Florida Agenda

LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM – The former Archbishop of Canterbury has responded to the most prominent gay member of the British government, in a public battle over the Church of England’s positions on marriage equality and other gay rights issues.

Nick Herbert, a Conservative Member of Parliament and the Minister for Police and Criminal Justice, accused the Church last week of “intolerant” language, after Lord Carey—who reigned as Archbishop of Canterbury and leader of the world’s Anglican Communion from 1991 to 2002— wrote in the Daily Telegraph (UK), “The Government’s fundamental interest in marriage should be confined to preserving an institution in which the raising of the next generation of citizens is stable and secure. Its interest in other kinds of relationship, though it may regard them as of equal esteem, has no pressing importance. To allow the state to interfere in this way in the institution of the family is to establish a very dangerous precedent.”

Herbert, 49—the highest-ranking LGBT person in the United Kingdom— said that he has never felt “more distant” from the Church than now, because of its stands on gay rights. Herbert, who is himself in a civil partnership, said that gay people will interpret Christian leaders’ comments as “judgmental or intolerant.” In a response in the Times of London , Carey said that supporters of “traditional marriage” are the ones facing judgment from gay rights advocates. “It is in fact the supporters of traditional marriage who have been accused of bigotry and homophobia—the kind of intolerant and judgmental language he talks about in his interview,” Carey said.

LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM – In an unusual call for political unity between faiths that are often at-odds with one another, the pope’s personal representative to the United Kingdom is urging British Roman Catholics to form a “united front” with British Muslims and conservative Jews to oppose marriage equality.

During an address to Roman Catholic bishops, the papal nuncio, Archbishop Antonio Mennini, repeated recent comments made by Pope Benedict XVI, who said that the church faces “powerful political and cultural currents” that threaten the traditional definition of marriage.

The nuncio’s timing coincides with recent statements by conservative British Jewish and Muslim leaders, who voiced strong opposition to Undersecretary for Equalities Lynne Featherstone’s call for a national dialog on marriage equality and the best ways to implement it. In response, the Muslim Council of Britain described the plan as both “unnecessary and unhelpful.”

Similarly, Scotland’s Council of Glasgow Imams agreed to a resolution that describes same-sex marriage as an “attack” on the Muslim faith and its fundamental tenets Although Liberal and Reform Jewish synagogues have thrown their support behind the U.K.’s marriage equality plans, the country’s United Synagogues—British Judaism’s largest sect, which holds its religious authority from the Chief Rabbi of Britain—have come out in opposition, with one prominent London rabbi condemning what he called the government “assault” on religious liberty and values.

In addition, the leader of Britain’s Network of Sikh Organizations, Lord Indarjit Singh, says that the plans to reform the U.K.’s marriage laws are “a sideways assault on religion.”

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM – A prominent British barrister says that rulings in favor of marriage equality by the European Court of Human Rights and the Court of Appeal mean that British churches will soon be compelled to perform same-sex marriages, despite promises to the contrary by Prime Minister David Cameron.

Cameron’s government issued a consultation document last month that said a marriage equality law will “make no changes to religious marriages.” The document said that church marriages “will continue to only be legally possible between a man and a woman.”

Neil Addison, the director of the Thomas More Legal Centre in London, which represents religious and social conservative organizations in court, says this isn’t the case. “The Government will be obliged to permit same-sex marriage on religious premises on exactly the same basis as it permits heterosexual marriage,” said Addison.

“Certainly a good legal case can be made that any place or person who is registered to perform marriage must be willing to perform same-sex marriage on the same basis as they conduct heterosexual marriage since, in law, there will be no difference between the two,” he added.

Addison pointed to the recent decision in a European Court of Human Rights case involving two French lesbians which found that, although no country has an obligation to legalize marriage equality, once such a law is passed, the state must apply it equally to all citizens.

