Part of Civil Partnership Bill [Lords] – in a Public Bill Committee am 2:45 pm ar 21 Hydref 2004.
The point is that I do not think that this provision is secular; it is anti-religious. That is my problem with it. It means that, for example, someone cannot use poems by Gerard Manley Hopkins, many of which are about love, because they have God in them. Much of the poetry about love in this country, and many of the readings that people might want to use at such a ceremony, have references to God. Many registrars will refuse point blank to allow people to have such readings. It seems bizarre in the extreme that the law presently forbids people to have 1 Corinthians XIII, probably the best-known part of the Bible for many people in the country, read at a civil marriage, and it seems curious, too, that it could not be read at a civil partnership ceremony.