Always the Bridegroom, Never the Bride...

Gay marriage is 'wrong', but Civil Partnerships are just dandy

Well, well, well. Terrible earthquakes appear suddenly, out of the blue, while huge uprisings in the Middle East take the World's breath away with surprise, but Austen Ivereigh can always be relied upon to undermine the Infallible Teaching of the Catholic Church on sexual morality and to spread his error and falsehood in the mass media.

Thank you, John Smeaton, Director of the SPUC, for drawing our attention to Mr Ivereigh's latest endorsement of that which is condemned by the Magisterium. It makes me sick to my stomach that Austen is sought out as a spokesman on Catholic issues and that he is paid in order to do so. The least that he could do is actually defend the Catholic Church's position on sexual morality.  Writing for The Guardian, one could be forgiven for thinking that Austen is just going along with the housestyle of the publication, writing for a particular audience. Unfortunately, though, he isn't even doing that. What the Church believes, Austen does not.

While Damian Thompson has raised questions over whether the Bishops Conference of England and Wales really meant what it said when Archbishop Peter Smith released his condemnation of the moves to legalise gay "marriage" religious ceremonies in Churches, or whether the Bishops were leant on by Rome, John Smeaton has provided us with an exemplary analysis of Austen Ivereigh's latest outrageous misrepresentation of the Catholic Faith. Of course, it isn't really a misrepresentation of the Catholic Faith as such, when Austen is speaking 'from the Throne', ex cathedra, so to speak, the kind of liberal diahorrea to which we have all grown accustomed. He's quite consistent like that, you know. In a way, you always know where you stand with Austen because you can take the Catechism of the Catholic Church and just know he's going to say something that contradicts it totally.

Austen's latest offerings. Isn't he just so quotable? 

"Civil partnership is a fine thing, and should be extended. But the government's desire to create 'gay marriage' is quite wrong".

"There are many kinds of loving, committed relationships. And it's good that the state supports them. It would have been much better if the legal privileges of the Civil Partnership Act of 2004 were not restricted to same-sex couples, but were available – as in France and Italy – to maiden aunts, marriage-phobic men and women, the disabled and their lifelong carers. It is right that people who commit themselves – lovingly, sometimes even sexually – to each other, and express that in stability and commitment, to have inheritance and hospital-visiting rights, tax breaks and the like. But civil partnerships are not marriage."

The question Austen could address, but won't, and quite possibly never will, is this. Austen, why is so-called gay marriage "wrong" but Civil Partnerships in which people of the same sex commit themselves "lovingly, sometimes even sexually" to each other not wrong? Come on, Austen! What is wrong with him? It's like he only does foreplay with Catholic teaching. He just can't go 'all the way'. Ah well, who can blame him. I mean, if he actually communicated the Catholic Faith, he'd lose friends in the media, wouldn't he? He'd be unpopular with many. He'd be hated by many of those who read his articles or listen to his musings on the Faith in the media. The Tablet would distance themselves from him. He'd be persecuted by the liberal establishment for speaking out for the Truth. He'd be derided as a 'Taliban Catholic' or something else. Then, maybe, just maybe, he might be worthy of his presumably quite ample salary. Coveting the jobs of others is sinful, of course, but O my...What I would give to have Austen's job! You know, Austen, if I could reach the number of souls who read your stuff, I'd still do it for the what I get now as the book-keeper and secretary of St Mary Magdalen Church, Brighton...