It doesn't compromise "...compromise religious liberty" it does however compromise religious bigotry. I challenge one conservative Biblicalist to show me where Christ condemns homosexuals. I challenge one conservative Biblicalist to show me where Christ taught intolerance and non-acceptance of homosexuals. Christ teaches us to love each other, no matter our differences, not to try and force some of our number below the level of equality that He displayed and taught. A disciple of Christ understands this and will not bend in their acceptance of Christ's teaching; love, acceptance and equality, without condition. I applaud these SoR's and I applaud the Christians that support them, especially the Evangelical ones, such as Faithworks. It is about time that we stopped living our faith as a vindictive dogma and started living it as Christ teaches us. I see a lot of hypocrisy from the Catholic church, but not a lot of Christ's love.

Jennifer Hynes, Plymouth, UK

In America, and I'll bet it is true in England and much of the world, religious conservatives have been on the losing side of almost all social progress issues. In America, this includes Slavery, Marriage for Blacks, women voting, allowing inter-racial marriage, and ending the virtual slavery of Blacks that persisted as law in much of our south for 100 years after our civil war

Slavery is a crime against humanity, which England abolished decades before America. So is disdain for Gay people buried in our culture but caused by conservative religion. It is finally coming to an end here. What is actually happening is that conservative religions are being abandoned. Religious conservatives put themselves in this position. They claim infallibility, so they can't change or the whole house of lies they built comes tumbling down. Instead, conservative churches are empty. Conservatives built this box. They deserve to rot in it. We'll take our gay friends any day.

Steve , Severna Park, MD, USA

I don't see the Supreme Governor of the Church of England having any issue with this. All I see is pompous Bishops claiming their rights are being violated.
Was it not the very same Bishops and Cardinals of old who claimed that the abolition of slavery would infringe on their religious freedom?
I believe it was.

Chris Kalan, Oxford, UK

If adoption agencies are taking money from the government, our money, tax payers money, then there should be no way that these religious 'objectors' should block the Equality Act. In an equal society we should all have equal access to goods and services.

Gareth Evans, Isleworth, Middlesex

Of course legislation protecting homosexuals from discrimination should trump the rights of the religous to deny equality and services. Imagine if some relgious people believed that those with a disability were immoral and that they could refuse services. Gay people have a lot to lose, if an exemption is given to the religous then they will lose education, welfare and employment services. If an exemption is not given then the religious will only lose the right to refuse servies. It is clear who would be the most disadvantaged. The law already restricts religious rights to act with conscience. No matter how strong the religious conviction you cannot marry polygamously and you do not have the right to stone to death anyone. The sheer possible breadth of religious belief mean that all equality would be compromised if religious belief was treated equally. There are clearly some religious people who believe that women are inferior, that disabilities are punishment from god, etc.

David Reid, London, UK

I'm totally amazed here by catholics who align themselves as some kind of maligned group that can justify their prejudice of gay people by hiding behind the Bible. If the Catholic church had their way, many laws in the UK would now be different, but they do they ever kick up such a fuss on issues of divorce or abortion? Of course not.

Gay people have become their favourite group to malign whenever they get the opportunity. I would suggest that some of them do their research and use some common sense before saying homosexuality and paedophilia are alike. They are two completely different things; homosexuality is a consensual sexual orientation between two adults, paedophilia on the other hand is a perversion based on violence against vulnerable minors.

I also suggest that some of the people here look at what the Bible says with regards to love and acceptance of others and not justify what the Bible says on homosexuality as a justification of their real prejudice, homophobia.

Ian, Alicante, Spain

SOR :11c) It is unlawful for a person to induce or attempt to induce another to discriminate unlawfully.

This completely removes the platform for an inclusive legitimate debate in relation to issues of sexual orientation. For an example, coming to all schools soon:
A parent governor at a school cannot represent the concerns of other parents regarding new sexual orientation educational materials when some of the legitimate views expressed might be surely 'attempting to induce the governing body to disciminate unlawfully'. Why is the parent goveror being criminalised for trying to represent the valid concerns of other parents - as is demanded from his role on the governing body?? The governing body are simply trying to execute a fair, inclusive debate, but many valid concerns and opinions brought to the table have been unnecessarily criminalised and gagged by this phrase in the act.
Debate leads to votes, votes lead to law. This is democracy! You can't suppress legitimate debate.

M Birtwistle, Coventry, West Midlands

There must be no 'trump cards' anywhere in EQUALITY legislation. That is the whole point behind equality law!

M Birtwistle, Coventry, West Midlands

I think is outrageous that people can be so narrow minded to believe that homosexuality is synonymous with paedophilia. Are we not all equal before God and the law.

C, London, UK

It is ironic that this is deemed 'progress'. The sor bill is simultaneously undermining the human rights it claims to be fighting for, what progress is this other than the imposition of a national orthodoxy which seeks to undermine the religious beliefs (which are upheld by the ECHR by the way) of those who have the right to believe what they want. Homosexuals are not being denied the right to adopt, it's just that they cannot adopt from Cath agencies, the same applies for other aspects of the bill. On the other hand there are Hotels and B&B's that are exclusively homosexual, these are not being changed to accomodate heterosexuals at all, double standards me thinks. This is just the kind of liberal nonsense which permeates our nation, blindly fighting for whatever is trendy at the moment. The homosexual lobby are quite happy to undermine aspects of the ECHR and actually cause reverse discrimination whilst all the time reminding us that they have been so very much discriminated against.

