<h3>DignityUSA Advocates for Sacramental Equality for Gays after Civil Marriage is Achieved</h3> <p><strong>Seattle WA. July 5 2015</strong>. Members of the leading LGBT Catholic organzation meeting in Seattle for the organizations national convention have voted to begin advocating for equal access to all of the sacraments of the Catholic Church for LGBT people and their families. A unanimously-passed resolution states that <strong>DignityUSA and its members call on the leaders and members of our Roman Catholic Church to ensure that all of the sacraments of our Church be DignityUSAistered regardless of the gender identity sexual orientation or relational status of the person(s) seeking the sacrament.</strong></p> <p>DignityUSA stands for full inclusion and equality of LGBT people in the Catholic Church. We cant be fully equal if we are barred from any of our Churchs sacraments said Marianne Duddy-Burke DignityUSAs Executive Director. Right now we are officially banned from marriage and ordination and often denied other sacraments as well.</p> <p>We hear stories all the time of people told they cannot have Communion because they are gay in a same-sex relationship or civilly married. Many priests refuse to baptize the children of same-sex couples. A gay man in Washington DC was denied last rites after suffering a heart attack. These incidents cause pain and alienation for us and for our families and create division within our Church continued Duddy-Burke.</p> <p>We believe that the Churchs own theology about the importance and nature of sacraments supports our goal. Sacraments are means of celebrating what is sacred in human lives and ways of being open to Gods grace. Surely the lives of LGBT people and our families are just as sacred and just as deserving of grace as the lives of other people said Duddy-Burke.</p> <p>We know that it is going to take a lot of work and probably many years to achieve this goal said Duddy-Burke. But having gained civil marriage equality in the US we know that the miraculous is possible. We believe that rethinking how sacraments are DignityUSAistered will be good for everyone in the Catholic Church because it will help us to live our belief in the intrinsic dignity and equality of every person as created and loved by God.&nbsp; This broadened understanding of the sacraments would apply not just to LGBT people but to everyone including women and married men and women seeking ordination for example.</p> <p>The full text of the resolution is as follows:</p> <p><strong>Whereas DignityUSA works for the full inclusion and equality of lesbian gay bisexual transgender queer and intersex (LGBTQI) Catholics in our Church and our world and</strong></p> <p><strong>Whereas DignityUSA has long proclaimed its belief in the sacredness of the lives and families of LGBTQI people and our families and</strong></p> <p><strong>Whereas LGBTQI people and our families have too often experienced difficulty in accessing or have been explicitly denied the sacraments of our Church simply because of who we are or whom we love</strong></p> <p><strong>Therefore be it resolved that DignityUSA and its members call on the leaders and members of our Roman Catholic Church to ensure that all of the sacraments of our Church be DignityUSAistered regardless of the gender identity sexual orientation or relational status of the person(s) seeking the sacrament.</strong></p> <p class=rtecenter>###</p> <p><em>DignityUSA is the nations foremost organization of lesbian gay bisexual and transgender Catholics their families friends and supporters. Founded in 1969 it works for full inclusion and equality for LGBT Catholics in the Church and society.</em>&nbsp;</p>