Civil partnerships do not go far enough, says Martin

A leading Irish churchman this week called for more to be done to recognise same-sex couples beyond civil partnerships.

The Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, was speaking ahead of Friday’s referendum on proposals to legalise single-sex marriage, as the Irish bishops increased their support for a “no” vote.

Reacting to the “yes” campaign’s claim that there are 167 legal differences between civil part­ner­ship and marriage, Arch­­bishop Martin said he believed the issue needed to be examined so as “to find ways in which the desires of gay and lesbian people to have their love fully recognised [are met] in an equal but different manner”.

He continued: “Am I happy voting ‘no’ – the answer would be I am not happy because I don’t think that simply voting ‘no’ is going to provide the answers that I am looking for.”

In a speech at All Hallows College, in which he outlined his reasons for voting “no”, the archbishop acknowledged that the Church has treated gays and ­lesbians “in a very harsh and ­hostile way”.

This week, in a move backdated to January, the Irish Government announced it is to withdraw ­funding from the Church’s marriage-preparation service.

This year funding for the service from the state’s child and family agency would have been €360,000 (£258,000). The final cut follows a reduction in funding by 42 per cent since 2011, despite demand for the service increasing annually for the past five years to 15,500 requests in 2014.

Bishop Denis Nulty, the president of Accord Catholic marriage- care service, said he was baffled by the decision that some believe is linked to the Church’s opposition to proposals for same-sex marriage. 

Meanwhile, Cardinal Vincent Nichols said, in a homily at a Mass regularly attended by a group of gay Catholics, that God’s commandments are not more important than his mercy .

“The commandments of God are given to us precisely as a mercy. They are not, in some strange way, more important than mercy. They are not rules imposed from the outside that above all else have to be obeyed,” he said during the Mass at the Jesuits’ church in Farm Street, Mayfair, central London.

He was celebrating a Mass last Sunday attended by the LGBT Catholics Westminster group. It moved to Farm Street having previously attended the “Soho Masses” at Our Lady of the Assumption and St Gregory in Soho, central London.

The cardinal added that receiving Communion can never just be a “badge of acceptability” but also must be an invitation to be changed.