marriage equality

Evangelical Lutheran Church leaders in Minneapolis have decided they will not endorse a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage in Minnesota. One out of every four Minnesotans belongs to the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America."Our daughter came out as a lesbian 12 years ago," a church member said. "There was shock, fear for her safety, questions, with no answers, silent grief." The member made it her mission to find out as much as possible about her daughter's world. "I needed to know. I needed to learn. We all need to learn. Was some of it uncomfortable? You betcha.

Miley Cyrus’ op-ed column in the March issue of Glamour Magazine explains that she understands the importance of marriage equality. We're thankful she's supportive of our personal liberties. Miley writes: When I shared a picture of my tattoo on my Twitter page and said, All LOVE is equal, a lot of people mocked me—they said, What happened to you? You used to be a Christian girl! And I said, Well, if you were a true Christian, you would have your facts straight.

First-year college students' political and social views continue to shift in a progressive direction. An unprecedented 71.3 percent of incoming college students indicated that same-sex couples should have the right to legal marital status, compared with 64.9 percent in 2009, according to the 2011 CIRP Freshman Survey, which is based on the responses of more than 200,000 first-time full-time students entering four-year colleges across the country.

Here's a complete list (so far) of U.S. mayors who support Freedom to Marry. The statement the group signed includes: "As mayors of great American cities, we proudly stand together in support of the freedom of same-sex couples to marry. We personally know many gay and lesbian people living in our cities who are in committed, loving relationships, who are active participants in the civic life of our communities, and who deserve to be able to marry the person with whom they share their life..."

Gay rights advocates from Wall Street to Hollywood poured donations into the budgets of four little-known Republican state senators after the lawmakers provided the decisive votes for same-sex marriage in New York last June, according to new campaign finance filings. Independent Bloomberg co-hosted a fund-raiser for the four Republicans, and contributed $10,000 to each. Maryland, New Jersey, and Washington state are expected to consider marriage equality legislation this year.

[via NYT]

Vowing to make a bill legalizing same-sex marriage a priority, the N.J. legislative leaders say they plan to make marriage equality a centerpiece of the new session that begins this week. "It's going be a fight," Senate President Stephen Sweeney (pictured) said. "We expect it to be a fight. The governor’s a decent person, and I think we can work on educating him to the fact of what it means." He doesn't expect a battle in the new Legislature, but rather with Gov. Chris Christie, who has been a staunch opponent of it.

There's been a sharp increase of marriage licenses issued in NYC over the past six months. Actually 14% more than last year during this time period. Almost all of them are believed to have been granted to same-sex couples. “We're overwhelmed,” Michael McSweeney, NYC city clerk, said. “It's been much busier for us than this time last year, but we're delighted to see the extra business because we understand the impact. We're handling it. We're thrilled.” New York legalized marriage equality in June and the law took effect in July.