- A bishop has threatened to not register marriages if same-sex marriage legalised
- Anglican bishop Gary Nelson said it was because they needed to protect religion
- The Western Australian bishop said it means he wouldn’t marry straight couples
- Comes after Immigration minister Peter Dutton said religious protection needed
A bishop has threatened to not register any marriages if same-sex marriage is legalised.
The Western Australian Anglican bishop said it all came down to protecting religion, and if it failed then he would not approve marriages, including straight couples.
The Bishop of North West Australia Gary Nelson said the Australian government didn’t handle the same-sex marriage postal vote sufficiently and more information should have been given to the public before survey forms were sent out, according to The West Australian.
Bishop of North West Australia Gary Nelson (pictured) has threatened to not register any marriages if same-sex marriage is legalised
The Western Australian Anglican bishop said it all came down to protecting religion, and if it failed then he would not approve marriages, including straight couples (stock image)
‘If we are in a situation where there isn’t enough religious exemptions regarding marrying same-sex people, then we’d have to pull out from being celebrants, so just withdraw all the approvals for everyone,’ Mr Nelson said.
The bishop said the legislation around same-sex marriage had to be made clearer so they could better understand if they had ‘a right to say no’ to the use of their buildings for same-sex weddings.
Immigration minister Peter Dutton said he wanted to protect religious freedom if same-sex marriage is legalised and that it was the Parliament’s responsibility he told 2GB Thursday.
‘There will be a bill before the parliament and my argument, and others have argued, is there should be adequate protections in there,’ Mr Dutton said.
Immigration minister Peter Dutton said he also wanted to protect religious freedom if same-sex marriage is legalised (stock image)
However, Liberal senator Eric Abetz said nobody knows what the religious protections should be or how far they should go, according to ABC News.
The Australia Bureau of Statistics (ABS) revealed about 10 million citizens had returned their same-sex marriage postal surveys earlier this week.
Australians still have until November 7 to submit their postal surveys.