SPAIN: Valencian gay community holds double wedding as Pope Benedict XVI finishes his trip

Record ID: 278369

  • Title: SPAIN: Valencian gay community holds double wedding as Pope Benedict XVI finishes his trip
  • Date: 10th July 2006
  • Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) TOWN COUNCILLOR CHELO ORIA SAYING: "I'd like to highlight here that nobody, not even the Church, can avoid the reality of people that are part of our society and that reality includes the existence of different types of families."
  • Embargoed: 25th July 2006 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Spain
  • Country: Spain
  • Topics: Legal System,Religion
  • Reuters ID: LVA1RAQBVSRW9BWZDJV3WIV0QR0E
  • Story Text: As Pope Benedict XVI was officially closing the World Family Meeting in Valencia on Sunday (July 8), emphasizing the importance of maintaining the Catholic Church traditions, a double gay wedding took place in the same city.
    Organisers of the event said they wanted to stress that there are alternatives to what the Church considers as traditional family values.
    "I'd like to highlight here that nobody, not even the Church, can avoid the reality of people that are part of our society and that reality includes the existence of different types of families," said Town Councillor Chelo Oria as she declared Luisa Notario and Nuria cobo, a lesbian couple, officially married.
    During the same ceremony, Jose Francisco de Lamo married his partner of two years Sergi Campillo.
    The two couples had purposely planned their weddings to coincide with Pope Benedict's visit.
    The ceremony was originally going to take place in an open public location but local authorities prevented the organisers to do it in the same date of the Pope's visit.
    Pope Benedict has strongly opposed gay unions as an expression of "anarchic freedom" while hailing heterosexual marriages and as "a pillar of humanity".
    Many of the weekend family celebration events demonstrated support those views.
    Spain has been on the frontline of a Europe-wide trend of social liberalisation since Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's government swept the conservative Jose Maria Aznar from power in elections in 2004.
    Zapatero got approval from Spanish parliament in 2005 to legalise same sex marriage.
    Zapatero did not attend mass on Sunday and was heckled by a small crowd when he arrived at the archbishop's residence to meet the Pope on Saturday (July 8).
    According to Spanish gay, lesbian and transsexual organisation FELGT, 4,500 gay couples have married in the last year while 50 couples have applied for adoption and three have filed for divorce.
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