the row began when he stated his point of view in his Parliamentary confirmation hearing as candidate designate for the European Commission.

did he really say it in Parliament? I must confess that I haven’t followed this debate particularly closely, but I was under the impression that he was asked by a journalist what his view of homosexuality was, and gave the answer we all have heard. I don’t think he uttered this opinion in any political capacity, let alone parliament. Anyone able to confirm?

“It is entirely possible to have strong and definite religious beliefs and at the same time to believe firmly that those beliefs belong in the personal sphere, not the public political sphere.”

I think that Mr Buttiglione tried to score a few cheap points, or simply underestimated the impact of his statement.

>An individual may firmly believe that
>homosexuality (or eating pork, or showing
>disrespect to a statue of Ganesh, or whatever) is
>sinful; but in the eyes of a non-confessional
>liberal democracy, that belief should be deemed
>neither right nor wrong so much as invisible.

Of course. It’s just not in the – English – statement I quoted…

>Buttiglione isn’t “den[ying] that gay people are >sinners.” He says we’re all sinners, and >homosexuality is not the worst sin —

As I said… translation matters. If that’s in the Italian, fair enough.

I just found it very strange/confused to say someone *IS* not a sinner (denying the sinful nature in general, not just politically) while reserving the right to “THINK” someone is a sinner – for purely liturgical reasons or whatever. Doesn’t work conceptually, in my opinion.

It will now remain a matter of conjecture whether Buttiglione would have been able to put this separation of spheres into practice. Perhaps he wouldn’t have done; but his statement at least is spot on.

While it’s clear Buttiglione was an unsuitable choice for this post, I don’t see a whole lot to mock here. Rather I see someone with rigid, even far-out views (“Democracy is expanding in the world under the guidance, let us be honest, of the Catholic Church”), but also a sane sense of how they can be integrated (or not) into a lay polity.

The other line is translated nearly right. He’s trying to clear up what he said that caused the scandal. I would translate it:

I defend the right to be able to think that homosexuality is a sin, but in the world of politics the concept of sin does not exist.

This, he claims, was misquoted, leading to all that misunderstanding.