Peter Ould offers a number of observations, among them this one:

One thing is clear though – this is legalised gay marriage in church by the back door and those of us who are Biblically conservative need to be very aware of what is going on. The Bill in its current form is too ambiguous and would arguably permit Church of England clergy to let Civil Partnerships be registered in churches without the permission of their Bishops.

Thanks, Sarah, for posting Peter Ould’s lucid analysis of this disturbing, but not entirely surprsing development.

I was particularly struck by the final two paragraphs, where Ould quotes the frank and exultant opinion of Colin Coward, the leader of Changing Attitude (UK equivalent of Integrity):

“Is Lord Alli’s amendment a Trojan Horse as some claim?  I very much hope so.”

And he goes on, in typical gay activist fashion, to advance the usual “all the with it people are doing it” or “the trend is unstoppable” argument we’ve all heard so often:

“There are many priests and parishes where civil partnerships are already celebrated and blessed in church, and bishops who either turn a blind eye towards what is happening or positively encourage priests to conduct a civil partnership.  Conservatives will be surprised to know which bishops and how many there are.”

Now that kind of rhetoric is a standard pro-gay propaganda ploy, but it probably has some truth to it.  If +James Jones has switched sides recently and publicly (from the conservative to liberal side), there may well be others who are compromising and doing so in a more covert manner.

Anyway, we’re talking about an amendment to the infamous Equality Bill here, and I hope that the whole bill is voted down in the end, as it ought to be.

David Handy+