R.J. Rose, left, and Chris Butler, who live in Pawtucket, were married in Attleboro last spring.

The Providence Journal / Ruben W. Perez

PROVIDENCE — Chris Butler and R.J. Rose dated for eight years before tying the knot on April 3. They had a small family wedding at Capron Park in Attleboro. As is the case with many young couples, they are now renting and searching for an affordable house.

Butler and Rose live in Pawtucket, but couldn’t wed in Rhode Island, because the state bans same-sex couples from legal marriage. That is why their nuptials were held in Massachusetts, the only state in the nation where gay marriage is legally recognized.

The couple is one of about 200 same-sex couples living in Rhode Island who crossed the state line to legally marry in Massachusetts, said Jenn Steinfeld, director of Marriage Equality Rhode Island.

Today marks the one-year anniversary of a Massachusetts Superior Court judge’s ruling that same-sex couples who live in Rhode Island can legally marry in the Bay State. Rhode Island’s gay-rights activists are using the occasion to kick off a renewed campaign in the 2008 General Assembly session for legalizing same-sex marriage in Rhode Island.

Massachusetts has recognized same-sex marriage since May 2004.

A major point in the push to legalize same-sex marriage in Rhode Island is a simple argument: Gay married couples are already living in the state without any discernable impact on the heterosexual married community or the practice of religious leaders who vigorously decry same-sex marriage.

“I take pride in listening to all sides of an argument; I never think I’m 100-percent right,” said Chris Butler yesterday. “But I listen to opponents of same-sex marriage and they claim that it undermines society and will lead to the breakup of heterosexual marriages.

“That’s ridiculous. I see my parents’ marriage, my siblings’ marriages, my friends’ marriages and they are flourishing,” Butler said. “We have many same-sex married couples already living in Rhode Island and the arguments against it are really kind of silly. It doesn’t affect anybody’s heterosexual marriage or anything else. The State House hasn’t fallen down, the state hasn’t changed at all.”

Butler and Steinfeld note that many gay couples have adopted children and live conventional lifestyles, except for their sexual orientation.

“We go to church on Sunday mornings and eat at Gregg’s,” said Butler, adding that they attend St. Stephens, an Episcopal Church near Brown University in Providence.

According to a recent study by the Williams Institute at the University of California at Los Angeles Law School, about 27,000 gay, lesbian and bisexual people live in Rhode Island. The study was based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau, said Gary J. Gates, spokesman for the Williams Institute.

The Rhode Island study is part of a nationwide report on the characteristics of the gay community compared with the larger community of heterosexuals. About 7 percent of adopted children in Rhode Island live with a gay or lesbian parent. Most gay parents who adopt children are lesbians, the study shows.

Partners in same-sex couples have higher educational levels on average than heterosexual couples, the study shows. Forty-two percent of same-sex couples have attained a college degree compared with 29 percent of married couples, Gates said.

Income levels of married heterosexual men are higher than gay men, but gay women in same-sex couples earn more than women in married families. The median salary for a Rhode Island man in a same-sex couple is $37,358, compared with $48,769 for heterosexual married men. Women in same-sex couples earn an average of $30,695 annually, compared with $26,443 for married, heterosexual women.

If anything, Steinfeld said, the 27,000 number may be too low because it is based on questionnaires sent out by the census, a U.S. government agency. Some gays are still intimidated by “coming out” on a government form, Steinfeld said.

Gates acknowledged that some of the data may be limited.

In Rhode Island, same-sex marriage legislation is likely to be sponsored by Rep. Arthur Handy, D-Cranston. Handy said yesterday he would submit a bill with the same language as last year, when the measure remained bottled up in committee.

The political calculus portends an uphill fight for any legislation that would have Rhode Island join Massachusetts in recognizing gay marriage, Handy acknowledged. Top Rhode Island political leaders, including Governor Carcieri, a Republican, and the two leading Assembly Democrats, Senate President Joseph Montalbano and House Speaker William Murphy, D-West Warwick, are opposed to legalizing gay marriage.

“We’re going to try again,” Handy said. “It won’t be easy.”

While the Most Rev. Thomas J. Tobin, Roman Catholic bishop of Providence, is against gay marriage, other religious leaders support it, including clergy from the United Church of Christ, the Universalist Unitarian Society and Providence’s Mathewson Street Methodist Church.

Meanwhile, the next round in a legal challenge to recognizing a divorce in Rhode Island by two women who married in Massachusetts will take place Oct. 9 in Rhode Island Supreme Court, with the court hearing oral arguments.

smackay@projo.com