One subject that's guaranteed to cause controversy amongst people of faith is sexual relationships and particularly homosexuality. Many Christians and Muslims take parts of the Bible and Quran as evidence that sex between two men or two women goes against God's law. Others take a more liberal reading of these texts, but for generations it's been a testy topic. For decades people have campaigned for gay rights. Before 1967, homosexuality was a crime.
Almost half a century later, Parliament passed a law to allow gay people to marry. However, the Church of England and Church of Wales are exempt from performing same-sex marriages. Even though the law recognises the rights of homosexuals, some religions still struggle to accept same-sex relationships. We've gathered 12 students together with different perspectives on the subject and sent three of them to find out more. I'm Imani, I'm 20 and I'm studying pharmacy.
This is my parents'shop. The shop is named after me. In Arabic, Imani means faith.
Islam was something that was instilled in me from a very young age, but it's also something that I feel within myself. In Islam it is wrong to be homosexual but I personally am not homophobic. I'm Stuart, I'm 19. I'm studying religious studies at Lancaster University. In the future I hope to train for the Catholic priesthood.
It will be a fantastic opportunity to serve people. As a priest I'll have to live a celibate life. It is a sacrifice but something that I'm prepared to do for the service of God. I'm 19 years old and I'm studying theology and religious studies at the University of Leeds.
I love making music and writing songs and doing gigs in my spare time. I describe myself as an agnostic but I do think there is some sort of spiritual thing, I'm just not really sure what that is. I would say that the rules and regulations of some religions is what makes them not very accessible to me. Imani, Harry and Stuart have come to London where the Metropolitan Community Church meets every Sunday. They hold services especially for people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, or LGBT for short.
They're here to take part in a religious service with a church. This is the first time I've been to a church. I don't really know what to expect but I think it'll be quite interesting.
Yeah, being part of the gay community, this is something that I've never actually been to before. As a Catholic, this is going to be something completely different to what I'm used to as well. Should we go inside? Yeah.
The denomination was set up in America about 40 years ago to provide a place of worship for anyone who feels excluded from their own churches. Good evening everybody and welcome to Metropolitan Community Church of North London. It's wonderful to see all your beautiful faces here tonight.
The Reverend Sharon Ferguson has led the congregation since 2008. My belief is that there is nothing in the Bible that says that it is wrong for two people of the same gender to love one another. In my heart of hearts, I believe that God made each and every one of us and we are all beloved children of God and that God is bigger than all of this and God is not hung up about sexuality. And in the same way as God made more than two types of tree, I believe God made more than two types of sexuality as well.
God is very creative. The church is a safe haven for some members of the congregation. Maria and Mabel had to flee Uganda because they were persecuted for being gay.
Here, oh God, when I cry aloud, be gracious to me... There, homosexuality is illegal and can mean life imprisonment. While I was in school, I was dating my girlfriend, the founder, so I was expelled and I was taken to prison.
I faced a lot of torture while I was in prison. And I managed to get out of there. My life in Uganda was typically finished. You cannot get a job anywhere. Even when you go to the clinics and you're lesbian, oh boy, you can't get treatment.
And if you're caught to be gay, you don't have a chance to be taken to police station. The normal people, the public, are going to deal with you. They'll either burn you with tires, or they're gonna put water on you, anything, the public, and use sticks.
By the time the police comes, you're dead. In Uganda, the aggressive homophobic even extended into the churches. When you go to churches and they're telling you, you're being gay, I mean you're trying to be a devil and your destiny is in hell.
I stopped going to church and then when I got here, somebody told me about the LGBT church. I thought it was a joke. They tell me, no matter who you are, God still loves you. This is what I'm trying to do is reconcile who I am with religion.
LGBT church has helped me. God wants you to be yourself and be yourself. in a Christ-like, loving, God-honouring way.
If you are gay, God asks you to be a gay person who is faithful and honest and trustworthy in your relationships and have relationships that reflect God's love. Not every church thinks the same, and some consider homosexuality a sin. The Catholic Church has teachings known as catechisms.
