I'm very sorry, says gay health warning clergyman

The chaplain to the London Stock Exchange has offered a "full and complete" apology for suggesting on his blog that gay men should carry tattooed health warnings.

The Rev Peter Mullen, who's also rector of St Sepulchre without Newgate and St Michael's Cornhill, caused a bit of rumpus by declaring: "It is time that religious believers began to recommend... discouragements of homosexual practices after the style of warnings on cigarette packets. Let us make it obligatory for homosexuals to have their backsides tattooed with the slogan SODOMY CAN SERIOUSLY DAMAGE YOUR HEALTH and their chins with FELLATIO KILLS."

According to the Evening Standard, he backtracked yesterday with: "I realise that the remarks were injudicious and I have caused offence. I was not actually meaning to criticise individual homosexual persons, but the promoters of gay culture."

Whether that's an end to the matter remains to be seen. Gay rights group Stonewall has called for Mullen's resignation over the outrage, and the Diocese of London said earlier this week in a statement: "These comments are now being looked at internally within the Diocese and he faces disciplinary procedures." ®