Two women, two white dresses and a priest. Matilda and Kristin’s church wedding became a dream coming true. A dream that will hopefully become possible in Kosovo.
1. You and your wife live in a beautiful house on the countryside in Sweden together with your two kids. If you would introduce your family to the readers in one sentence what would that sentence be?
Rainbow family of four with music, love and laughter as most important parts in life, never sitting down, dreaming of pigs and sheep.
(Matilda is the brunette, Kristin the blonde and Britta is Märta’s big sister.)
2. Your wife is a vicar and you are a church musician. Tell us, did you meet your wife at church through work, or how did you meet?
Yes, we met in church! Kristin is the vicar in our parish and we worked together for about 15 months before we started dating.
3. What was it that made you fall in love with your wife?
Matilda: The brain! And her humor. There is no one like her. She is brilliant, intelligent, and so quick thinking. She gets me speechless every day with her funny and brilliant comments. And of course, she is the most beautiful woman!
Kristin: Matilda is so beautiful! And smart! For that, and her exceptional creativity and kindness it’s hard to not fall in love with her. Plus – she has the most beautiful voice. You should hear her sing!
4. What was it like starting a family as a lesbian couple? Can you tell us about the process and how you decided to do it? Did you consider other options?
At first we visited a LGBT clinic in Stockholm to get all information and to see what options we did have. We decided from start that I (Matilda) should be inseminated though I am the youngest of us two. In Sweden lesbian couples are allowed to get inseminated at a few big hospitals, luckily we have one of them just a few miles from where we live. At first we went on a few assessment interviews to prove that we would be good parents, and I also got a health examination. After that we were assign a donor.
The whole process took about half a year – from the first meeting to the first insemination. After two inseminations we were expecting a baby! The process went much more easy than we could ever dream of, and everything were paid for by taxes, just like if it would have been a normal doctor visit.
5. You and your wife had a beautiful summer wedding in a white church. Can you share with us what it meant to both of you to have the right to get married in a church as a homosexual couple?
Thankfully, church of Sweden took a fast decision to allow gay marriage the same year as it was legalized in Sweden (2009) and it means a lot to us that we had the same possibility as everyone else to get married. Our wedding was a dream coming true!
6. You build a lot in your garden, you farm, you sew clothes and on social media it looks like you are always up to some new exciting project. You are a very active family. Can you tell us what does an everyday look like in your home?
Haha! Yes! We are very active and we get creative as fast as we have time! Now most of our time is spent with our kids to get them happy, warm and fed. But in a year we have renovated six rooms in our house (by ourselves!), grown a lot of vegetables in our garden and a lot of other things! No day is like another in our family!
7. You have two small daughters. The older one, has she started getting any sort of reactions, maybe at the kindergarden, for having two mums? Do you or your daughter ever get negative reactions and experience hate? Can you tell us about that?
Our daughter has luckily never experienced any hate for having two mums! It is normal for her and her friends that she has two mums instead of a mum and dad. At “Father’s Day” in November, her teacher at the kindergarden arranged some activities for the kids. They painted cards and so on, and we got a card too. “This is for the mums – Happy Parent’s Day!”.
8. Lately, a lot of work has been done in Kosovo to legalize gay marriage. It’s not yet legal and one of the reasons are the people who don’t want it to be. One of them is Mergim Lushtaku.
During a session in the Kosovo Assembly October 21st 2020, PDK deputy Mergim Lushtaku said he would vote against the Draft Civil Code. Among other things, he stated that he was “in favor of the family and its preservation,” that the Civil Code gives “legal space for same-sex marriages,” and that according to him, most researchers agree that children raised by both biological parents in a stable marriage are better than children in other family arrangements.”
Reading Mergim Lushtaku’s statement and the researchers he is referring to, what does it make you feel and what would you like to say to him?
It is so sad to hear. It’s such a patriarchal mentality claiming that a family should consist a mother and a father. It reduces the power of women and also it reduces the power of men. Two mothers are perfectly fine to raise a child, and two fathers are perfectly fine to raise a child too, and the same with all other family constellations that are.
