Vigo Auguste Demant

Vigo Auguste Demant (1893 – 1983), known as V. A. Demant, was an English Anglican priest, theologian, and social commentator. He was one of the 14 committee members who served on the Wolfenden Report on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution.

Early life and education Demant was born on 8 November 1893 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. He was educated in Newcastle, England and Tournan, France. He studied engineering at Armstrong College, Durham. He then studied theology at Manchester College, Oxford.

Career Ordained ministry and academia Demant had originally intended to become a Unitarian minister, but became attracted to Catholicism while studying at the University of Oxford

Demant became Vicar of St John the Divine, Richmond, in 1933 and nine years later he became a canon of St Paul's Cathedral. He served as canon chancellor of the cathedral from 1942 to 1948 and as canon treasurer from 1948 to 1949. He was a canon of Christ Church, Oxford, and Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at the University of Oxford from 1949 to 1971.

Other work Demant served on the Committee on Homosexual Offences and Prostitution. The committee's report, known as the Wolfenden report was published in September 1957 and recommended that "homosexual behaviour between consenting adults in private should no longer be a criminal offence."

Demant was a regular broadcaster on the BBC's Third Programme in the 1950s. He supported Maurice Reckitt in founding the Christendom Trust to encourage and fund research into the application of Christian social thought.

Later life Demant retired from his post at Oxford to a cottage in Headington, Oxfordshire, in 1971. He died there on 3 March 1983 at the age of 89.

Writings

The Just Price (1930) This Unemployment: Disaster or Opportunity? (1932) God, Man and Society: An Introduction to Christian Sociology (1933) Christian Polity (1936) The Religious Prospect (1939) Theology of Society: More Essays in Christian Polity (1947) The Responsibility and Scope of Pastoral Theology To-Day (1950) Religion and the Decline of Capitalism (1952) The Elements of Christianity (1955) A Two-Way Religion (1957) Christian Sex Ethics (1963) The Idea of a Natural Order (1966) Why the Christian Priesthood Is Male (1972)