An anti-LGBT+ Christian legal advocacy group has asked the US Supreme Court to review a ruling that bans employers from discriminating against transgender people on religious grounds.
Alliance Defending Freedom filed a petition to the court last week, which means that the Supreme Court, if it decides to go ahead and hear the case, now has the option to rule whether the country’s civil law right prohibiting sex discrimination in the workplace also includes discrimination based on gender identity.
This Court of Appeals ruling was issued after a transgender employee from Detroit was fired by her employer because she is transgender.
Aimee Stephens was fired from her job at a funeral home after coming out as trans to her boss.
She took her case all the way to the Court of Appeals with the support of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission [EEOC], after a district court dismissed her legal challenge, claiming that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act gave the funeral home an exemption from the federal law – Title VII – of the Civil Rights Act, which covers sex discrimination in the workplace.
However, the Court of Appeals overruled this district court decision, saying that sex discrimination includes discrimination against trans people – and that there is no exemption under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
“Discrimination against employees, either because of their failure to conform to sex stereotypes or their transgender and transitioning status, is illegal under Title VII,” Circuit Judge Karen Nelson Moore wrote for the Court of Appeals.
(Mark Makela/Getty Images)
“Discrimination against employees, either because of their failure to conform to sex stereotypes or their transgender and transitioning status, is illegal under Title VII,” Circuit Judge Karen Nelson Moore wrote for the court.
“The unrefuted facts show that the Funeral Home fired Stephens because she refused to abide by her employer’s stereotypical conception of her sex.”
A representative from the ACLU, who argued the case for Stephens, said at the time that it was “an exciting and important victory for transgender people and allied communities across the country.”
A community march in Amsterdam, where the 22nd International AIDS Conference was held. Photo by: Matthijs Immink / IAS
AMSTERDAM — The fight to end HIV/AIDS was given a boost by a star-studded week of presentations, panel sessions and the occasional protest at this year’s International AIDS Conference in Amsterdam. However, tensions within the community remain, and with few new funding pledges announced, there are questions about how to translate strong rhetoric into action.
Some 16,000 stakeholders from more than 160 countries gathered in the Dutch capital last week for AIDS 2018, the conference’s 22nd edition and one of the biggest events in the global health calendar, featuring sessions on the latest HIV science, policy, and practice.
Held under the theme of “Breaking Barriers, Building Bridges,” the real story of this year’s conference was the growing realization that the HIV/AIDS epidemic is in crisis, with 1.8 million new infections in 2017. There are also alarming spikes in new HIV cases among key groups including adolescent girls in sub-Saharan Africa and drug users in eastern Europe and parts of Asia, according to recent figures from UNAIDS. At the same time, development assistance for HIV dropped $3 billion between 2012 and 2017, according to a study by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
“The feel is definitely less congratulatory than past conferences and more sobering,” Rachel Baggaley, coordinator for HIV prevention and testing at WHO, told Devex, but added that it was good to see the community responding with force. The activist spirit which has defined the fight against AIDS in the past was never far away, she noted, with many sessions interrupted by campaigners.
“It is very positive to see the AIDS movement hasn’t gone away … I went feeling rather down and have come away challenged and inspired; there’s a lot of things we must do and a lot of people who continue to take this [AIDS agenda] forward,” she said.
One protest challenged the leadership of the U.N.’s dedicated AIDS agency, UNAIDS, with more than 20 female campaigners interrupting Executive Director Michel Sidibé — who has been criticized for his response to a sexual harassment scandal — during his address on stage at the opening plenary. Sidibé insists he has made changes and has resisted calls to step down, but his presence was a source of controversy.
The key now will be turning the strong rhetoric and passion seen throughout AIDS 2018 into action on the ground, according to youth HIV activist Mercy Ngulube.
“We are all going to build bridges this week … but where is your bridge going to lead us? Don’t let your bridge be a bridge to nowhere,” she said during the opening plenary.
A Devex team was on the ground throughout the week and rounds up the key takeaways.
1. Target key populations
Attendees agreed that, without drastic change, the world will see global HIV targets missed and a possible resurgence of the epidemic. But Peter Piot, founding executive director of UNAIDS and now director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, warned the targets themselves could leave key populations even further behind.
