The First Official Jewish Same-Sex Wedding in Latin America

Image by Facebook
(JTA) – A synagogue in Buenos Aires will host the first official same-sex Jewish marriage held in a synagogue in Latin America.
The synagogue and Jewish community center NCI-Emanu El and the LGTB organization Judios Argentinos Gay (Jews Argentinian Gays), or JAG, announced Wednesday that the assembly of NCI last month unanimously approved a request to hold a same-sex wedding, and that Romi Charur and Vicky Escobar will meet under the huppah sometime this month. No exact date was released.
Both groups said in the announcement that it is the first official same-sex Jewish marriage to be held in a religious setting in Latin America.
NCI-Emanu El belongs to both the Conservative and Reform movements.
The approval “is another major step in the full recognition of all religious rights for all members of the community,” NCI Emanuel and JAG said in a statement. The decision was made under the guidelines of the 2006 Committee on Jewish Law and Standards of the Conservative movement’s Rabbinical Assembly, which approved same-sex marriages for the movement.
The 2006 ruling by the committee “favor[s] the establishment of committed and loving relationships for gay and lesbian Jews.” In 2012, specific guidelines were issued for same-sex wedding rituals.
Argentina was the first country in Latin America to approve same-sex marriages, which have been legal since July 2010. Charur and Escobar had a civil marriage in 2014.
JAG said in a statement issued Wednesday that it “celebrates this foundational event in community life and expresses hope that the decision taken by NCI-Emanu El will be emulated by other Jewish communities in Argentina and Latin America. This first step is a contribution to building a more just, equitable and inclusive society.”
JAG and NCI Emanu El both are part of the Judaica Fundation network of Jewish institutions.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
2X match on all Passover gifts!
Most Popular
- 1
News A Jewish Republican and Muslim Democrat are suddenly in a tight race for a special seat in Congress
- 2
Film & TV What Gal Gadot has said about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- 3
Fast Forward The NCAA men’s Final Four has 3 Jewish coaches
- 4
Fast Forward Cory Booker proclaims, ‘Hineni’ — I am here — 19 hours into anti-Trump Senate speech
In Case You Missed It
-
News Rabbis revolt over LGBTQ+ club, exposing fight over queer acceptance at Yeshiva University
-
Opinion In Qatargate fiasco, Netanyahu’s ‘witch hunt’ narrative takes cues from Trump
-
Yiddish די הגדה ווי אַ לעבעדיקער דענקמאָל פֿון אַשכּנזישער פּאָעזיעThe Haggadah as a living monument to Ashkenazi poetry
אַמאָל זענען די פּייטנים, מיסטישע דיכטער־וויזיאָנערן, געווען אויבן־אָן בײַ די פֿראַנצויזישע און דײַטשישע ייִדן.
-
Opinion Marine Le Pen may be headed to prison — antisemitism and xenophobia still roam freely
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.