This past summer at Hartford Pride I noticed that of all the booths and tents there nearly half were churches that were openly accepting of all GLBTI's and eager to engage them and hoping to bring them in as congregants. I found this refreshing to experience that religious organizations were openly accepting of me, my friends and my community.

I've been in a few different churches, synagogues, temples and mosques. Some were exclusionary for one thing or another. (typically race or ethnicity) but sometimes it was to bar people from a different version of their religion. But they get to be exclusionary. It’s really part of religion itself. Look around a lot of the conflicts around the world come down to exclusionary practices by religions.

So long as they understand that they can be exclusionary in their private place but cannot be exclusionary in public places they can hate all they want. I mean, look at the KKK. It’s got a church affiliate. Do you think they allow just anyone to join or even walk in to its spaces? I’m sure that even the janitor is whiter than me.

However, if a church is taking any government money to offer services that are typically government tasks then the church either needs to honor its contract with the government to the letter of the law or remove itself from the contact and services immediately.
I think that Jesus was right. Give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.

I still think that the faith based initiative was wrong as it placed federal funds into religious coffers to support government services that should have remain held in the public domain.

I live in Washington, DC. An amazing 79% of white voters in public opinion polling have indicated support for same sex marriage. The city council does not intend to send the issue to the voters for a referendum, with 11 of the 13 members currently co-sponsers.

The Catholic Church's strategy is :
1) disinformation
2) working with right wing republicans in the US Congress
3) exciting the black community.

1. Concerning the disinformtion, they claim that they will be forced to cease social services, Catholic Charities, AA meetings at their facilities if there is same sex marriage. The truth is that they MIGHT decide to do this, only because they would be subject to the city's Human Rights (non-discrimination) statute in some very few instances.
The Catholic Church used these same arguments of doctrine and right to discriminate in the 1980's when the Archbishop ordered Georgetown University ( a Catholic school) to shut down the gay/lesbian group. The gays and lesbians fought back in court , and the WON BIGTIME, with the church being ordered not only to permit the organization or forgo all government benefits , but they also had to pay more than $1 Million dollars of legal fees for the gay / lesbian students. The COurt ruled that if the Church is taking public funds for various programs, it must also be bound by the Human Rights law.
The Church cried wolf in the 1980's . It did not close down Georgetown University, and as a matter of fact, this year the university opened a LGBT Center. Congratulations to the students of the '80s who fought back.
The Church can continue all of its social programs if it uses its own money. They are asking for an unreasonable exception, the right to discriminate against LGBT, while using public funds as city contractors. The city would continue all the social programs without interruption, using different contractors.
Very likely, among the qualified bidders for these currently Catholic contracts, would be other religious groups, including the Episcopalians, who fully are supporting the same sex marriage law.

2. For those of you who do not know, the District of Columbia is "the last colony". We have no voting member of the US House of Representatives, or the US Senate. All of our city laws are subject to review by the US Congress, with the right to veto anything, even as small as the amounts to charge at parking meters. Nancy Pellosi has said that she will not allow this to come for a vote in the House, and Reid has been supportive in the Senate. However, the city could be blackmailed indirectly with other legislative maneuvers, such a holding up our federal payment ( what the rest of the country pays us for supplying all the police protection, etc to all the federal buildings and the employees who commute into DC every day to work, and go home to Maryland or Virginia at night, but whom we may not tax). So, in other words, anything is possible with the US Congress possibly involved.

3. The Catholics have banded earlier in this fight with a fundamentalist Baptist Minister called Bishop Harry Jackson from Maryland, who is giving speeches about the unmanly gays, the vileness of their sex acts, the unnaturalness, etc. Part of any strategy must be to shame the Catholics (the sooner the better) for taking such a low road.

Last summer, DC passed a law recognizing same sex marriages from other jurisdictions. This has been on the books since July 7, 2009. So far, none of the catastrophes predicted by the Catholic Church have occurred. I am not aware, and the Catholics do not cite, any such problems in other places where there have been same sex marriages, such as Massachusetts, Connecticut, and for awhile in California. They are literally chicken-littles crying that the sky is falling.

An interesting note: The Catholic Church only was involved in 6 out of a pitifully small 102 adoptions in DC last year. According to National Public Radio, an astounding 25% of all DC adoptions last year were by gays and lesbians, including many hard to place "special needs" children. In other words, the Church has failed totally in promoting adoptions among its straight brethren.

In the area now comprising the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington (until 1947 it was part of the Baltimore Archdiocese), the Catholic Church previously owned slaves, and also ran racially segregated institutions in Washington, DC. Surprise, I am my self a Catholic (I will not be kicked out) , and in my own Church (as one example) there once was separate seating for blacks and for whites. Of course, these situations are not unique among Catholics. However, they are indications that the Church is not usually a leader in recognizing civil rights.
As for their claims of being forced to violate their doctrines, the Catholics do not permit priests to marry, and have wives and children. However, just last week, the Pope himself cut a special deal in his attempt to poach Anglican and Episcopal clergy (even of married with kids) to jump ship and to join the Catholics. IN DC, there are already such married clergy, former Episcopalians who were women haters, and came over to avoid the female clergy in their church.

It would be a big mistake to allow the Church to get away with an exemption, allowing it ti discriminate against whomever it wants, citing doctrine. We live in a pluralistic society, and there is a coalition of over 200 clergy representing dozens of denominations who all fully support the proposed same sex marriage law.

I agree with your post that the religious arguments must be engaged, but in order to do so, it requires a huge factual background about the local situation here in DC.