Speaking on Thursday, Piot reminded the audience that the 90-90-90 targets set by UNAIDS in 2014 will miss 27 percent of HIV patients. The framework calls for countries to get 90 percent of people living with HIV diagnosed; 90 percent of those diagnosed to be accessing treatment; and 90 percent of people on treatment to have suppressed viral loads by 2020.
“The 90-90-90 targets are actually 90-81-73,” he said, adding that “what the future of the epidemic is going to be determined by is the 10-10-10” — those not hit by the targets.
The 10-10-10 is likely to be made up of key populations including sex workers, men who have sex with men, LGBTI groups, people who inject drugs, and young people — all of whom are less likely to access HIV services due to social stigma, discrimination, criminalization, and other barriers, Piot said. These groups currently account for 47 percent of people with new infections, according to UNAIDS data.
Reaching these key populations was high on the agenda last week. Dudu Dlamini, a campaigner for sex workers’ health and rights who was awarded the Prudence Mabele prize for HIV activism during the conference, spoke to Devex about the need to decriminalize sex work in order to remove barriers to HIV services for sex workers.
Leading HIV scientists also put out a statement in the Journal of the International AIDS Society about laws that criminalize people with HIV for not disclosing their status and for exposing or transmitting the disease. Such laws, which exist in 68 countries, “have not always been guided by the best available scientific and medical evidence,” it said, and when used inappropriately can reinforce stigma and undermine efforts to fight the disease.
2. Prevention pay off
With new infections standing at 1.8 million last year, the recent UNAIDS report describes a “prevention crisis.” Traditionally, prevention has received only a tiny proportion of HIV funding, with the bulk going toward treatment. But there was a new buzz around the prevention agenda at this year’s event, in part driven by excitement around oral pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, which can prevent HIV infection among those at high risk. The antiretroviral medication has been successfully rolled out in North America, western Europe, and Australia, and has been shown to help reduce new infections among men who have sex with men.
WHO’s Baggaley said PrEP had “energized the prevention agenda.” However, questions remain about the feasibility of rolling it out in low-income countries, and about its efficacy for women.
“There is a prevention crisis and we need to find better ways of addressing it,” said Christine Stegling, executive director of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance. But while PrEP is a promising tool, a full approach to prevention needs to include a range of methods, combined with interventions that tackle human rights issues and gender inequality, she said.
3. A youth bulge
It was impossible to miss the strong youth presence at this year’s AIDS conference, which organizers said had a larger number of young people attending than ever before, and featured dozens of youth-focused events. This is linked to a growing recognition that adolescents face a disproportionately high risk of becoming infected with HIV, especially in Africa where the population is set to rapidly increase, and where new infection rates are on the rise among young people.
Ugandan youth advocate Brian Ahimbisibwe, a volunteer ambassador for the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation, said: “Without the youth, the future of all these conferences, and more importantly [of] services and programs, [is] compromised.”
However, 28-year-old Tikhala Itaye, co-founder of women’s rights group Her Liberty in Malawi, said the youth voice had not been fully integrated and that young people were still being “talked at” during many of the sessions, as opposed to being listened to.
“There’s now acceptance that young people need to be at the center … they do have the demographic weight and power to influence issues around HIV,” she said, but “you still find the different youth events happening in different rooms … Why aren’t we all coming together as one to build the bridges and have a global voice?”
Signs at the 22nd International AIDS Conference in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Photo by: Marcus Rose / IAS
4. The need for integration
A number of sessions talked about the need to integrate HIV programming, which has traditionally been siloed due to having its own funding streams, into broader health care. This was a key message of The Lancet Commission report on strengthening the HIV response published ahead of the conference, and was also the message delivered by WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus during the opening plenary.
“We have not truly helped a child if we treat her for HIV, but do not vaccinate her against measles. We have not truly helped a gay man if we give him PrEP but leave his depression untreated … Universal health coverage means ensuring all people have access to all the services they need, for all diseases and conditions,” he said.
