State of...Married

Opening Blasphemy, and yes, RantWoman humbly acknowledges this could really, really use and editor.: Jesus Christ on a Pizza Crust.

RantWoman WILL post her Meeting's State of Society report anon.

Hypothetically, there would be an outtake of the form: Did anyone get married?

(RantWoman notes here two weddings in past years: rantWoman wishes the happy heterosexual couples extra decades together and still DOES NOT APOLOGIZE for, um, RantWoman PRESENCE in the same time frame as the weddings. Hold sundry sore points in the Light especially if it winds up that RantWoman haunts anniversaries. But RantWoman digresses.)

RantWoman has lost track of which same-gender couples in her community have finally done the state paperwork after WA Referendum 74 made same-gender marriage legal in 2012 and the Obama administration refused to enforce DOMA and various court rulings have inched things forward. RantWoman remembers a couple moments in Meeting or on Facebook. RantWoman notes that federal circuit after federal circuit is striking down bans on same-gender marriage but has a pretty strong leading not to take or to let others take anything for granted.

A Friend from RantWoman's Meeting who now lives far away has been very active in the FLGBTQC Ad-hoc committee on Friend of the Court Briefs. MAYBE if the State of Society report was mentioning people by name who are very visible outside Meeting, the report could have gone all out and mentioned this Friend. (Okayyyy, RantWoman, TRY to stay away from topics that tempt you toward Dial-a-Tirade, like that Friend's ministry.)

RantWoman is unclear whether faithful work by the FLGBTQC ad-hoc committee and other faith communities on Friend of the Court Briefs has played any role in these decisions or whether this is just a tide of federal precedent.
http://rantwomanrsof.blogspot.com/2015/03/the-marryin-thang-faithfulness-in.html

Either way, RantWoman thinks, given her Monthly and Yearly Meeting's long history of work about marriage equality, RantWoman might think to take note in the State of Society Report. Okay, RantWoman thought that taking note of Referendum 74 would have been entirely on point in the 2013 State of society Report and was darned grateful that other Meetings in her Quarter DID take note in that year's State of Society reports.

RantWoman thinks it would also have been AWESOME if someone other than RantWoman thought to bring either Referendum 74 of this past year's marriage equality advances up. RantWoman thinks this but RantWoman is biased. RantWoman in a fit of social awkwardness one night at Annual session teamed up with another Friend to put the final touches on the draft  1997 NPYM minute on civil recognition of same-gender marriage.  And before that RantWoman remembers being in Meeting for Business when Meeting finally came to unity to call same gender commitments maririages. And RantWoman remembers that unity about the marriage wording was important because for a time her Meeting was marrying no one, not same-gender couples and not heterosexual couples in solidarity.

RantWoman wonders whether people doing clearness committees for marriage under care of her Meeting even talk about this history or the part of Faith and Practice that talks a little about this. RantWoman specifically wonders this in humble irritation about the editing process that year and that the nice couple who drafted the 2013 State of Society report was married under the care of the Meeting!

Along the way from unity and NPYM minutes, RantWoman has both signed petitions and, when the Yes on 74 campaign was already big and well-funded united with Friends clear to move onto other things. RantWoman is grateful for the stalwarts who did phone-banking for the big campaign.

Just when RantWoman thought she was going to get by with only another outtake from the State of Society report, crash, rattle, bang, with computerized chatter, along comes dialogue about the role of Care and Counsel Committee with the brave Clerk of Nominating committee who serves Meeting heroically and is not clear to become a member for what RantWoman considers a very important reason related partly to heritage.

Brave Clerk gets to help put together Care and Counsel without exactly knowing what they do. Start with memberships and marriages and clearness processes for both. Add in  "I'm not interested in Your Thought Processes Friend who a. will not return phone calls or respond to phone calls and only wants to talk in a loud environment when rantWoman finds it hard to have centered conversation anyway, and b is the liason between Nominating committee and Care and Counsel. So please hold RantWoman in the Light because she feels entitled to another temper tantrum and sort of hopes the tantrum will get transformed into appropriate actual live conversations but has no freaking idea even where to start!

RantWoman thinks of
--One Friend who was married in the manner of Friends in our worship room and a couple years ago gratefully announced the couple's 50th anniversary.

--Another young Friend, not a member, who reports a "We''re kind of busy" response when she expressed interested in community help about a wedding. It's true that marriage in the manner of Friends is a different task than a clearness committee and marriage under the care of Meeting, but, really!

(For the record, RantWoman was thinking about marriage and Ferrener Husband in the same timeframe where Oversight Committee lost RantWoman's first letter applying for membership. Okayyy, RantWoman, STOP! Membership meditations get their own post!)