“Churches which perform heterosexual marriages will have to be willing to perform same-sex marriages and they will have no legal grounds to resist since the courts have determined that the ‘orthodox Christian view of marriage’ is not a ‘core’ part of Christian belief,” Addison noted.

LONDON, UK – LGBT rights have come unexpectedly to the forefront of the debate in this year’s campaign for Mayor of London, with the current officeholder being criticized for permitting homophobic ads to be placed on public transportation by an anti-gay church.

Last week, London Mayor Boris Johnson, a well-placed figure in the country’s Conservative Party, ordered municipal employees to pull the ads, which were paid for by a Christian group called Core Issues Trusts, which supports “reparative therapy,” a highly controversial and widely-discredited course of “treatment” to turn gay people straight.

The bus ads—which were scheduled to run for two weeks starting this Monday—carried the message “Not Gay! Post-Gay, Ex-Gay, and Proud. Get Over It.” They were meant to mimic a recent campaign by LGBT rights group Stonewall that included the message “Some people are gay. Get over it.”

“London is one of the most tolerant cities in the world and intolerant of intolerance,” said Johnson. “It is clearly offensive to suggest being gay is an illness someone recovers from and I am not prepared to have that suggestion driven around London on our buses.”

According to Core Issues’ Web site, the group is “a non-profit Christian initiative seeking to support men and women with homosexual issues who voluntarily seek change in sexual preference and expression.” The group’s co-director, Mike Davidson, expressed displeasure with Johnson’s decision to block the ads.

“It is of deep concern that there can only be one point of view and that is the point of view of individuals who are determined to push through gay marriage and apparently believe that homosexuality cannot be altered in any possible way,” said Davidson. “This is a disturbing development.” Davidson has previously said that he believes “homoerotic behavior is sinful.”

Johnson, who is seeking a second term, was also criticized by one of his opponents, Labor candidate Ken Livingstone. “In 1906 the front page of the Daily Mail’s headline was ‘Jews bring crime and disease to Britain,’” said Livingstone, a former Mayor of London who was defeated in 2008 by Johnson. “Then it was the blacks, then it was the Irish, then it was the lesbians and gays—there has always got to be an enemy.

LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM —Queen Elizabeth II addressed both houses of Parliament last week to celebrate 60 years on the British throne. In an address scheduled to mark the sovereign’s diamond jubilee, Speaker of the House of Commons John Brecow raised a few eyebrows when he introduced the 85-year-old monarch as “a kaleidoscope queen of a kaleidoscope country.”

Bercow, 49, is straight and married, but serves as the honorary president of the Kaleidoscope International Diversity Trust, a gay rights group which works to overturn anti-gay legislation across the world and to open dialogues between straight government officials and gay citizens in less tolerant countries.

Telegraph columnist and blogger Damian Thompson suggested that Bercow’s comment was “a thinly disguised plug for gay marriage.”

British Prime Minister David Cameron, who supports marriage equality, was clearly not amused by Bercow’s remarks, as his expression showed when it was captured on television just moments after the Speaker of Commons’ “kaleidoscopic” comments.

Elizabeth II ascended the throne of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in 1952. “I am reassured that I am merely the second sovereign to celebrate a diamond jubilee,” the queen told officials. Only one other British monarch, Victoria, celebrated 60 years on the throne, in 1897 (she died in 1901).

By Phoebe Moses

LONDON, UK – The former ordained head of the Church of England called attempts to legalize same-sex marriage in the United Kingdom an effort to “undermine” the traditional family.

George Lord Carey, the Archbishop of Canterbury, told the Daily Mail that “The ideal is for children to be raised by a mother and father who are married,” and said that marriage equality is merely a “power grab” by a secular government to control an institution it does not own.

“The honorable estate of matrimony precedes both the state and the church, and neither of these institutions have the right to redefine it in such a fundamental way,” Carey said.

“I do not believe the British public wants any of this,” he added, saying that the “move to legalize same-sex marriage is undemocratic.” Carey told the British newspaper that a new group, the Coalition for Marriage, had been formed to oppose the government’s plans to change the nation’s marriage laws.

