Thank You Bishop Drainey

Blogged by James Preece on 14th January 2013

As Joseph Shaw rightly points out, it's been busy weeks in busy parishes and people may have been away on holiday and not got the letter etc. We absolutely cannot read anything in to who didn't sign the 1000 strong letter to The Telegraph.

That said, I think it's only right and proper to recognise that of the handful Bishops whose name are on the list - one of them is Bishop Terence Drainey of Middlesbrough.

Thank you Bishop Drainey. We really appreciate it.

Rate this blogentry: + -

+32

This Item Tagged With:

Reader Comments

New Friend said...

That 1000 people signed this letter does nothing at all to make it right though does it?
In fact it's approach reflects the incorrect attitude shown in the recent past over such issues as the closure of Catholic adoption agencies and whether guest house owners can discriminate. It seems to suggest that there ought to be separate rules for Catholics over such things.
I am quite certain that great efforts will be made to try to ensure you don't have to compromise your beliefs over this issue. What you cannot be allowed to do is to impose your opinion if, after due consideration, parliament approves the change.

"This is what marriage is. That is why marriage is only possible between a man and a woman."

This is the signatories, and probably also your, opinion. It is not a universally accepted fact. This is why this quote is so wrong:-

"Legislation for same-sex marriage, should it be enacted, will have many legal consequences, severely restricting the ability of Catholics to teach the truth about marriage in their schools"

You WON'T be restricted to teach the truth. You will be asked to keep your personal opinions to yourselves and do what the curriculum, and society, demands. If you cannot then you are in the wrong job.

+17

Mark Dobson said...

"That 1000 people signed this letter does nothing at all to make it right though does it?"

The irony of your comment is so thick that you could cut it with a knife, though I don't expect you to appreciate/admit it.

A democratic process can't make things right either.

New Friend said...

Mark

There is no irony at all in my comment, it is a simple statement of fact for I didn't claim that a majority holding the alternative were right either.

The point is that we live in a democracy where majority opinion is what decides how we proceed. The minority will continue to believe they are right but must accept the situation.

What would you suggest? That we abandon democracy and re-establish a theocracy! So long it's run by Catholics of course.

Mark Dobson said...

"What would you suggest? That we abandon democracy and re-establish a theocracy! So long it's run by Catholics of course."

What the hell makes you think you have the right to invent opinions for me? I never said anything of the sort, and insinuating such a thing with no provocation marks demonstrates your lack of class and unwillingness to engage in real discussion.

My policy of ignoring the time-waster now resumes.

Mark Dobson said...

Orig. Comment

New Friend said...

Mark

Sorry you are rattled but I need to set the record straight and respond to another ad hominem from you.

James's original post asked no questions but did make reference to a letter which contained assumptions I believe are false and needed exposure. So although away from the central theme I made some comments, which can be found of interest, or ignored at your choice.

You were the one who chose to criticise democracy as a system. There is the provocation. All I did was question what you would suggest is better and ask if a Catholic theocracy would be your preference. That is not inventing your opinion! It is asking what it is. I cannot help but notice that you don't answer it, but prefer to just attack me. I wonder why that is.

Mark Dobson said...

I would be glad to accept your apology and move on if it didn’t ring so hollow.

You accuse me of “another ad hominem”. I agree with the commenter who previously opined that you don’t really understand the concept. Here it amounts to mere name-calling, since it is far from clear wherein you think the fault in my reasoning lies.

“All I did was question what you would suggest is better and ask if a Catholic theocracy would be your preference.”

Rot, disingenuous rot. If you really wanted to know what I thought, you would have stopped after “What would you suggest?” You don’t even have the decency to put a question mark after your made-up opinion; it reads like a conclusion, not the entirely undeserved slur on my intellect that it really is.

“I cannot help but notice that you don't answer it, but prefer to just attack me. I wonder why that is.”

Stop insulting me and you might find me more responsive. Instead you add insult to injury by insinuating that my frustration with your cheap, if politely written, rhetoric must be due to a fault on my part.

New Friend said...

Mark

I am once again sorry. This time because you seem to have misunderstood me. My regret is that you get so wound up over my words, which I most certainly have no need to apologise for.

I ignore one poster who seems to delight in concentrating on the number of lines written, rather than their content. I thought you planned to do the same with mine, which hopefully would avoid you getting so stressed.

I will continue to provide some balance and have discussions with whosoever wishes to engage in sensible and reasoned debate.

I still don't know if you have a preference for an alternative to democracy, and if so what it might be. A theocracy is but one possibility. If democracy is indeed your preference then we can move on to discussing the implications of that on minority viewpoints and their place in society.

+24

Tom said...

"You will be asked to keep your personal opinions to yourselves and do what the curriculum, and society, demands. If you cannot then you are in the wrong job."

What part of the above is not threatening?

Want to be doctor but oppose abortion and contraception? No job for you.

Want to be a teacher but oppose teaching sex ed and promoting homosexuality as an equally valid alternative to marriage? No job for you.

Want to be relationship counsellor but not prepared to deal with homosexual couples? No job for you.

Want to be a registrar but not willing to officiate at civil partnerships? No job for you.

Want to run a B&B but not prepared to have homosexual couples? Bankruptcy for you.

Want to be a priest and not prepared to "bless" homosexual unions? Prison for you at some point.

Want to be parent and not prepared to accept the sexualisation of your child by the state and don't think that your child should have homosexuality promotion forced on it at school? Child taken into care for "re-education".

There are few, if any, areas of professional or commercial practice and life in which Catholics would be able to earn a living in your world.

What you propose is the reimplementation of the penal laws against Catholics. Be honest enough to admit it.