Mark D, Bromley, England

Mr. Collins, No one is depriving "the church" (sic) the right to free speech to promulgate their opinions concerning sam sex relations. What the legislation would do is force "the church" to treat persons with a same sex orientation EQUALLY. Equal treatment under the law. If "the church" takes public monies, then the source of those funds has every duty to impose restrictions on unequal treatment.

J Hagan, London, UK

I'm a Christian who believes that gays should have complete equal rights. I really don't understand how Christians could think that giving gay people equal rights is an attack on their religion. You'd think we'd learn from the past. If you read just a little ways back in history the Christian church warned heavily against giving women equal rights, saying it was directly violating the bible. Also, do you think that certain religious agencies should decline rights to people of a certain race if that is their belief? Mormons believe blacks are inferior. Should they be able to discriminate? Are we denying them their religious rights? If everyone were allowed to do whatever they wanted for religious reasons then democracy would be dead. Basically you'd be saying terrorism is completely justified. I believe discrimination which kills the soul is just as dangerous as murder which kills the body. As a Christian, I strongly believe in a doctrine of love and equality.

Heather, New York, New York

As Catholics we are being directly discriminated against by this piece of legislation.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor is not trying to prevent gay couples from adopting children absolutely, just that this legislation should not encroach on the teaching of Jesus Christ and the Church. Why can't gay couples adopt from state adoption agencies and leave Christianity alone? We would never dream of telling you how to live your life and who to live it with, all we ask as Catholics is that you respect our religion and do not discriminate against us.

Please do not get me wrong, i believe that everyone is entitled to live their lives the way they want but NEVER to directly discriminate against another group... this is exactly what is happing.

If there had been public consultation regarding this issue do you think this legislation would have gotton so far?

This is supposed to be a Christian country with the Queen as the head of the Church and protector of the Faith?

Gemma, Manchester, Lancashire

Religious freedom - an oxymoron, surely?

Iles Tunereine, Nice, France

The church has every right to say that sexual conduct outside of marriage is wrong. These regulations aim to remove that right.

Denis Collins, london, England

Considering that nobody is 'born' a Christian but is a poor choice imposed to children by parents and society based on history, ignorance and hate - my question is - where are the human rights of the children of not being indoctrinated into sectarian, delusional and ancient life styles we now call religions that don't correspond and follow today's life style, two thousand years later?

Ferdie Roberts, London,

The Bishop of Winchester speaks of the rights of gay people in opposition to the rights of Christians. What does he have to say to gay and lesbian people who are also Christians? Has he listened to any of their views, we see no opposition.

Barry Naylor, Leicester,

Can those who support these gay right rules not understand the bigger picture? Freedom of religious conscience is the the defining value of a liberal society and legislation such as this goes down the road of abolishing it. Same sex couples are not hurt by Christians choosing not to place children with them. Gay would-be adoptive parents would always be able to choose a different adoption agency. The Catholic agencies however, are denied their rights to act according to their beliefs. This chilling intolerance is where the true bigotry lies.

Emma Thomson, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

This Law will mean that I cannot say flatly that I believe that homosex is wrong without a risk of being taken to court, fined, and imprisoned.

The European legal framework, and the reasoning behind this particular piece of legislation, means that this will soon become true of saying flatly that an orientation towards child-sex is wrong.

This is what is at stake.

David, Bristol, England

It's bizarre to hear Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor talking about freedom of conscience. The staff in the Catholic adoption agencies are not given the choice whether to serve gay couples - they have to do as they're told.

The Cardinal obviously thinks "freedom of conscience" means doing what he tells you to do.

Chris, Dorking, UK

I have heard a lot of nonsense in my time from people with religion especially when they hide their bigotry with it. If I did believe in god I would thank him for the law that protects gay people and gives us equality after all religion has 'trampled' on all of us since its inception. My advice is to swallow your bitterness, get over it and let us all live in peace.

David Holgate, London, UK

Human rights must always - always - trump religious demands. And giving this protection to gay people is defending their human rights. The "Christian consicence" that the Catholic Church says is being traduced by these Regulations seems to amount to giving them carte blanche to behave as unjustly as they please.

This proves how necessary the Regulations are. Bring them on.

Terry Sanderson, London, UK

Considering that it was the Christian Church. by no means perfect. that gave this Country the Universities. Hospitals. Orphanages ect . and may we be forgiven the Labour Party the present Leader Tony Blair will be remembered as an Apostic and will one day with the rest of us lesser mortals be Judged by our Maker. but meantime perhaps if we Christians are to be persecuted for our beliefs it is time for another Mayflower to be built to take us to where we can live out our lives in peace praying for them who seem determined to destroy our country.

Ritchie Ross, Fraserburgh, Scotland

It now seems that gay power tramples religious freedom in Great Britain.

In the immortal words of Captain Louis Renault, Casablanca Prefect of Police, upon learning that there was gambling taking place in Rick's American Bar, "I am shocked!!!"

Bob Evans, Anaheim, California