California, a U.S. trendsetter for progressive policies and a state where the current governor once made news issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples in San Francisco before it was legal, will attempt to enshrine marriage equality in the state constitution.
The effort comes 15 years after a voter-approved initiative, called Proposition 8, banned the state from recognizing same-sex marriages. In 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way for same-sex marriage in California. The constitutional amendment is still on the books, however, and that worries advocates who think the high court may revisit the 2015 case that legalized gay marriage nationwide.
“It’s absolute poison, it is so destructive and it’s humiliating that this is in our constitution,” said Democrat Scott Wiener, a state senator who represents San Francisco.
He and Democratic Assembly Member Evan Low of Silicon Valley plan to introduce legislation Tuesday to rescind Proposition 8. The measure would need to be approved in the Legislature by a two-thirds vote, and then it will ultimately fall to voters to decide via a referendum.
In the days leading up to Proposition 8′s approval, Low joined opponents of the measure outside his alma mater De Anza College in Cupertino, California, to call on voters to reject the initiative. When it passed, it felt personal to Low, who is gay.
“Why do fellow Californians hate me?” he said. “Why do they feel that my rights should be eliminated?”
California could follow in the footsteps of Nevada, which in 2020 became the first state to amend its constitution to ensure the right to same-sex marriage. The matter took on fresh urgency last year when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the right to an abortion established by Roe v. Wade. At the time, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas called into question other prominent cases and urged the court to reconsider them. His list included Obergefell v. Hodges, which forced states to issue and recognize same-sex marriages.
“In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell,” Thomas wrote, referencing two other landmark cases involving access to birth control and a decision striking down laws against same-sex sexual activity.
In December, President Joe Biden signed into law the Respect for Marriage Act, which requires states to recognize same-sex marriages, but the legislation doesn’t force states to allow them if Obergefell is overturned.
Wiener and Low, the two California lawmakers, hope to replicate the process under which state voters in November approved a constitutional change guaranteeing the right to abortion.
Proposition 8 has yet to be repealed because there was less urgency to do so after the state was allowed to resume issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples and gay marriage was legalized nationwide, Wiener said.
“It became a fire drill once the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade,” he said.
The path to marriage equality in the Golden State was uneven. In 2000, voters approved a statute that banned the recognition of same-sex marriages, a measure that was overturned by the courts. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who became San Francisco’s mayor in 2004, issued marriages in the city to same-sex couples in a move that defied the law and ran counter to views then held by many in his party. In 2005, the California Legislature was ahead of all other states when it passed a bill to legalize same-sex marriage. But then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, vetoed it.
Support for marriage equality has rapidly expanded since the Obergefell ruling. While Mormon groups helped fund the Proposition 8 campaign in California, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints came out in support of the Respect for Marriage Act.
Tony Hoang, executive director of Equality California, is optimistic the group can help build a large supportive coalition for the proposed amendment.
“I know this will be a bipartisan campaign,” he said.
Hong Kong’s top court ruled Monday that full sex reassignment surgery should not be a prerequisite for transgender people to have their gender changed on their official identity cards, in a move that is likely to have a far-reaching impact on the transgender community.
A transgender activist, Henry Edward Tse, and a person identified only as Q appealed to the court last month over the government’s refusal to change the genders on their ID cards because of their decision not to have full sex reassignment surgeries.
Tse and Q are both transgender men who have had their breasts removed, received hormonal treatments and lived their lives as males with professional support and guidance as well as psychiatric treatment.
The judgment by the Court of Final Appeal is expected to have a wide impact on the LGBTQ community because many of its transgender members consider having the operation unnecessary and risky.
The two went to court because existing government policy allows transgender men to change their official gender only if they have removed their uteruses and ovaries and constructed male genitalia. Only those who cannot undergo the surgical procedures due to medical reasons can be exempted.
Both the Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeal dismissed judicial review proceedings brought by Tse and Q. The two were allowed to go to the Court of Final Appeal.
In a judgment made public Monday, the court said the government’s policy was unconstitutional and imposed an “unacceptably harsh burden.” They also said that the policy was “disproportionate” in its encroachment upon the rights of the two to gender identity and physical integrity.
The judges also said any administrative issues that usually arise tend to pertain to a transgender person’s outward appearance and not the appearance of their genital area, and that leaving the gender on their identity card unamended “produced greater confusion or embarrassment.”
Tse welcomed the ruling, saying many transgender people have been longing for a “final victory” for years.
