The news site Christian Today has kindly published an article by me on why Theresa May's plan to introduce opposite-sex civil partnerships is a bad, unnecessary idea.
Read the whole argument here:
Opposite-sex civil partnerships: Divisive, pointless and an all-round bad idea
Basically, the commitment in marriage is a good thing. And we can't encourage more stable relationships by watering down the idea of commitment involved in marriage and by dividing a common institution in half. Also there is no other example of parallel, identical legal institutions that do the same thing. The government should be promoting marriage, and helping people be prepared for stable, long-lasting marriages not undermining it.
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2 comments:
Hi Stephen
Are you aware that the main reason that we have retained civil partnerships is that the Church of England has asked the government to keep them? The CofE officially permits civil partnerships on the understanding that they remain celibate, but does not allow marriage.
Removal of the option of civil partnerships would leave English Anglicans with no option to have their relationships legally recognised.
Removal of current civil partnerships would leave English Anglicans choosing between their church and legal recognition of their relationship.
Automatic conversion would presumably mean that English Anglicans would have to file for divorce.
Hello, Peter. I have seen this point raised before. My response would be I am in favour of the Church of England accepting civil, same-sex marriages on the same basis it currently accepts civil partnerships. Civil marriages are not Church marriages already. I regard the civil partnership distinction as an unhelpful, divisive semantic difference.
I understand that the Church is currently unwilling to do this and to be honest I would be happy with a continuation of the current status quo if it helped ease a difficult situation for LGBT Anglicans and others. Either way I think the extension of civil partnerships is a bad idea that will cause more harm than good for the reasons I gave in the article and more.
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