Finally, the Catholic leaders have always opposed every issue that was gay related, whether concerning housing, employment, gay student organizations, etc. One should ask them, "What's new"?.

The July law recognizing same sex marriages from other jurisdictions was challenged by the above mentioned Bishop Harry Jackson (Baptist) and the court ruled that civil rights issues under the Human RIghts statute were not subject to a popular referendum. This is why the Catholic Church is currently so steamed, and calling for a vote. When was the last time they ever allowed an internal vote on anything in their authoritarian organization?

The Approve Referendum 71 campaigned sought out support from faith based communities early on and it paid off. The more support we got from faith communities, the more our opponents appeared to be the fringe minority.

Their faith statement in support of our campaign was very powerful, and can be found here
http://approvereferendum71.org/faith-coalition

Bishop Harry Jackson is not Baptist, he is non-denominational. Baptists do not have bishops.

With all my respect for Matt Comer, who I admire, I wonder which religious persuasions we'd be trying to communicate with. Even Christianity varies greatly. As a gay Roman Catholic northerner, I know there's that underlying tension between myself and someone like the Southern Protestant Matt. In a sense, we are born enemies. But I still love Matt's idea, overall.

Their reaction to that commercial would be "we do love our gay brothers and sisters, that's why we have to stand up against their evil, make their lives as hard as possible (insert anything from discrimination to the death penalty by torture) so others will be dissuaded, and pray they repent."

There's also that little problem that their interpretation of their (false) deity's proclamation about being gay is a lot more authentic than tolerance. God hates us. Yes, God hates shrimp too, but you're more likely to hurt the shellfish industry with that argument than to advance gay rights.

I think this should be definitely be a /piece/ of the fight, just not convinvced it's swing the troops enough.

The real issue that I have with the religious argue our rights are infinging on theirs is that their rights currently infringe on ours. I would not want to hire a religious person for my wedding services I could be guilty of discrimination because religious status is a protected class in most areas.

So, do Catholic organizations currently refuse health benefits, or downright refuse to employ people who break other Catholic rules? Must everyone go to Confession on a regular basis? Do they hire divorced people [who have not had anullments]? Do they check to make sure no one on the payroll is using birth control, or having sex out of wedlock?

If they do those things -- i.e., are consistent with their own doctrine in every other instance when employing and giving benefits to their workers, then they _might_ have a better argument when they say a law might force them to do something they find repugnant.

But I have this really strong hunch that their eyes are averted for convenience's sake in most of the cases I've described. They have decided to pick and choose within their comfort zones, and discriminate when they feel uncomfortable [or feel the group in question is easy to pick out, and not likely to have strong allies].

A gay couple, legally married, not using contraception, and wishing a child could result from all of their sexual activities, would actually be following Catholic doctrine in more ways than most R.Catholics currently run their families and sex lives.

Who has the credibility to win the hearts and minds of Christians? Gay Christians, like the members of the Gay Christian Network (gaychristian.net) who are doing it already...see Washington Post.com essay about it
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/guestvoices/2009/05/our_gay_christian_neighbors.html

I suggest something additional.

I think that it would be great if people like you had an organization that made it a point to have real live LGBT persons in small groups of 2,3, or 4 go to friendly or open churches to speak at different programs. It is amazing how many people in different parts of the country say that they do not personally know a gay person, and how many say that they have never had a conversation with one. Surveys show that this type of personal contact has a huge positive effect in supporting (voting for?) gay issues.

I would envision that the gay participants would have a few training sessions, on what the main points of the message should be, how to handle hostile questions, and what to avoid or to emphasize. I am surprised that even in denominations that are gay friendly (such as the Episcopalians) I have heard middle aged persons say that they have never know a homosexual, and how sorry they feel for "them." They are a bit taken aback when I let them know that I am both gay an married to a man.

Obviously, the LGBT speakers should totally avoid any discussion of the religious doctrine of any denomination, and stick to people to people issues. ("I'm the gay son taking care of my mother with Alzheimers" , "I am a lesbian former army sergent", etc.

This reminds me of the "homophile movement" (look it up in Wikipedia). Many homophile groups of the 1950's and 1960's went out to meet people/groups in this fashion. I attended such a meeting as an observer in the early 1970's in Boston. I think that this could be a great interfaith effort of lots of the LGBT religious groups also, since they are generally scorned by their own denominations, and spend lots of their time licking their wounds and wondering if things will ever get better.

You are entirely correct that the religious groups can not be ignored.

Bringing religion into politics is a vindictive act of bigotry and discrimination against atheists like myself. Sadly, I experience far more of this kind of bigotry in the lgbt community than I ever have heterosexist bigotry in the atheist community.

I disagree that "we have to use religion." What we need to do is to isolate the leadership of antigay religious bigotry in our struggle for civil equality, while advancing religion neutrality as in separation of church and state.

Many LGBT people are skeptical or even hostile toward religion. Gay organizations used to advance separation of church and state arguments, but today both HRC and NGLTF have "religion desks" to put positive spins on gays and religion. Gay film festivals are replete with films promoting a reconciliation of gays and religion. And all this is taking place at a time when polls show a growth in numbers of people calling themselves atheists or other types of "free thinkers."

I say that we continue to welcome the backing of pro-gay religious folk, while maintaining a separation of church and state stance. Take on and isolate bigot leadership of churches involved in campaigns against our civil rights.

Matt-

Are you familiar with this guy, John Corvino? I think that it is worth looking at his web-site, as well as listening to his uploads on YouTube. He is a university professor, who is doing something along the lines of what you are calling for.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SutThIFi24w

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qH-EYHWVejk

I will be interested to hear what you think of these.

also : www.johncorvino.com