UK’s first interfaith homosexual wedding

A Hindu and a Jewish woman tie the nuptial knot

Freestyle

August 25, 2017

/ By / New Delhi



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Kalavati Mistry and Miriam Jefferson on their wedding day

An interfaith wedding between a lesbian couple is being said to be the first of its kind in the UK, ever since the country legalised same-sex marriage in 2014.

A Hindu woman and her Jewish partner have come together, in what is being reported to be the UK’s first interfaith lesbian wedding.

Kalavati Mistry and Miriam Jefferson met more than 20 years ago on a training course in the US, and have been in a relation since. However, it was only recently that the two ladies came out and spoke about their ties, and their decision to finally get married.

It was “very difficult for me as an Asian gay woman,” 48 year old Mistry, who had kept her sexuality a secret for many years, was quoted saying.

After she revealed her relationship, Mistry’s friends and family have been “welcoming and embracing” towards Jefferson. “I hope many gay people – no matter what religion or culture they’re in – are in loving relationships,” she was quoted saying.

Both Mistry and Jefferson work at an interfaith organisation.

They recently got married at the Chutney Ivy restaurant in Leicester, and will now be living in the US.

The couple got married in a traditional Indian fashion, in a ceremony that was attended by their friends and family. Earlier this year they had a Jewish wedding in Jefferson’s hometown of San Antonio, Texas.

“It’s really nice to now have a Hindu wedding here, because it brings both of us together and completes both of us in my eyes,” Jefferson said.

The couple struggled to find a Hindu priest willing to perform the unconventional ceremony.

“Although attitudes are changing at the moment, it was very difficult to find a priest. Many priests were warm and welcoming and said they’d like to the wedding, but they said that their federation wouldn’t allow it,” Mistry was quoted saying.

“I’m very grateful that we’ve been able to do this. I will follow the Hindu faith and follow some of the Jewish traditions. I’d like to see our lives bond together – our traditions and our cultures. We get to embrace both, Hinduism as well as Judaism. That’s how I see it. I hope this brings people together,” she added.

Although not the first homosexual marriage in the UK, after gay weddings were legalised in England in March 2014, the wedding is a first of its kind because of the couple being of different religions.

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