“Now I have a male ID card, it will be a lot easier for me to access gender-segregated spaces,” he said. “I wouldn’t be questioned and humiliated by being outed by my ID that’s incongruent to who I am.”
Liam Mak, co-founder and chairperson of local transgender youth organization Quarks, described the win as an “important milestone” for the transgender community in Hong Kong.
“We believe that the gender identity of oneself should not be tied to medical intervention, we should ensure minimal to no medical intervention in the policy,” Mak said. “Given that every individual has different preferences or decisions in their own gender transition journey, I hope that the government will be referencing the advice from the court to protect the right of all transgender people.”
Pope Francis, the head of the Anglican Communion and top Presbyterian minister together denounced the criminalization of homosexuality on Sunday and said gay people should be welcomed by their churches.
The three Christian leaders spoke out on LGBTQ rights during an unprecedented joint airborne news conference returning home from South Sudan, where they took part in a three-day ecumenical pilgrimage to try to nudge the young country’s peace process forward.
They were asked about Francis’ recent comments to The Associated Press, in which he declared that laws that criminalize gay people were “unjust” and that “being homosexual is not a crime.”
South Sudan is one of 67 countries that criminalizes homosexuality, 11 of them with the death penalty. LGBTQ advocates say even where such laws are not applied, they contribute to a climate of harassment, discrimination and violence.
Francis referred his Jan. 24 comments to the AP and repeated that such laws are “unjust.” He also repeated previous comments that parents should never throw their gay children out of the house.
“To condemn someone like this is a sin,” he said. “Criminalizing people with homosexual tendencies is an injustice.”
“People with homosexual tendencies are children of God. God Loves them. God accompanies them,” he added.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, recalled that LGBTQ rights were very much on the current agenda of the Church of England, and said he would quote the pope’s own words when the issue is discussed at the church’s upcoming General Synod.
“I wish I had spoken as eloquently and clearly as the pope. I entirely agree with every word he said,” Welby said.
Recently, the Church of England decided to allow blessings for same-sex civil marriages but said same-sex couples could not marry in its churches. The Vatican forbids both gay marriage and blessings for same-sex unions.
Welby told reporters that the issue of criminalization had been taken up at two previous Lambeth Conferences of the broader Anglican Communion, which includes churches in Africa and the Middle East where such anti-gay laws are most common and often enjoy support by conservative bishops.
The broader Lambeth Conference has come out twice opposing criminalization, “But it has not really changed many people’s minds,” Welby said.
The Rt. Rev. Iain Greenshields, the Presbyterian moderator of the Church of Scotland who also participated in the pilgrimage and news conference, offered an observation.
“There is nowhere in my reading of the four Gospels where I see Jesus turning anyone away,” he said. “There is nowhere in the four Gospels where I see anything other than Jesus expressing love to whomever he meets.
“And as Christians, that is the only expression that we can possibly give to any human being, in any circumstance.”
The Church of Scotland allows same-sex marriages. Catholic teaching holds that gay people must be treated with dignity and respect, but that homosexual acts are “intrinsically disordered.”
The British government said Monday it will block a new law that makes it easier for people in Scotland to legally change their gender, sparking conflict with transgender rights advocates and the nationalist Scottish administration in Edinburgh.
Secretary of State for Scotland Alister Jack said he would prevent the bill from getting royal assent — the final formality that makes it law — because of concern it conflicts with “Great Britain-wide equalities legislation.” That legislation, among other things, guarantees women and girls access to single-sex spaces such as changing rooms and shelters.
The Scottish government is likely to challenge the decision at the U.K. Supreme Court.
Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon called the decision by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Conservative government “a full-frontal attack” on the Scottish parliament, which approved the bill last month.
“The Scottish Government will defend the legislation and stand up for Scotland’s Parliament,” she said on Twitter. “If this Westminster veto succeeds, it will be first of many.”
The Scottish bill allows people aged 16 or older in Scotland to change the gender designation on their identity documents by self-declaration, removing the need for a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria.
It also cuts the time trans people must live in a different expressed gender before the change is legally recognized, from two years to three months for adults and to six months for people aged 16 and 17.
The legislation sets Scotland apart from the rest of the United Kingdom, where a medical diagnosis is needed before individuals can transition for legal purposes.
The Scottish National Party-led government in Edinburgh says the legal change will improve the lives of transgender people by allowing them to get official documents that correspond with their gender identities.
Opponents claim it risks allowing predatory men to gain access to spaces intended for women, such as shelters for domestic abuse survivors. Others argue that the minimum age for transitioning should remain at 18.
