Madam, – Vincent Twomey (Opinion, June 29th) has echoed the call made by the Irish Bishops’ Conference to amend the Civil Partnership Bill to allow for registrars to refuse to register partnerships on grounds of conscientious objection. Why, one must wonder, do the same people who make this call not also call for conscientious objection with respect to the processing of divorces, or the civil marriage of divorcees?
“Conscience” and “moral beliefs” are being invoked rather selectively with respect to same-sex couples. Many people in many jobs will frequently have to perform tasks which may involve a level of moral compunction for them. To legally provide for conscientious objection in the case of civil partnership would be to further institutionalise the discrimination already inherent in the fact that full marriage is not being made available to same-sex couples. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – I have some sympathy for Vincent Twomey (Opinion, June 29th). Ireland has changed all too fast for him. There was a time when bishops and priests were listened to, and their advice acted on. This no longer seems to happen.
While their views should not be disparaged, he should recognise that the authority his church had was detrimental to the development of the country and its people.
But he raises a problem for liberals. Shouldn’t people be allowed to act according to their own morals and conscience? Surely the State must take a view on morality if to protect a minority? To take a seemingly absurd example (better that Vincent Twomey’s use of the Nazis, a device used in desperation in any argument), what if one religion thought that people with green eyes were inferior and should not be afforded the same rights as the blue-eyed majority? Surely it is right for the State to legislate to ensure that no one is allowed discriminate against those with green eyes. Happily for Mr Twomey, the Civil Partnership Bill does not even give equality to gays. – Yours, etc,
A chara, – The Civil Partnership Bill is now before the Oireachtas. Are our people aware of, and alert to, the serious challenge that marriage and family are thus facing?
While sexually inclined persons get their entitlements, this must not be done in a way damaging to the vital status of marriages and the family, and this is just what the Civil Partnerships Bill would do.
To give the dignity of legal recognition to the sin of sodomy, as is done by the Civil Partnership Bill is almost equating it with marriage and is thus downgrading marriage and the family.
For this reason and others, the Bill must be rejected, and please let our politicians not have this on their conscience.
Readers should contact their TD as an urgent duty, as time is not on our side. – Is mise,
Madam, – A stranger perusing the article by Fr Vincent Twomey (Opinion June 29th) could be forgiven for presuming that Ireland is in the thrall of an immutable, secular dictatorship that is indifferent to the wishes of citizens and which disregards the primacy of the Constitution. The article would suggest that help is at hand in the form of an alternative ecclesiastical, but sacrosanct, dictatorship that is seeking to rescue the citizens from the consequences of their own whims, thoughtlessness and random impulses.
No legislation is capable of forcing any Irish citizen to collude in anything that they believe to be morally wrong. But “belief” and “conscience” are not one-size-fits-all concepts and they are influenced and characterised by moral authority as well as personal experience.
The “outrage” directed at the Civil Partnership Bill is based on a misleading presumption that it will confer on same-sex relationships a standing which will be as similar as possible to marriage and that apart from a right to adopt children, that same-sex, civil partnerships will be regarded as being equal to marriage. This equality argument is false. The features contained in the Bill may be equivalent to those attaching to marriage – but that does not make a civil partnership equal to marriage. A marriage between a man and a woman is a fundamentally exclusive institution whose uniqueness will always prevail, despite any legislative changes in any jurisdiction. To suggest that both are equal is to imply that a delivery van is equal to a family car on the grounds that each has some common features, equal standing on the highway and total integrity among users.
The bishops make much of significance in changes in terminology – that “marital status” will be replaced by “civil status”. So what? Those who hitherto formally witnessed the exchange of marriage vows are now known as solemnisers, rather than celebrants – and happy, stable, enduring, fulfilled marriages continue to be consummated.
Legislators are elected to conduct the people’s business and to represent all the people with fidelity. That alone is what ought to define the primacy of conscience in Leinster House. – Yours, etc,