Catholics still obsessed with sex
MAXWELL Laurie’s attack on the Charity Commission, whose successful opposition to the adoption agency Catholic Care’s refusal to recognise same-sex couples as potential adopters, once more betrays the Catholic Church’s obsession with sex (Yorkshire Post, November 8).
Despite the tenuous etymological argument that the word “couple” means sexual union, I’m sure most of us would never immediately associate it with copulation. Nor is it true that homosexuality precludes sexual union: clearly it doesn’t and this still bothers some people.
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Hide AdBut this is to miss the point. Parenting has nothing to do with sex.
It is deeply insulting to Sir Elton John and his partner to question their ability to help an adopted daughter in dealing with menstruation, pregnancy and childbirth.
You might as well say that a father, no matter how sensitive, should stand aside and leave it all to his wife.
And is a caring mum incapable of understanding the dramatic effects of puberty on her teenage son?
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Hide AdAnd where do these attitudes leave the widower or abandoned husband, left to bring up a daughter?
Ladies’ excuse-me?
From: John Wilson, Horsforth, Leeds.
THIS problem of the expense of childcare is really interesting. Many years ago, when I was a lad, ladies would stay home to look after their children.
But now several decades on we see that the onward march of equality and liberation have led us on to a great new world of freedom for the fairer sex in which women instead stay home to look after other people’s children.
The only problem is the constant complaints that looking after other people’s children doesn’t make enough money to enable the ladies concerned to pay to have their own children looked after by somebody else.
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Hide AdAnd of course conversely the other lady complains that she isn’t making enough out of it from the first to be able to afford someone to look after hers either.
Maybe the answer is to make another great leap forward in liberation and equality by empowering women to make the choice to stay home and look after their own children.
Or even, perish the thought, get the men to do it.
Razors – or rashes?
From: John H Langley, Rosewood Close, Bridlington.
I WAS fascinated to read Ian McMillan’s article (Yorkshire Post, November 6) on the subject of shaving and razors.
His story really caught my attention. As a gents hairdresser in Leeds in the mid to late 1950s, wet shaves, particularly at weekends, were very popular.
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Hide AdI initially worked in Kirkstall Road, where this service continued well into the evening on a Friday and Saturday to eventually moving to a city centre salon (off Boar Lane) and providing this service on a daily basis with, of course, hot towels and a cut-throat razor.
A far superior finish to an electric razor. I didn’t quite understand the appearance of the raw red ring around Ian’s neck.
My advice to you Ian would be, get rid of your bathroom Lambretta and contemplate whilst you enjoy a wet shave after which, rinse your face with cold water and, after drying, apply Nivea cream as I have done for the past 60 years. Incidentally, the finish was known years ago as smooth as a babies’ bottom.
Clerical relevance
From: Peter Hyde, Kendale View, Driffield.
I FULLY agree with Gary Streeter (Yorkshire Post, November 9) on how the new Archbishop of Canterbury can become more relevant, but am afraid that it will never happen.
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Hide AdI am a Methodist who attends the Anglican Church, although I support both and am happy doing so, there are far too many who think that having archdeacons, bishops and vicars donning their finery somehow makes them special.
Palaces are a thing of the past and are a burden on the people who attend services each Sunday.
Churches are wonderful creations, but they are too costly to heat in winter and a hole into which we pour money.
The Church should be the people and our church has a wonderful, welcoming congregation who struggle to make ends meet.
From: John Gordon, Whitcliffe Lane, Ripon.
THE new Archbishop of Canterbury fits neatly into the Governing Class but one cannot help feeling that to unite Christians both here and abroad a candidate nearer home would have been preferable.