The Government have promised not to put anyone into a difficult position... so that's alright then, because, after all, the Government is unchanging and eternal, just like its policies...
Why does it make me think about the Mental Capacity Act, and how welcoming the Bishops were about the assurances they were given then?
'It's all just a little bit of history repeating itself'
ReplyDeleteWell, I wonder. We've had divorce for a long time and no Government has forced a priest or even a clergyman of the Established Church, founded on a divorce, to marry a divorcee. Perhaps we are getting the tiniest bit overstressed.
ReplyDeleteFrederick, the Catholic Church does not grant divorces. She does, however, solemnize marriages. The government could pass a law purporting to require Catholic clergy not to "discriminate" against same-sex couples in witnessing marriages. In an age when the unthinkable quickly morphs into the commonplace, this is not beyond the pale.
ReplyDeleteI have similar foreboding about the United States, whose president is all but a self-declared enemy of the Church. "Don't ask, don't tell" has been repealed, and the military has given military chaplains "permission" to conduct same-sex "marriage" ceremonies. The current archbishop of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA, the awesome +Timothy Broglio, has declared that under no circumstances are Catholic chaplains to officiate at such travesties, nor will they take place in Catholic chapels. I can foresee a day, not too far down the road, where "permission" will become mandatory and we will see chaplains getting court-martialed.