Leading Australian rugby player and committed Christian David Pocock says he and his female partner supports marriage equality law reform and “can’t see what the big deal is about it in Australia.”

In an interview in today’s New Zealand Herald, the Wallabies team flanker (pictured) said: “Being brought up in a Christian home and still identifying as Christian, I get pretty annoyed with the Christian lobbies around the world who say gay marriage destroys the family and all that kind of rubbish.

“They claim to follow someone who always stood up for the oppressed and marginalised.

“I guess it is a fear of the unknown,” Pocock, who is regarded as one of the toughest rugby players in the world, added. “If you talk to someone who doesn’t like gay people you can almost guarantee that they don’t know too many.

“These are the prejudices that you have to challenge and break down. Emma and I decided not to get legally married until our gay friends could do the same.”

Australian Marriage Equality National Convener Alex Greenwich welcomed Pocock’s statement, saying it shows support for the issue is increasingly widespread in all sections of Australian society.

“David Pocock’s strong support for equality will have a dramatic impact in a sports-mad nation like Australia,” he said.

“David’s stance also sends out the message that marriage equality is a reform Christians can and should support.”

VICTORIAN SUPPORT

Pocock’s statement comes on the day the Victorian Labor Party endorsed full marriage equality at its state conference.

The motion of support passed on the voices and was one of the first motions voted on in Melbourne today.

The Victorian Labor Party now joins their counterparts in South Australia, Western Australia, Queensland, Tasmania, The ACT, Young Labor, and Labor Women, who have all passed motions of support for full marriage equality at conferences this year.