Clear strong language - asking why, when he knows otherwise, the Archbishop of Canterbury chooses ignorance, whilst accepting that Wright just might well be ignorant (regarding the theologies that tackle the issue of the Bible and gay faithful relationships).

I picked out some choice paragraphs:
http://pluralistspeaks.blogspot.com/2009/08/smell-of-coffee.html

How much "gravitas" does this group possess?
Will this paper be taken seriously?
Thanks for your opinions. Regards.

Thank you MCU for such a well reasoned and well expressed response, and thanks of course also to Simon for pointing the essay out to us. One thing came to my mind reading it and that is RW's argument that we need a recognised authority in order to engage in ecumenical relationships. That of course is nonsense in the Anglican world where we have happily formed full communion alliancesprovince by province. So TEC is in full communion with the Lutheran church (none bishop variety), but C-of-E isn't. C-of-E is in the Porvoo agreement, but TEC isn't nor is the Anglican church in ... Australia (?) etc. A non-argument, unless your aspirations are ... Roman, so to speak.

Plausible cases can be made for all sorts of things by " modern" exegesis. That is why I became a Roman Catholic, the promises of our Blessed Lord to St. Peter guarantees that you have the right definitive infallible answer... even if it does not fit your "reasonable" conclusions.

" but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not, and when you are converted strenghthern your brothers. "

So simple..so perfect...so liberating.

What a blessing the good MCU folks are. Thanks lots. Guess I am an MCU type Anglican, an Ekklesia type Anglican.

I agree completely with them in tagging the faked, false arguments which sadly both Wright and Williams have most recently used to close down in favor of a presuppositional Status Quo, dogmatic.

Indeed, dogmatic.

The analysis of the power grab that will de facto centralise global Anglicans is deft, clear, and substantive.

My own modest proposal?

I'm getting tired of always responding critically and thoughtfully to the same old conservative spin doctoring - all Status Quo of course.

We get spin about how to read the scriptures. We get spin about how unchanging believer views have always been since time immemorial. We get spin about how queer folks either have no heart, or only have hearts full of cheap thrills hedonism. We get spin about queer folks causing - bad weather (tornado hits while Lutherans are meeting this week?), bad straight family life, and any number of other spin doctored bad effects. We get spin about an alleged gay agenda. Now, even Canterbury is spin doctoring, alas.

No light, no love in any of that.

I recommend that any poster who declines to do his or her homework in the three areas of changed thinking which MCU so concisely summarizes - be directed to something from that large, large body of scholarship and empirical research. Then asked to go engage with it.

Let's start with Wright, and with Williams.

Finally, yet again, a big loud thanks to Lord Carey and his conservative evangelical campaigners back at Lambeth 1998 - for pushing so hard so fast, all in retrospect to freeze a picture of changing Anglican views which otherwise would likely have been reported out of that Lambeth, per the sexuality working committee's news. It really was a hard start to our current conservative realignment campaign.

All touching on the current hot button presenting spin doctor conservative leadership issues. Given the elaborate dissent about the ways that evangelicals have stereotyped queer folks, and the even worse ways queer folks have been treated, that Fulcrum is now praising so loudly - I'd venture a guess that evangelical believers are not so antigay as the leaders are.

IRD and other USA religious-secular new conservatives are just proud, would be so proud of it all. Good work. Just not godly work.

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems to me that one of the most import aspects of the Anglican movement is that it is not, and has never been, a "confessional" movement in the way that Luther or Calvin moved. There is no Augsburg or Westminster confession. Hence no clearly articulated common doctrine - just common prayer.

Leaving aside the "accidents" of this discussion - which are sex and biblical interpretation - there is a deep attempt to introduce a "confession" of sorts - call it "covenant" or "39 Articles" in some form...

It saddens me greatly that the ABC seems so determined to take such a set - though one can understand that it consolidates power and clears up a lot of vagueness.

