St. David’s Episcopal Church of Austin would be among the first Episcopal congregations in Texas allowed to offer a liturgy blessing same-sex unions if the Episcopal Church, as expected, approves the trial rite at its general convention in July.
The Rt. Rev. Andy Doyle, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Texas, has named only one other church, St. Stephen’s Episcopal in Houston, as among the first with permission to bless same-gender covenants.
Like other denominations, the Episcopal Church has wrestled with the issue of homosexuality for decades. Texas does not recognize same-sex unions, and a number of traditionalists in the Episcopal Church do not favor them.
For the record, there are a lot of Texans who don’t even consider Austin part of the state, hence all the “Keep Austin weird” t-shirts out there. 🙂 Houston is another story that I would need someone else to tell…
I belonged to St. David’s from’74 to 79. It was a place with many wonderful things going on. There was also a strain of slightly off-beat stuff that left me slightly uneasy. A few years I stopped by on a nostalgia tour and noticed they were building a concrete labyrinth in a little garden out back. I’m fairly neutral about labyrinths, but it did seem trendy. I’m not sure why I am posting this, except that out makes me sad and it seems an object lesson in how things go up our down, left or right.
Perhaps there’s another TV show about Texas in here somewhere! I mean it could give GCB a whole ‘nother twist, now, couldn’t it? Nah. The real question is who’ll do it first for the notoriety of it, that being the most important thing. And Andy will have his doily,