Baggaley said integrating HIV into the broader health agenda posed both “an opportunity and also a challenge and risk for those populations most marginalized,” explaining that key populations currently served by externally funded nonstate health services could see their assistance diminished under UHC if the country in question did not believe UHC includes key populations or had punitive laws against gay men or sex workers, for example.
There was much discussion around the need to combine HIV and tuberculosis efforts, especially in the run up to the first U.N. high-level TB event in September. TB is the number one killer of people with HIV, who are up to 50 times more likely to develop it, according to WHO.
Speaking in between interruptions from the crowd, former U.S. President Clinton highlighted the need to address HIV and TB in tandem during the closing plenary and called on world leaders, notably India which has the highest TB burden, to attend the upcoming U.N. TB meeting.
“If you think … anyone ..that we can possibly bring the developing world to where we want it to be by abandoning the fight against HIV/AIDS and the collateral struggle against TB, you need to think again,” he said.
New findings from the Sustainable East Africa Research in Community Health program, presented during the conference, showed positive results from a community-based program which combined HIV testing and treatment with other diseases including TB, diabetes, and hypertension. The findings of a three-year randomized controlled trial in Kenya and Uganda showed that communities receiving testing and care for HIV alongside related conditions saw nearly 60 percent fewer new TB cases among HIV-infected people and that hypertension control improved by 26 percent.
5. Medical developments
Concerns about GlaxoSmithKline’s so-called “wonder drug” dolutegravir, which a study recently suggested might be linked to serious birth defects among children in Botswana, sparked debate amongst conference goers about whether potential mothers should be prescribed the drug.
WHO already advises that women of childbearing age wishing to take the antiretroviral have access to effective contraception, and will be re-evaluating its guidance as new evidence emerges, Baggaley told Devex. But there are concerns the agency could introduce blanket restrictions for women of childbearing age, which would force them to take other antiretroviral drugs that have worse side effects. The controversy could also lead to delays in the rollout of other forms of the drug, such as a pediatric version.
The conference also featured new data from the APPROACH study, which is evaluating the safety of several different HIV vaccines currently undergoing clinical trials in the U.S., East Africa, South Africa, and Thailand — but researchers admitted a vaccine will take years to develop.
6. The Trump effect
The shadow of U.S. President Donald Trump’s beefed-up “global gag rule,” otherwise known as the Mexico City Policy, loomed large over the conference, and a number of sessions discussed how it is negatively affecting HIV programs. Unlike previous iterations of the policy — which restricts U.S. funding to non-U.S. organizations that offer services related to abortion — Trump’s version is applied to almost all U.S. global health assistance, including PEPFAR.
Santos Simione from AMODEFA, an NGO that offers sexual health and HIV services in Mozambique, said his organization had lost U.S. funding due to the gag rule and was forced to close half of its youth clinics, which offered sexual and reproductive health services alongside HIV testing, counseling, and antiretroviral therapy.
“We could not provide condoms … testing … we just stopped everything,” Simione said.
Participants also spoke of a chilling effect, whereby organizations have stopped offering services that may not actually be prohibited under the rule, and raised concerns about PEPFAR’s staying power within a hostile Trump administration.
Meanwhile, there was heated debate about arrangements for the next conference, which the International AIDS Society has said will take place in San Francisco, California, in 2020. The decision has been met with fierce opposition and threats to boycott the event from AIDS campaigners who say many key population groups affected by HIV will have difficulties attending due to strict immigration policies. In 2009, former U.S. President Barack Obama lifted a restriction banning people with HIV from entering the country, but sex workers and people who use drugs still face legal challenges entering.
The LGBT Foundation said there has been a recent rise in cases of shigella among men who have sex with men.
Shigellosis, or shigella, is an intestinal infection caused when bacteria found in poo gets into your mouth.
Last month, health officials in San Diego issued an advisory over the sexual transmitted infection. It said that gay and bisexual men, homeless individuals, and people with compromised immune systems could be at an increased risk for the intestinal disease.
In 2017, San Diego recorded the highest number of cases in 20 years, including a disproportional increase in the gay and bisexual community and among the homeless population.
How do you get it?
Shigella can be caught from rimming, oral sex, or putting your fingers in your mouth after handling used condoms, douches or sex toys, the LGBT Foundation says.