But it seems to me that making the Anglican communion something like a confessional church fundamentally changes the movement. More than that, it ends it. We might just as well take the Augsburg confession (the 39 articles are already really close) and be Lutheran.

Goodbye Elizabethan Settlement. Goodbye scripture/tradition/reason. Goodbye Anglicanism.

Or am I being hysterical?

This MCU paper is absolutely superb.

And unfortunately, it is accurate when it says that "Both Williams and Wright show themselves to be dogmatic authoritarians."

Well, I am very impressed -- I don't know who the authors are, but they seem to have touched all the bases, including the truth of Dunelm's claim to be clarifying Cantuar, but also the way in which his Calvinist perspective is blind to the ABC's Catholic concerns (BTW -- it seems clear that had Williams been ABC instead of Carey, the C of E would still not allow women to be priests)

Wright does seem to miss one point about the schism having occurred, IMHO -- viz., the GAFCON churches have written the ABC out of their title deeds & boycotted Lambeth, whereas TEC has done neither. He seems to be sadly mistaken about who has already chosen to "walk apart" ...

Well the ELCA vote dropped the other shoe today, Friday, August 21, 2009.

See: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090822/ap_on_re_us/us_lutherans_gays

After passing a resolution earlier in the week which honestly said that Lutherans were not of one conformed mind (rather similar to the sexuality commission report that Lambeth 1998 would have received and reported out, if not for the last minute conservative campaign which famously got us handcuffed into resolution 1.10, and subsequently frog marched by conservative realignment campaigning); Lutherans said that local parishes and synods could decide for themselves if and/or when to allow queer folks who are clergy in committed adult relationships be called, and serve. All, honestly, openly.

A great model for a number of church life dimensions in this hot button domain, then. Thanks, ELCA.

ELCA families will probably also be deciding for themselves when/if to invite the partnered queer folks who are their relatives, offspring, and such. Imagine not automatically having to hide one's queer family members, say, in the garage with the doors closed.

Meanwhile, the largest Lutheran church in the US has by quite a wide margin affirmed partnered GLBT people as pastors. As for Rowen et alia - ho hum.

I was very encouraged by the MCU response, and felt supported for once, in my own thinking and place.

I only wish they would have said and done a lot more. The liberal groups in the C of E have said and done very little sto support gay ministers like myself, and to refute those whose anti-gay ideology matters to them more than anything else.

Yes, as I write this, I realize just how fed up I am with liberal bishops and organisations. They didnt stand up much to Carey and now they have failed to remonstrate with Wiliams as he has abandoned his own liberal stance, along with Fr J John.

Now that Holloway, and Spong have retired and HA Williams and Pitteneger left us, who do we have to express a liberal vision ? Let alone carry the figh tto the anti-gay conservative bastions ! I say 'fight' relectantly as i am a live and let live kind of person, but the behaviour of certain indiviudals and groups in attacking anything not hammered on their own anvil, is appalling.

Wew still have Don Cupett of course. But he has been disgracefully neglected by the church hierarchy, and hardly back up all the way by MCU and other 'liberal' bodies.

I have been waiting for decaedes for liberals to do SOMETHING ! Are you rousing yourselves when it is too late ? Or can something still be done to stop the so-called 'Evangelical' rot ?

MCU you need to get orgnized !

A beautiful paper. Thank you and well done.

"Plausible cases can be made for all sorts of things by " modern" exegesis. That is why I became a Roman Catholic, the promises of our Blessed Lord to St. Peter guarantees that you have the right definitive infallible answer... even if it does not fit your "reasonable" conclusions.

" but I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not, and when you are converted strenghthern your brothers. "

So simple..so perfect...so liberating."

And precisely why I stopped being a Roman Catholic. I do not WANT my faith separated from my reason; I want each to inform and strengthen the other. If I cannot make what my faith tells me conform with what science tells me the real world is, then what am I to make of my faith? That God is lying to me in the truths he reveals through human reason?