Scotland is part of the United Kingdom but, like Wales and Northern Ireland, has its own semi-autonomous government with broad powers over areas including health care.
This is the first time a U.K. government has blocked a Scottish law since the Scottish government and parliament were established a quarter century ago. The move will provide fodder for nationalists who want Scotland to break away from the U.K. and become an independent country.
Jack, the U.K. minister responsible for Scotland, said he had “not taken this decision lightly.”
“Transgender people who are going through the process to change their legal sex deserve our respect, support and understanding,” he said in a letter to Sturgeon. “My decision today is about the legislation’s consequences for the operation of GB-wide equalities protections.”
Shami Chakrabarti, a Labour Party member of the House of Lords and former director of the rights group Liberty, said Sunak’s government might be trying to stir up “culture wars” by stepping in, but legally “they may have a point.”
Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is asking state universities for the number and ages of their students who sought or received gender dysphoria treatment, including sex reassignment surgery and hormone prescriptions, according to a survey released Wednesday.
Why he’s conducting the survey wasn’t completely clear. DeSantis has been criticized by LGBTQ advocates for policies seen as discriminatory, including banning instruction on sexual and gender identity in early grades and making it easier for parents to remove books related to the topic in public schools.
“We can see cuts in funding for universities to treat students with this condition, and I think an all-out elimination of services is certainly on the table,” said House Democratic Leader Fentrice Driskell.
The survey was released the same day the university presidents voted to support DeSantis’ anti-woke agenda and to reject “the progressivist higher education indoctrination agenda” and committing to “removing all woke positions and ideologies by February 1, 2023,” according to a Department of Education news release.
The survey is being sent to the university board of trustee chairs by DeSantis’ budget director, Chris Spencer.
“Our office has learned that several state universities provide services to persons suffering from gender dysphoria,” Spencer wrote. “On behalf of the Governor, I hereby request that you respond to the enclosed inquiries related to such services.”
The governor’s office did not respond to emails and a phone call seeking information about the purpose of the survey, which must be completed by Feb. 10. Spencer told the chairs the survey is to be completed as part of their obligation to govern institutional resources and protect the public interest.
Driskell said DeSantis is trying to remake the state’s universities “in his own image” as far as what can be taught and how students can be treated.
“I’ve never seen anything like this. It’s a really terrifying place that we’re at in Florida history,” Driskell said. “What can happen is a brain drain where we have Florida students not want to stay here and attend school at our public colleges and universities.”
The survey is similar to one the governor is forcing state universities to complete regarding spending on diversity, equity and inclusion and critical race theory programs.
The current memo asks universities to “provide the number of encounters for sex-reassignment treatment or where such treatment was sought” as well as data for students referred to other facilities. It says to protect students’ identities when completing the information.
The survey requires a breakdown by age, regardless of whether the student is age 18 or older, of people prescribed hormones or hormone antagonists or who underwent a medical procedures like mastectomies, breast augmentation or removal and reconstruction of genitals.
Florida lawmakers will move to increase state control of Walt Disney World’s private government, according to a notice published Friday, the latest development in a feud over a law critics have dubbed “Don’t Say Gay.”
The notice posted on the Osceola County website says the Republican-controlled statehouse will take up legislation changing the structure and powers of the Reedy Creek Improvement District, as the 55-year-old Disney government is known.
A bill has not yet been filed detailing exactly what changes would be under consideration. The notice serves as a procedural step in what has become a closely watched process between Disney and Florida.
Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis last year signed legislation that would dissolve the Disney government in June 2023, a move aimed at punishing the company for its public opposition to a law that bars instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade and lessons deemed not age appropriate.
Additionally, Disney said it would suspend political donations in the state and that it would support organizations working to oppose the education law.
DeSantis and statehouse Republicans slammed Disney, saying the entertainment giant had become a purveyor of so-called woke ideologies that are inappropriate for children.
The squabble marked a rare moment of discord between the state and Disney, one of Florida’s largest employers and a major political donor. It also provided another front in an ongoing culture war that has made DeSantis one of the nation’s most popular Republicans.
The creation of Reedy Creek district was instrumental in Disney’s decision to build near Orlando in the 1960s. Having a separate government allows the company to provide zoning, fire protection, utilities and infrastructure services on its sprawling property.
The language of Friday’s notice aligns with assurances Republican lawmakers and DeSantis have made regarding the district’s future, including a pledge that the district’s debts and bond obligations would not fall to local county governments.
