83% Christians oppose Conservative proposal to legalize same-sex marriages
And of that 83%, three-quarters were ‘strongly opposed’.
British Religion in Numbers have all the details.
Overall the Conservative Party risks losing 57% of Christian votes, if they go ahead with legalizing gay marriage, and not one respondent claimed this move would predispose them to vote Conservative.
Here are some of the concerns raised:
85% were concerned that the value of marriage would be further undermined
78% that it would be harder to argue against ‘other novel types of relationship’ such as polygamy
88% that schools would be required to teach the equal validity of same-sex and heterosexual relationships
93% that clergy would have to conduct gay marriages against their consciences
Tags: Christianity, Law Moral Ethical, Politics
November 6th, 2011 at 4:54 pm
Stuart, I don’t think that’s what the survey actually says.
According to the BRIN report, the survey was actually limited to a “ComRes CPanel of UK churchgoing Christians.
So something less than 5% of the UK population then… (And at only 500 or so respondents the sample is only a tiny %age of that already small cohort)
Given the way the web works, before long this erroneous perception will be re-quoted out of context and become a ‘fact’. I just wanted to nip this in the bud, so to speak.
November 6th, 2011 at 9:59 pm
The new leader of the Scottish conservatives s a lesbian. I think that’s the first openly gay leader of one of the big three parties.
November 7th, 2011 at 8:37 am
Quite correct Stuart. Furthermore I have several friends who describe themselves as atheist or agnostic, and one who is gay, none of them ageree with ‘gay marriage’ but are OK with civil partnerships.
November 7th, 2011 at 9:45 am
@Gordon,
The Scottish Conservatives playing token gender politics, if Thatcher made them unelectable for thirty years, Cameron will make them unelectablef for a hundred years.
Token politics – politics without principles the precursor of dictatorship.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:50 pm
The thing is, if this group of Christians do not like the Conservative Party, who are they going to vote for instead? Not sure Labour or Liberal Democrats will be more to their liking. Maybe what we will begin to see is socially conservative Christians paying more attention to who the candidates are in each constituency rather than voting on a party basis.
November 7th, 2011 at 1:55 pm
The thing is, if this group of Christians do not like the Conservative Party, who are they going to vote for instead?
I quite agree and that sentiment is being expressed over on Cranmer’s blog right now.
November 7th, 2011 at 3:55 pm
A lot of fundamentalists already vote UKIP. A small number vote BNP (being the only party opposed to abortion).