Former British prime minister Tony Blair, who converted to Roman Catholicism after leaving office, has said he disagrees with Pope Benedict XVI’s attitude on homosexuality and that the Catholic Church is out of step with ordinary believers.

Mr Blair made his comments in an interview published on April 8 in Attitude, which describes itself as Britain’s “best selling gay magazine”.

He was asked if he agreed with statements made by Pope Benedict while still a Vatican cardinal that homosexuality is “intrinsically disordered” and that its physical expression leads towards “an intrinsic moral evil”.

Mr Blair replied that he believes ordinary Catholics do not feel the same way about homosexuality but that church leaders fear the consequences of making doctrinal concessions.

“There is a huge generational difference here. There’s probably that same fear among religious leaders that if you concede ground [on homosexuality], because attitudes and thinking evolve over time, where does that end? You’d start having to rethink many things. If you went and asked the congregation, I think you’d find that their faith is not to be found in those types of entrenched attitudes.”

The former British prime minister urged religious figures to interpret biblical texts that appear to condemn homosexuality as being metaphorical rather than literal.

“When people quote passages in Leviticus [a book of the Old Testament]

condemning homosexuality, I say to them if you read the whole of the Old Testament and took everything that was there in a literal way, as being what God and religion is about, you’d have some pretty tough policies across the whole of the piece,” said Mr Blair.

“What people often forget about, for example, Jesus, or indeed, the Prophet Muhammad; is that their whole raison d’etre was to change the way that people thought traditionally,” said the former prime minister who since leaving office has set up the Tony Blair Faith Foundation.

While prime minister Blair supported equality legislation in Britain including the introduction of civil partnerships and the lowering of the age of consent for homosexuals to the same as that for heterosexuals.

Martin Revis, ENI

April 9, 2009

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