The notice also says the legislation would intend to increase state accountability of the district, change how its governing body is selected, and revise permitting rules and the district’s regulatory frameworks, among other things.
“Disney will no longer control its own government, will live under the same laws as everyone else, will be responsible for their outstanding debts, and will pay their fair share of taxes,” Taryn Fenske, a spokeswoman for DeSantis, said in a written statement. “Imposing a state-controlled board will also ensure that Orange County cannot use this issue as a pretext to raise taxes on Orange County residents.”
The Legislature is set to meet for its next regular session in March.
Kathy Whitworth set a benchmark in golf no one has ever touched, whether it was Sam Snead or Tiger Woods, Mickey Wright or Annika Sorenstam. Her 88 victories are the most by any player on a single professional tour.
Whitworth, whose LPGA Tour victories spanned nearly a quarter-century and who became the first woman to earn $1 million for her career on the LPGA, died on Christmas Eve, her longtime partner said. She was 83.
Her partner, Bettye Odle, did not disclose a cause of death, saying only that Whitworth died suddenly Saturday night while celebrating with family and friends.
“Kathy left this world the way she lived her life — loving, laughing and creating memories,” Odle said in a statement released by the LPGA Tour.
Whitworth won the first of her 88 titles in the Kelly Girls Opens in July 1962. She won six majors during her career and broke Mickey Wright’s record of 82 career wins when Whitworth captured the Lady Michelob in the summer of 1982.
Her final victory came in 1985 at the United Virginia Bank Classic.
“Winning never got old,” Whitworth once said.
All that was missing from her career was the U.S. Women’s Open, the biggest of the women’s majors. Upon being the first woman to surpass $1 million in career earnings in 1981, she said, “I would have swapped being the first to make a million for winning the Open, but it was a consolation which took some of the sting out of not winning.”
Sorenstam referred to her on Twitter as the LPGA’s all-time victory leader and a “total class act” who will be dearly missed.
“Thanks for setting the bar so high, Kathy,” she wrote.
Whitworth was the AP Female Athlete of the Year in 1965 and in 1967, when she easily beat out Wimbledon singles champion Billie Jean King. Whitworth was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 1982.
She was the LPGA player of the year seven times in an eight-year span (1966 through 1973). She won the Vare Trophy for the lowest scoring average seven times and she was the leading money winner in eight seasons.
But she was identified by one number — 88.
Snead was credited with a record 82 wins on the PGA Tour, a total Woods has since matched. Wright won 82 times on the LPGA Tour, while Sorenstam had 72 wins when she retired after the 2006 season at age 36.
“I think Mickey had the best swing, and was probably the greatest golfer,” Betsy Rawls once told Golf Digest. “But Kathy was the best player of the game that I have ever seen.”
Whitworth was born in Monahans, a small West Texas town, and learned to play golf in New Mexico. She started at age 15 in Jal, New Mexico, on the nine-hole course built for the El Paso Natural Gas employees.
She soon was a two-time winner of the New Mexico State Amateur. After briefly attending Odessa (Texas) College, she turned pro at age 19 and joined the LPGA Tour in December 1958.
“I was really fortunate in that I knew what I wanted to do,” Whitworth once told Golf Digest. “Golf just grabbed me by the throat. I can’t tell you how much I loved it. I used to think everyone knew what they wanted to do when they were 15 years old.”
Wright had the more aesthetically pleasing swing. Whitworth was all about grinding, and about winning.
Whitworth won eight times in 1963 and 1965, and she had 11 victories in 1968. In none of those years did she earn more than $50,000. All these years later, the LPGA Tour total prize fund for 2023 will top $100 million.
Whitworth continued to conduct junior clinics and stay active in the game.
“I don’t think about the legacy of 88 tournaments,” she once said. “I did it because I wanted to win, not to set a record or a goal that no one else could surpass. I’m not some great oddity. I was just fortunate to be so successful. What I did in being a better player does not make me a better person.
“When I’m asked how I would like to be remembered, I feel that if people remember me at all, it will be good enough.”
Fabu Olmedo is so nervous about clubs and restaurants in Paraguay that before a night out she often contacts one to make sure that she’ll be let in and won’t be attacked or harassed.
Olmedo doesn’t know if she can go out in public safely because daily life is hard for transgender people in the capital, Asunción. Now, a new group of allies in Latin America is trying to make life better by changing minds in this socially conservative and often highly religious region.
