Senator Rónán Mullen has warned that Ireland’s same-sex marriage legislation may “exclude religious bodies from a role in civil marriage unless they change their current form of ceremony”.
During a debate on the Marriage Bill 2015, Seanator Mullen expressed grave concerns over apparent problems with the proposed legislation in terms of “the right of religious bodies and solemnisers to celebrate marriage according to the traditions and beliefs of those bodies and to continue in their civil role as solemnisers of marriages that take place in the context of church weddings”.
“I believe the legislation…put before us is very flawed and poorly drafted,” he said. “I am surprised to discover that the office of an tArd-Chláraitheoir might have discretion and even be obliged to exclude religious bodies from a role in civil marriage unless they change their current form of ceremony.”
Senator Mullen asserted that the Bill “sets up the possibility that religious solemnisers may be refused registration unless a new form of ceremony that contemplates same-sex unions is submitted by them. Alternatively, it is even possible that marriages people think are valid might later be invalidated if the form of ceremony used by the religious body is at some future point deemed to have been inconsistent with the requirements of the legislation.”
Pointing to a contradiction between State requirements on marriages under the Bill and the forms of marriage ceremonies offered by church communities, Senator Mullen said that on the one hand, the Bill “requires that in all approved forms of marriage ceremony, there be a declaration to the effect that each party ‘accepts the other as a husband, a wife or a spouse as the case may be’.The term ‘spouse’ is used instead of the terms ‘husband’ and ‘wife’ elsewhere in other sections of the Bill but in the crucial section changing the marriage declaration, the acceptance of a spouse is presented as an alternative situation to that of accepting a husband or wife.” On the other hand, meanwhile, the Bill purports to provide…that a religious solemniser may only use a form approved by his or her religious body. The Bill immediately undermines that protection by requiring that the form to be used by the religious body include and be in no way inconsistent with the new declaration described above. In other words, the Minister is creating a situation where the State will say ‘you may only use your own form of ceremony but your own form of ceremony may fail to meet the requirements of the State’.”
However, Minister for Justice and Equality, Frances Fitzgerald dismissed his concerns.
“The points made by Senator Rónán Mullen are incorrect,” she said. “Religious solemnisers have only ever been permitted to solemnise in accordance with their own ceremonies. What we are doing will not require any change to any form of ceremony currently approved. He is incorrect in his interpretation of the legislation as it is presented.”
