'Gays can have their sexuality changed'

Nov 7 2003 David Holmes Chester Chronicle

As the Anglican Church reached crisis point with the ordination of the openly gay Gene Robinson in America, chief reporter DAVID HOLMES talked to the Bishop of Chester, the Rt Rev Dr Peter Forster, about his traditional and controversial views.

'SOME people who are primarily homosexual can reorientate themselves. I would encourage them to consider that as an option, but I would not set myself up as a medical specialist on the subject - that's in the area of psychiatric health.

'We want to help them but I don't offer it as a panacea. I am about giving honour to marriage.'

These words of the Bishop of Chester, the Rt Rev Dr Peter Forster, are certain to add fuel to the fiery debate which is raging within the Anglican Church regarding sexuality.

Bishop Forster was speaking exclusively to The Chronicle as the Church of England unveiled a report, Some Issues In Human Sexuality - A Guide to the Debate, produced by a working party of the House of Bishops, on which he sits.

The report is timely, given the debate raging in the worldwide Anglican Church following the controversial ordination of Gene Robinson, who is openly gay, as bishop of New Hampshire.

Bishop Forster, who is chairman of governors at University College Chester, is opposed to his ordination. His view is that the Church should promote the institution of marriage as the ideal building block in society - but he stresses the need for 'maximum tolerance' of people who choose not to conform to matrimony.

Talking in the study of his Chester home, he began by setting the context of the debate about human sexuality.

He said: 'Whichever way you look at contemporary society, changing patterns of family life and sexual activity are a feature of the scene, which raises all sorts of interest and views, and there are problems.

'There is a real debate over whether marriage should retain its special place in society, how it should be defended and whether there should be financial advantages in being married. In the middle of them are moral questions about what is right behaviour in the area of our sexuality.'

Bishop Forster, who says offering moral guidance was 'not a popularity contest', explained that the Church was at a crossroads in its thinking. >>>

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