UK Catholics and Anglicans oppose anti-discrimination law on gay adoption

[kwassa]

I like Rowan Williams less every day.

http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2007-01-24T134142Z_01_L24184849_RTRUKOC_0_UK-BRITAIN-CATHOLICS-ADOPTION.xml

LONDON (Reuters) - Anglican and Catholic Church leaders joined forces on Wednesday in a battle to be excused from new anti-discrimination laws they say would force Catholic adoption agencies to place children with gay couples.

In what is becoming a fierce battle between Church and state, the leader of the world's 77 million Anglicans, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, backed the country's leading Catholic cardinal in urging Prime Minister Tony Blair to exempt Catholic adoption agencies from the new law.

In a joint letter with the Archbishop of York John Sentamu, Williams told Blair: "The rights of conscience cannot be made subject to legislation, however well-meaning."


The letter piles pressure on Blair, who commentators say is leaning towards the Church's view, but who would face a fierce backlash from within his party if he allowed an exemption.

Williams's intervention came just hours after Blair was sent a strongly worded letter by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, saying Catholic adoption agencies would face "serious difficulty" adhering to the law and may be forced to close.

"We believe it would be unreasonable, unnecessary and unjust discrimination against Catholics for the government to insist ... Catholic adoption agencies must act against the teaching of the Church and their own consciences," he wrote

(more in the article)