Signs of infection include having an upset stomach, fever, stomach ache, and diarrhoea which might have blood in it.
These symptoms can last for around a week. Shigella is closely related to the E.coli bacteria.
Disease and infections magazine outbreaknewstoday.com reported that the number of cases typically increases in the late summer and fall.
How to lower risk of shigella infection
The LGBT Foundation says you can lower your risk of infection by washing your hands, bum and genitals after sex.
You could also use dental dams, condoms, and fisting gloves to protect you when having oral sex, fisting, and fingering.
It is also recommended that you change condoms between partners, and between anal and oral sex, whether they’re on a penis, hands, or sex toys.
Hygiene as prevention: Wash often and don’t re-use condoms. Photo: Mark Johnson
Shigella treatment
Shigella is treated with a course of antibiotics, the Foundation says. However, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned last month of an increasing number of antibiotic-resistant shigella infections.
If you think you have shigella, go to a sexual health (GUM) clinic or your GP and explain your symptoms. You may also want to say that you think you may have picked up an infection from sex.
A Fortune 500 company has named an openly gay woman to the role of president and CEO.
Effective August 1, Beth Ford will take the reins of food and agricultural cooperative Land O’Lakes, Inc., ranked 216 in the annual ranking of the largest companies in the US compiled by the American publication Fortune.
She joined the company in 2011 and has more than 20 years’ experience specifically in the areas of technology and research and development. The company statement announcing her appointment on Thursday made no reference to her appointment breaking new ground for the LGBT+ business community, although it stated that the new CEO is married to a woman: “Ford and her spouse, Jill Schurtz, have three teenage children and live in Minneapolis.”
Chief Executive Officer of Time Inc., Laura Lang speaks during a Fortune 500 event on May 7, 2012 in New York City (Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Time)
Ford joins a small club of openly gay business leaders running a Fortune 500 company. “By Fortune’s count, Ford will be the third openly gay CEO of a Fortune 500 company and the first woman,” the publication wrote—Apple’s Tim Cook and the Dow Chemical Company’s Jim Fitterling being the other two.
“Ford said it didn’t even come up in her discussions with the board. But she conceded that ‘it’s not nothing,’” Fortune’s article read.
“If it gives someone encouragement and belief that they can be their authentic self and live their life and things are possible, than that’s a terrific moment,” Ford told the publication, adding that she remembers what it was like not to be out in her workplace when she was in her 20s.
“I think I’ve been fortunate since my mid-30s of being just who I am,” Ford said, adding: “Work is hard enough, and then when you have to feel as though you can’t be who are, that’s got to be incredibly difficult.”
Apple’s Tim Cook and the Dow Chemical Company’s Jim Fitterling are the only other two openly gay business leaders running a Fortune 500 company (Andrew Burton/Getty Images)
In a separate statement to CNN, Ford said: “I am extraordinarily grateful to work at a company that values family, including my own.”
The LGBT+ rights group congratulated Ford on her appointment. “Her authentic leadership as an out lesbian is well-known in the LGBT corporate community, and the fact that she is assuming this role as an out lesbian sends an especially powerful message,” says Deena Fidas, HRC director of workplace equality, told CNN.
“This is not a story of someone getting into the higher echelons of leadership and then coming out, this is someone walking into this role with her full self,” Fidas added.
Los Angeles businessman David Cooley was flying from New York back to LA when he and his partner, who had already been seated in their assigned premium seats “for a while,” were approached by a flight attendant.
“My companion was asked to move from his premium seat to coach, so a couple could sit together,” Cooley wrote in a Facebook post about the incident. “I explained that we were a couple and wanted to sit together. He was given a choice to either give up the premium seat and move to coach or get off the plane.”
Cooley and his partner “could not bear the feeling of humiliation for an entire cross-country flight” so they left the plane.
“I cannot believe that an airline in this day and age would give a straight couple preferential treatment over a gay couple and go so far as to ask us to leave,” he wrote. “I have never been so discriminated against while traveling before.”
When contacted by GSN, Alaska Airlines said the businessman and his partner were “mistakenly assigned the same seats as another couple in Premium Class.”
