The Archbishops of Canterbury and York have intervened in a growing public row over gay adoption after they warned Prime Minister Tony Blair not to bring in legislation that may make religious people feel unable to undertake public service if it goes against their consciences.
In a letter to Mr Blair, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, and the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, said: "Many in the voluntary sector are dedicated to public service because of the dictates of their conscience."In legislating to protect and promote the rights of particular groups the government is faced with the delicate but important challenge of not thereby creating the conditions within which others feel their rights to have been ignored or sacrificed, or in which the dictates of personal conscience are put at risk.
"The rights of conscience cannot be made subject to legislation, however well meaning."
The archbishops continued: "It is vitally important that the interests of vulnerable children are not relegated to suit any political interest.
"And that conditions are not inadvertently created which make the claims of conscience an obstacle to, rather than the inspiration for, the invaluable public service rendered by parts of the voluntary sector."
Meanwhile, the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, said in a letter to Mr Blair this week that he would have a "serious difficulty" with the Sexual Orientation Regulations if they required the Catholic Church's adoption agencies to consider homosexual couples as potential adoptive parents.
The Cardinal said it would be "unreasonable, unnecessary and unjust discrimination against Catholics" if the Government forced Catholic adoption agencies to place children with gay couples.
Mr Blair and communities minister Ruth Kelly, a devout Catholic, are believed to support an opt-out for faith-based adoption agencies which would make it possible for them to refer gay couples to other adoption agencies with a pro-gay adoption policy.
