Recent news reports raised the possibility of bringing the issue of gay marriage directly to the people in 2012, and I couldn’t be happier. I’m sure there are those out there who feel like we’ve just spent a lot of time and effort talking about this. I know they must feel that this issue has been decided.

But for thousands of Maine families living without the protections that only marriage can provide, this issue is far from over.

Additional Photos

Matt Moonen hugs Taryn Friedman on the steps of Portland City Hall on Nov. 5, 2009, after a failed bid to uphold a gay marriage law. 2009 Press Herald file

I haven’t always been a supporter of marriage equality. As a matter of fact, I was strongly opposed at one point. But something changed when I was challenged about my preconceived notions of people with different sexual orientations. When I really got to know such individuals on a personal level, it struck me how normal they were. I don’t know why it shocked me so much, but it did.

They weren’t looking for special rights. They were looking to be treated just like everyone else.

As a pastor, I know that this can be a very emotional and divisive issue. I have friends, family and congregation members on both sides. But I have to admit, it saddens me that we are preparing for yet another up-or-down vote on the quality of another person’s family. That just seems wrong.

But I, for one, will continue to work toward the day when my LGBT friends and their families can enjoy all of the same rights and responsibilities that I do — no matter how long it takes.

Pastor Michael Gray

Old Orchard Beach

Pastoral letter a blueprint for return to fiscal sanity

The bitter intensity of the debate about the best way to reduce the national deficit and bring fiscal sanity to the national budget leads me to suggest a turn to intelligent reasoning.

I suggest using the following statement as a foundation on which to build sound new economic policy and an appropriate budget. It is taken from the 1986 pastoral letter of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops on Social Teaching and the U.S. Economy:

“The needs of the poor take priority over the desires of the rich; the rights of workers over the maximization of profits; the preservation of the environment over uncontrolled industrial expansion; production to meet social needs over production for military purposes.”

This is a sound, equitable and moral set of principles on which to build security and peace in this world and a sound budget for the U.S.

John J. Godfrey, Jr.

Gorham

State’s ethical employers don’t need new teen rules 

While I have no reason to doubt Ky Wolterbeek’s good faith in defending Maine employers in a letter published Monday, Bill Nemitz is right in excoriating the GOP proposal to allow teens to work longer hours for less pay.

While most employers may be ethical, some would certainly succumb to the lure of paying $2 less per hour and requiring teens to work many more hours to retain their jobs.

More troubling is the probability that some employers would replace full-time, minimum wage-earning adults with teens at a substantially reduced rate of pay and benefits, firing the teens at the end of the six-month period allowed for the reduced wage. Thus the effect would be to reduce employment for those who most need it, rather than increase it.

However, if Wolterbeek is right and no employee would do such things, then the bill is unnecessary anyway and should not be acted upon, especially given the GOP’s alleged commitment to less government. This is certainly one law that the state does not need.

(Rev.) Donald J. Rudalevige

Cape Elizabeth

Fear not, the governor will solve mural dilemma

Clearly, the labor mural is an inappropriate canary in the coal mine (hope that isn’t too downtrodden a metaphor).

Gov. LePage is completely right that the Maine Department of Labor is the wrong site for the mural. It is a mere technicality that their current website lists goals of “Assisting individuals, families and communities when jobs are lost; Protecting workers on the job,” and so on.

Just give the governor a second. He is dismantling these goals and resources as fast as he can. All of those folks who wait in the DOL lobby now for their unemployment checks or to file work complaints may soon be encountering locked doors under “Welcome to Mainedens!” banners.

But even LePage’s worst critics have to hand it to him for taking a less-than-Diego-Rivera-quality mural and turning it into an international overnight sensation!

If someone had tried to sell that mural a month ago, what would it have brought on the market? Maine libraries, schools or universities might have liked it — especially as public education has always been the means by which the poor have raised themselves out of murals. But such institutions are feeling puny these days.

Now, since the U.S. Department of Labor wants its money back, the Aristocrooks are raising $60,000 to buy the mural. Christies would surely start the bidding at several times that figure.

But paws off, everyone: A clear majority of the owners — Mainers — want it restored to the original site.

Now just where is our precious “public art?” No worries, it’s locked up safely in an electrical closet because you never know when an inappropriate fox might take up residence at the henhouse.

Carolyn Eyler

Westbrook

How’s a voter to know if a politician’s lying

So let me see if I understand this. Your editorial on Monday (“Misleading claims are part of politics, not libel”) applauds Judge Hornby’s decision that it is perfectly all right for a politician to publish “imprecise facts” and “misleading” allegations about an opponent during a political campaign.

In addition, you and Judge Hornby are both comfortable with the idea that “… it is up to the voter to figure out who is telling the truth.” So, if the editor of the newspaper is willing to approve “imprecise facts” (when I was a kid my mom called these lies) and our court system is OK with that, where do voters get the information to figure out who’s telling the truth?

Where am I going and why am I in this hand basket?

David Dodge

Buxton

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