ENS: Albany Convention passes canons banning same-gender marriages, blessings

By Mary Frances Schjonberg
June 10, 2008

[Episcopal News Service] The Episcopal Diocese Albany, meeting June 6 in its 140th annual convention, passed new canons prohibiting same-gender blessings and ordaining and licensing only those clergy who are married to a member of the opposite sex or "celibate and abstinent."

In his address to the convention meeting at Camp of the Woods in Speculator, New York, Albany Bishop William Love said the canons "are consistent with past and current diocesan policy and are not in violation or contradiction" with the Episcopal Church's canons.

The new canons "are not intended to be divisive, although some have come to see them that way," he said. "But rather, they are intended to provide clarity, in a time where there is great confusion within the Episcopal Church as well as the Anglican Communion concerning marriage and sexual relations outside of the confines of marriage between a man and women."

He noted that the canons "apply to everyone, regardless of one’s sexual orientation. There is one standard concerning sexual relations by which we are all called to live. While recognizing that many heterosexual couples have chosen to engage in sexual relations outside of marriage, the Church will not bless such unions."

Love also placed the need to pass the canons in the light of recent executive order issued by the governor of New York state, ordering state agencies to recognize the legality of same-gender marriages of couples coming from other states and Canada where such marriages are legal. the rest