For better, for worse, in sickness and in health.

April 5, 2009 by Dan Hooper.

This is not a blog about gay marriage. Indwelling Spirit is about a lot of issues affecting LGBT people who are trying to follow Christ, and to remain in fellowship with other Christians who either reject us and hate us, or at the least are suspicious of us.

But we take the news of the day, and play the ball where it lies. In recent months the news has been jammed with the aftermath of Proposition 8, which (temporarily) dash the hopes of California becoming and staying the third United State to legalize same-gender civil marriage.

The news of my day has changed things, at least for a time. My lawfully-wedded spouse Carl is in the hospital, having suffered a disastrous fall on Saturday. He has four fractured vertebrae, one of them serious, and two fractured ribs. It appears now that this will not require emergency surgery, but what is coming next is still quite unclear.

Carl was climbing a tree in order to do some quick pruning in preparation for Palm Sunday. Now w have both missed the Palm Sunday service entirely, instead watching the hours tick by in the Emergency Room. At this hour he is completely immobilized with a neck brace, until the results of his MRI can be evaluated by a neurosurgeon.

Yet in the midst of all his pain, Carl has been capitalizing on our civilly-married status. Coming out all over again, he makes sure that each doctor or nurse attending him understands that I am his “husband”—a term I have yet to get used to when applied to myself, even though we have been a couple for decades. In fact, last October’s National Coming Out Day was the fourth time we have tied the knot in a ceremonial way.

After waiting in the rain overnight in front of San Francisco’s City Hall in February 2004, a quick view of our happiness.   The Lutheran magazine later mentioned us and our best friends in a news brief, “Married in the State of Grace.”

“He is fulfilling his marital vows,” Carl tells the nurse matter-of-factly, “to take care of me in sickness and in health.” As much as I have advocated for stable, permanent relationships among lesbian and gay couples, and now carried the flag for Marriage Equality in the streets and in my church (NoOn8Church.org), there is something almost monumental in just living as a married couple and in effect holding our heads up high as a married couple. Not just when the television station showed up at our wedding reception, but when we have to call the nurse (again) for some pain medicine.

The Supreme Court may speak any day now on whether it considers our pre-Prop 8 marriage “legal.” That nasty ballot measure insisted that only a marriage between a man and a woman is “recognized” in California regardless of when or where contracted (not the exact wording).  A month ago, the Justices closely questions attorneys on both sides in the oral arguments about what “recognized” might mean, and what it was intended to mean in the wording of Proposition 8.

But I am here to tell you that my marriage is recognized in our local Emergency Room, as it is in the congregation and the supermarket and the neighborhood and in our extended family circle. Ultimately, Proposition 8 cannot erase recognition for those who know that they have tied the knot securely and have already claimed their rightful status as “married.”

But please pray for Carl, and for all of us who have to keep coming out and claiming rights until the rest of the state “gets it.”

— Pastor Dan Hooper, Los Angeles

Posted in LGBT Christian, Lesbian/Gay Marriage, LGBT Rights, Living by Grace, Spirituality, PRAYERS, Coming Out | Print | No Comments »