ARGENTINA today became the first country in Latin America to legalise gay marriage after the Senate voted in favour.
The country’s Chamber of Deputies had already approved the legislation.
In December 2009 Jose Maria Di Bello and Alex Freyre became the first gay couple to marry in Argentina
According to breaking news, the vote in the Senate, which backed the bill by just six votes, came after 14 hours of at times heated debate.
The law, which also allows same-sex couples to adopt, had met with fierce opposition from the Catholic Church and other religious groups, notably the Mormons.
The legislation, backed by President Cristina Fernandez’s centre-left government, passed by 33 votes to 27 with three abstentions.
There were demonstrations for and against the bill outside Congress as senators debated the controversial issue.
Outside Congress, as the debate continued into the early hours of this morning, supporters and opponents of the bill held rival demonstrations.
Said Maria Rachid, President of the Argentine Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transsexuals:
Nearly every political and social figure has spoken out in favour of marriage equality and we hope that the Senate reflects this and that Argentina, from today forward, is a more just country for all families.
Civil unions between people of the same sex are legal in Buenos Aires and in some other provinces but there was no law to regulate it on a country-wide level.
Argentina’s capital is widely considered to be among the most gay-friendly cities in Latin America. It was the first Latin American city to legalise same-sex unions.
Same-sex civil unions are also legal in Uruguay and some states in Brazil and Mexico, while gay marriage is legal in Mexico City.
According to this report, Mormon interference in Argentina’s gay marriage debate took the form of a letter to its 371,000 members in the country. In it, Mormon church leaders restated the faith’s unequivocal position against gay mariage.
Church President Thomas S Monson wrote:
The doctrine of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is absolutely clear: Marriage is between one man and woman and is ordained of God.
The letter fell short of calling for political activism by members in Argentina, but is an echo of a 2008 letter from Monson to Latter-day Saints in California. Monson had called for Mormons to give their time and money to help pass Proposition 8, a state ballot initiative to ban gay marriage.
The church was seen as a driving force behind that initiative’s success, with members donating tens of millions of dollars to the campaign.
Mormon historian, D Michael Quinn, said the letter was a significant step in political activism for the church outside the United States.
Since the 1990s, the church has been politically active in defeating same-sex marriage initiatives across the US and was a signature on a letter seeking a marriage amendment to the US Constitution.
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
July 15th, 2010 at 12:36 pm
>Marriage is between one man and woman
a Mormon said that? He meant one man and women, surely
July 15th, 2010 at 12:50 pm
Sally, this reveals the mindset of Mormons. The term “Women” contains an implicit recognition of females as individuals. “Woman” is merely a collective gender category.
July 15th, 2010 at 3:16 pm
Also, how can you be “ordained of”? I know fanatics say this, but that doesn’t make it mean anything. In English it would be “ordained by”.
July 15th, 2010 at 3:54 pm
Religious groups such as the Morons interfere with other peoples lives and freedoms. All of secular Argentina should be offended by the Moron and RCC sticking their appendages into state business. Isn’t it about time people took action against them and bit back? I always challenge religiots when they speak and do/will not employ any. They need to be scrutinised and ridiculed more in the media.
Sane Argentinians must be doing this, I’d be interested to know what they get up to.
July 15th, 2010 at 4:12 pm
The efforts of the Catlicks and MoreMen in these kind of things, clearly shows that they may not be killing people but they are still as whacked-out, bat-schite crazy as the IsLameics.
July 15th, 2010 at 4:37 pm
Usual religious attitude. Never content with what they want to do. They insist on trying to force their views on the rest of us. It’s not even as if they had a semblance of balance. They are are so dippy that they don’t come close to an objective view. Why is it so often the sex thing that gets them complaining? The world is being destroyed, humans continue to breed like rabbits, we are well advanced on one of the all time great extinctions, the fabric of the web of life on which we all depend is being ripped apart and all they can think about is who is shagging whom and, unless it suits their weird religion, how it can be stopped.
