There is no reason why this video is up on this post, aside from the fact that it's a great Bowie song.
H/T to My Heart Was Restless for this:
British churches will be forced to accept practicing homosexuals or "transsexuals" in positions as youth workers and similar roles, under upcoming equality legislation, the government has said. The Labour government's Equality Bill will prohibit churches from refusing to hire active homosexuals even if their religion holds such behavior to be sinful, said deputy equalities minister Maria Eagle.For full story see Life Site News.
The legislation is due to come into force next year, and churches fear that it will force them to act against their religious convictions in a broad range of areas. Eagle indicated at a conference called "Faith, Homophobia, Transphobia, & Human Rights" in London, that the legislation "will cover almost all church employees."
There are, as is usual with Government 'equality' legislation, several key points in this policy move which are glaringly insane and unworkable.
1. What kind of a person goes to an interview at a parish Church for, say a job as a youth worker, and makes his sexuality the chief reason for why he thinks he is 'appropriate for this position'?
2. I thought everyone's private lives were left outside the door when turning up for work, or have those days gone by? It is a sad reflection of our times that we are reducing our humanity to our sexuality and feel the need, so desperate for identity as we are, down to only that.
3. It would be unjust and unfair for a parish Church to sack someone, or not hire someone because they suspected that the individual was a homosexual or because they thought they were in a relationship. I would imagine that the majority of parish priests are not only discreet but also compassionate regarding the intricacies of worker's private lives. The Church already has, within the Catechism, the expressed desire that 'any unjust discrimination' with regard to homosexuals is to be rejected. Thus this legislation is or at least should be redundant.
4. If someone was a 'active homosexual', that would not necessarily preclude them from wanting a job as a Church youth worker, for the Church includes people with different sexual peccadillos. However, while the LGBT movement within the Church is strident, a sharp and irritating thorn in the side of the Church, why would a 'homosexualist activist', for only such would make his sexuality so apparent, want a job working for a Church with whom, theologically, at least, he is at odds.
5. One suspects that as with all of this bulls**t equality legislation, that the Church will have to fill a quota of 5-10% of its staff being 'friends of dorothy'. This is why I cannot stand this awful, awful Government. There is no aspect of human interaction and human affairs for which they will not legislate. What next? Friendships? "We wish to fine you because you are not friends with enough gays, or lesbians, or transgendered people. By and large the group of friends you hang out with are straight. You must fulfill a quota of at least 5 LGBT friends or we'll charge you £80."
Finally...Where, in all the Government legislation, is the equality for the employability of Catholics? There should, given that Catholics are a minority in this country, be at least a quota of 5-10 % Catholics in the Houses of Parliament. Let's start a campaign for this now!
I have the greatest respect for any Catholic who is gay and still continues to accept the church's teachings on this. Okay, I am sure that many such Catholics fall short of living up to the standards which should accompany these beliefs - but then, we are all sinners and who but God is to say one sin in worse than another?
ReplyDeleteI have sympathy too for gay Catholics who cannot accept these teachings and leave the church. It must seem very unfair to them (although the older I get the more I realise that not very much in life is actually very fair anyway!).
What I cannot understand are those who stay, but try to tell the church that its teachings on the subject are all wrong (just because they personally find them difficult to follow). Why would such people want to work as Catholic youth workers? I am afraid I would be very suspicious of the motives of such people. Especially as there is no guarantee that they would not share their views with the youth in their care.
This new legislation means that the church will have to accept as youth workers people who do not even accept the churches teaching on this matter (regardless of whether they live up to these ideals). So we are supposed to accept as temporary guardians of our youth people who might teach them something contrary to our beliefs! Great!
I like your last question - where indeed is the equality of employability of Catholics? I suggest that all Catholic youth workers leave their posts in protest at the new legislation and apply for posts with other religions. I wonder how, to take two random examples, the Muslims or Jehovah's Witnesses would take to a Catholic Youth worker going in and teaching their youth something contrary to their beliefs? Not a lot, I suspect!