New York Times Editorial: The Church and the Capital

New York Times Editorial: The Church and the Capital
Copyright by the New York Times
Published: November 22, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/23/opinion/23mon1.html?th&emc=th


Gay people will eventually win full civil rights — including the right to marry — throughout the United States. Between now and then, there will be many more disputes like the one unfolding between the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington and the District of Columbia City Council over a bill recognizing same-sex marriages that could be voted on as soon as next week.

City lawmakers who are negotiating with the archdiocese over the language of the bill should try to settle it without acrimony — but not by abandoning the District’s equal-rights tradition or by selling out same-sex couples.

The District of Columbia has a distinguished tradition of statutes dating back to the 1970s that protect the rights of gay people. It passed its first domestic partnership law nearly 20 years ago and recently recognized same-sex marriages created in other jurisdictions.

The pending bill appropriately exempts religious institutions from having to marry same-sex couples, promote same-sex marriage or rent church property to them for receptions or other affairs. But this bill rightly requires that employers providing spousal benefits to employees extend those same benefits to same-sex partners who marry.

This law, which deals in the civic institution of marriage and not religious doctrine, would cover Catholic Charities, an organization that receives public funds and that does extraordinary work feeding and housing the poor in Washington and elsewhere in the country.

In an article in The Washington Post on Sunday, the archbishop of Washington said the diocese “has long made it clear that all people have equal dignity, regardless of sexual orientation.” But he said the new definition of marriage laid out in the bill could end the decades-old partnership between the church and the city in the mission of caring for the needy.

This has troubled some Catholics, who believe the church is holding the poor hostage to force changes in the bill. It has also disturbed other churches and denominations that have long wanted to perform same-sex marriages but were precluded from doing so by city law.

Critics of the archdiocese’s position rightly point out that other Catholic leaders have found a way to accommodate same-sex partnerships without compromising their values.

As has been noted by some members of the City Council, Georgetown University, a Catholic university, has written eligibility for its staff and faculty benefits program broadly, so that employees can extend benefits to other eligible adults with whom they may or may not be romantically involved. Lawmakers point to a similar arrangement in San Francisco, where church officials reached an agreement with the city in the late 1990s under which church-related employers allowed employees to designate a member of the household as a “spousal equivalent.”

These agreements preserved the beliefs of the church and the legal rights of the employees, without compelling the church to explicitly recognize gay marriages or domestic partnerships.

The Washington City Council was on the mark when it said in its committee report that the same-sex marriage bill was “in keeping with fundamental fairness and recognition of basic civil rights for all District residents.” Lawmakers should keep that basic requirement in mind as they negotiate over any changes in this bill.