"That is why I became a Roman Catholic, the promises of our Blessed Lord to St. Peter guarantees that you have the right definitive infallible answer... even if it does not fit your "reasonable" conclusions."
- Robert I williams -

And what, Robert, does this have to do with the subject on this thread? Your constant references to your swimming the Tiber are beginning to show signs of some sort of aberration. Perhaps you need to find a web-site more accommodating of your deepest spiritual needs: Virtue-on-line?

I have a few issues with the thinking in this and believe it misses much, but still I am glad to see it!

Perhaps someone needs to write a response to it ... but then that would be a critique of the MCU piece which critiques blessed Tom's crit of Rowan who critiqued the outcome of the 2009 General Convention .... and that might just be one crit to far!

Just some anoying factual errors ....
It was the Lambeth Commission that produced that nasty little document .. The Windsor Report
The Eames Commission did their stuff on women

In +Cantuar's comments he noted:
Without more ado Williams dismisses all human rights discourse as though there was no proper place for it in Anglican ethics. Against it he presents what we might call 'the unchanging church argument'. The question

is about whether the Church is free to recognise same-sex unions by means of public blessings... In the light of the way in which the Church has consistently read the Bible for the last two thousand years, it is clear that a positive answer to this question would have to be based on the most painstaking biblical exegesis and on a wide acceptance of the results within the Communion, with due account taken of the teachings of ecumenical partners also. A major change naturally needs a strong level of consensus and solid theological grounding. It would appear that, at least among a great deal of the communion...New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Sweeden,and the US, there is wide acceptance. In the "ecumenical" sphere, last night's actions of the ELCA with whom TEC is fully in communion, seems to indicate an awareness of our "ecumenical partners" so, on this issue, is +Cantuar referring principally to Rome as the "ecumenical partner" that matters?

One slight corrective to Sara. The ELCA does have bishops and the Concordat between it and TEC provides for Episcopal bishops to participate in the ordination of ELCA bishops, which has been going on for some time. [This to calm the concerns of those who insist on a lineal 'apostolic successsion' I suppose.] The nice thing about the ELCA bishops is that their terms of office are limited and eventually they return to parochial or teaching positions. How I wish TEC would do something similar.
Meantime, ELCA's entry into full communion with the United Methodist Church USA bodes well for TEC's current interim eucharistic sharing to move on to full communion, likewise. ELCA now has full communion with six other denominations. TEC as of this summer has two: ELCA and the Moravians, as I understand it. This is significant to me because I have maintained for many years that the fault lines are moving from denominational borders to theological compatabilities. I would love to live to see a reconfiguration of American [et al] denominations according to theology and not according to historic differences. [E.g. the TEC dissidents and others might find cause to align themselves with similar dissidents which are and will fall out from the ELCA decisions, much less the coming storm for the United Methodists.]

It has seem for a while now that Rowan wants us to be Romans and Tom wants us to be Baptists.

So it is nice to see that there are still some Anglicans in England.

I've always considered myself a 'catholic' in anglican terms - this paper begins to convince me of my basic 'liberalism', if belonging to groups matters. I've tired desperately to be a Rowan loyalist (hoping against hope) but the more he has shifted towards the bullying of N.T.Wright the less I can take him seriously. I owe a great deal to those whose insight and clarity have compiled this masterful response. Roll on the General Synod's next consideration of the covenant.

"So simple..so perfect...so liberating."

Yes, it liberates us all from the responsibility of thinking for ourselves like adults.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, with over 4 million members and the 4th largest Protestant denomination in the States, just voted by substantial margins to accept their gay children as equals and as potential leaders.

I happily pass along the designations "marginalized" and "pathological" to the gay-hostile folk in the Anglican hierarchies and at Lambeth.

There will surely be a scramble for the position of the first Anglican Pope. I don't think Bishop Wright will be satisfied with being an assistant.

How wonderful it must be to have easy, unmediated, and unproblematic access to the Whole and Complete Truth, RIW! So simple..so perfect...so liberating from any need for serious thought, active engagement with Scripture, or real moral responsibility. How I envy you!