The catechism says that homosexuals should be treated with respect and respect. respect, compassion and dignity and all unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided and that gay, lesbian, transgender people are called to remain celibate. Do you think that's sort of a fair position to stand at?
Not the current Pope, but the Pope beforehand actually said that we were all morally disordered. How accepted and respected would you feel if you were told that you are disordered? That doesn't smack to me very much of acceptance. and love and respect.
The Catholic Church is saying, if you're not heterosexual, then you've got to be celibate. Human beings are not made to be celibate. And therefore to impose celibacy onto people against their will, again, I don't believe is a loving thing to do. In Islam, we believe that God created man and woman in order to procreate.
That's not possible if a man and a man are together or a woman and a woman are together. Do not think... I think that goes against the laws of nature.
My understanding is that God didn't actually create human beings to procreate. God created human beings to love. So I feel it's trying to force something on God that actually isn't there.
We are not meant to be tempted. So, is homosexuality just two people who love each other, or is it a sin against God? Harry, Stuart and Imani are back from the Metropolitan Community Church in London, and I'm immediately going to go to you, Stuart, because you felt quite uncomfortable in that service, didn't you? Yeah, it was something that is completely different to what I'm used to being a Catholic, what was being said.
was what suited, not what should be heard or what God wants, but what the people there wanted to hear. And Harry, is it good that there's a special congregation for gay and lesbian people? It seemed to provide them with some form of safe haven, really, where they could practice their faith in a situation where they were comfortable with it. So I think, yeah, it is a good thing for them.
We saw two Ugandan lesbians fleeing from their country because of the persecution of their sexuality. What did you think of that? I thought that... The fact that they were being persecuted in this day and age is quite barbaric because I think it's a personal choice that you make.
I mean, I personally don't believe that it's right to be that way and find to be gay or lesbian, transgender or bisexual. So it's OK to be gay, but you can't... Islam accepts that people can be gay, but...
Only if you act upon those desires and that feeling, does it become a sin? I think if a person is attracted to someone of the same sex, that is a test from God for that person. You know, they're getting rewarded for that. holding back their desire because they love God. Very much similar to what Imani said, the church doesn't teach that homosexuality in itself is wrong, it's acting upon the homosexual desires that are wrong.
Rachel, do you believe homosexuality is a sin? No, I don't think I do. I think they should be able to love who they want to love.
Homosexuality is wrong and it is a sin. It is according to the Bible. I mean that's what Saint Paul teaches us.
in his epistles, but just saying that homosexuality is wrong doesn't mean that I should discriminate or segregate people who are practicing homosexuality. I sin. I just sin in other ways.
The book of Leviticus in the Old Testament that prohibits homosexuality, by the way it says it's an abomination and should be punished by stoning to death, also says that eating shellfish is an abomination and should be punished in the same way. I just want to... I ask this question, would God or Allah create people who were gay if he didn't think that was the right way to live?
I don't think God creates anyone homosexual or not. I think it's kind of a build-up of environmental factors or the way they were brought up. People have all manners of kind of sexual provisions.
They can either act on that or not. I don't believe that it is a choice. I believe that you're born that's the way you're born.
And I completely understand that quite a lot of you won't mean to cause upset, but to hear words like perversion mixed in with that is something that is so dangerous on vulnerable young people. Quite a lot of religions preach love and peace. To me, that's just another contradiction. Has anyone here, in their own experience and personal experience, being around gays and lesbians changed their own personal moral views? Before starting college, I didn't have a lot of...
I didn't really interact with people who were gay. But once I started college, you know, there are quite a few people who are gay. And, you know, just talking with them, they're just normal human beings.
You treat them with respect, you treat them with dignity as you would any other human being. my main thought about it is that it's too big an issue. I think we've escalated it into something huge that it doesn't need to be.
I think it's like it comes in the same category as things like sex before marriage and sexual immorality just in general. I don't think homosexuality should be isolated. Thank you all for your comments.
So if God loves everyone, why do religions seem so anti-gay sometimes? Should they change? What's your view?