Individual conscience has no place in your dystopian future - only the collective "conscience" of the state. Please provide an example of one place where that has worked.

New Friend said...

Tom

Of course individual conscience has a place, as all the efforts which are made to try to accommodate them clearly indicate. However the laws apply to everyone and that includes both you and I.

Nurses and Doctors who object to abortion are not asked to be involved. There are plenty of other jobs they can do.

Likewise with teachers, they don't have to be involved in teaching sex education but if they are then they must follow the curriculum and not their own personal views. This is not a free for all in which we can teach whatever we choose. Imagine a racist teacher who is allowed to teach unrestricted.

I guess that a relationship counsellor who objects to homosexual couples could cause their management some problems. I am sure efforts would be made to help them, but they are, quite rightly, going to have equality issues. Actually I don't think this is a suitable job for anyone who holds such views and this ought to be screened out at interview.

Registrars have a contracted role and, whilst I am again sure that efforts will be made to ensure their personal beliefs are not compromised, there may well be occasions when they have to perform a civil partnership. They are legal and the registrar has a duty to their employer. If they feel unable to fulfill their duties then they have no choice other than to resign, just like anyone else.

Guest houses are businesses and not private houses. They need to abide by the appropriate laws and not make excuses. If they cannot then they are in the wrong business. I ran a nursery. If I objected to certain children, then I would have been in the wrong business as I was not permitted to discriminate in any way.

The idea that any priest will be forced into "blessing" a homosexual union is an oft quoted red herring. No-one wants it and everyone would resist it, me included.

Parents are not the only ones interested in their children's education. Society at large has a stake in ensuring that extreme views are not promoted and that every child learns the generally accepted current standards. This is as much in your interests as mine for I am quite sure you can imagine some other views you too would regard as extreme. There needs to be balance and for the child to reach their own conclusions.

+13

Tom said...

NF you are regrettably detached from reality. The examples I gave were, other than the possibility of priests going to prison, not hypothetical - they are real.

Your insistence that individual conscience has a place in your dystopian future is both dishonest and undermined by the logic that you follow.

New Friend said...

Tom

Real?

They seem to me to indicate evidence of the persecution complex which seems to infect much of the Catholic thinking on such subjects. You have only to reflect upon the judgements issued today by the European Court of Human Rights for confirmation of this.

It is all a question of finding the balance between competing rights. I think we have got it pretty well correct.

Tom said...

NF, on reviewing your many comments both on this post and elsewhere, I am left with no option but to consider you to be intellectually dishonest. Essentially your position appears to be that the conscience of the individual is subject to and may/shall be overridden by the diktats of the state/majority. That is a position that can only be logically sustained if it is accepted as a two way street - something that you have never expressly or implicitly indicated that you accept. Following that logic to its natural conclusion leaves you with no room for dispute with a state/majority that determines any particular group to merit persecution or marginalisation - be that group religious, women, the disabled, homosexuals, atheists, black people or multi-coloured leprechauns.

You do however serve a purpose - in so far as you enable people to crystallise their thinking and position in response to almost anything you say. Thus you do your cause, whatever that might be, more harm than good by serving to clarify the stark dividing lines between thesis and antithesis that cannot produce synthesis.

New Friend said...

Tom

I don't believe I am dishonest at all. Misunderstood, probably. Disagreed with, certainly but not dishonest.

I find the way that you, and others, refer to the "state" as some kind of over bearing, evil presence to be a misrepresentation designed to muddy the water, when actually the "state" is just another way of saying "all of us".

I don't support the "diktats of the state" because we don't live in a totalitarian society. I support freedom under the law. Laws which are determined by US, via our freely elected representatives. Our system is imperfect, and definitely capable of improvement, but it is the best we have and I support it.

I also support the rights of minorities to protest and conscientiously object, provided this is permitted under the law. If anyone decides to act in an unlawful way, then they do so in the full knowledge that they may face some consequences. Many have done so in the past, acquired public support and been the pre-cursors of changes to the law. Only they can decide whether such action is worth the risk they take. So the groups you identify have plenty of opportunities to make their voices heard.

As with most issues, where more than one opinion is held, there are competing rights to be considered, and it becomes a question of which is held to be the most important.

As a minority group I can see why this is an important issue for Catholics, but I don't see any persecution or marginalisation going on. Indeed quite the reverse. The current direction seems to me to be trying to establish a level playing field for everyone, with no group holding a special place. Whilst that may well be a bitter pill for Christians to swallow, as they have enjoyed special privileges in the past, actually it will, in time, be seen as a considerable benefit because your rights, as a minority, will be protected.

+10

Nicolas Bellord said...

Your analogy of running a nursery and a guest house does not hold water. The objection to having a homosexual couple in one's house is not discrimination against the couple but discrimination against what they propose doing in your guest house. Rightly you cannot discriminate against children coming to your nursery but if you found that one of them was intent on beating up the other children would you not discriminate and expel that one?

New Friend said...

Nicolas

We did have violent kids but were not allowed to exclude them. We were expected to employ additional staff to supervise them. The alternative would have meant losing our registration and without that we would have had no business at all.

So I think the analogy, whilst not perfect, does hold water quite well. The issue is trying to determine whose rights are most important and even Eric Pickles, who says some pretty daft things, believes that the rights of gays trumps that of any religious belief.

Mater mari said...

And another was our bishop, Malcolm McMahon of Nottingham. Deo gratias.

Chrysostom said...

By the time I look at this good feature there are ten comments, four of them by "New Friend". He, or she, uses some 62 lines.
He, or she, cannot punctuate and perpetrates the solecism: "it's approach reflects".

To recycle one of the world's oldest jokes, first used by Suetonius of Nero, what a pity "New Friend's" father did not confine himself to a "gay marriage"!