Thousands Protest New Gay Marriage Law in Saltillo, Mexico

An estimated thirty-thousand people marched Sunday in protest of a new law allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry in the Mexican state of Coahuila. The protest, which took place in the city of Saltillo, the capital and largest city of Coahuila, came a week and a day after a male gay couple inaugurated the law and a day after the state's first lesbian couple exchanged vows. A male couple who tied the knot last weekend was the first to take advantage of the recently approved same-sex marriage law in the northwestern Mexican state of Coahuila. Jesus Fernando Covarrubias Monsivais and Luis Alberto Reyes Soto married in front of friends, family, and the media at a Civil Registry office in Saltillo, the state's capital and largest city. According to El Universal, a “sea of people” flooded the city's major streets demanding the law's repeal. The mega march was organized by the evangelical Cristo Vive Saltillo (Christ Lives Saltillo), one of 18 local chapters of Cristo Vive Mexico. Demonstrators waved banners with an image of a heterosexual family, wore white shirts and chanted “True love is found in mom and dad.” Gay couples can also marry in the federal district of Mexico City, where lawmakers approved a marriage law in 2009. Such unions have also taken place in Quintana Roo, where the state's civil code is gender neutral.