Alberta premier officiates cabinet minister’s historic same-sex wedding

Premier Rachel Notley officiated a historic Alberta wedding on Friday.

Calgary-Cross MLA Ricardo Miranda, who is also the minister of culture and tourism, became the province’s first cabinet minister to be married in a same-sex wedding.

Miranda and his partner Christopher Brown tied the knot at Calgary’s Glenbow Museum Friday.

Notley thanked the couple for inviting her to be a part of their special day, tweeting “What a great day to celebrate the love.”

“It was a beautiful day filled with love, joy and family,” Miranda tweeted.

Miranda came to Canada as a refugee when he was 10-years-old, from war-torn Nicaragua. He was the first openly gay, Jewish, Hispanic person elected to the legislature in 2015.

He met Brown, who works from Children’s Services Minister Danielle Larivee, at a constituency event earlier this year.

Miranda said he and Brown decided to share news about the engagement and wedding because visibility is an important way to advance LGBTQ rights.

“We’ve seen, unfortunately, even here in the province, a rise in hate crimes. And it takes us back to a time I don’t want to go back to,” he told CBC Edmonton earlier this month.

“We could have … easily done this without anybody finding out. But I’ve always been open and forthcoming and honest about my life, and this didn’t seem like the time to actually hide.”

There wasn’t a dry eye in the house, MLA Sandra Jansen tweeted.

The couple plan to host a second reception in Ontario in the new year, where Brown’s family is from.