A sermon preached by the Reverend Diane Teichert
Paint Branch Unitarian Universalist Church
February 14, 2010
My typical wedding ceremony begins,
“Dearly beloved, we have gathered here this day from near and from far. We have gathered here in a house of worship, where people of faith gather to worship, to marry, to welcome their young, and to mourn their loved ones. The word “worship” simply means “the naming and shaping of that which is worth and value.” Whatever our religious backgrounds and practices, this setting reminds us that today we have gathered to honor something of sacred worth, the power of love to create life anew. Love’s commitments will make of this couple a family, and of their household a home.”
Then, I go on: “Dearly beloved, we have gathered here today that Mark and Mary might bear witness before us and the world to the love that has grown up between them…” But after May 17, 2004 – the day when same-sex marriage became legal in Massachusetts – it could easily have been Mary and Melissa… or Mark and Matthew!
Whatever their names, I say, “we have gathered here today that might bear witness before us and the world to the love that has grown up between them; that they might affirm their oneness and their dedication here, as they have already affirmed to each other. The mysterious union of two persons in marriage occurs in the giving and receiving of their love and devotion. In witness to this mystery, they have come to pledge their affection and the sharing of their lives. They have gathered you together, their families and close friends, to witness this pledge and to ask you for your support, for they know marriage is no easy commitment to make or to keep.
To be true, this outward form must be a symbol of that which is inner and real: a sacred personal union, which a minister may bless and the state make legal, but which only love can create, and mutual loyalty fulfill.”
“Love and loyalty.”
Love and loyalty.
I remember myself at a young 22, never the romantic, responding to the first vulnerable declaration of love by the man whom I later married, with this demanding question, “what do you mean by ‘love’?” ! Poor guy!
What do we mean by “love” as in a “sacred personal union that only love can create”?
I asked my demanding question back in the nineteen seventies. In my circles, marriage was viewed as nothing more than a patriarchal institution effectively designed to hold women back. People had been marrying “for love” rather than “by arrangement” for a century, but mine was the generation that thought marriage was not required for love, or for sex.
I could see in the long-term relationships of lesbian couples I knew back then, that a marriage license is not essential to love, no more essential to love than it is a guarantor of love’s longevity, as the high heterosexual divorce rate shows.
So, there were moments in the equal marriage debate in MA when I had to wonder, why are we fighting so hard for something I once thought so flawed?
One answer is: for loyalty. Loyalty is difficult to maintain. As I typically say in my wedding ceremony, “marriage is no easy commitment to make or to keep.”
Having made a public commitment before family, friends and God, if by some name they worship, having benefited from the social and economic supports marriage provides…a couple is encouraged to be loyal through love’s inevitable low periods, when love ebbs in a long-time relationship.
In looking back over the thirty years I have been married, and the preceding five we’d been more or less together, I see loyalty carrying us through the times when love was lacking.
I remember one such period, early in our marriage, when love was lacking because his medical training schedule allowed us nearly no time together, and I said to myself, “If we weren’t married, I’d be out of here!” One day, arriving at the hospital to pick him up after a long rotation, I found myself throwing my mostly-eaten apple core at the hospital’s lawn sign, “So there!”
And, later, when our children were young and our work lives insecure, I recall feeling trapped and saying to one of my sisters, “If I’m this unhappy a year from now, I want you to remind me, so I can do something about it,” for the time discounting a year or two prior, when my father became ill and died, and I found in Don’s love more support than I could ever have imagined needing.
Love, whatever that means!, and loyalty. If not love for a while, then the other, loyalty.
Many of us, if not most of us, have faced loss and disappointment in our love lives. For some of you, death did the parting and left a space—in the house, in the bed, in the heart—that time will not ever fill.
For others, no serious relationship has yet materialized.
For yet others, the relationship ended in separation or divorce.
Was it love that was lacking? Or loyalty? Or, maybe, was it luck that was lacking? Or, selfknowledge? Which of these things and on whose part, or, more likely, both?
Or, was it not a lack in anything, really, but simply a growing apart, the maturing of two individuals in different directions?
For those facing recent loss and disappointment, it may be too early to say which it was – a lack in love, loyalty, luck, and/or self-knowledge and on whose part – or an inevitable growing apart. In time, with reflection, and perhaps with the help of family, friends, religious community or professionals, you will shape a story out of your experience and so will learn the lessons it has to offer you.
As years go by, the answers to our “why” questions about loss and disappointment evolve, as we come to know ourselves as whole and independent persons, perhaps for the first time, and the ragged edges of the torn relationship slowly mend, turned under like the edge of a hem.
So, it’s hard work to maintain a loving long-term relationship. At its best, the institution of marriage surrounds the couple with a network of financial, legal, social, familial and spiritual supports to make that hard work easier.
And, all of this about love and loyalty, hard work, challenges and delights in committed relationships is as true of gay and lesbian relationships as it is of heterosexual. So, why should the commitments of gays and lesbians not be not protected by the same laws, celebrated in the same ceremonies, supported by friends and family when the going gets rough? Why should one of them not be allowed to visit the other in the ICU, or be covered by the other’s health benefits, or inherit their jointly owned property, or be goofy and/or romantic toward the other in public on Valentine’s Day?
Let’s re-imagine a Valentine’s Day when gay couples can hold hands, sneak a kiss, buy flowers or gifts for one other openly, without experiencing stares, unkind comments, open hostility or violence. Let’s imagine a Valentine’s Day when a man can say say to his male partner, “On this Valentine’s Day, I want to ask, will you marry me?” and know that it will carry as much weight in our society as if his partner was a woman.
