Gay marriage will be the key issue which will push the strift-ridden Ulster Unionists over the brink at its annual conference in late September.
And Alliance, not the DUP, poses the biggest threat to the future of the election battered UUP.
Such has been the slip in support for the UUP that Alliance has crept up the polls and is virtually neck and neck with the party which once dominated the North's political landscape.
For many of the UUP representatives to hold their seats, they will rely on transfers from a rampant Alliance under Justice boss David Ford – not the DUP or Traditional Unionist Voice (TUV).
Many UUP candidates may have to make a tough choice between Christian principles and political survival. So now we come to the thorny question of gay marriage in that mix.
The UUP policy on gay marriage is … well, as with many issues the party doesn't actually have one!
On abortion, homosexuality, corporal and capital punishment, the UUP can sidestep by playing the old 'it's a matter of personal conscience' card.
But they cannot do this with gay marriage. Like Alliance, the UUP will have to come off the fence and publicly state what its policy is.
Already, leading UUP MLAs, such as Basil McCrea, John McCallister and Michael Copeland, have openly voiced their support for gay-rights issues.
While former leadership contenders McCrea and McCallister represent the UUP's liberal wing, Copeland from East Belfast is seen as being on the party's Right. So why this seemingly unified approach on gay marriage?
The solution is simple: it's a matter of survival. Each of these three MLAs represents a constituency in which they will need significant transfers from Alliance to get re-elected in 2015.
And there's only one way for the UUP to suck up to Alliance at the moment – publicly support gay marriage!
While the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) community represents a small percentage of the North's 1.8 million citizens, it has one of the most pro-active and vocal lobbies.
We in the campaign to help autism could learn a trick or two from LGBT lobbyists.
While Irish Catholicism is united in opposing gay marriage, the issue will fatally split the Church of Ireland. And, like the issue of women clerics, gay marriage will also split Presbyterianism and Methodism.
The UUP's dilemma on gay marriage is that what is left of its core support is mainly a Bible-believing, Church-going fraternity, which privately is opposed to gay marriage, never mind homosexuality.
Many traditional Christian UUP members and supporters also privately share the views on gay marriage which were publicly expressed by former Fermanagh South Tyrone MP Ken Maginnis.
During an on-air interview, Lord Maginnis branded gay marriage as "unnatural and deviant behaviour".
The UUP really cannot sit on the fence come the vital September conference. Either it rebrands itself as a radical right-wing party committed to defending Biblical principles and Christian values.
Or, it unveils supporting gay marriage as party policy and enters an electoral pact or merger with Alliance.
If the latter happens, the question is – how many Christians will exit the UUP and where will they go? And could the same gay marriage issue spell the end of the SDLP, too?
