From Berks County comes word of a Pennsylvania lesbian couple stuck in legal limbo.  They married in Massachusetts, but to obtain a Massachusetts divorce will need to reside there for one year.  To get divorced in Pennsylvania, their marriage has to be legal in Pennsylvania which it is not.  Thus, their divorce petition was turned down.

Berks County is in Southeastern Pennsylvania

This is certainly not the first report of a same sex couple caught in a legal limbo due to the patchwork quilt of marriage equality laws in the United States and they certainly aren't the only couple in Pennsylvania who face this dilemna.  Faced with the dissolution of marriage, it is unreasonable to expect someone to move to Mass just to obtain a divorce.

Pennsylvania has just recently squelched attemps to amend the PA constitution to restrict marriage to one man, one woman.  Another bill is sitting in the Senate which would legalize same sex marriage. That's not going to happen, but I'd certainly like to see elected leaders such as Pennsylvania Senator Daylin Leach tackle the thorny issue of the divorce.  Forcing people to remain in legal limbo is not acceptable.  It is bad enough to have your marriage semi-acknowledged when YOU acknowledge it.  Being "sort of married" when you aren't with your spouse any longer is a real problem. 

We need real solutions.  Clearly, marriage equality is the ultimate solution which allows people to make their marital decisions without legal maneuvers and political power plays.  But is there something else that can be done?   A Rhode Island court denied a petition for divorce even without the DOMA law Pennsylvania has in place. A New York court, however, granted a divorce because children were involved.  This can be a very sticky wicket that requires thoughtful solutions as the full impact of second-class citizenship continues to fall out throughout the nation.

I say the solution in the short term is for us to work to elect allies who will show leadership on LGBTQ issues and tackle this sure to be growing legal problem for Pennsylvania families.

The deception with tact, just what are you trying to say?
You've got a blank face, which irritates
Communicate, pull out your party piece
You see dimensions in two
State your case with black or white
But when one little cross leads to shots, grit your teeth
You run for cover so discreet, why don't they:

Do what they say, say what you mean
One thing leads to another
You told me something wrong, I know I listen too long
But then one thing leads to another.

The impression that you sell
Passes in and out like a scent
But the long face that you see comes from living close
To your fears
If this is up then I'm up but you're running out of sight
You've seen your name on the walls
And when one little bump leads to shock miss a beat
You run for cover and there's heat, why don't they:

Do what they say, say what they mean
One thing leads to another
You told me something wrong, I know I listen too long
But then one thing leads to another
One thing leads to another

Then it's easy to believe
Somebody's been lying to me
But when the wrong word goes in the right ear
I know you've been lying to me
It's getting rough, off the cuff I've got to say enough's enough

Bigger the harder he falls
But when the wrong antidote is like a bulge on the throat
You runs for cover in the heat why don't they

Do what they say, say what they mean
One thing leads to another
You tell me something wrong, I know I listen too long
But then one thing leads to another
One thing leads to another (Repeat)

sdf

This is what caught my eye this morning ...

The military thinks we are stupid enough to accept a faux-relaxing of policies in lieu of real reform on Don't Ask, Don't Tell. You still aren't supposed to tell, but now if a third party tells on you --- they aren't so quick to take action.  Geez. 

I completely missed this Tribune-Review posting on State Rep Darryl Metcalfe's run for Lt. Governor.

If the next governor doesn't stick to cutting "excessive spending and reducing taxes and protect the liberties of Pennsylvanians," Metcalfe said, he would run for governor in 2014.

Metcalfe said he is the first "accountability candidate" for lieutenant governor in state history and will have the next governor "looking over his shoulder

Here's the scary ... and comforting ... part.

Metcalfe's reputation could galvanize support in the primary season but be more damaging in the longer term, said Christopher Borick, a political science professor at Muhlenberg College in Allentown.

"In the short term, in the primary -- where the electorate is more conservative -- it may strike a few chords with your base," Borick said.

The homo card will pay off in the primary, especially in Jason Altmire's district.  Great. At least, we can *hope* that the actual Lt. Governor will support Domestic Violence Awareness Month proclamations. 

The Trib also reprints an AP story questioning whether loosening DADT will impact military benefits for the families of LGBT soldiers. 

It really is just a matter of time folks until these walls finally crumble down, but it is tough to wait it out especially when we watch our so-called allies doing patchwork that keep the wall up.  Imperfect analogy, but you get my point. 

From the Post-Gazette:

The First Presbyterian Church of Beaver has been allowed to leave the Presbyterian Church (USA) and take its property into the more theologically conservative Evangelical Presbyterian Church.

An agreement between the 700-member church and Beaver-Butler Presbytery was reached Tuesday. The congregation made a parting gift to the presbytery of $133,700 from its reserve funds, and the presbytery signed over the deed to the property. The settlement was reached through a process that the presbytery approved in 2009, when it became apparent that several congregations wanted to leave over issues including gay ordination and biblical authority.

At least this was resolved amicably, but how very sad that entire congregations are so rooted in bigotry against the LGBTQ community that the church must change hands. Even more sad that the "theologically conservative" denominations are preying on these same fears to swell their ranks. 

This brought to mind the Washington Post blog of Reverend Janet Edwards, a Pittsburgh based minister in the Presbyterian Church. She writes that the call of pastoral ministry is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

But if a pastor is struggling with a conflict between his or her faithful knowledge of Scripture and the traditional assumptions of the congregation -- even when congregants hold to them tightly as defining beliefs -- then welcome to ministry. There is no getting around the fact that afflicting the comfortable is an aspect of our calling.

While it is comfortable to see the lack of acrimony among the church and the presbytery play out across the front pages, I can't help but wonder if genteel agreements about the distribution of property are the way to go.  Is the further entrenchment of the gay-friendly and the gay-phobic faith community consistent with the obligations of the pastors, the bishops -- the calling?