Dilemma

Sir, Apparently on the Isle of Man, a gay marriage entered into in another country or jurisdiction is legally seen as a civil partnership. This is most interesting as recently on the mainland in the Church of England diocese of York, a layperson with a ministry of reader has been refused permission to officiate as he moved from civil partnership to marriage.

Last Sunday the Bishop of Sodor and Man, the Rt Rev Roger Paterson was interviewed on the Radio Four Sunday programme and he claimed he stood by the Archbishop of York’s decision to withdraw Mr Jeremy Timm’s permission to officiate in readership ministry, as he has entered into a same sex marriage.

Mr Timm had previously been supported in his lay ministry by the divorced and remarried bishop of Hull who is now bishop of Hereford. Bishop Paterson claims the Church of England bishops are not opposed to a reader in a civil partnership. Yet this is the same bishop who spoke against civil partnerships in the legislative council of the Tynwald and then abstained from voting at the final reading.

It would be interesting to know where Bishop Paterson now stands if Mr Timm moved to the Isle of Man. Surely this shows up the total confusion of the Church of England, which if it didn’t involve the eternal worth of souls would be as farcical as the diocese of Barchester.

At least in the Roman Catholic Church the Universal catechism, whilst unequivocally giving support to chaste homosexuals, states: “Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered. They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.”

Is no Church of England bishop prepared to agree with this and stop playing a semantic game over the meaning of marriage and civil partnership.

Robert Ian Williams,

Bangor on Dee