Ireland: Anglican minister's civil partnership 'welcomed'

5 September 2011
BBC


A senior Church of Ireland minister has said his same-sex civil partnership, the first for an Anglican clergyman in Ireland, has been "warmly welcomed" by his congregation in County Carlow.

The Very Reverend Tom Gordon is originally from Portadown and is now Dean of Leighlin Cathedral.

He told the BBC that he and his partner of 20 years held the ceremony in a registry office in July.

He described it as a legal instrument and not equivalent to marriage.

The Anglican church in England, where several ministers have entered civil partnerships, requires those within them to remain celibate. the rest