“We reseated one of the guests from Premium Class in the Main Cabin,” the airline’s statement read.
In his posts on Twitter and Facebook, Cooley — owner of the popular West Hollywood club The Abbey — implored his followers to boycott Alaska Airlines and Virgin Airlines, the company it just purchased. He noted that they booked flights through Delta, who he called an “LGBT friendly airline” worthy of patronage.
A St. Louis County senior community has denied housing to a married lesbian couple who have been together for nearly four decades because of the couple’s sexual orientation, according to a lawsuit filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court.
Mary Walsh, 72, and Bev Nance, 68, both of Shrewsbury, say the Friendship Village senior living community, which has locations in Sunset Hills and Chesterfield, denied occupancy to the couple to live at the Sunset Hills community in 2016 because their relationship violated its cohabitation policy that defines marriage as “the union of one man and one woman, as marriage is understood in the Bible,” according to the lawsuit.
The policy, the suit says, violates the Fair Housing Act and the Missouri Human Rights Act. It names Friendship Village and its parent company FV Services Inc. as defendants. The couple is represented by the San Francisco-based National Center for Lesbian Rights, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Washington D.C.-based firm Relman, Dane & Colfax.
For the third year, Greater Fort Lauderdale will host the longest-running transgender conference in the United States, the Southern Comfort Transgender Conference, on Sept. 6-8, 2018. The informational forum will welcome hundreds of attendees for a series of workshops, seminars, and networking events hosted at the Riverside Hotel in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Conference activities include legal and medical presentations, as well as informative sessions on family, relationships, sexuality and much more. During the conference, participants will have the chance to experience Greater Fort Lauderdale’s stunning natural scenery, exciting nightlife, and exquisite dining.
“We are proud to welcome back the Southern Comfort Transgender Conference to our sunny shores,” said Richard Gray, Vice President of LGBT+ for the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau. “Greater Fort Lauderdale is committed to inclusion and equality, and we are continuously working to reach the transgender community to show them we are a destination that is diverse, welcoming, authentic and accepting.”
On Thursday, Sept. 6, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., The South Florida Transgender Medical Consortium, a collaborative partner with the Southern Comfort Transgender Conference, will host an in-depth professionals’ training program geared towards medical and mental health practitioners, and nursing and medical students, as well as their support staff. This part of the conference is free, and onsite registration for this day will be available. The remaining two days of the conference require registration, which can be done at sccfla.org.
On Friday, Sept. 7, Marie Trottier, policy advisor at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), will also speak to conference attendees. She recently helped develop a video focused on helping transgender travelers through the security screening process and letting them know what to expect.
On Saturday, Sept. 8, the keynote speaker will be Gia Gunn, a transgender activist, entertainer and TV personality. She was a contestant on Season 6 of “RuPaul’s Drag Race.” She will be speaking about pressing issues addressing the transgender community.
“We are looking forward to returning to Greater Fort Lauderdale – from the hotels to the cuisine to the nightlife, our attendees have been wowed every step of the way,” said Lexi Dee, President of Southern Comfort Transgender Conference. “Our partnership with the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau continues to grow each year as we work together to support our common interests and provide invaluable resources for the transgender community.”
The Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau has been welcoming LGBT+ travelers since 1996 when it became the first Convention & Visitors Bureau with a dedicated LGBT+ marketing department. Since then, Greater Fort Lauderdale has continued to break down barriers and facilitate visibility for the LGBT+ community at large, acting as a pioneer in the hospitality industry and ensuring that the destination is inclusive and welcoming with a diverse, safe and open community for all travelers.
On January 9, 2017, the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau launched a new global marketing and advertising campaign featuring transgender models, making it the world’s first destination to use transgender models in mainstream destination advertising. The campaign, which also features straight, gay and lesbian models, follows the destination’s long and storied history in LGBTQ marketing.
Most recently, Greater Fort Lauderdale/Broward County opened the area’s first LGBT+ Visitor Center in Wilton Manors, Broward County’s gay-centric district with the destination’s largest concentration of gay residents and businesses. It is located at 2300 NE 7th Avenue in Wilton Manors.