Founded in 2017, the Latin American Movement of Mothers of LGTB+ Children lobbies governments to eliminate prejudical laws and better enforce existing bans on violence and discrimination.
It’s a difficult fight that will require patience and a years of effort but the mothers are working together to help others in their position, and function as a refuge for LGBTQ children whose families are not as supportive.
Members of the Latin American Movement of Mothers of LGTB+ Children during a march in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on Nov. 5. Natacha Pisarenko / AP
“It’s all about recognizing the strength and power that we have as mothers to accompany our kids and help other families,” said Alejandra Muñoz, 62, of Mexico City. Her son Manuel came out 11 years ago and suffered so much bullying at school that he spent recesses with the teachers.
“He’s constantly at risk of being yelled at or worse in the street because of his sexuality,” she said.
Olmedo, 28, said that in July she was barred from an Asunción nightclub with her friends.
“Many times they let you in but there are violent people inside,” Olmedo said.
The Latin American Movement of Mothers of LGTB+ Children held its first in-person meeting in early November in Buenos Aires, where they attended the annual massive gay pride march on Nov. 5.
“Our main battle is to make sure our children enjoy the same rights in all of Latin America,” said Patricia Gambetta, 49, the head of the Latin American Movement of Mothers of LGTB+ Children, which has members in 14 countries and the goal of expanding to all the countries in the region.
The work of the mothers is often made more complicated by the enduring power of the Catholic Church, which teaches that gay acts are “intrinsically disordered.” The increasingly popular evangelical faith also often preaches against same-sex relationships.
There are stark differences in the acceptance of sexual minorities across Latin America. Argentina and Uruguay have been regional pioneers in marriage equality and transgender rights. Other countries in the region have yet to institute protections for the LGBTQ population.
Marriage equality became law in all of Mexico’s states last month. Honduras and Paraguay both ban same-sex marriage. In Guatemala, a conservative congress has repeatedly tried to pass legislation that would censor information about LGBTQ people. In Brazil, at the federal and state level there are bills and laws that either ban, or would ban, information about sexual orientation and gender identity, said Cristian González Cabrera, LGBT-rights researcher for Latin America and the Caribbean at Human Rights Watch.
And laws often fail to tell the full story.
“Irrespective of what legal regime a youth finds themselves in, prejudice and discrimination in the region continue to be commonplace,” González Cabrera said.
Vitinia Varela Mora said that her daughter, Ana María, decided to hide her lesbian identity after seeing other gay students bullied at her school in Tilarán, Costa Rica, which is about 124 miles (200km) from the capital, San José. She came out to her mother at 21.
In some countries, mothers who try to help their children deal with discrimination suddenly find themselves the subject of scrutiny.
Claudia Delfín tried to seek help in government offices for her transgender twins, who were facing bullying and discrimination in their school in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia, when they were 16.
“They told me to go to church and look for a better path. They practically sent me to pray,” Delfín said.
Varela Mora of Costa Rica says it took her around two years to accept her daughter after the girl came out as a lesbian in what hit her mother like “a bucket of cold water.”
“There’s a lack of education, no one prepares you for this,” Varela Mora said. Now she tries to make up for that by supporting other mothers whose children have come out of the closet.
“It’s important for young people to feel they have a mom who understands them when they aren’t supported in their homes,” the 59-year-old woman said.
Groups of LGBTQ parents are “vitally important to show that regressive political projects do not respond to the needs of the region’s diverse communities,” González Cabrera of Human Rights Watch said.
Delfín said that she is one of two mothers in Santa Cruz who are activists fighting for their LGBTQ children. Elena Ramírez, Olmedo’s mom, also says that many trans children who are having trouble at home come to her for refuge.
“I’m a mom to all of them,” Ramírez, 66, said. “I know there are mothers that I will not be able to convince, but there are other children who really are in need.”
Gambetta says that all the mothers in the organization effectively end up training each other in their monthly virtual meetings.
“As mothers we have greater reach, we can raise more awareness,” Gambetta said. “When your family supports you, you’ve already won 99% of the battle.”
Mary and Sharon Bishop-Baldwin were jubilant after winning a decadelong fight for the right to wed in Oklahoma.
But eight years after tying the knot — on the day they won their lawsuit challenging a state ban on gay marriage — and seven years after the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed same-sex couples’ constitutional right to marry, they no longer take their union for granted.
“The very fact we’re even having these conversations is really disheartening to me,” especially given a dramatic shift in public opinion over the past decade, with polls showing 70% of U.S. adults now favor same-sex marriage rights, said Sharon Bishop-Baldwin, 54.
