone of their gender. Simple as that.

Posted by Mike Conway on 09/21/2009 @ 04:41AM PT
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You are nonsensical, Mr Berg, not same-sex marriage. You simply hate the idea of LGBTQ people having open honest lives and their relationships honoured alongside others. You are a homophobic hater and we get that. You want us treated as second-or third-class citizens...that is what will get redifined if marriage equality is enacted throughout the US.

Posted by Ioan Lightoller on 09/18/2009 @ 08:34AM PT
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Mr. Berg,

It saddens me that you feel as though you have the authority to tell other Catholics their faith and understanding of the Catholic Church is somehow sub-par to your own. Who gave you the heavenly authority to judge others? If you only spent more time focusing on positive causes—the LOVE not hate kind. I embrace all people, regardless of who they choose to love. We certainly need more love in this world. We do not have the power to judge, nor should we want it. It’s also important to understand that there are plenty of WONDERFUL LOVING Catholics that even WORK for the Church that disagree with this campaign. They seem to understand and grasp the concept of this being an issue separate of the Church. The separation of church and state is important here. Never will the Catholic Church be told they need to perform “gay Marriage” within its doors. Marriage can be defined one way within the Church and another way with the State. Just like hundreds of other words in our language have several different meanings. The Church does not own, “marriage” and its definition.

Marriage can be a lovely civil act for all GBLT people, without ever having to ‘hurt’ our Church.

No on 1:)

Posted by Billi Blanchard on 09/18/2009 @ 08:35AM PT
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Okay, who the hell let Mr. Berg out of his "straight" jacket?

Posted by Dave Hershey on 09/19/2009 @ 09:32AM PT
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Hell if I know but someone needs to put him back in it then give him a strong dose of reality...

Posted by Thomas McHugh on 09/19/2009 @ 05:37PM PT
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I like your way of thinking mr. marshall...

Posted by Thomas McHugh on 09/20/2009 @ 05:25PM PT
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What happened to mr. marshal's comment that I responded to ?

Posted by Thomas McHugh on 09/24/2009 @ 12:43AM PT
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I was raised Catholic and it does my heart good to see Catholics expressing the church's message of love towards others in such a way. Good going!

Posted by Mike Conway on 09/21/2009 @ 04:32AM PT
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I cannot tell you wonderful people how encouraging it is to hear Catholics like the Fathers and Sisters who raised me in the 70s. Ours was a Church of tolerance, non-judgement, expansion of rights, freedoms, and letting God do whatever judging might need to be done. I had all but given up on Catholics when I saw the Right-wing hysteria taking over. It is so good to know my Brothers and Sisters are still here, still speaking from the soul on behalf of Jesus' gay disciples. "The Disciple Jesus Loved?" I have often wondered....

Posted by Sue Bielenberg on 10/03/2009 @ 10:37PM PT
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Michael is the Communications Director for the Human Rights Program at Harvard Law School, and previously was Communications Director for Pax Christi USA, a progressive Catholic human rights organization.