The Amazing Race

Kate and Pat, remember them?  The pair competed together on The Amazing Race 12, and though they were the second team eliminated last season, the duo made an impression.  The Amazing Race is famous for casting interesting teams and Kate and Pat were one of those teams.  Two women, two episcopalian pastors, who had been a couple for over ten years.  It's not everyday you find two lesbian members of the clergy racing around the world and, regardless of your belief system, Kate and Pat were exceedingly likable.  Now, thanks to California's new gay marriage laws, Kate and Pat were married on Wednesday in a Santa Monica church in front of family and friends. 

Pat Hendrickson and Kate Lewis are there full names, and they couldn't have been happier about getting married.  Though the couple owns a house in Thousand Oaks, California, they are in the process of moving to the Hawaiian island of Oahu, where Lewis has a job as a vicar at an Episcopal church. 

Pat, after the ceremony, said, "I'm OK with you not accepting who I am.  But don't tell me that I have to be something else to have my rights in this country."  This sort of encapsulates my thoughts on the hot-button gay marriage issue.  I'm not going to whip out my soap box here.  All I'll say is that, regardless of your stance on gay marriage, it shouldn't be as heavily debated as it is.  It is an issue whose opponents are wasting their time.  For instance, if all the gay couples in the country were instantly married this second, not one heterosexual couple would be effected in any way.  Life would go on, and gay marriage opponents would be none the wiser.  If someone wants to get married, let them.  It has no bearing on who you are, or what your marital situation is. 

The Amazing Race will return this Fall with its thirteenth season, and then once again in early 2009 for its fourteenth go-around.


-Oscar Dahl, BuddyTV Senior Writer
Source and Image Courtesy of Ventura County Star