Kamogelo Olaitan
Mpho Tutu van Furth was barred from officiating her godfather’s funeral because she is married to a woman.
The late Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s daughter, who is an Anglican priest in the Diocese of Washington DC, was barred from doing so by The Church of England.
She was to lead the funeral service of Martin Kenyon in Shropshire, England on Thursday.
The church said it does not allow its clergy to be in a same-sex marriage because its official teaching is that marriage is only between one man and one woman.
Mpho told BBC News, “It’s incredibly sad. It feels like a bureaucratic response with maybe a lack of compassion”.
Kenyon, a British Army Officer, passed away on Wednesday 7 September at the age of 92 and his daughter, Nina, said her father had specially requested Mpho to officiate his funeral.
When Kenyon’s family was told of the Church’s decision, they moved the funeral to a marquee in the vicarage next door so Mpho could officiate and preach, as per their father’s wishes.
The family said they were devastated at the church’s decision.
“Even in a conservative rural hinterland like Shropshire, people are appalled at what has happened. It’s unchristian and unjust,” a family friend said.
Kenyon was close friends with the late South African archbishop, Desmond Tutu.
Mpho’s wife Marceline called the decision homophobic.
“She fell in love with me and then she had the courage to marry me and then she can’t be the person she is as a priest and that’s… I don’t understand that,” said Marceline Mpho married Marceline in 2015 and her father supported their marriage.
However, the marriage cost Mpho her priesthood licence from Saldanha Bay.
Image source: @voiceofnaijan
