A York author has described the stance of the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches on gay couples adopting children as "disgraceful".

The comment, by Jenny Roberts, came after the Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, signed a letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair saying Roman Catholic adoption agencies should be allowed to opt out of a new anti-discrimination law.

Dr Sentamu is the second most senior figure in the Anglican Church.

The law - set to be passed in April - will make discrimination in the provision of services on the grounds of sexual orientation unlawful. It would force adoption agencies to consider gay couples as potential parents.

But while Ms Roberts said there was no difference between heterosexual and homosexual couples adopting children, a Roman Catholic priest in York said the Government should allow agencies to continue to pass on applications from prospective gay parents to other agencies.

Ms Roberts, 62, an author who for several years ran the Goodramgate feminist bookshop Libertas! with her partner, Ann Croft, said: "I see no difference between my partner and I and a heterosexual couple - we live our lives just as everybody else does.

"There's no difference between heterosexual couples adopting and homosexual ones doing so. I think that acceptance is a basic human right - we all have a right to be accepted for who we are. The Christian Church is simply hypocritical - to back up its statements it conveniently ignores other parts of the Bible because they don't support its arguments.

"And it homes in on homosexuality because this suits its purposes. It's all about keeping power.

"It's disgraceful that an organisation that pretends it's all about conscience is actually making an effort to control the way things are.

"Jesus preached that everybody should be accepted - yet here we have the Church telling other people what to do.

"I don't know why we listen to them - we're not a Christian country anymore, but they still seem to have a hold over us."

But the Very Rev Patrick Hartnett, 52, of St George's Roman Church in York, said: "The Christian Churches should be able to continue their policy.

"There should be that option that they do not have to go along with the legislation.

"If they are not exempt from the law it will mean that they won't be able to look after these children in the future - because the funding will be cut from the agency.

"When you legislate, you can't have a statute to cure all ills. You've got to take into consideration people's beliefs and traditions. In this instance, if the church's agencies were allowed to be exempt from the law, they could pass on the applications to another agency that would look after them."