THE Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland has said civil partnerships should be available for heterosexual as well as gay couples.
Professor Iain Torrance claimed such a move would allow people to have "greater faithfulness and greater structures in their lives".
But the Moderator said his views were not intended to be an attack on the sacrament of marriage.
Speaking at the annual St Andrew’s Tide lunch in London yesterday, Prof Torrance said: "If here we see a mechanism which will enable people who lead very mobile lives to have greater faithfulness and greater structures in their lives - who are we to condemn it?
"I do not believe it’s talking about, as is sometimes said, gay marriages. What it is talking about is a justice matter and to do with civil partnerships."
Civil partnerships would give same-sex couples the same legal rights as married couples.
The government included a Civil Partnerships Bill in the Queen’s Speech last week. The Scottish Executive wants the new legislation to cover Scotland as well, and has opened a consultation exercise to gauge public opinion.
Last month, Hugh Henry, the deputy justice minister, denied that giving homosexual couples the same legal rights as married people would undermine marriage.
Religious groups have voiced fears that the plans would "lend status and credibility" to same-sex partnerships, and want the proposals scrapped.
But Mr Henry told a back-bench committee of MSPs the Executive was simply seeking to give homosexual couples the right to access tax and pension benefits which are currently restricted to married people.
He did rule out extending the civil partnership scheme to mixed-sex couples, on the grounds that that would undermine marriage.
"It would provide an alternative to marriage, and it’s not our intention to do that," Mr Henry told Holyrood’s Equal Opportunities Committee. "We believe that providing an alternative to marriage would have the same effect of undermining it. We have no intention of taking away the relevance and significance that marriage has for many people in our society."
Mr Henry said that with the Westminster government seeking to legislate on the matter in England and Wales, it made sense for Scotland to follow suit.
Mr Henry also ruled out the Scottish Parliament going it alone if the bill failed at Westminster. He said that since taxation and benefits were issues reserved to Westminster, any bill north of the border would lack the necessary powers.