I'm a gay man who opposes gay marriage. Does that make ME a bigot, Mr Cameron?

When David Cameron committed the Government to supporting same-sex marriage some months ago, he declared: ‘I don’t support gay marriage despite being a Conservative. I support gay marriage because I’m a Conservative.’



His argument being that the party should support a long-term commitment in any relationship.



The unexpected policy shift caused uproar in the Tory Party in Parliament and across the country.

A poll by Catholic Voice of 550 gay men and women suggested only 40 per cent identified the change in marriage as their priority

Now, a submission by the Church of England into the Government’s consultation on gay marriage has warned of an historic division between the Church’s canon law — that marriage is between a man and a woman — and Parliament.



It suggests the schism could even lead to ‘disestablishment’, a split between the Church and the State, and the removal of the Queen as Supreme Governor of the Church.



Calculated



Despite the opposition of every major faith group — notably the Catholic Church — Mr Cameron is arrogantly pressing ahead with an issue which excites his chums in the metropolitan elite, but which disregards the sentiments of millions of ordinary people who, as poll after poll has shown, are against it.



Even some of the Prime Minister’s admirers concede that the policy has less to do with offering equality to the gay community and more to do with decontaminating the allegedly ‘toxic’ Tory brand.



Perhaps the Prime Minister has calculated that anyone who stands up and argues against his proposals will be branded a homophobe and a bigot.

Angry: The Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has called the Government's gay marriage proposals 'completely irrational'

Well, Mr Cameron, I am a Conservative and a homosexual, and I oppose gay marriage. Am I a bigot?



And what about Alan Duncan, the first Conservative MP to come out as gay? Mr Duncan, the International Aid Minister who is in a civil partnership, is implacably opposed to gay marriage.



So is Dr David Starkey, the celebrated historian, who is openly gay.



The Labour MP Ben Bradshaw, meanwhile, who was the first Cabinet minister to enter into a civil partnership, is contemptuous of Mr Cameron’s motive for smashing down centuries of traditional Church teaching in reference to marriage.



‘This isn’t a priority for the gay community, which has already won equal rights with civil partnerships,’ says Bradshaw. ‘This is pure politics.’



He’s right. It’s yet another sop to the wretched Lib Dems, even though they number only 57 of the 650 MPs at Westminster.



The introduction of same-sex marriage became a policy commitment at the Lib Dem conference two years ago, even though there was no reference to it in their election manifesto, or in their four-page manifesto written for the gay community only six months earlier.



At the time, the former Lib Dem MP Dr Evan Harris hailed the policy as ‘creating clear blue water with the Tories’.



Few Conservatives took the idea seriously — until Mr Cameron’s bombshell announcement at the last Tory conference that he backed it, too.



In spite of the furore caused by the Church of England’s intervention this week, Downing Street is insisting that Mr Cameron, who has so far performed 34 policy U-turns in power, has no intention of backing down on this issue.



Even gay rights campaigners are puzzled by the Prime Minister’s conversion to the cause.

Stonewall, a powerful pressure group for gay equality, has not called for gay marriage.



While the organisation — of which I’m proud to be a member — supports the idea of gay marriage, its priority remains tackling homophobia in schools after research showed that gay men in the 16-to-24 age group are significantly more likely to have attempted suicide than other young men.



So who — apart from Mr Cameron — is clamouring for gay marriage to be allowed?



The Treasury estimates that six per cent of the population, or 3.7 million people, is gay. Yet I understand the Government’s Equalities office, having approached a polling company to test the opinion of the gay community, then decided not to go ahead.



Were the officials worried what the conclusions might be? None of my gay friends want gay marriage to be written into law.

Married: Kieran Bohan and Warren became the first gay couple to be wed in a religious building, but do other want the same?

A poll by Catholic Voice of 550 gay men and women suggested only 40 per cent identified the change in marriage as their priority.



Certainly, at Westminster yesterday, Tory MPs were appalled by the Prime Minister’s perverse set of priorities.



As one senior Tory figure told me: ‘In the week we have been demanding a policy shift to kickstart economic growth. We get instead an entirely predictable row about gay marriage.



‘What sort of message does our preoccupation with fringe issues like gay marriage and Lords reform send to people who are worried about their jobs?’



The Tory Party HQ, I can disclose, has warned the Prime Minister that this issue has triggered the biggest revolt among grassroots members since Tory MPs dumped Margaret Thatcher in 1990.



Worthless



Literally thousands of the party’s foot soldiers are refusing to renew their subscriptions. Some major donors have closed their cheque books.



So Tory rebels will be emboldened by this astonishing warning by the Church of England, which for once is showing clear and principled leadership, that it could be forced to abandon its traditional role of conducting weddings on behalf of the State.



Certainly, the Archbishop of Canterbury has dismissed as worthless the assurances of the Prime Minister and the Lib Dem Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone — nicknamed ‘Featherlight’ by her despairing civil servants — that churches will not be ordered to conduct same-sex marriage ceremonies.

Under fire: The Tory Party HQ has warned the Prime Minister that this issue has triggered the biggest revolt among grassroots members since Tory MPs dumped Margaret Thatcher in 1990

Mr Cameron seems to have learned nothing from the follies of the Labour government when it comes to imposing an equalities agenda on Britain’s leading faiths.



In 2007, Labour passed legislation which effectively ordered Roman Catholic adoption agencies to place children with same-sex couples.

Now I have to declare an interest in this aspect of the argument: I spent the first two years of my life in a Catholic orphanage in Cheltenham run by nuns and, to this day, I am eternally grateful to the Catholic Children’s Society which placed me in a loving home with my adoptive parents, who cared for me as one of their own. But, disgracefully, societies like the ones that rescued me and thousands of other abandoned children have now been forced to close down because the Catholic Church understandably could not accept the Labour government’s diktat — which ran contrary to its sincerely-held beliefs.



Provoke



Reassurances: Home Secretary Theresa May has said that religious organizations will not be forced to conduct same-sex marriages

As a lapsed Catholic, I am not going to defend that Church’s teaching that homosexuality is a sin, but to force its adoption agencies to close on a point of moral principle was a scandal which has resulted in countless vulnerable children being denied the possibility of loving homes. What madness!



And for pity’s sake, which gays would have gone to Catholic agencies in the first place?



Those terribly depressing consequences of Labour’s sweeping changes should serve as a warning as the Tory-led Government presses on with the rewriting of the centuries-old tradition of marriage.



Ironically, if the change goes ahead, it could provoke legal challenges from the heterosexual community.



Ministers have ruled out extending civil partnerships, which became law in December 2005, beyond the gay community. So we gays will enjoy rights denied to heterosexuals. What an absurd state of affairs.



The truth is that no one has been able to explain to me the difference between gay marriage and a civil partnership. I have asked ministers and friends. None has an answer.

