Oceania Australia Quakers in
Australia are overwhelmingly accepting of homosexuality and will celebrate same sex marriages as they would an opposite sex marriage. In 1975
Australia Yearly Meeting officially stated: The Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in Australia calls for a change in the laws ... to eliminate discrimination against homosexuals. This statement is made in the light of the Society's desire to remove discrimination and persecution in the community. The Society also calls on all people to seek more knowledge and understanding of the diversity of human relationships and to affirm the worth of love in all of them. Australian Quakers have supported the celebration of same sex and different sex commitment ceremonies since 1994 and recognize them on an equal basis with other committed and loving relationships. In January 2010, Quakers meeting in Australia Yearly Meeting in
Adelaide agreed to treat all requests for marriages in accordance with Quaker traditions, regardless of the sexual orientation or gender of the partners. Before this Australia-wide decision, Canberra Regional Meeting celebrated the first same sex marriage among Australian Quakers on 15 April 2007.
New Zealand In
New Zealand, the yearly meeting
Te Hāhi Tūhauwiri, in 1992, resolved "to seek formal ways of recognizing a variety of commitments, including gay and lesbian partnerships".
Europe Ireland Ireland Yearly Meeting, which includes meetings in Northern Ireland, permits same-sex marriages to take place within their meetings. However, no individual Friend or Meeting is required to take part in these marriages if it offends their conscience.
United Kingdom Britain Yearly Meeting formally minuted support for
same-sex marriage in 2009 and began to centrally lobby the government for the necessary legal changes. The decision was taken 22 years after being first raised at
Meeting for Sufferings, and 46 years after the publication of "Towards a Quaker View of Sex". Controversial in its day, the book forms one of the first Quaker statements regarding sexuality, and includes affirmation that gender or sexual orientation are unimportant in a judgement of an intimate relationship and that the true criterion is the presence of "selfless love"; further consideration arose from Harvey Gillman's
Swarthmore Lecture, in 1988. Before the legalisation of same-sex marriage, some Friends (both opposite-sex and same-sex) celebrated their relationships in a Meeting for Worship with a Celebration of Commitment. Britain Yearly Meeting supported the
Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, which legalised secular and religious same-sex marriages in
England and Wales.
North America United States Quakers in the
United States are divided on the issue of homosexuality, with some (mostly Friends affiliated with programmed meetings) not approving of either homosexuality or the legalization of same sex unions. Friends associated with
Friends General Conference (FGC), the more liberal group of Friends encompassing a large number of yearly meetings and approximately a fifth of all Quakers in the country, are the most tolerant with many monthly meetings and some yearly meetings providing full equality for homosexuals including marriage. FGC itself in 2004 made a statement on including LGBT quakers as equals in worship and acknowledging their past contributions to the conference. The largely FGC-based FLGBTQC (
Friends for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Concerns) group holds meetings twice a year. Similar positions from other unprogrammed Quaker meetings not affiliated with FGC include that taken by
North Pacific Yearly Meeting and
Pacific Yearly Meeting, which support same-sex marriage. On the other hand, Friends associated with the
Central Yearly Meeting of Friends (CYMF),
Friends United Meeting (FUM) and
Evangelical Friends Church International (EFCI), which represent mostly programmed Quaker meetings, have taken stands condemning gay marriage and homosexual relationships altogether. In Northwest Yearly Meeting of Friends Church (NWYM), associated with EFCI, one Portland-area Monthly Meeting has minuted its support of same-sex unions, creating a discussion on their statement of human sexuality. This led to a number of other NWYM churches discussing this matter, leading some of them to form a new yearly meeting, and at least one of them to split. Most monthly meetings of
Baltimore Yearly Meeting (BYM, a member of both FGC and FUM) have taken a similar position. Similarly, although perhaps to a lesser extent, some meetings associated with groups on the other side of the issue have dissented. Swansea Monthly Meeting, under care of
New England Yearly Meeting, is one of two meetings in that group to publicly oppose same-sex marriage. In 2002, FUM and BYM began a dialogue on homosexuality and same-sex relationships. At the 2002 FUM Triennial, Clerk Lamar Matthew was excluded from leading a worship sharing group because he was in a relationship with another man. FUM has affirmed in a minute of its General Board that its policy that anyone in sexual relationships outside of marriage – "which is understood to be between one man and one woman" – cannot be in paid leadership positions (a minute approved in 1988) also applies to those in other leadership positions and to their overseas workers. Since that time, BYM has had a program of intervisitation with other Yearly Meetings on the issue of same-sex relationships. This policy of FUM has been in constant discussion in the FUM board ever since it was originally proposed. BYM is not the only dual-membership Yearly Meeting (membership in both FUM and FGC). Many members of the New England and New York Yearly Meetings have also been struggling with the FUM position.
Canada In
Canada, the main "umbrella" Quaker body,
Canadian Yearly Meeting, shares a similar view to the more liberal American Quaker groups, and stated in 2003 that Canadian Quakers "support the right of same-sex couples to a civil marriage and the extension of the legal definition of marriage to include same-sex couples." Since then a number of same-sex marriages have been performed at Canadian Monthly Meetings. CYM is a member of both FUM and FGC. As a result of FUM's position on homosexuality, there is ongoing debate within Canadian Yearly Meeting about CYM's relationship with FUM. Canadian Yearly Meeting in 2007 approved a letter to be sent to FUM stating that CYM has appointed a committee "to review the involvement and participation of CYM in FUM". In the meantime, CYM's financial contribution was earmarked for a specific purpose.
In other countries The majority of Quakers live in countries not mentioned above. Kenya, for example, has a Quaker population larger than that of any other country. The Friends Church in Kenya "condemns homosexuality". in
Asia, many of the meetings are unprogrammed and have connections with more liberal groups elsewhere in the world. African Friends in general are supportive of the position taken by FUM. In 2007, at the first meeting of FUM held in Africa, the clerk of Uganda Yearly Meeting delivered a devotional in which he quoted Romans 1:8–32, saying that "homosexuals and even those who support them are worthy of death." Although in a later letter of apology he said that he was referring to spiritual death, many more liberal Quakers found his comments hateful. ==See also==