Archbishop Tutu's Daughter Marries a Woman

The Rev. Mpho Tutu, the daughter of Anglican Archbishop Emeritus and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Desmond Tutu, married Marceline van Furth in a civil ceremony in the Netherlands last week, the Washington Blade reports.

It is the second marriage for both women; Tutu’s previous marriage was to Joseph Burns, and they have two daughters. Tutu, an Anglican priest like her father, is the executive director of the Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation. Furth is a professor in pediatric infectious diseases at Vrije University in Amsterdam. They plan to have another ceremony in Cape Town, South Africa, in May.

Archbishop Tutu is known primarily for his work to end apartheid in South Africa, but he has also been a longtime advocate for LGBT rights. “God’s dream is to embrace all of us, an embrace we are not allowed to escape out of, including the gay, lesbian, and so-called straight,” he said in an appearance in Los Angeles in 2012.

The following year, at an event launching the United Nations’ “Free and Equal” campaign against antigay discrimination and violence, he said, “I would refuse to go to a homophobic heaven. No, I would say sorry, I mean I would much rather go to the other place. … I would not worship a God who is homophobic, and that is how deeply I feel about this.”

At that event, he also said the fight for LGBT rights is as important to him as the struggle against apartheid. “I am as passionate about this campaign as I ever was about apartheid,” he said. “For me, it is at the same level.”

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