But when the high court overturned Roe v. Wade, which had guaranteed abortion rights, Justice Clarence Thomas suggested in a concurring opinion that the decision upholding gay marriage should also be reconsidered. That prompted Democrats to act quickly to protect same-sex marriage while the party still holds the majority in both chambers of Congress.
The Senate passed the Respect for Marriage Act last week with support from 12 Republicans; it’s expected to easily win approval in the House before being signed by President Joe Biden.
At first, Sharon Bishop-Baldwin said, she thought the act was “lip service.” But she changed her mind because it would at least provide some protection.
“It’s ridiculous to think that anybody in this country who has legally married one place could suddenly be unmarried in another,” Bishop-Baldwin said.
When the couple filed their 2004 Oklahoma lawsuit, 76% of state voters had just approved a constitutional ban on gay marriage. Ten years later, the U.S. Supreme Court let stand a federal appeals court ruling that declared the state ban unconstitutional. A year later, the high court decided in another case that all states had to issue marriage licenses to gay couples.
“When we won, one of our lawyers said, ‘This is game, set, match, marriage’ … and that’s what we thought: We’re done,” said Bishop-Baldwin, who runs a small newspaper and met her wife in 1995 when both were editors at the Tulsa World.
The legislation wouldn’t codify, or enshrine into law, the Supreme Court decision requiring states to issue same-sex marriage licenses. But if that decision were overturned and states revived bans, they still would have to recognize same-sex marriages performed legally in other states.
“I can’t imagine that happening at the Supreme Court … but we have to be prepared,” said Mary Bishop-Baldwin, 61, who notes that Oklahoma’s ban is still on the books.
The possibility has created “a state of extreme anxiety and stress” among same-sex couples, said Jenny Pizer, chief legal officer at Lambda Legal, an LGBTQ civil rights group.
That’s especially true for those with children, she said. Currently, both spouses are considered legal parents, which is especially important if one of them dies or they divorce. “So this bill really does matter,” Pizer said.
Some also fear the high court or a future Congress could undo the federal legislation.
“Every time the House and Senate overturn, you’ll wonder what might happen this time,” said Dawn Betts-Green, 43, who lives in Birmingham, Alabama, with her wife, Anna Green, whom she married in Florida in 2016. “It’s honestly in the hands of whoever we elect, and that is scary.”
A scenario in which constitutional protections are overturned by the Supreme Court and the Respect for Marriage Act is overturned by the court or Congress might be a long shot, but “it is certainly possible for there to be a series of events that really took us back to that earlier time when it was incredibly difficult for families,” Pizer said.
“The idea of returning to those days, frankly, is terrifying,” she said.
Betts-Green and her wife hurried to complete paperwork, such as wills and powers of attorney, after Roe v. Wade was overturned, getting “all of our legal ducks in a row (because) they’re clearly coming for us,” she said, recalling a time when her wife was hospitalized in Florida — before they were married — and a nurse said Betts-Green would not be permitted to make medical decisions.
Marriage also provides many other legal protections, including the ability to claim survivor benefits from Social Security and to obtain health insurance through a spouse’s plan, and tax benefits, such as the ability to leave assets to a spouse.
The Respect for Marriage Act makes Betts-Green feel a little more secure, she said, though “I find it absolutely ridiculous that we’re having to go through this kind of thing in 2022, not only just for queer people, but also interracial marriages. It’s not 1941, but it certainly feels like we’ve gone back in time.”
The issue of same-sex marriage also is overshadowing other concerns, including anti-LGBTQ legislation and harassment of and attacks on LGBTQ people, most notably the recent shooting at a Colorado nightclub that killed five people, Betts-Green said.
“I’m constantly reminded that this is the least of our issues in a lot of ways,” she said.
Minneapolis legal aide Robbin Reed, a white woman who is married to a Black transgender man, supports the act but worries it could mean more danger from people who might be angered by its protections.
“The law won’t really change anything about my life … because there’s still so much to worry about,” said Reed, who has an 8-month-old child and performs with her husband in queer nightclubs. “This is a ridiculous situation to be in.”
The Bishop-Baldwins said they doubt the Supreme Court will strip away same-sex marriage rights, but are relieved there will be some protections in place just in case. Still, federal legislation shouldn’t even be required, they say.
“Is the Respect for Marriage Act good enough? No, of course not. Good enough should be” constitutional protection, said Sharon Bishop-Baldwin.
