Gay and blind, lesbian and disabled Gay men on male pregnancy Is the editor of the Gazette a homophobe? Togetherness at Unity BBCM and the circuit You're never too old to tell Mother! Gay marriage update

Going to the chapel

>> The state of the fight for same-sex marriage rights

by Matthew Hays

Local activists Michael Hendricks and René Leboeuf will be having their commitment ceremony before the gay pride parade this Sunday. Note the careful wording of their invitation. The two want everyone to know it: right now, gay men and lesbians do not have the right to marry legally.

But the two aren't limiting their actions to a publicity-stunt ritual. They are part of the nation-wide legal push and pull to make Canada's gay and lesbian citizens truly equal and allow them to be a part of one of our basic, fundamental social institution: marriage.

Government hearings are being held across the country, in which opponents and proponents on the issue are being heard. The hearings are taking place as of press time in Vancouver, where several couples are challenging the government to allow them to wed. Hearings are slated to take place here and in Toronto in November.

Interestingly enough, a number of those involved with the hearings say a sense of inevitability around the legal possibility of same-sex marriage within approximately two years. Activists report that Holland's move to completely legalize gay marriage last year has led to the shattering of a barrier. "Our argument is a very simple one," says John Fisher, a spokesperson for Equality for Gays and Lesbians Everywhere (EGALE), on the phone from Vancouver. "The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms clearly allows for this."

Some lawyers working on the case suggest the ministry of justice may attempt to sidestep the issue of gay marriage by unveiling a bill for virtual marriage, Vermont style. Two partners of the same sex would be allowed to register their relationship with the government. Everything would be precisely the same as a het marriage, except the name.

This would not be an acceptable compromise to activists working on the gay-marriage case, who want into marriage as full equals. Craig Maynard, who works with the B.C. Partners Group--the lobby group fighting for same-sex marriage in that province--refers to the idea as "marriage lite," adding that "yes, that's a cute one. But why create an entirely different structure? We then get into separate but equal territory." (Referring to the Brown vs. Board of Education U.S. Supreme Court decision in which racially segregated schools were deemed unconstitutional.)

But marriage-lite proposal or not, activists across the board indicate that the government seems to be going through with the hearings less as a real fight against gay marriage then a simple rite of passage. As the results of the Leger & Leger poll indicated last month, Canadians are becoming more and more comfortable with the idea of gay marriage all the time.

Hendricks and Leboeuf's ceremony will take place on Sunday, Aug. 5, at 11:30am at the garden at the Centre for Canadian Architecture. Their reception, otherwise known as the Divers/Cité parade, will follow.