Two local women who testified at the trial of a lesbian minister, who performed same-sex marriages, said they see positives in the verdict.

The Presbyterian Church panel found the Reverend Jane Spahr guilty of violating the church constitution by performing marriages for 16 same-sex couples.

Spahr presided over the 2004 marriage of BJ Douglass and Connie Valois of Penfield. In 2008, the couple went to California and obtained a marriage license, during the brief time that same-sex marriages were legal in that state.

Theirs was one of the 16 marriages Spahr performed, which the church said violated its constitution. Spahr was found guilty, but the panel also recommended the church reconsider how that constitution handles same-sex marriages.

“We felt very victorious in that way,” said Douglass. “They (the judges) were very gracious in that way. We felt very welcomed by them, even though it was a painful final decision.”

Spahr gained national attention in the early 1990s, when Rochester's Downtown United Presbyterian Church was denied a bid to hire the lesbian as its pastor. Spahr plans to appeal the verdict.