As monks chanted evening prayers in the dimly lit Saint John’s University church, members of the student LGBTQ organization, QPLUS, were meeting in a dedicated, Pride flag-lined lounge at the institution’s sister Benedictine college, a few miles away across Minnesota farmland.
To Sean Fisher, a senior who identifies as nonbinary and helps lead QPLUS, its official recognition and funding by Saint John’s and the College of Saint Benedict is welcome proof of the Catholic schools’ “acknowledging queer students exist.”
But tensions endure here and at many of the hundreds of U.S. Catholic and Protestant universities. The Christian teachings they ascribe to are different from wider societal values over gender identity and sexual orientation, because they assert that God created humans in unchangeable male and female identities, and sex should only happen within the marriage of a man and a woman.
“The ambivalence toward genuine care is clouded by Jesus-y attitudes. Like ‘Love your neighbor’ has an asterisk,” Fisher said that late fall evening.
Most of the 200 Catholic institutions serving nearly 900,000 students have made efforts to be welcoming while staying true to their mission as Catholic ministries, said the Rev. Dennis Holtschneider, president of the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities.
Among Protestant institutions, a few are pushing the envelope, and most are hoping to stay out of the messiness, said John Hawthorne, a retired Christian college sociology professor and administrator.
“Denominations won’t budge, so colleges will need to lead the way,” Hawthorne added. Otherwise, they might not survive, because students are used to values far different from churches’ teachings, as highlighted by last week’s Senate passage of legislation to protect same-sex marriage.
“Today’s college freshman was born in 2004, the year Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage,” Hawthorne said, suggesting there might not be enough conservative students in the future for some of the universities to survive.
The consequences extend beyond the experiences of current students, many of whom enroll not because of faith but academics, athletics or scholarships. Some will likely become church leaders in an already divided society, where the recent shooting at an LGBTQ club in Colorado was only the latest reminder of the threats against that community.
From right: Ryan Imm, Sean Fisher and Sam Schug on campus in St. Joseph, Minn., on Nov. 8, 2022. Giovanna Dell’Orto / AP
The majority of Christian colleges and universities list “sexual orientation” in their nondiscrimination statements, and half also include “gender identity” — far more than did so in 2013, said Jonathan Coley, a sociologist at Oklahoma State University who maintains a Christian higher education database of policies toward LGBTQ students.
But translating that into practice creates tensions affecting most campus life, including enrollment at single-gender institutions, housing, restroom design and pronoun use.
Backlash follows from opposing corners: At some conservative schools, some students and faculty have filed discrimination complaints, while at more affirming institutions, some parents and clergy argue that approach doesn’t align with their mission.
“We have to learn to live with this tension,” said the Rev. Donal Godfrey, chaplain at the University of San Francisco, a Jesuit institution in a city with a history of LGBTQ rights advocacy and a conservative Catholic archbishop opposed to same-sex marriage.
New Ways Ministry, which advocates for LGBTQ Catholics, keeps a list of over 130 Catholic colleges it considers LGBTQ-friendly because they provide public affirmation, including courses and clubs, said its director, Francis DeBernardo.
“Catholic colleges and universities were … and still are the most LGBTQ-friendly places in the church in the United States,” DeBernardo added.
The Cardinal Newman Society, which advocates for fidelity to church teachings on all Catholic education issues, maintains its own list of recommended schools, a little more than a dozen the organization considers “faithful.”
“For these colleges, being ‘Catholic’ is not a watered-down brand or historical tradition,” Newman president Patrick Reilly said via email.
Other campus leaders see tension in Catholic teachings, which tend to skew conservative on human sexuality but progressive on social justice.
“It’s kind of a tightrope,” said John Scarano, campus ministry director at John Carroll University, a Jesuit school near Cleveland with “safe zone trainings” as part of its ministry to LGBTQ students.
When parents and prospective students come to him undecided between John Carroll and Franciscan University, 100 miles away in Steubenville, Ohio, Scarano tells them, “Here, your Catholicism is going to be challenged” by different perspectives.
At the Franciscan-run school, “we don’t move away from the truth of the human person as discovered in Scripture, the tradition of the Church, and the teaching authority of the Church — this is our mooring, and we believe that to follow Christ is to be faithful to the Church’s teachings,” said the Rev. Jonathan St. Andre, a senior university leader.
The Steubenville institution strives to develop students’ “healthy sense of the gift of their human sexuality,” he added via email — but with no tolerance for harassment of those who disagree.
