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Showing posts with label Same Sex Marriage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Same Sex Marriage. Show all posts
National Secular Society ✒ has pressed the future monarchs to confirm their stance on homosexuality after the Church of England affirmed its opposition to gay sex and marriage.


The NSS wrote to the Prince Charles and the Prince William last week to ask if they agree with Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby's affirmation of a Church resolution which said same sex marriage was wrong and "homosexual practices" are incompatible with scripture.

The NSS said that as future sovereigns, the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge will be "oath-bound to maintain and preserve the doctrine and worship of the Church of England".

But it highlighted that Prince William has previously spoken up for the rights of LGBT people.

In 2019 the duke told an LGBT youth charity he would "fully support" his children if they were gay, but would worry about the "discrimination that might come".

The NSS asked whether the duke agreed with the Church's stance and for his message to his "future gay, lesbian and bisexual subjects".

The British monarch, as well as being head of state, also holds the title 'Defender of the Faith and Supreme Governor of the Church of England'. 

Continue reading @ National Secular Society.

NSS Probes Future Monarchs Over Gay Marriage Stance

UnHerd ✒ Even in the bedroom we are shaped by the past.

 Tom Holland

It was 20 years ago today. On 1st April 2001, same-sex marriage became legal in the Netherlands. The Dutch, liberalism’s most celebrated trend-setters, had done it again. Where they led, others quickly followed. Scenes of gay couples cutting wedding cakes and spraying champagne over each other became common around the world. 

Today, same-sex marriage is recognised as legal in 29 countries. What even 30 years ago would have seemed to most gay people an impossible dream has come to be widely accepted — and not only by gay people — as entirely normal. The most startling thing about the institution, it can often seem, is that people ever found it startling.

Except, of course, that there are large stretches of the world where the idea that men might legally marry men, or women legally marry women, continues to be seen as abhorrent, grotesque, immoral. The list of countries that license same-sex marriage is a highly distinctive one. All of them, with the sole exception of Taiwan, are culturally Christian. All of them, to a greater or lesser extent, have witnessed a decline over recent years in church-attendance.  

Continue reading @ UnHerd.

Homosexuality’s Christian Roots

Sara Canning welcomes the extension of the same sex marriage bill to the North of Ireland. 

MPs have voted to bring LGBT+ equality to Northern Ireland. I shed tears of happiness at the news, but they were bittersweet

It won’t always be like this. It’s going to get better.” My incredible partner, Lyra McKee, wrote these words years before we crossed paths. I remember reading her “letter to my 14-year-old-self” and being blown away by her bravery. Lyra opened up about the deep hurt so many of us felt as teenagers, and showed that families can be incredibly loving, supportive and accepting; particularly important in a place like Northern Ireland, where religious divides and conservatism still play a huge role ...

... The rest of the UK had implemented marriage equality that year, while in Northern Ireland, despite swiftly increasing public support, it remained a political football … 

… We are five years behind the rest of the UK in terms of marriage equality, and four years behind the Republic of Ireland. It seems that in Northern Ireland, lagging behind our neighbours is standard. Women have lacked reproductive rights that have existed in the UK since 1967 and were legalised in “Holy Catholic Ireland” last year. Waiting is something we have got used to, and in the meantime we have become very good at campaigning, speaking out and speaking up. It often feels as if Northern Ireland is forgotten until there’s some terrorist crisis, or one of our parties is needed to prop up a minority government, then suddenly we pop up in people’s consciousness again, and everyone has an opinion on “the Northern Irish problem”.

Continue reading @ The Guardian.

My Partner, Lyra McKee, Would Have Been Overjoyed About The Same-Sex Marriage Bill

Grow a set! That’s the blunt message to Protestant denominations and fellowships following the mainstream Irish Presbyterian Church’s decision that people in same-sex relationships cannot become full members. Controversial commentator, Dr John Coulter, throws down the gauntlet to other Protestant Churches in his Fearless Flying Column today. 

Grow A Set

Decades ago, and said to have had a longer life span in rural communities than in urban areas, some blackguard of a priest could be found calling out the names of those who the church had been unable to extort money from through their supposedly voluntary collections. It was sheer intimidation. When intimidation is used to extract money, extortion is a term fit for it.

Barbarians In The Pulpit

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