United Church elects Canada’s first openly gay leader of a major Christian denomination
OTTAWA, August 23, 2012 - An openly homosexual United Church minister from Vancouver was elected as the 41st moderator of the United Church of Canada at the Protestant denomination’s General Council meeting held at Ottawa’s Carleton University last week. Rev. Gary Paterson of St Andrew’s-Wesley United Church in downtown Vancouver was elected from a field of 15 nominees on August 16 to become the first openly homosexual leader of a major Christian denomination in Canada . Paterson was one of three openly homosexual candidates for the moderator’s job, which according to the Ottawa Citizen carries a salary of between $119,000 and $135,000 a year. Paterson succeeds the current moderator, Mardi Tindal . At a news conference following his election, Paterson acknowledged that his open homosexuality and same-sex “marriage” to Rev Tim Stevenson , another United Church minister, as well as the fact that he has three daughters from his first marriage, would be seen by many t