Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair has a message for the pope – time to ditch the church’s official homophobia!
“We need an attitude of mind where rethinking and the concept of evolving attitudes becomes part of the discipline with which you approach your religious faith,” Blair told Attitude magazine, a publication targeted at gay people.
During Blair’s premiership, Britain enacted legislation introducing civil partnerships, giving gay and lesbian couples legal recognition of their relationships, allowing them the same rights in areas like work, pensions and inheritance as heterosexual couples.
Asked about the pope’s comments on homosexuality — he has in the past suggested that it is as much of a threat to the survival of humanity as climate change — Blair replied that “there is a huge generational difference here.”
“And there’s probably that same fear amongst religious leaders that if you concede ground on an issue like this, because attitudes and thinking evolve over time, where does that end?
“You’d start having to rethink many, many things.”
Blair recently became a Catholic. Hopefully he can have some positive influence in the church!
Founder of Motley Mystic and the Jubilee! Circle interfaith spiritual community In Columbia, S.C., Candace Chellew (she/her) is the author of Bulletproof Faith: A Spiritual Survival Guide for Gay and Lesbian Christians (Jossey-Bass, 2008). Founder and Editor Emeritus of Whosoever, she earned her masters of theological studies at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, was ordained by Gentle Spirit Christian Church in December 2003, and trained as a spiritual director through the Omega Point program of the Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta. She is also a musician and animal lover.