A CHURCH of Scotland evangelical group claims the Scottish Parliament "arrogantly elevated its own wisdom" above God's after MSPs passed stage one of the Bill to allow same-sex marriage.
The traditionalist grouping, Forward Together, said it deeply regrets the decision by the Scottish Parliament to approve, in principle, same-sex marriage in Scotland. On Wednesday, 98 MSPs saw the Marriage And Civil Partnerships (Scotland) Bill on course to become law in 2015.
The group, whose director is the Rev Norman Maciver, said: "In making this decision, the Scottish Parliament has taken to itself the right to redefine marriage, which is a gift from God to human society for the well being of men and women and for the upbringing of children.
"The Parliament has in effect said God is wrong, his gift is inadequate, and the divine pattern of gender complementarity, seen to be God's will in both Old and New Testaments, is a mistake. The Scottish Parliament has arrogantly elevated its own wisdom over that of the living God."
Forward Together said it is not convinced Holyrood can guarantee legal protection for those whose conscience will not permit them to support move.
The statement added: "Forward Together laments the haste with which the Scottish Parliament has pressed ahead. The implications are of such magnitude that a much longer period of reflection and careful thought was called for."
The Rev Scott Rennie of Queen's Cross Parish Church in Aberdeen, the Church's first openly gay minister, has asserted the Kirk is being overtaken by civic society as it struggles with the issue of homosexuality.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article