Do the bishops seriously imagine that legalising gay marriage will result in thousands of parties to heterosexual marriages suddenly deciding to get divorced so they can marry a person of the same sex?

It is a fact that all women contribute more to marriage than men for the most part they have to change their place of living their method of work a great many women today changing their occupation entirely on marriage and they must even change their name.

My second marriage had a lot to do with alcohol.

Well marriage doesn't function in the way it used to in terms of deciding our fate but it's in our heads and it determines a lot of our actions. Like right now if you think about gay marriage - and they just started having the first gay marriages in New York - it shows what a potent idea marriage remains for people.

The Amateur Marriage grew out of the reflection that of all the opportunities to show differences in character surely an unhappy marriage must be the richest.

My marriage had been impulsive. That marriage should have been short-lived instead of the 23 years it spanned.

I find it disturbing that the media keeps referring to my marriage since I got divorced in 1979. But the media never wants to let me forget.

My first marriage was totally unsuitable and shouldn't have happened. It was a whirlwind rebound thing. I was 23 or 24 - a baby.

How do you explain the bond between man and wife? Well for one thing it's private. What people do in their own marriage is their own business.

Seeing unhappiness in the marriage of friends I was content to have chosen music and laughter as a substitute for a husband.

I was sent to a nice Church of England girls' school and at that time after university a woman was expected to become a teacher a nurse or a missionary - prior to marriage.

I think one reason for a successful marriage is laughter. I think laughter gets you through the rough moments in a marriage.

Any sex outside of the marriage bond between a man and a woman is violating God's law.

Marriage is something that needs to be worked on every day. I don't know if I'm the one to give marital advice since I've only been married for a little over a year but marriage is certainly easier if you are open trusting and loving.

You have to work for everything. Marriage should not be any different.

Marriage is too interesting an experiment to be tried only once.

Same-sex marriage would eliminate entirely in law the basic idea of a mother and a father for every child. It would create a society which deliberately chooses to deprive a child of either a mother or a father.

I had a very wise person tell me that he thinks marriage when you're younger you keep thinking you can fix things. That's what people do. And you can't really fix anything. It shouldn't be a massive difficult thing every day. Life's difficult enough.

Marriage to Fernando offered shelter and security but the shackle was the price I'd pay.

The secret of a good marriage is forgiving your partner for marrying you in the first place.

I don't do marriage. I think it's incredibly naff. And I don't like vulgar displays of ostentation.

Marriage can be expensive and if I lose millions then it'll be the best millions I've spent.

I'm always told that what I say is controversial. Why is it controversial? Because I speak from a tradition that has now fallen out of favor with the dominant media in this country. And so when I say things like marriage should be between one man and one woman I'm called a bigot.

It is statistically proven that the strongest institution that guarantees procreation and continuity of the generations is marriage between one man and one woman. We don't want genocide. We don't want to destroy the sacred institution of marriage.