The Christian Science Monitor analyzes the implications of the election of Annise Parker in Houston, as the first openly gay mayor of a major metropolitan city, on broader gay rights issues:

By electing Annise Parker mayor Saturday, Houston became the largest city in the United States to elect an openly gay candidate. More broadly, however, the city threw into sharp relief the conflicted – though not necessarily contradictory – stance that defines many Americans’ attitudes toward the gay and lesbian community.

Houston chose Ms. Parker, the city controller, over Gene Locke, a former city attorney, with 53 percent of the vote. Yet, in the past, Houston has voted against extending benefits to the partners of gay and lesbian members of the city government. And Texas has outlawed gay marriage.

The distinction neatly sums up the American mood. As gays and lesbians become broadly accepted in society and politics, that acceptance is marked by a firm boundary beyond which voters do not yet appear willing to cross: same-sex marriage.

Read more about Parker’s election and gay rights in the Christian Science Monitor.

Following the lead of Ireland, the Austrian Parliament has passed a civil unions law which would afford greater protections and rights for gay and lesbian couples.

Austria’s parliament passed legislation Thursday allowing same-sex couples to enter into civil unions, a move hailed by proponents as a historic win for gay rights in the country.The bill, slated to become law Jan. 1, will give same-sex couples many of the rights enjoyed by their heterosexual counterparts, including access to a pension if one partner dies and alimony in the event of a split.

“We are living in the 21st century and I’m very glad this step is being taken today,” Justice Minister Claudia Bandion-Ortner said during parliamentary debate leading up to the vote.

Christian Hoegl, co-president of the Homosexual Initiative Vienna, Austria’s oldest group of gays and lesbians, agreed.

“It’s a relief, a big success and a reward for two decades of lobbying,” Hoegl said.

Read more about Austria’s new civil unions law.

A Representative in the Philippines is proposing legislation that would apply jail time and financial penalties against gay and lesbian couples:

Manila Rep. Bienvenido Abante Jr., a former pastor and advocate against pornography, claims that while same-sex marriage is not allowed in the country, legislation is needed to punish those who attempt to enter into such marriages.

The bill labels gay marriage “highly immoral, scandalous, and detestable,” reports Filipino newspaper Business Insight Malaya.

Under the bill’s provisions, same-sex couples who attempt to marry would face 15 years in prison and be fined 150,000 Philippine pesos (approximately $3,200.)

Read more at Advocate.com.

As the New Jersey legislature prepares to extend full marriage equality, an African American Minister speaks about how his experience in the civil rights movement and Bruce Springsteen go hand in hand with support for the rights of all to marry, regardless of their sexual orientation:

The Civil Rights Movement ”back in the day” has become alive in this “Movement.” As an African American clergyman who was a foot soldier in the “Movement,” I have no time to debate the differences in the struggles of black persons and the struggles of gays and lesbians. Of course there are differences! But, prejudice, bias, and bigotry are prejudice, bias and bigotry whether directed at persons who are black, or persons who are gay. I long for the day when more persons in the African American community will become advocates/allies of gay rights, and more gay persons will become allies/advocates of the many issues important to the black community. I have for years sought to be a “bridge over the troubled waters” that divide the poor black and brown community and the gay community. The passage of the marriage equality bill may signal the beginning of new efforts to deal with the education and econonomic issues that confront

poor brown and black people.

One of my friends and mentors is a writer and teacher who lives in Amherst, Massachusetts. She writes of those who stand on the side lines, who are afraid to take a stand, who are infected with the anger and bitterness of others. She says of writing, but it applies to me as I live my life as a clergyman or to Bruce Springsteen as he lives his amazing public life as a musical icon, and to all of us who support marriage equality and all of life.

My friend writes words that really ring true when she says “the issue is not whether our writing will be political. If we are silent, our silence is political. If we write our writing is political. No one has seen the night sky exactly from your trajectory. No one has loved exactly the people and places you have loved. Who will tell that part of the earth’s story, if you do not?”

Read more from Rev. Gil Caldwell at Liberty Education Forum.

As the New Jersey legislature prepares to take up a law allowing gay and lesbian couples, the debate highlights the differing levels of support in different age groups:

A national CNN poll this year showed that 58 percent of those under 30 back gay marriage, while only 24 percent of those over 65 do. This generational divide is the size of the Grand Canyon.

It means that history is on the side of marriage equality. Younger people are simply not as rattled by homosexuality, perhaps because they have lived among more openly gay people. They don’t consider it a personality defect, or a moral wrong. And they don’t want treat their gay friends and relatives as something less.

So gay marriage will happen. The only question is when.

The Senate will probably vote on this Thursday, and the odds are long. Democrats are rattled after their defeat in the governor’s race last month, and intimidated by the muscular show of force from the Catholic Church in the last few months. The defeats in Maine and New York were both setbacks.

Opponents will emphasize tradition and religion, and a more fanatic fringe will say that homosexuality is deviant.

Some will argue that we need a referendum on the issue, as if the legal rights of a minority should be subject to approval by the majority. A historical note: When the Supreme Court struck down state bans on interracial marriage, 73 percent of American were opposed to mixed marriage, according to a Gallup poll.

Read more in the New Jersey Star Ledger.