Greater Fort Lauderdale is also home to one of the largest Pride Centers in the country, the world’s first AIDS museum, the global headquarters of the International Gay & Lesbian Travel Association, and the Stonewall Museum, one of the only permanent spaces in the U.S. devoted to exhibitions relating to LGBT+ history and culture.
Greater Fort Lauderdale welcomes an estimated 1.5 million LGBT+ visitors who spend $1.5 billion annually. For more information on LGBT+ travel in Greater Fort Lauderdale, visit sunny.org/tlgb and www.sunny.org/lgbt. To see how welcoming Greater Fort Lauderdale is, click here.
For more information on the Southern Comfort Transgender Conference, please visit sccfla.org. The conference is produced and run by volunteers.
About Greater Fort Lauderdale
From the seagrass to the sawgrass, Greater Fort Lauderdale, located in Broward County, boasts more than 34,000 lodging accommodations at a variety of hotels, luxury spa resorts, and Superior Small Lodgings reflecting a “beach chic” vibe. Visitors enjoy 23 miles of Blue Wave certified beaches, discover 300+ miles of inland waterways that run from the Intracoastal Waterway to the Everglades, dine at thousands of restaurants and eateries, get immersed in a thriving arts and culture scene and indulge in top shopping.
For more information, contact the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau at (800) 22-SUNNY or visit www.sunny.org. Get social and engage with Greater Fort Lauderdale on social media channels including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest: @visitlauderdale.
A new report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) has revealed the state of accessing healthcare for LGBT people in the United States.
The research indicates that queer and trans populations encounter significant barriers, including facing discrimination from insurers or providers and long waiting lists for specialist services.
Additionally, the report found that LGBT people have restricted options when facing prejudice as there isn’t federal legislation which prohibits healthcare discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.The majority of the 81 interviewees told HRW that they had little or no access to LGBT-friendly healthcare providers in their area.
The head of one community center in rural Michigan said: “I do not know of any trans-affirming healthcare providers in the area. And I’ve talked to many trans people in the area.”
Some interviewees described driving two hours to attend a support group for gender-expansive youth, and others travelling two hours to attend therapy or meet with a trans-affirming doctor.
Other findings revealed some interviewees knew of very few providers in their areas who would prescribe PrEP, a medication that significantly lowers the risk of HIV infection by preventing HIV from taking hold in the body.
A psychologist in Knoxville, Tennessee, explained: “There are only two providers who’ll prescribe it—in a community this large. And the doctor we like, we overload him—we’re like, you have one option, and if you don’t have insurance, you’re pooched, because he’s expensive.”
While in Memphis, Tennessee, a healthcare provider similarly said that, in a city of a million people, the hospital they worked with was aware of three doctors who would handle PrEP referrals.
The report also highlighted struggles for same-sex couples looking for reproductive health providers.
A lesbian woman in Mississippi recalled that, when she and her wife sought a fertility doctor in 2012, they were unable to find options in their area and contacted a clinic in Alabama. When that clinic informed the couple that they only treated heterosexual, married couples, they did not find an LGBT-friendly provider for a year.
The report primarily focused on LGBT people living in Mississippi and Tennessee, two of the states where statewide antidiscrimination protections do not prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity and where lawmakers have recently enacted exemptions permitting some providers to refuse service to LGBT people because of their religious or moral beliefs.
It appears a local McDonalds has thrown down the gauntlet to its new fast-food neighbor.
A Chick-fil-A is moving in next to the Glastonbury McDonald’s. While the chicken chain does not open until July 26, to the casual observer it appears McDonald’s may already be taking a dig at their values. The sign under the golden arches reads “We Welcome Everyone.”
Chick-fil-A has taken criticism in the past for the fast-food chain owner’s opposition to same-sex unions and past support for anti-same-sex marriage initiatives. The chain was founded by S. Truett Cathy in 1946 and is now run by his family.
Under the religiously conservative founder, the chain gained prominence for its Bible Belt observance of Sunday — none of its hundreds of restaurants are open on that day, to allow employees a day of rest.
