Quebec City, Canada, Jan 23, 2005 / 22:00 pm
Canada’s top cleric is calling for a “genuine debate” on the federal government’s proposed same-sex marriage legislation and warns that such a law “threatens to unleash nothing less than a cultural upheaval whose negative consequences are still impossible to predict.
“As a Canadian citizen and as the Primate of Canada, I feel it is my duty to express my concern and disagreement and that of a great number of Canadians, who have asked me to step forward to give public voice to their opinion about the meaning and the consequences of this proposed change,” said Marc Cardinal Ouellet in an open letter, issued Jan. 22.
Prime Minister Paul Martin’s Liberal government is expected to table a bill on same-sex marriage in February.
In its Dec. 9 opinion, the Supreme Court of Canada stated that same-sex marriage would be in line with the Constitution.