Cat Smith
Main Page: Cat Smith (Labour - Lancaster and Wyre) Equal Marriage: Church of England
Cat Smith Excerpts(1 year, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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Cat Smith (Lancaster and Fleetwood) (Lab)
I had not planned to speak in this urgent question. However, other contributions have spurred me to do so. I often do not participate in Church Commissioner-type questions because I am a member of the Methodist Church, and I would arrive at a slightly different conclusion, but it does strike me that, because we have an established Church in this country, it falls on all of us to take an interest in and to speak out on the issues of the Church. As a Christian, I know that God sent his own son to die on the cross for my sins and for the sins of all of us. That love is huge and incomprehensible. Love is such a beautiful thing and should be celebrated. Will the Second Church Estates Commissioner convey feelings that I would represent, which is that love should be celebrated in all its forms, and that our diversity in terms of human sexuality is not an accident—it is not a design fault by God—but something designed by God and therefore beautiful?
Andrew Selous
The Church of England recognises the huge privilege that it has in being the established Church and it does see it as its role to speak for all Christian denominations and, in a sense, to hold the ring for all faiths within this country, as the Queen said very movingly at Lambeth Palace in 2012. So what the hon. Lady says from the point of view of the Methodist Church is an important contribution and I absolutely hear that. If she has a moment, I commend to her the prayers of love and faith—I shall put a copy in the Library of the House. They are beautifully written, they celebrate love and I think she will find much to commend in them, but I have listened carefully to what she has said and I thank her for it.