Those religious views helped win Cathy and his family loyal following from conservative customers, but also invited protests when Cathy’s son denounced gay marriage.
The general manager of the Glastonbury McDonald’s told NBC Connecticut off camera that the sign was simply a welcome message.
“It just means that everyone is welcome, young old, everyone,” she said. She said the sign was not meant as a political statement.
Still, the message raised some eyebrows with those passing through.
“Diversity’s a good thing. What are they gonna do? Not serve some people? I mean, it’s kind of funny today but I think it might have something to do with their neighbors. Which, you know, not calling them out or anything…” said Raymond Modzicato of South Windsor.
“For McDonald’s to step up and say we welcome everyone. I feel that is a huge step for them. Then in the background you have Chick-fil-A who has historically not welcomed everyone,” said Tina Manus, who drove all the way from her home in Stratford to show her support of the McDonald’s.
Some felt that the restaurant shouldn’t be making statements about anything other than food.
“I feel like it’s kind of rude to Chick-fil-A because they have Christian beliefs, but that doesn’t mean they have to not accept gay people,” Zack Caporale of Glastonbury said.
Jordan Snook, the Chick-Fil-A franchise owner, said he wasn’t sure what the intention of the sign was, but said they were striving to create “an environment of hospitality.
Snook also released the following statement when asked about the sign.
“We are excited to open in Glastonbury next week, and look forward to being great neighbors who welcome everyone. Glastonbury will be representative of all Chick-fil-A restaurants in serving great food and providing remarkable service for all customers, as well as a diverse workplace of individuals who represent many viewpoints, opinions, backgrounds and beliefs.”
The Episcopal Church has passed a resolution that will allow same-sex couples to get married in their diocese of choice, regardless of the bishop’s view on same-sex weddings.
The resolution B012 was approved with an overwhelming majority on Friday, July 13, during the Episcopal Church General Convention in Austin, Texas—a triennial event. In 2015, after the historic Supreme Court ruling recognising same-sex marriage across the US, the General Convention too voted on allowing same-sex weddings.
The resolution passed, but it gave bishops the power to refuse a couple on the basis of their theological views on marriage, and force other members of the clergy in that diocese to follow their line. Overall, eight dioceses were effectively refusing same-sex couples the right to marry.
Friday’s resolution removes that hurdle, placing the decision to marry a same-sex couple in the hand of the local priest. Members of the clergy can make the personal decision to not wed gay or lesbian couples—but they will have to tap another priest or bishop willing to perform the sacrament using gender-neutral liturgies.“We are fond of saying around the Episcopal Church that all are welcome, and all means all, y’all,” said the chair of the General Convention’s Task Force on the Study of Marriage, East Carolina Deputy Joan Geiszler-Ludlum, ahead of the vote in support of the resolution, quoted in the Episcopal News Service.
The US Episcopal Church, led by Bishop Michael Curry who gave a memorable, fiery sermon during Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding, is one of a handful of Christian denominations supporting LGBT inclusion—the Unitarian Universalist Association and the United Church of Christ are two of the others—which resulted in the church being shunned by the global Anglican Communion. The Scottish Episcopal Church too faced similar punishment from the Anglican Communion for recognising same-sex marriages.
A Filipino priest performs Christian rites during a mass ‘wedding rites’ on June 28, 2015 in Manila, Philippines. (Photo by Dondi Tawatao/Getty Images)
The resolution approval on Friday marked a victory for the All Sacrament for All People group, which has been campaigning for full marriage equality across the dioceses for the past three years, when Bishop Joseph Bauerschmidt of the Episcopal Diocese of Tennessee enforced the opposition to same-sex marriage in his diocese.
The All Sacraments for All People campaign produced a moving video in which families affected by bishops’ negative decision on same-sex marriage told their stories, calling on the convention to make the necessary changes.
“I think it’s a wonderful compromise, which respects the dignity of the bishop and his position, but still allows marriage for all in their home congregations,” Connally Davies Penley, a member of the All Sacrament for All People, told the Tennessean.
The resolution will only come to effect on the first Sunday of the Advent, December 2. In the meantime, Bishop Bauerschmidt told the Tenneassean, “there is much to work out.”