Mormons? That’s not that crazy con man Joseph Smith, is it? There are so many religious nutters I lose track.
July 15th, 2010 at 5:30 pm
Uzza,
It is an archaic form of English, suitable for an archaic mindset.
July 15th, 2010 at 7:39 pm
The question is not why the LDS Church and the Catholics are against Gay Marriage, but why more churches are not. Any church that believes in the New Testiment should be upset with this. Paul was very clear in Roman’s about how the church should view Homosexual relationships.
Archaic, perhaps, but if you have faith in God, it requires you to act on your faith.
July 15th, 2010 at 8:23 pm
Spain and Argentina, right-wing military dictatorships in my lifetime and claimed by the RC church as strongholds to this day, are now ahead of the UK and US. It’s a remarkable thought.
July 15th, 2010 at 8:23 pm
I think that it is interesting to note that in the UK the (Always Religious) people opposed to gay civil partnerships had to desperately scratch around for reasons for their opposition. They will have to re-write all the dictionaries and sisters living together will be disadvantaged, were just two genuine examples. The fact that the latter were not campaigning for the co-habiting sisters to be allowed a civil partnership too, but for gay couples not to be allowed one, kind of exposes their true, bigotted agenda.
The good news is that despite their insistence that Britain is a Christian country, these people fully recognise that “God says so and that settles it” has absolutely no value.
The fact that supposedly Catholic countries are moving in this direction is also excellent news, Ratty’s authority is rapidly becoming non existent, and not before time.
July 15th, 2010 at 10:26 pm
Couple dozen years back I hear of a story, that the wall in the Vatican City, where they hang paintings of the Popes, is running out of space, and there was at that time, only space for 5 or 6 paintings.
Must be a sign from (help, need a word/person here) that the end is near ?
July 15th, 2010 at 11:06 pm
I can’t stand how religious groups think nothing of sending people around the world to recruit others into their lifestyle. Then they turn around and try to push their chosen bigotries on others, and pretend they’re the victims if anyone dare question or criticize them. Freaking bullies and hypocrites, the lot of them.
July 16th, 2010 at 1:27 am
@Buffy
That’s why I think it’s laughable when religious bigots talk about homosexuals recruiting children and having an agenda. Projection much.
July 16th, 2010 at 3:29 am
Don’t the morons have enough to do in Utah?
July 16th, 2010 at 6:25 am
Time for a global recount; if this can happen in a supposedly RC country, how many truely practicing RC-christians do we have? Ratzinger’s fanbase seems to be much smaller than he claims it to be.
July 16th, 2010 at 12:11 pm
Har Davids. Whatever else we think of RCs they are not all stupid and that includes lots of priests and above. In fact, some are seriously intelligent. Which leads me to think that very few of them believe the nonsense the preach. They cannot. It is just too silly, contradictory and beyond any kind of reason. I think they get used to it, like the respect and the power of the mumbo jumbo, fear the penalties of butting out and stick with the career.
Another example is Rowan Williams who is at the top of his career ladder. Rowan is a seriously intelligent man and expert on stuff like the poetry of T.S. Eliot on which he speaks with clarity and insight. Move to what he is supposed to be the head honcho on – religion – and the rambling, confused, mysterious nonsense make him seem like a fool. The reason being he no more understands it than the rest of us and hypocrisy is preferable it seems to abandoning his career.
July 17th, 2010 at 4:53 am
Little by little, piece by piece, the delusion of the unmistakeable bullsh*t that is religigious dogma is being undone. They continue to shoot themselves in the foot, everytime the pope opens his thoughtless mind and mouth, evertime an imam makes another brain dead utterence (eg. well presented women cause earthquakes was the latest laugh) they add to their eventual dismantleing. They really don’t require the help of organised athiests in their quest to rid the planet of the evil delusion of religious faith, the most evil organised con in the history of mankind. They are doing it all themselves. Look at that mob of idiots at that baptist church in the American mid west, that Fred Phelps & family bunch of of dickheads. Their god is nothing more than wishful thinking, gotton out of hand. Total nonsense.