Mags Gargan
Bishop says some comments “misquoted or quoted out of context”
Bishop Kevin Doran has issued a clarification following a radio interview on Monday which attracted controversy.
Bishop Doran said that some of his comments in an interview on Newstalk’s Breakfast with Chris Donoghue on Monday, had been “misquoted or quoted out of context in further media coverage”.
In the statement he accepted that “in the cut and thrust of a live interview” some of the words and examples he had used were not “chosen as carefully as in a prepared address”.
The bishop made two specific clarifications:
“1. In response to a question about whether God intended people to be gay, I commented that to say this would be like saying he intended them to have Down Syndrome. It was not a comment about people who have Down Syndrome or about people who are gay or a comparison between them. I simply don't believe that God micromanages the universe in such detail. I do believe that every person is willed by God and loved by God. I regret any hurt that may have been caused either by what I actually said or by how it was presented by others.
“2. I referred in the interview to the way in which the Children and Family Relationships Bill sets out to broaden the legal definition of parents (and systematically removes the words "mother" and "father" from previous legislation. In that context I commented that people who have children are not necessarily parents. In some reports, the crucial phrase "not necessarily" was dropped. This, of course changed the meaning of what I was saying.”
