I would like to point out that this is not party political and I’m comparing my position to that of the Lib Dems within the government coalition and not with respect to any policy.

It seems the coalition are committed to allowing gay couples to officially get married. While civil partnerships are recognised in this country they don’t have the status of a married couple. This is considered by many to be unfair. After all, if we are not allowed to discriminate on the basis of sexual preference in the larger arena of public life then why should gay couples be treated any differently than heterosexual couples? This makes a good deal of sense and people of all persuasions can only presume that any resistance to gay marriage can only be a homophobic reaction born of ignorance or religious dogma.

The fact that the church is the main voice of opposition only strengthens this opinion with the danger that the established church is seen as increasingly out of touch with society and irrelevant. However much sense Dr Carey makes and however persuasive his arguments, his dog collar will speak louder than his rhetoric. Anticipating the media circus that will be the public face of this stand off I fear the church will not come out of this very well in victory or defeat.

When the Coalition for Marriage was presented to me I signed the petition immediately and posted my action of facebook. I am of the opinion that marriage is the union of a man and a woman – till death do they part – and that the union of two gay people, no matter how legitimate it might be in itself, is not a marriage. I’m not homophobic or against civil partnerships but let us call a spade a spade. A gay couple is two people of the same sex who cannot procreate or even have sex in the way a man and a woman can. If they adopted children of different sexes only one child would have a parent of the same sex.

I have deeper theological reasons that would take too long to go into (not the abomination thing), but the simple truth is that gay people cannot be married in the way that a man and a woman can. If gay marriage were recognised as such we would then have to discriminate between a traditional married couple and a new, gay couple. To even imply that gay marriage was not the norm would be to negatively discriminate and possibly land oneself in legal hot water. Life is complicated enough.

Getting back to the Coalition for Marriage. They asked the married folk to send pictures of their weddings as a symbol of our celebration of marriage but this raised some serious questions in my mind. Being separated I’m not really in the mood for celebration and with the divorce rate being what it is I wonder how positive a message this will be to the nation. Would it be like presenting Westminster as a symbol of honesty or the City of London as a symbol of generosity?

I’ve been campaigning against the privatisation of the NHS and I would be happy to stand up and be counted as a supporter of our national institution. No one can accuse me of having any hidden agenda or vested interest (apart from the obvious one). I wouldn’t feel like I was forcing my beliefs on anyone and I wouldn’t lose any sleep over being accused of bias against private enterprise. However I can’t help feeling that with the Coalition for Marriage I’m defending myself and with the niggling doubt about my own insecurity. And how do I hold marriage up as a high ideal when I’m in the middle of a car crash?