Jeff Wilson (Tricycle.com, June 27, 2015 ); Ashley Wells, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly
 |
| Do we support gay marriage, Bruno? |
Buddhist same-sex marriage was born in the USA.
That’s a little-known
but significant fact to reflect on now, just after the Supreme Court
has declared legal marriage equality throughout the country.
Appropriately enough, it all started in San Francisco and was conceived
as an act of love not activism.
The first known Buddhist same-sex marriages took place in the early
1970s, at the Buddhist Church of San Francisco. Founded in 1899, it’s
the oldest surviving temple in the mainland United States.
 |
| Rainbow flag of unity now a gay symbol. |
It’s also
part of the oldest Buddhist organization outside Hawaii: the Buddhist
Churches of America (BCA), part of the Shin tradition of Pure Land Buddhism.
During the Nixon years, the LGBTQ rights movement was picking up, and
San Francisco was one of the primary centers of both activism and
community building.
 |
Located not far from the famously gay Castro
District, the Buddhist Church of San Francisco (BCSF) was attended by
singles and couples, gay and straight. As consciousness rose, people
began to seek the same services that heterosexuals already enjoyed in
American society.
A male couple in the congregation eventually asked Rev. Koshin Ogui,
then assigned to BCSF, to perform their marriage. He readily agreed, and
the ceremony was held in the main hall -- identical to other marriages at
the temple, except for the dropping of gender-based pronouns in the
service. Without fanfare, history was made.
 |
| Lost in Capitulation |
Soon other BCA temples were also conducting same-sex marriages, and
by the time of my research into the subject in the early 2010s, I
couldn’t find a single minister in the scores of BCA temples who was
unwilling to preside over same-sex weddings.
 |
Indeed, BCA ministers had
already performed marriages for gay and lesbian couples, bisexuals,
transgender people, and polyamorous groups. Many of these were
interracial marriages, or carried out for non-Buddhists who had nowhere
else to go, though most were for members of local BCA temples. More
The first gay U.S. president
RantPolitical.com
Skeletons in our American closet: Pres. James Buchanan was a "bachelor" as president and might have been the first gay
president. Not that being gay is a scandal, but when you think about
America in the mid-19th century you can bet it would be a skeleton that
a person would want kept in the closet. For 15 years, Buchanan lived
with William Rufus King. The two were called “Miss Nancy” and “Aunt
Fancy” by U.S. Pres. Andrew Jackson.
Pres. Buchanan even referred to King as his wife in a
letter to James K. Polk’s wife. While none of this had an effect on his
presidency, it did on his immediate legacy. To make matters worse,
Pres. Buchanan is often [listed] among the worst presidents in history for his role in
kicking the can down the road to our disastrous Civil War. More
The first gay U.S. president
RantPolitical.com
 |
| U.S. President James Buchanan (wiki) |
 |
| The first gay first couple, Barry and Michael |
No comments:
Post a Comment