The Washington Post opines about how Washington D.C.’s City Council and the Archdiocese could work together:

THE DISTRICT’s same-sex marriage bill continues on its path to passage. So, too, does the battle between the D.C. Council and the Catholic Church over whether and how the Archdiocese of Washington would be able to comply with city law without violating church tenets. Council members David A. Catania (I-At Large) and Phil Mendelson (D-At Large) have offered a fair compromise, which the church should accept.

The Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Equality Amendment of 2009 would not require religious organizations to perform same-sex marriages. But if the bill becomes law, church groups that have city contracts would have to provide spousal benefits to their gay and lesbian employees. Catholic Charities believes this would force it to recognize those relationships. The same concern applies to adoption services for same-sex couples.

Archbishop Donald W. Wuerl has been trying to secure a religious exemption in the bill. The latest attempt came during a meeting on Monday. The language proposed would allow a religious group not to provide, among other things, “privileges, advantages, benefits, or goods for a purpose related to or arising from the solemnization or celebration of a same-sex marriage, or the promotion of same-sex marriage, that is in violation of the religious society’s beliefs.” This won’t do. If Catholic Charities wants to exclude gay and lesbian couples from its adoption services, then it should do so without receiving taxpayer money.

But it is on the issue of spousal benefits that Catholic Charities’s intransigence is mystifying. The fight going on in the District today took place 13 years ago in San Francisco.

Read more in the Washington Post.