Ivory speech omitted constitutional prohibition against gay marriage The Layman Online Tuesday, March 9, 2004 In her untrue declaration that the Presbyterian Church (USA) supports civil marriages of homosexual couples, Elenora Giddings Ivory, director of the denomination's Washington Office, quoted from the Directory of Worship in the Book of Order. Whether intentionally or arbitrarily, she omitted a sentence that states just the opposite of what she declared. The following is the citation, with what she omitted highlighted by a strikethrough: Marriage is a gift God has given to all humankind for the wellbeing of the entire human family. Marriage is a civil contract between a woman and a man. For Christians marriage is a covenant through which a man and a woman are called to live out together before God their lives of discipleship. In a service of Christian marriage a lifelong commitment is made by a woman and a man to each other, publicly witnessed and acknowledged by the community of faith. W-4.9001, Directory of Worship, Book of Order Ivory used her self-edited version of the denomination's constitutional policy on marriage to claim that the PCUSA supports civil marriages for homosexual couples and urged that the Federal Marriagement Amendment be rejected. By eliminating the sentence, "Marriage is a civil contract between a man and a woman," Ivory was overlooking – or rebuking – one of the denomination's constitutional requirements.

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