The Anglican tradition is quite a different one in this respect, although it seems that we are in danger of being taken over by an unlikely coalition of Catholics and evangelicals who do indeed want to promote exactly this kind of ecclesialogy: we are bound together not by the love of Christ, but by the unbreakable iron chains of "the right, definitive, and infallible answers." God help us.

My last post may ahve sounded churlish. MCU have now done something ! Good. I was protesting at the time lag. Too little too late ? !

But also my words are directed at other C of E organisations, bishops and opinion formers who have not acted much. They allowed both Carey and now Williams to act as they ahve. They ahve not refuted forcefully the American and UK obscurantists and sectarians.

They have not organzed.

They have not organized and acted against the so-called 'Covenant' and all the Windsor and now 2 tier or gear nonsense. They have not protected TEC.

I do understand that this kind of thing is not part of the liberal spirit and campaigning against idocies is not generlaly part of our ethos. We are not enthusistic hotheads and rally callers or rabble rousers. We are more likely to be roused to writng a note in the margin of a book (!) or sending a copy to someone.

Also we / I underestimated the appeal and political clout of those who are truly rending anglicanism and its national expressions apart. We didnt see that this anti-intellectual, anti-incarnational, anti-culture approach would deveop malignantly, theatening rational theologies and praxis.

Still most of the people of England -in and out the pews know little about all this and care less. They value their gay and lesbian friends and relations, and colleagues; they cohabit, they marry and divorce and birth-control --so they have that much in common with the Evangelicals, who become fiercely practical when faced with their own sexual practices and arranglements-- and not a bit dewy-eyed !

So maybe there is more hope than I'd thought afterall.

May be liberals need do nothing !

As a matter of information, L Roberts, Don Cupitt no longer is an active member of the church.

http://www.doncupitt.com/doncupitt.html

The fact is that the liberal groups have been reluctant to stand out, because standing back was seen to work in the past. But it doesn't work now, and really Rowan Williams's latest piece has jolted them into action.

Some probably sympathetic bishops are becoming loud by their silence. What of the President of MCU? After Williams's offensive writing, nodding and winking are no longer good enough.

I thought you'd gone to the Quakers L. Roberts. Is that wrong? I don't want the Anglican label any more, and just be regarded as free floating.

Both Wright and Rowan Williams seem to making it quite clear that no formal spaces for any sort of progressive believer will exist at top levels in global Anglicanism, newly covenanted into first track.

This stark inference is pretty nigh unavoidable, if one takes Rowan Williams as one's clue and example of just how shut down things will have to be, worldwide. Surely if any Anglican leader could still read science openly while paying attention in ethics and theology, it would have been supposed that RW would have been among the readers. Alas, no. He's heard of something like that, but only very dimly, from an extreme and uncertain distance. Gee whillakers, this bodes ill.

I don't need to exclude RW or Wright from common prayer; but I cannot sit back comfortably while they drive the intellectual buses off their closed-minded theological cliffs. No Anglican can afford to let the likes of Wright or Williams do much thinking for them, now, as it turns out in these latest missives.

Only believers who preach and think and study in closed circles, airless; will be proper Anglican First Trackers.

And, Wright seems wary lest even some leaders among that narrowed group might fail to keep the circles closed properly.

After all, CoE has women bishops waiting in the wings. If turning back the clock on queer folks turns out to be easy enough, at least in certain CoE quarters; turning back the clocks on women will be even nastier. How RW the Anglican could so categorically turn his back on modern scholarship and science is far beyond my abilities to fully explain. This is the fellow who once preached that, No Anglican believes unintelligent readings of the scriptures. And, Anglicans do not wish to prematurely foreclose scholarship and controversy about difficult and complicated modern issues.

We can just kiss all that global Anglican space a fond goodbye, especially at top levels; if the new covenant passes as intended. Of course, much may happen that shifts the effective use of that covenant as redrafting and reception unfold.

