Robert Melucci and Joel Sartorius have spent the last 30-plus years affirming their love for each other, and will do it again this weekend before a collection of friends and family.
The pair, who met in 1978, will be joined in a commitment ceremony Nov. 7 at Trinity Memorial Church.
Melucci said he and Sartorius first ran into one another on a night out, and soon after became inseparable.
“Neither of us were ever really bar people, but we both happened to be at a bar one night — the old Drury Lane bar — and then we just started seeing each other constantly and decided to make a go of it,” Melucci said. “And we’re still making a go of it.”
Melucci, 68, a native of Scranton, received his master’s degree from Virginia Tech University. He became a chemistry teacher at West Chester University and later transferred to Community College of Philadelphia, where he currently teaches part-time. Sartorius, 62, hails from Norfolk, Va., and moved to the Philadelphia area to earn his graduate degree from Bryn Mawr College. He went on to work for years as a librarian in the children’s section of the Free Library of Philadelphia and, although he retired several years ago, continues to work part-time in the Central branch’s rare-books collection, while also taking courses in Yiddish at the University of Pennsylvania.
Melucci said the pair wanted to wait to hold their commitment ceremony until they felt completely welcomed into the Episcopal Church, the governing body of which, this past summer, voted to permit gay and lesbian bishops and also allow bishops to perform same-sex unions.
“We had first discussed doing this mainly as a celebration and out of thanksgiving for our years together, but we were hesitant to do it until the Episcopal Church made it fairly clear that we were accepted and were no longer second-class citizens,” he said. “We didn’t want to do this when we were just kind of tolerated within this church but actually accepted up front.”
Sartorius, who is Jewish, said the ceremony will be secular, but the couple still wanted to feel “completely comfortable having our ceremony in an Episcopal church, and we do now. And the church has been very supportive in every step of this.”
The couple, who invited more than 100 guests to the ceremony, also want the event to show younger generations that same-sex couples can take part in all of the life-cycle events that heterosexual couples experience.
“We want people, especially younger people, to be able to see that this is OK,” Sartorius said. “This is OK for us, and it can be OK for them too if they’re gay.”
Sartorius noted that societal acceptance of the LGBT community and same-sex couples has heightened over the past 30 years, but it can always be furthered.
“There’s definitely been a lot of strides made since I came out, but there’s still a lot more progress left to be made,” Sartorius said. “I think the people who are against us are a minority, although they’re unfortunately a very loud minority.”
Although same-sex couples have added external pressures to face, Melucci said he and Sartorious learned that they should always keep one another’s interests at the forefront of their minds, an idea he said is helpful for all couples.
“Be persistent and accept the personality of the other person; allow them to be who they are and don’t expect any kind of conformity.”
Sartorius added that, over the past three decades, he and Melucci have developed a close friendship that has fueled their relationship.
“We’re best friends,” Sartorius said. “If you’re really fortunate, you can turn out to be best friends, which thankfully is what happened with us.”
Jen Colletta can be reached at [email protected].