Dozens of demonstrators were arrested Wednesday as they tried to stop a church trial that could remove a lesbian from the Methodist ministry for living openly in a lesbian relationship.
Rev. Karen Dammann last week wed her partner of nine years, Meredith Savage, in Portland, Ore., where Multnomah County officials have begun allowing same-sex marriages. They have a 5-year-old son.
United Methodist officials have said the trial north of Seattle is the first against a homosexual pastor in the denomination since 1987.
Outside, about 100 people demonstrated loudly but peacefully, and many blocked church officials from entering the building. Police arrested 33 people when they refused to move.
Dammann is charged with “practices declared by the United Methodist Church to be incompatible to Christian teachings.”
