Monday, June 16, Del Martin, 87, and Phyllis Lyon, 84, were married by San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom in a special ceremony at City Hall in San Francisco.
The elderly couple, long involved in the struggle to gain the right of marriage for the GLBT community, at long last can look at one another, after 55 years of love, with the legal rights and responsibilities of marriage. Hats off to them and to everyone who made this good day possible for the great state of California.
Is love a threat?
The only threat here are small-minded Christians and reactive conservatives who will fight this tooth and claw. Why?
I've given up trying to understand their mind and heart on this one. Though I know the essential arguments - "the Bible says so" (no, it doesn't!) and this is threat to "real" families (a family is any unit wherein love is received and love is given). I can't help but feel some hell-driven fear at the root of their concerns, a fearfulness that distorts all of their perceptions and imprisons them in ideas and practices from which only grace can deliver them.
But enough about them for now; we'll be hearing a lot of them in the months to come.
But for now, let's take a deep breath, celebrate this moment and enjoy our friends and family members who have a chance to fully and publicly honor their heart and their commitments.