Carey’s comments were met with strong opposition from Britain’s gay rights groups. “Coalition members are entitled to believe that same-sex marriages are wrong, but they are not entitled to demand that their opposition to such marriages should be imposed on the rest of society and enforced by law,” said British LGBT rights advocate Peter Tatchell. “The coalition is out of touch with public opinion. Most British people now support marriage equality.”

In fact, all three of Britain’s major political parties—Conservative, Labor, and Liberal– support same-sex marriage. Speaking last year at the Conservative Party’s national convention, Prime Minister David Cameron was clear about his stand on the issue: “To anyone who has reservations, I say this: yes, it’s about equality, but it’s also about something else: commitment. Conservatives believe in the ties that bind us; that society is stronger when we make vows to each other and support each other. So I don’t support gay marriage in spite of being a Conservative. I support gay marriage because I am a Conservative.”

LONDON, UK – The Guardian reports that a senior Tory counselor has been suspended after suggesting his party “may as well legalize marriage with animals” after David Cameron (in photo) declared his support for gay marriage.

Party chiefs took immediate action against James Malliff, a cabinet member of the Tory-controlled Wycombe council in Buckinghamshire, who is in charge of “big society and localism.”

A party spokesman said: “These comments are completely unacceptable. Counselor Malliff’s local party association has suspended him with immediate effect.”

The London Evening Standard reported that Malliff tweeted to Paul Goodman, a former Conservative MP, who asked whether legalizing gay marriage could lead to multiple sharia marriages being made lawful.

Malliff wrote: “There is no doubt the PM is wrong on this issue. We may as well legalize marriage with animals, crude I concede but no apology.”

Another tweet on his feed read: “Great keynote address by David Cameron, not sure about legalising gay marriage though, what happened to sanctity of marriage #odd.” The tweets have since been removed.

In a statement to the Press Association, Malliff admitted his comments were“ill-conceived and crude.”

“I am deeply, deeply sorry for the offence I have caused,” he said. “I was not intending to be offensive. It was much more a comment to try to establish where we draw the line on these things.”

“My comment [on Twitter] was there is no doubt the PM has got this wrong and you may as well legalise marriage with animals. It sounds terrible now, but it was not meant to be anti-gay. I am not anti-gay and I respect people’s views on this issue.”

“The comments were ill-conceived and crude, but I want to know where we are going on this – it needs to be discussed.”

The gay rights group Stonewall said: “We warmly welcome the decision of the Conservative party to suspend Counselor Malliff.

It’s extraordinary in 2011 that he is prepared to insult so many of his council taxpayers in this way.”

LONDON, ENGLAND – A proposal will allow same-sex parents to be included in the revised application for a British passport.
According to the BBC, the new forms include “parent one” and “parent two.” The terms “mother” and “father” are expected to be removed from the application by the end of the year. The proposals also include sex-free passports to allow transgender people to opt out of identifying themselves as either male or female.

Passport officials say the change of terms will ensure passports are issued safely to the right person.

LONDON, ENGLAND – The BBC has reported that the lifetime ban on blood donations by homosexual and bisexual men will be lifted in England, Scotland and Wales. Ministers have agreed to let men who have not had sex with another man in the past twelve months to donate starting in November. The restrictions were originally put in place in the 1980s to prevent the risk of HIV contamination. However, the latest medical evidence presented to a government panel argued the ban could no longer be justified.

Ministers in the three countries accepted the argument and said they would soon be relaxing the rules. Northern Ireland is expected to make a decision soon. The National Blood Service screens all donations for HIV and other infections. However, there is a “window period” after infection during which it is impossible to detect the virus.

LONDON, ENGLAND – Brian Paddick, a married gay man, former high-ranking officer in Britain’s police force and a crusading victim of Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World’s phone-hacking scheme, has been nominated as a London mayoral candidate by the Liberal Democrats party.

The election will take place next year.