Monday, August 26, 2002

A story published today by the New York Post reports that two Episcopalian priests who want to get married are spearheading a legal fight by same-sex couples, dividing church leaders and igniting a new religious controversy over homosexuality.

Dennis Winslow, who preaches at St. Peter's at Chelsea, and his partner of 10 years, Mark Lewis, of the Church of Our Savior in Secaucus, N.J., believe they are being treated like "second-class citizens" because the law in New Jersey, where they live, forbids same-sex marriage.

Bishops in the Episcopal Church are deeply divided over the couple's decision to join forces with six other couples suing the state of New Jersey for refusing them marriage licenses.

While Lewis' Newark Diocese has lent public support, the New York Diocese has refused to comment, and other bishops have called on them to resign from the ministry.

Bishop Jack Iker, of the Fort Worth Diocese in Texas, and Bishop John Howe, of the Central Florida Diocese, said yesterday the pair were violating the church's teachings and their ordination vows.

"It's outrageous and it's an embarrassment the Episcopal Church doesn't need," Iker said.

"We're seeing a breakdown in the church's authority and discipline and, really, they should leave the church."

But Bishop John Palmer Croneberger, of Newark, said it was time for the church to change its canons that describe marriage as a "solemn and public covenant between a man and a woman."

"Sometimes, those two people will be of the same sex - in my view, it makes it no less a marriage," he said.

Winslow and Lewis are the lead plaintiffs in the groundbreaking civil suit, filed in Hudson County Superior Court in Jersey City by a national rights group, Lambda.