Catholics Fuel Discrimination Row
Is Adoption by Homosexual Couples Right or Wrong?
After the Christian Church became caught up in a homophobic row when Reverend Gene Robinson was ordained as a Bishop, the Catholic Church now raises more eyebrows.
The ordination of openly homosexual Reverend Gene Robinson as a Bishop in US in 2003 nearly split the Christian church in a manner similar to the Great Schism of 1054. Then the row died down – on the surface at least – and Christianity appeared to be united again and gradually rebuilding their public image.
But now they’ve thrust themselves back into the spotlight by objecting to the adoption of children by homosexual couples. As the UK Government seeks to introduce new adoption laws, the Catholic Church, whose adoption agencies total roughly a third of all UK adoption agencies and help to place some of the most hard-to-reach children, are threatening legal action if the new laws are passed.
Their objection surfaces from their religious conviction that homosexuality is a sin, a belief held less strongly by some more liberal Christian groups. Furthermore, they feel that a child and their development benefits more from a balanced upbringing from the different sexes in a heterosexual marriage than from the same sex one-sidedness of homosexual relationships.
The Catholic objection has now gathered support from the Anglican Christians who publicly backed their religious comrades in the face of growing resentment from other quarters.
So while Members of Parliament and gay lobby groups voice protests of discrimination against the Catholic Church, the Catholics themselves argue that forcing them to place children with homosexual couples, which is against their religious beliefs, is also discrimination. Just as with those in the medical or teaching professions, they want some opt-out clause for laws which go against their religious teachings. But what they have yet to answer is why they still allow adoption by single gay people and by co-habiting couples – both against their religious beliefs.
The adoption row rumbles on and neither side looks like giving in – for the time being at least.
