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In NY, pro-equality clergy actually helped pass the marriage law



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The often untold story in the battle for marriage equality is that there are many religious leaders who are on the side of equality. Today's NYT "On Religion" column looks at "How Clergy Helped a Same-Sex Marriage Law Pass":

The conventional — and erroneous — perception of the gay-marriage issue is that it pits secular forces against religious ones. From New York to California, wherever and whenever the battle has flared, news coverage has focused almost entirely on the religious groups who uniformly denounce it: Mormons, Roman Catholics, evangelical Christians and many Hispanic Pentecostals and African-American Protestants.

Yet the passage of same-sex marriage in New York last month, just two years after its defeat here, attests to the concerted, sustained efforts by liberal Christian and Jewish clergy to advocate for it in the language of faith, to counter the language of morality voiced by foes. In so doing, they provided a kind of political and theological cover to the moderate and conservative state senators who cast the vital swing votes for a 33-to-29 margin.

“It’s like affirmation that this is a spiritual issue, and that it’s integral to a person’s faith,” said Ms. Taylor Sweringen, 54, during an interview this week at her Brooklyn home. “How can you be a person of faith and not be where the issues of justice are being debated?”
Yes, in fact, Archbishop Dolan, Brian Brown and that ultra-extreme whack job Rev. Jason McGuire do not speak for all people of faith.

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