Among the 17 groups who've signed the brief are the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the National Association of Evangelicals, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.
Avila explained that the Defense of Marriage Act was passed in 1996 by Congress and signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton. The act requires federal agencies to define “marriage” and “spouse” when these words are used in federal laws and regulations “as applying only to the marital union between one man and one woman,” he said.
However, after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled in 2003 that state marriage licenses should be issued to same-sex applicants, “same-sex couples filed a federal lawsuit to force the federal government to recognize their state-approved marital status under its federal programs,” Avila said.
Though same-sex “marriage” has been allowed in the state for several years, a federal judge ruling the Act as unconstitutional in July of 2010 allowed federal benefits for same-sex couples.
Avila said that the Massachusetts Catholic Conference – which represents the four Roman Catholic Ordinaries of the Archdiocese of Boston, and the Dioceses of Fall River, Springfield and Worcester – has been united with U.S. bishops in the “public debate over the definition of marriage” within the state throughout the years.
In helping file the brief in January, Avila said the bishops “decided that it was important to join with a broad array of other religious groups to demonstrate to the courts that the act is a rational exercise of federal authority that is not rooted in animus or bigotry.”