Ironic that, just as evangelical believers are trying to open up about queer stuff - (see ELCA, and Andrew Marin's new book?) - the neocons move over to campaign in global Anglican Churches, to get it all closed down, meaner and nastier than ever.

Plausible cases can be made for all sorts of things by " modern" exegesis. That is why I became a Roman Catholic, the promises of our Blessed Lord to St. Peter guarantees that you have the right definitive infallible answer... even if it does not fit your "reasonable" conclusions.
So simple..so perfect...so liberating.

Well - that used to mean that you had to believe the earth was flat. What a comfort! To be safe, all you had to do was not stray near the edge.

Oh blssings! Someone else will think for me! Gee whillikers! Faith is EASY! bring on the Kool-Ade!

"Meanwhile, the largest Lutheran church in the US has by quite a wide margin affirmed partnered GLBT people as pastors."

Tuna Noodle Casserole and Ambrosia for EVERYONE! Happy Day!

Seriously, this MCU paper is just what the doctor ordered-a forthright, no nonsense article that hopefully empowers the laity in the England to set a fire under the leading clerics. It is sad, where are the "liberal" bishops in England?

Talk about Calvinism - the newest "Anglican" bishop who will be ordained for CANA/AMiA is a guy who has been a evangelical fundamentalist minister for 25 years and an "Anglican" priest for six hot months. AXIOS!!!

""...but when the fires die down only a small number of extremists will carry on refusing on principle to attend the same church as active
homosexuals and their supporters. We should not repeat the mistake of 1993, giving special favours to Anglicans who dedicate their efforts
to condemning other Anglicans" - C.T.U. Response -

What a timely and measured response by the Modern Churchpeople's Union to the dual criticism by the ABC and the Bishop of Durham - of TEC's re-thinking of the moratoria on the ordination of gays and the blessing of same-sex unions! In this pericope of their reaction, the M.C.U. is making a very clear statement about what they (any many other Anglicans) believe will be the most likely outcome from the present spat about the inclusion of the LGBT community in the Church.

In the meantime, however, the statements made by the ABC and +Durham, which affect to draw our attention to the need for uniformity of doctrine and belief on such matters - for the Anglican Communion to be able to present a united front in the ecumenical stakes - is perceived as having two very different agendas: 1 - for the ABC, to conform with his 'catholic' ecclesiology, and, 2: for +Durham, to conform with his Calvinistic inclination towards a narrow, purely doctrinal *sanctification* model of Church - for only the pure and undefiled.

Both of these models, ECU sees as not typically or broadly Anglican. Both seem to condemn the state of homosexualty as being 'sinful' - at
least in the protestations contained in their responses to what has happened in TEC. There seems to be little willingness to concede that homsoexuality, per se, is viewed by scientists as a neutral condition, occurring naturally within the human and animal world. We know, from past
writings, that the ABC is not of this opinion, whereas; Wright, on the other hand, is prepared to ignore the paradox of homosexual clergy and bishops ministering within the Church of England, in his desire to purge the Chruch of what he perceives to be a cult of unrighteousness.

"you have the right definitive infallible answer... even if it does not fit your "reasonable" conclusions.
So simple..so perfect...so liberating."

'Well - that used to mean that you had to believe the earth was flat.'

Not quite, Cynthia. It used to mean that you could not say the earth went round the sun, even if you knew it did. But in fact you interlocutor is ill-informed about the scope of "infallibility"; he is perhaps a Catholic of recent vintage, who will mellow as time goes by.

Kahu Aloha, aren't all (male) members of CANA bishops now?

"Finally, yet again, a big loud thanks to Lord Carey and his conservative evangelical campaigners back at Lambeth 1998 - for pushing so hard so fast, all in retrospect to freeze a picture of changing Anglican views which otherwise would likely have been reported out of that Lambeth, per the sexuality working committee's news. It really was a hard start to our current conservative realignment campaign."

Methinks it actually was Lord Carey who started all by pushing things too far...

