jz slams same-sex union

By Mhlaba Memela (Sowetan)

September 26, 2006: ANC deputy president Jacob Zuma has condemned come out against same-sex marriages, saying they are ungodly and against African tradition.

“Same-sex marriage is a disgrace to the nation and to God,” Zuma told thousands of people including amabutho [warriors] who attended Heritage Day celebration at Kwadukuza on the KwaZulu-Natal north coast on Sunday.

Zuma said he was speaking in of gay marriages his personal capacity and “as a man”.

“When I was growing up unqingili [homosexuals] could not stand in front of me,” he said.

Zuma’s comments come as parliament prepares to hold public hearings on a bill that would place same-sex partnerships on an equal footing with heterosexual marriages. If the bill is passed, South Africa will become the first country in Africa to sanction same-sex marriages or unions.

Last year, the constitutional court recognised the marriage of two Pretoria women and gave parliament a year in which to extend the marital rights enjoyed by heterosexual couples to same-sex couples.

The ruling was welcomed by gays and lesbians but rejected by most churches.

If the bill is passed, South Africa will become the first country in Africa to do so.

Meanwhile media reports revealed over the weekend that Archbishop Desmond Tutu, in the first authorized biography of the Nobel peace laureate, said he was ashamed of his Anglican church's conservative position that rejected gay priests.

In the book, Rabble-Rouser for Peace, by his former press secretary John Allen, Tutu said he was deeply saddened at the furor caused by the appointment of openly gay V. Gene Robinson as bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.

In the book Tutu is also critical of the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams for bowing to conservative elements on the gay priest issue, particularly African bishops, in the 77 million-member Anglican Communion, which includes Episcopalians in the United States.

In a 1998 letter to Williams' predecessor, Archbishop George Carey, Tutu wrote that he was "ashamed to be Anglican."

The letter came after the Lambeth Conference of Bishops rejected the ordination of practicing homosexuals, saying their sexual relations were "incompatible with scripture."