SE Florida Bishop Authorizes Same-Sex Blessings

September 15, 2009

Only a few months after General Convention approved Resolution C056, public blessings for same-sex couples have begun emerging in dioceses of the Episcopal Church.

On Aug. 30, E. Denise Simmons, the mayor of Cambridge, Mass., exchanged marital vows with her partner, Mattie Hayes, at St. Bartholomew Church, Cambridge. The Rev. Irene Monroe wrote for the online magazine Religion Dispatches about presiding at the service with the Rev. Leslie K. Sterling, the priest in charge of St. Bartholomew's, and Jada D. Simmons, a justice of the peace and the mayor’s eldest daughter.

“I was elated to be a part of this liturgical assembly line, helping to make a historic event [happen] within the ecclesial strictures of the church,” Ms. Monroe wrote. “Sterling did the invocation, declaration of consent to marry, and blessing of the marriage; Simmons pronounced the marriage, and I did the homily, blessing of rings and vows.”

Further south, the Rt. Rev. Leo Frade, Bishop of Southeast Florida, has authorized his clergy to provide pastoral blessings—but not to preside over same-sex weddings—within about a month. the rest