Family are not all about bloodlines. Many children around the world are abused and bullied by a biological parent. Blood is not a guarantee for a good parenting – the only thing that matters is love. The role as mum or dad is not a thing you “get”. It’s a thing you work for and deserve.
9. You and your wife challenge the rules of heteronormative society. Your wife is a lesbian vicar. Female priests have been allowed since 1958 and in The Swedish Church and today they even outnumber men with 50%.1. However, they are still paid 220€ less per month.
Can you tell us about things you see as a challenge working in a church environment like a Christian lesbian church musician and vicar? If you experience at times being oppressed and judged – what can that look like?
I (Matilda) have never felt oppressed or judged in church for the fact that I am a lesbian. Maybe because I came out as a grown up and I already “had my place”, if you know what I mean. Kristin was a bit scared that she, as a lesbian, should be judged during her priest studies so therefor she held it a secret during her whole study time. After that she has been open and have never been oppressed or anything, thankfully!
10. What does Pride mean to you and your family? And if you met a person who think badly about Pride, that gay people should not promote homosexuality or express it in public through Pride parades – what would you say to that person?
Pride is a lifesaver! For all who can’t come out. For all who want, but not have come out yet. We need to express ourselves in public. We need to be seen – to give hope, to get acceptance, to be normalized. Pride means a lot to us, so much that we have started Pride community in our church. We celebrate pride in a worship every year and it has become very popular! Many people visit church, and it is like a big Halleluja Party with pride flags, pop music and speeches about being Christian and LGBT+.
11. Getting kids can be a real challenge when it comes to the romance going in a relationship. What are you two doing to keep the fire burning and what kind of creative solutions do you have as tips for other couples in this area?
Get a good nanny – a grandmother who loves the kids more than life itself, for example. No further comments, haha!
12. Do you and your wife have different roles in your relationship and in when it comes to household work? Please tell us about them. What are the things that sometimes makes your relationship less equal?
The first thing that makes us less equal is the big age difference. It leads to much higher salary for Kristin and gets us economically unequal. When it comes to household work I (Matilda) often is the one who cook, because mostly I find it funny and I see it as a time for myself when I stand in the kitchen with music in my inears. Kristin sometimes laughs and says “I am the husband” about herself, as a joke, haha!
13. When did you come out as gay? Can you tell us about that process and what it meant to you?
Matilda: Kristin is the first woman I have had a relationship with. Before I had a few longer relations with men and I was engaged to a man in my early twenties. When I started dating Kristin I told my family that I had met a woman and it was no big deal for them. Even my grandparents, born in the 1940s, were so kind and understandind and it means the world to me to know that my sexuality doesn’t affect how they look at me.
Kristin: I came out late too, when I was 29 years old. I had no long relationship before that, and I guess that’s why the “outcoming” took so long. I am a late bloomer and I wanted the feeling of safety from my priest exam before. I came out in steps – many times in many different contexts. And all the time I was treated with kindness and love. No one was surprised!
14. In Kosovo I had a boyfriend that had never – or thought he had never – met a homosexual person in his life. If you met him, what would you say to him being the first openly gay person he has ever met?
I would say: Don´t be scared. We are just humans, and we love each other. A person is so much more than her sexuality. Sometimes people think that homosexuals are different in some way. We aren´t. Love is love!
15. And to all those people out there who struggle with acceptance from society, family and friends as a result of their sexual orientation or gender. To those ones that haven’t yet dared to come out, who fear coming out. What message would you like to give them that they carry with them into the New Year?
Never lose hope. Hope is the most important thing we have. You are good enough, you are perfect as you are. Always remember that you are the one you are meant to be. The words from Lady Gaga will be our message to you: “I’m beautiful in my way, ‘cause God makes no mistakes, I’m on the right track, baby, I was born this way”. Love to you all! We see you.
Follow Matilda, Kristin and their rainbow family on Instagram
Written by: Mirja Lakso
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My name is Mirja Lakso. I am a writer... 