ABSTRACT
This chapter explains the relationship between law and religion in respect of the regulation of homosexual sex. An historical account that traces the development of the relationship between English law, religion and homosexual sex from the thirteenth to the mid-twentieth century. The chapter provides the long and complex relationship between law and religion in order to contextualise and situate its analysis of the role of religion in homosexual law reform from the mid-twentieth century onwards. It analyses the UK parliamentary debates during three key moments of legislative reform: first, the partial decriminalisation of male homosexual acts in England and Wales by the Sexual Offences Act 1967; second, changes to the minimum age for male homosexual acts that culminated in the Sexual Offences Act 2000; and, finally, the repeal of male homosexual offences by the Sexual Offences Act 2003. statute law in Ireland by An Act for the punishment of the vice of Buggery 1634.
