Article Added On: February 02, 2005 - over 3 years ago
Title: Pressure is on
Author: Curtis Brown
Publication: BRANDON SUN
Publication Date: January 01, 2005 - over 3 years ago
Faith Groups: Other Christian
Themes: same sex marriage/blessing

Abstract: While the United Church's general council says marriage will be enhanced and religious freedom will be protected and Canadian society will be strengthened as a result of the same-sex marriage legislation, a coalition of the Roman Catholic Church, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh and Jewish organizations oppose to the law.

Tuesday, February 02 2005

The in-boxes of Westman's members of parliament are filling up quickly as local constituents and national lobby groups put pressure on Inky Mark and Merv Tweed to vote for or against same-sex marriage.

Legislation to make same-sex marriage legal was presented to Parliament yesterday morning. The divisive issue will be a free vote in the House of Commons and for that reason, MPs across the land are being deluged with pressure by lobbyists and citizens to vote a particular way.

Herb Jones, assistant to Brandon-Souris Conservative MP Merv Tweed, said their Brandon office had 139 e-mails on the issue just yesterday morning.

"And that's nothing compared to what they're getting in Ottawa. We're talking thousands," Jones said.

Both Tweed and Mark, his Conservative counterpart from Dauphin-Swan River-Marquette, plan to vote against the same-sex marriage bill.

Mark said his opposition is based solely on the views of constituents, who have told him in surveys they don't want to see gay and lesbian couples wed. He said the 15,000 e-mails he has received from the "national gay lobby" in the last month won't make him change his mind when it comes time to vote.

Prime Minister Paul Martin has said he will support the bill to protect minority rights from the will of the majority, but Mark said that's hypocritical because the government hasn't extended minority rights to other groups, like language rights to anglophones in Qu