Students’ safety is a priority, said Mary Geller, the associate provost who oversees student affairs for the 3,000 undergraduates at Saint John’s and Saint Benedict, the single-sex institutions in Minnesota.
“We’re set up in the binary, but we know there are people coming to us who don’t live in the binary,” Geller said. They now admit students based on the gender they identify with, and consider transfers for those who transition.
That has enraged a few parents, like a father complaining “that we have students with male body parts in a female dorm,” Geller recalled. “I just said, ‘Sir, I don’t check body parts.’”
With the help of legal advocates, some students at evangelical and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints schools are suing.
Last year, 33 LGBTQ students or former students at federally funded Christian schools filed a class-action lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education, claiming the department’s religious exemption allows schools that receive federal dollars to unconstitutionally discriminate against LGBTQ students. The plaintiffs have grown to more than 40.
In May, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights launched a separate investigation for alleged violations of the rights of LGBTQ students at six Christian universities — including Liberty University.
The independent evangelical university is one of several that have greatly expanded their rules prohibiting students from identifying as LGBTQ or advocating for such identities.
Liberty forbids LGBTQ affinity clubs, same-sex displays of affection, and use of pronouns, restrooms and changing facilities not corresponding to a person’s birth sex. As of this year, its student handbook, called “The Liberty Way,” bans statements and behaviors associated with what it calls “LGBT states of mind.”
“Liberty is very anti-gay,” said Sydney Windsor, a senior there who first decided to attend Liberty to quash her sexual attraction for women and now identifies as pansexual. “I found friendships ending and me getting bad grades because of differing opinions or things I said or posted. It’s years of irreversible trauma.”
At some evangelical schools, the argument has now moved from fighting over student’s sexual and gender equality to fighting for LGBTQ diversity in faculty and staff hiring.
This year, Eastern University, located in St. Davids, Pennsylvania, and affiliated with American Baptist Churches USA, amended its policies to allow for the hiring of faculty in same-sex marriages — one of only a handful of evangelical schools to do so.
“If we can get faculty to come out and to have queer people openly represented on campus, that would be really big,” said Faith Jeanette Millender, an Eastern University student who identifies as bisexual or queer and is active in the school’s LGBTQ group.
A high-stakes clash between students, faculty and the school’s board of trustees over hiring LGBTQ faculty is unfolding at Seattle Pacific University, a 131-year-old school affiliated with the Free Methodist Church.
The faculty held a vote of no-confidence in the board, one-third of which is appointed by the denomination, because it insists on keeping the policy barring people in same-sex relationships from full-time positions. Faculty and students have also sued the board in Washington State Superior Court for breaching its fiduciary duty, arguing the policy threatens to harm SPU’s reputation, worsen an already shrinking enrollment and possibly jeopardize its future.
“This entrenchment around human sexuality feels so incongruent with the on-campus experience and what we teach our students,” said Lynnette Bikos, professor and chair of SPU’s clinical psychology department and a plaintiff in the suit against the board.
Chloe Guillot, a 22-year-old graduate student at SPU who is one of 16 plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the school, said it was a matter of social justice.
“I’m wrestling with my own identity and I know how much Christianity has brought harm to communities, whether its people of color, women, or LGBTQ people,” Guillot said. “I have a responsibility to step into those spaces and be willing to fight back. As someone who is a Christian we need to hold ourselves accountable.”
In late November, a group of students and faculty decorated several campus buildings with rainbow-colored Christmas lights.
The administration has responded to one of the suits in a court filing saying that it expects students and faculty to “affirm the University’s statement of faith, and to abide by its lifestyle expectations, which together shape the vision and mission of the institution.”
Kathryn Lee, who came out as lesbian last year, while still a professor at Whitworth University, an evangelical school in Spokane, Washington, said debates over LGBTQ issues will persist for years.
“What’s unfortunate in my view is that in some people’s minds how do you define Christian education and it will be, ‘Oh, where are they on LGBTQ?’” she said. “I find that tragic.”
To students like Fisher in Minnesota, concrete actions will show if LGBTQ people can truly be welcomed on Christian campuses.
There are still too many incidents. Ryan Imm, a Saint John’s University junior and QPLUS leader who identifies as gay, recalled an anti-LGBTQ slur used on his residential floor. Sitting together in the QPLUS lounge, both students pointed to signs of hope — like the popular drag show at Saint Benedict.
“It’s almost like people forget there’s dissonance,” Imm said.
