A Letter From The President

 Bob Dorr, PFLAG Omaha

 Posted on March 23, 2004

This is turning out to be one wild year, perhaps a watershed year for gay rights. In San Francisco, Portland and Canada, same-sex couples have been getting married by the thousands. On television and in newspaper pictures, their faces radiate joy. They are our family members, our friends, couples we would like to know making a lifetime, public commitment to each other.

We don’t know yet whether these marriages will survive court challenges and win legal recognition across the nation so the couples can receive the same benefits that other married Americans already have. But surely, by becoming so visible, these couples have advanced the day when marriage is available equally to opposite-sex and same-sex couples.

One couple from Omaha, Michael Orr and Thomas Pate, who have been together 11 years, got married in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada. Michael and Tom emailed friends this message: “On Monday, March 15th at 3 p.m., we exchanged vows. We are now legally married. Maybe Nebraska won’t recognize the marriage—yet. But one thing is for sure—Bush Can’t Take It Away!”

How do we stay informed? What can we do?

If you have email, and you are not already on our list of members and supporters to whom we forward the National PFLAG Weekly Alert, please let us know and we’ll put you on the list.

You can write, email or call your elected representatives to say how much the equality-in-marriage issue means to you and your family, or write a letter to the editor in the newspaper.

Come to PFLAG’s April 8 meeting to learn more about marriage for same-sex couples. Donna Colley, an Omaha attorney, will speak on that and other issues. She and her spouse, Margaux Towne-Colley, who are raising their two-year-old son, Grayson, were instrumental in founding Real Families, an organization of gay and lesbian couples with children. Donna and Margaux also are active in Citizens for Equal Protection. They traveled to Vermont to become united in a civil union. They have become increasingly visible advocates for gay rights. Their story has been told in The Omaha World-Herald and USA Today. They are PFLAG members.

Civil unions, by the way, seem to be winning more support from the public. A recent nationwide USA Today/CNN/Gallup Poll found that 54 percent of Americans support legalizing civil unions for gay couples, and 42 percent oppose them. That’s a change from last July, when respondents opposed civil unions by 57 percent to 40 percent.

The April 8 PFLAG meeting, as always, will start at 7 p.m., with support time. The program is at 8 p.m. Come at 6:30 p.m. for coffee and socializing. The meeting will be at First United Methodist Church, 7020 Cass St., in Mead Hall at the building’s west end.

Marriage equality for same-sex couples is an issue that we can be optimistic about. Even with President Bush’s support, a proposed Federal Marriage Amendment to the Constitution prohibiting same-sex marriages seems unlikely to make it out of Congress. The amendment’s opponents include conservatives who believe that defining marriage should be left to the states and not placed in the U.S. Constitution. One website that covers gay issues counted 48 senators who have announced their opposition to a constitutional amendment or are leaning against an amendment. It takes just one-third of the Senate, 34 votes, to stop the proposed amendment.

Two of those opposing the amendment are Nebraska’s senators, Chuck Hagel, a Republican, and Ben Nelson, a Democrat—even though both Hagel and Nelson oppose same-sex marriage. PFLAG Board Member Barbara Johnson and I joined a small group of Lincoln PFLAG and Real Families members who visited recently with U.S. Sen. Ben Nelson in his Omaha office. We thanked Nelson for his opposition to the proposed amendment.

On a personal note, my wife, Betty, and I join many others in being overjoyed that the Rev. Karen Dammann was acquitted recently of a charge of violating United Methodist Church law by being in a lesbian relationship. The jurors were not convinced that the Book of Discipline, the church law, prohibits gay men and lesbians from serving as ministers, said a spokeswoman for the 13 ministers who served as jurors. With the verdict, which can’t be appealed, Karen will be permitted to remain in the United Methodist Church ministry.

Betty attended part of the church trial in a suburb of Seattle, Wash., and took part in a demonstration supporting Karen Dammann.

First United Methodist Church, where Omaha PFLAG meets each month, is a member of the Reconciling Ministries Network, a national United Methodist Church network that seeks full inclusion of gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgenders in the church. First United Methodist, where Betty and I are members, is a church that is fully open to all.

Bob Dorr, president