Madam, - The Irish Catholic bishops have denied that the timing of their renewed opposition to gay marriage had anything to do with the Gay Pride Festival (The Irish Times, June 17th). Their spokesman insisted that the bishops' statement was based on bishops' meeting last week and implied that its timing was coincidental.
Are we expected to believe the bishops were unaware that gay people also have their annual "June meeting" when they celebrate gay pride, and that the bishops' offensive statement would drop right in the middle of it?
They insist on telling the Irish people, gay and straight, in this of all weeks, that "Christian tradition holds that sexual differentiation is intrinsic to our understanding of the sacrament of marriage". Whose understanding might the bishops be referring to? Certainly not gay people's.
Or do the bishops imply that gay people who marry might not also be Christian? Just because a prejudice has survived thousands of years does not make it valid. No church or minister makes the sacrament of marriage, but rather the two people making a commitment of love to each other. Sexual differentiation has nothing to do with love, but rather with making babies, and many married couples do not make babies. They are married nevertheless.
The Irish bishops should keep their hands off marriage and what it takes to make one. They, after all, do not play the game. They are not qualified to make the rules. - Yours, etc,
DECLAN KELLY, Davis Court, Christchurch, Dublin 8.