The Boston Globe, a subsidiary of The New York Times Company, continued to distort the news last Friday, in its ongoing efforts to promote gay marriage, with a story headlined, "Church open to same-sex benefits talk."

The story had the unintended effect of renewing speculation that the Globe/Times conglomerate is working closely with Chief Justice Margaret Marshall, who continues to stall on her court's decision about gay marriage. The speculation is that there is a conflict among the seven members of the state's Supreme Judicial Court.

Not only has the court failed to decide the gay marriage case, it has taken the unusual step of informing Massachusetts Citizens for Marriage and its President, Sarah McVay Pawlick, that the lawsuit to send MCM's ballot initiative for the Protection of Marriage Amendment to the present legislature will not be decided on time and is being held for a later decision.

Lawyers point out that all Marshall needs to do is write a two-word decision, "Judgment affirmed" if she wanted to end the MCM suit. This would affirm the opinion of Single Justice John Greaney, who dismissed the MCM suit, causing it to be appealed to the full court.

Some observers believe the Globe and Marshall are trying to discourage the voters and make them believe they have lost the battle, and they will therefore not be attentive to what is happening. Under that scenario, the Globe and Marshall hope they can quickly pass something in the legislature while no one is looking. But no one knows for sure what is occurring in the SJC.

If a reader continued past the headline in Friday's story and went to the seventh-through-eleventh paragraphs, he would finally discover that the headline and the first six paragraphs were a distortion of the testimony before the legislature on Thursday, which considered several bills to approve same-sex marriage or civil unions.

Truth Comes Out

The truth was finally told, beginning in the seventh paragraph:

"Daniel Avila, associate director for policy and research for the Massachusetts Catholic Conference, the church's lobbying arm, said [Worcester Bishop Daniel P.] Reilly's official testimony represented nothing new and did not signal a shift in church policy. Avila emphasized that the church remains opposed to putting gay or heterosexual domestic partners on an equal legal footing with married couples and that 'it would be mischaracterizing our position to report that what was said today was in any way supportive of domestic partnerships.'

"The church has opposed legislation that would create domestic partner benefits because the efforts, in the church's view, equated the partnerships to marriages between men and women.

"'Our position has been consistent,' Avila said. 'Up until this point, we have always opposed specific bills dealing with domestic partnership because they were enmeshed in the same problem as civil union bills. They always attempted to equate a domestic partner with a spouse, and therefore we could not support it. It brought in an unrelated issue that brought larger issues in. As the bishop said today, we can join the discussion if a bill does not equate a partner as a spouse. How it is accomplished is crucial.'

"A spokesman for the Boston Archdiocese, the Rev. Christopher Coyne, echoed Avila's position, saying the church is primarily interested in extending benefits that affect education and health matters in gay families with children. Such benefits would be unrelated to the institution of marriage, he said.

"'I think what's actually being said is that the benefits that are necessary for the protection of children and families don't necessarily involve any kind of a redefinition of relationship or marital status,' Coyne said."

The Globe jumped to propaganda again when it quoted C. J. Doyle of the Catholic Action League:
"As if highlighting the seeming confusion over the issue, the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts, a lay organization, submitted testimony vigorously opposing benefits to same-sex couples.
"'Proposals to grant legal recognition and tax-funded benefits to so-called civil unions are, far from being a compromise, merely an incremental tactic,' said the league's director, C. J. Doyle."

But there's nothing "confusing" about that. It would be an "incremental tactic." The Times and the Globe have always indicated over the years that domestic partnerships are a method of ultimately getting to homosexual marriage, but getting there a few years slower.

It all boils down to what Speaker Tom Finneran has always wondered: How will you tell two sisters who are living together after becoming widows that they must also have sex together in order qualify for any benefits. It also causes lawyers to point out that it would violate the U.S. Constitution to award benefits only to homosexuals and not to the many other groups also clamoring for marriage benefits nowadays.

(The word "Times" was not italicized in the second paragraph of this article because it refers to the conglomerate, The New York Times Company, not the newspaper.)