A gay clergyman who was disciplined for violating Church of England teaching on marriage lost his case at the Court of Appeal in mid-March.
Canon Jeremy Pemberton entered into a same-sex marriage in 2014, despite CofE rules not allowing clergy to do so. The Court said the Church had applied ‘its sincerely -held beliefs in a way expressly permitted’ by the Equality Act.
Licence revoked
The long-running legal case began after Canon Pemberton had his licence as a priest officially revoked. The clergyman mounted an employment discrimination case, giving evidence in 2015 that ‘no one has the right to tell you who you can or can’t marry’. But the tribunal rejected his legal arguments, and in 2016 an Employment Appeals Tribunal agreed.
