Bermuda’s collection of African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Churches has voiced its opposition to a gay and lesbian family cruise scheduled to come to the island in early July.

American television personality Rosie O’Donnell is slated to host the cruise from New York which departs on July 7.

The AME opposition appears in an official resolution statement produced at the group’s eleven-church annual conference earlier this month.

The statement says: “The AME Church opposes the same sex lifestyle of many of the anticipated passengers of the cruise hosted by Rosie O’Donnell. The lifestyle is incompatible with the Word of God and the Christian moral fibre of our beautiful Bermuda. Consequently, the AME Church of Bermuda is not (in) favour of this cruise coming to our shores in July 2007.”

It’s not clear from the resolution what efforts the church lobby might employ to either prevent the cruise from coming or to voice their displeasure when the cruise arrives. An effort to reach an AME spokesperson last night was unsuccessful.

The Royal Gazette advised Government MP Renee Webb of the resolution. She is a self-described advocate of anti-discrimination and equal rights regardless of sexual orientation.

She said: “I think that the church has the right to oppose whatever it wants to oppose within the context of its religion. However, it cannot dictate the tourism policy of the island.

“And within the context of our tourism policy we welcome all tourists to our shore. We do not ask them before their arrival whether they are homosexual, bisexual, or heterosexual.”

Ms Webb is a former Tourism Minister. She said there have been other cruises to Bermuda specifically geared towards same sex couples and those events happened “without incident”.

Current Tourism Minister Premier Ewart Brown similarly outlined the country’s tourism stance. He said: “The Government’s policy is that Bermuda does not discriminate against Bermudians or visitors based on sexual orientation.”

This is not the first time Rosie O’Donnell has arranged a cruise for gay and lesbian families.

Her franchise of cruises became widely known in 2006 with the release of a documentary on HBO called “All Aboard: Rosie’s Family Cruise”.

Rosie O’Donnell announced she was a lesbian in 2002. Two years later she married her long time girlfriend Kelli Carpenter in San Francisco. The couple has three adopted children and a fourth who was conceived through sperm donation.

The AME also resolved during its conference to “address the affordable housing crisis in Bermuda” by launching an empowerment initiative to open the path of home ownership for its church members.

There’s also an effort underway to address a “glaring omission of media coverage” of local AME church events.