Let’s imagine a Valentine’s Day when a woman can say to her female lover, “On this Valentine’s Day, I want to ask, will you marry me?”and know that it opens up for them the same rights and responsibilities, challenges and delights as it would if her lover was a man.
As the Religious Coalition for Civil Marriage Equality explains, “Marriage as a civil institution, has changed greatly over time. This is not the first time our country has struggled with exclusion from and discrimination in marriage. Previous struggles have granted women equal partnership in marriage with their husbands and allowed persons of different races to marry one another. The ability to be married by a judge or clerk of the court, and not clergy, was another crucial evolution. In the same ways that these events have not changed the concept of marriage as the building block of stable relationships and healthy families, neither would ending the exclusion of gay people from marriage. It would merely remove a discriminatory barrier from the path of people who have made a personal commitment to each other and are now ready and willing to take on the responsibilities and legal commitment of civil marriage.”
As I say in my typical wedding ceremony, “To be true, the outward form of marriage must be a symbol of that which is inner and real: a sacred personal union, which I, as a minister, may bless and the state make legal, but which only love can create, and mutual loyalty fulfill.”
Before May 17, 2004, when officiating weddings I did not mention my role as agent of the state, because I didn’t feel comfortable with it. I still don’t. I believe wedding licenses should be signed by a public official, not clergy. I believe in the separation of church and state. I believe that all couples should be issued civil marriage licenses; those that want religious marriage ceremonies can so choose.
But, starting in May 2004, because of the historic decision in Massachusetts allowing gay couples to legally wed, I added a line to my typical wedding service script, “by the power vested in me by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts … I do declare you to be love-fully and lawfully … wed!” To date, I’ve not made it through that line at a gay wedding without pausing for euphoric cheers, clapping, whistling and even happy stamping of feet! I get goose bumps every time!
Having had that experience in Massachusetts, and knowing how hard people worked to achieve it, I am even more committed to doing my share to make it possible in Maryland too. And so today I am announcing that I have signed the Maryland Freedom to Marry Pledge, committing myself to forgo signing Maryland marriage licenses for heterosexual couples until it is legal to sign them for gay couples as well.
This only means that the couples whose weddings I will officiate will need to have the county or city clerk, or other recognized agent of the state, sign their marriage license, either before or after their wedding ceremony, as they so choose, as long as it is not less than one day but not more than sixty days from when the license was issued, as required by current state law.
For most couples, it will just require a return visit to their county offices. I fully expect that heterosexual couples will be glad to do so, to support the cause of equal marriage rights for all. I anticipate that my stance will not reduce the number of weddings I officiate.
In this small way, I am a conscientious objector, no longer implicitly supporting the unjust marriage laws of our state that offer the benefits of marriage only to heterosexual couples.
In this small way, I am also an educator, because I will need to explain my stance to each couple that asks to be married by me. It gives me the opportunity to talk with them about why I feel that gay and lesbian couples have the same hopes for a future together as they do and deserve the same rights and responsibilities in marriage as they do. I will listen to them, and hopefully win them over, if necessary.
In this small way, I am also an organizer. Each couple I marry will have taken one small step in support of the freedom to marry for gay and lesbian couples, paving the way to more active involvement in the cause, I hope.
Will you support me in my conscientious objection? If you will, say “I will.”
Will you join me in educating others about why the principles of our faith, especially our affirmation of the inherent worth and dignity of every person, call us to support equal marriage? If you will, say “I will.”
Will you do your part as an organizer, too, contacting your legislators in support of marriage equality whenever needed and motivating others to do so as well? If you will, say “I will.”
In many other communities across the country today, Unitarian Universalists are standing on the side of love to re-imagine a Valentine’s Day when the loving relationships of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people are as affirmed as those of straight people.
It’s not just in the United States! Far away in Africa, on this day, the Unitarian Universalist Association of Uganda is taking a strong and courageous stand against the Ugandan government’s proposed “Anti-Homosexuality Bill of 2009.” This hate-filled legislation, proposed in the Ugandan Parliament, would criminalize homosexuality and enforce penalties of life imprisonment and capital punishment against gays and lesbians. Bisexual, Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender (BGLT) allies would also face drastic punishments.
The Unitarian Universalist (UU) Church of Kampala is one of the few religious organizations in Uganda that is welcoming and supportive of the BGLT community. During a visit with the Kampala congregation in 2008 UUA representatives met with both gay and straight Ugandans who offered powerful accounts of the terror that the Ugandan BGLT community faces, and the importance of the congregation’s support. This visit occurred many months before the current legislation was proposed.
Ugandan UUs are holding a conference today to highlight the need for an end to discriminatory treatment of the BGLT population—and their allies—in the country. More than 200 Ugandans from various faith traditions are expected to have the courage to attend.
Today we join with all people everywhere in re-imagining a Valentine’s Day when gay couples can be open about their romances and commitments, and even legally marry. So may it be in Maryland, soon!
Knowing that we’ve got a long way to go toward marriage equality, so long that many longtime gay couples may not see it in their their lifetimes, and knowing the way ahead toward peace and justice for all is an even longer road than that, let us rise in body or in spirit and sing together “We’ll Build a Land.”
Benediction From the Charge to the Couple from The Book of Pagan Rituals
Have no fear, and let not the ways or words
Of the unenlightened give you unease.
For the spirit of life and of love is with you.