Minister awaits church verdict on same-sex marriages

<p>Rev. Jane Spahr now awaits the verdict following a two-hour trial Friday before the Presbyterian Church’s highest court on charges that she violated church law by marrying same-sex couples.</p><p>“It’s been wonderfully inspiring,” Spahr, 65, a lesbian activist, said in a telephone interview. “So we wait, but we’re with wonderful family and friends.”</p><p>Spahr has acknowledged marrying gay and lesbian couples, saying it is a matter of principle and conscience.</p><p>Critics and church prosecutors say she is flouting Presbyterian law which defines marriage as “a civil contract between a woman and a man.”</p><p>A 16-member Permanent Judicial Commission of the General Assembly is expected to issue a verdict Monday. The body heard the case at the denomination’s national headquarters in Louisville, Ky.</p><p>Spahr said she couldn’t predict how the ruling might go, but one of the women she married expressed optimism.</p><p>“This body seemed open-minded,” said Sherrill Figuera of Guerneville. “I hope, pray and believe that the spirit will move their hearts and they will realize that now is the time for change.”</p><p>Spahr presided at Figuera’s marriage to her longtime partner, Annie Senechal, on the Sonoma coast in 2005, one of the two ceremonies cited in the charges against Spahr.</p><p>The case against Spahr was prompted by an e-mail from a Seattle-area Presbyterian minister, the Rev. James Berkley, in 2004.</p><p>The 2.3-million member Presbyterian Church has been sharply divided over homosexuality, including the question of gay marriage, for more than 30 years.</p><p>Spahr was acquitted by a church tribunal in Santa Rosa in 2006, but the verdict was appealed by the Presbytery of the Redwoods. A regional judicial body found last August that Spahr had violated church law, and she appealed to the Louisville tribunal, which is the equivalent of the church’s supreme court.</p><p>Sara Taylor, one of Spahr’s three attorneys, said she argued today that since there is no “strict prohibition” against performing same-gender marriages that no offense can be established.</p><p>“We’re definitely hopeful,” Taylor said. “It is a very thoughtful commission.”</p><p>Commission members were not available for comment.</p>