Way too far, waking people up to the dangers of this last minute anti Modern attempt at getting the Middle Ages back.

Rowan is correct to try to set the Anglican House in order, and redirect the queer drift.

Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate. So ex gay is possible.

Williams dismisses all human rights discourse as though there was no proper place for it in Anglican ethics.

Yet that is one of the fundamental tenants of the Jewish God. God does not oppress, thus any strategies that impose are not from God.

Job 37:23 "The Almighty is beyond our reach and exalted in power; in his justice and great righteousness, he does not oppress."

Deuteronomy 23: 15-16 "If a slave has taken refuge with you, do not hand him over to his master. Let him live among you wherever he likes and in whatever town he chooses. Do not oppress him."

Exodus 22:21 ""Do not mistreat an alien or oppress him, for you were aliens in Egypt."

Isaiah 58:6 ""Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke."

Zechariah 7:10 "Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor. In your hearts do not think evil of each other."

Deuteronomy 10:17 "For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes."

Malachi 2:9 "So I have caused you to be despised and humiliated before all the people, because you have not followed my ways but have shown partiality in matters of the law."

1 Timothy 5:21 "I charge you, in the sight of God and Christ Jesus and the elect angels, to keep these instructions without partiality, and to do nothing out of favoritism."

"That is why I became a Roman Catholic, the promises of our Blessed Lord to St. Peter guarantees that you have the right definitive infallible answer... even if it does not fit your "reasonable" conclusions."

We know. You are the kind of person who needs clearly spelled out statements of your acceptibility to God. Live by the Law, however that is defined, and God will have to love you. There's nothing wrong with that, of course, except that it reveals a certain weakness of faith. But, let's be reasonable, all of us humans are weak in some area or another. It also tends to works based salvation, but as long as you just practice that yourself and don't preach it to others, I am given to understand you can't be called a heretic. You are one of those in whose way St. Paul warns us not to put stumbling blocks. We haven't listened to him all that well, have we?

"Rowan is correct to try to set the Anglican House in order, and redirect the queer drift.

Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate. So ex gay is possible. "

After how long? And how many suicides? And how do they define "success"?

William's paper is typical bait and switch. He has included things in it that are not only demonstrably daft but things he has actually demonstrated are daft in a past life (prior to his current elevation).

Including such nonsense (Williams clearly doesn't expect anyone to be taken in - anymore than he would have been, apart from those already taken in because it's the way they rationalise their backdated beliefs and that's the key to it all) suckers in the likes of Wright to regurgitate it giving the progressives an easy time to demonstrate the position's absurdity (as MCU has had an easy time of here).

It's a gift from Williams to us. Maybe we're the only ones able to see it. The last laugh's on Wright.

I re-read it, especially in the light of the reservations of Martin Reynolds and the Rev L Roberts. I still think it is a wonderful statement of the kind of Anglicanism most of us (here) believe in. I also think it will have impact. Its power partly derives from its being unsigned - a corporate response from a grouping with some very big heavy-weights as well as inspirational activists such as Jean Mayland, partly from the fearlessness of its criticisms (no false deference anywhere), partly from the fact that it doesn't sneer or bully (unlike NTW), and partly from the fact that the gentlemen concerned will be experiencing very public, very strong and very detailed criticism from people who know them well and to whom they have in the past sometimes been close.

As for the Rev L Roberts' laments, mostly sadly and shamefully true, of course, but surely Jean Mayland is above reproach in this area, and Keith Ward has been blessing homosexual couples for decades and has argued in print for the theological legitimacy of such unions. Others too in this group.

The other cause for hope is that, like others, I seem to see clear signs that main-line Evangelicals want to move on and sideline this issue, even if they (most of them) can't quite bring themselves to say it's OK. I think this has been going on for some time. A couple of years ago, the Durham Diocesan rag featured a piece by some C of E Evangelical youth worker (not my normal cup of tea) telling how his experience of gay clergy in the diocese had caused him to rethink and concluding: 'if the doctrine's wrong, it should be changed'. So I hope and believe that Bishop Tom may huff and may puff (no stopping that) but rather a lot of his natural constituency won't be following him.

"Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate. So ex gay is possible. "

Ah, so of those who decide it is important to function as heterosexuals, and are therefore one assumes highly motivated to do so, forty per cent remain same-sex in their orientation. And those poor people are labelled as 'failures'. How lovely. Thanks and no thanks.

>>>Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate.

There's a man in Nigeria who reports to me, via regular emails, that he has access to $25,000,000 that he is willing to share with me.

One of the problems with even the nicest religion is, it trains people to believe without evidence -- like accepting a 60% success rate claim from an ex-gay ministry with a dicey history. (60% of what? People self-select going in, many drop out, there's no follow-up.)

John Henry said: "Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate. So ex gay is possible."

This is just wrong and also dangerously wrong.

Exodus claims a "success" rate of about 53% - which doesn't round to "almost 60" no matter how you slice it. But that rate is found in only one study conducted by two professors, one from Wheaton College and the other from Regent University - context is important.

These two faculty members determined that in their group 0f 61, 23% reported conversion of sexual attraction, 30% reported achieving chastity - hence the 53% "success" number.

The American Psychological Association recently reviewed more than 80 studies stretching back to the 1960s and determined that there is no evidence that any form of therapy works to change sexual orientation - but that there are dangerous side effects of such interventions, including depression and suicide.

Assuming God wants us whole, not shattered, leaves me with little room in my heart for the work of Exodus.

I know one person who endured this type of therapy at Wheaton. The damage inflicted on him is shocking.

Perhaps John Henry knows others who have had a different experience.

"Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate. So ex gay is possible."

I'm sure they do. It is in their best interests to say so. But what exactly IS a "success rate"? The vast majority do NOT "become straight" or anything close to it. They live a lie, supported by people who pretend to follow the Truth. Many of them were never gay in the first place. Exodus itself reports an alarming number of its clients as having been abused as kids. They take this to mean that most gay people were abused as kids. In fact, it just means that people who were abused as kids are often very confused about their sexuality, and are craving some sort of acceptance. Their sexuality has been largely a source of pain, and they have little difficulty denying it and pretending to be straight if they can get what is far more important to them: acceptance and validation. Thing is, Exodus et al do nothing to identify people as actually being gay as opposed to having other issues, manipulate that hurt and pain for their own political ends, have no definition of what actually consititutes "success" or how to measure it, and, in the course of all this manipulation they drive a good many to such dispair they kill themselves. That's why the APA and various other bodies are so opposed to these abusive manipulative "therapies". Where do you get your "success" data? Do you have credentials in areas of councilling and sexuality? Ex gay is not possible. Conservative propaganda, on the other hand......well, what else would we expect from people who think it is entirely in keeping with the Gospel to jail for five years people who try to relieve the pain of others?

Exodus ex-gay success claims-rates are still remarkably shaky. A good, close look at their numbers and their methods raises perennial outcome research questions.

Self-report is a problem. Subject Bias is a problem. Ideally, as with new drug studies and even sometimes with new surgical or other medical procedures, a double-blind method would be most reliable. So far, we can imagine a DB method, but nobody has published anything coming close to one. Certainly not the latest published Wheaton College-led study, which was more clear and careful than many.

Not bothering to account for where subjects are before treatment, on the Kinsey Scale Adjusted (for sexual orientation) – is a problem. Masters and Johnson were famous (infamous?) for this flaw. If one reads the religious models closely; one usually finds that they rigidly construe all subjects as essentially heterosexual, and seek to ameliorate some detriment claimed to have made subjects queer. So far, this is simply presumed; despite our available evidence for the contrary in animal species and in humans.

Experimenter Bias is a third problem. Usually double-blind methods address EB. Exodus has a vested, biased interest in believing its treatments work. Like an offshore clinic in an medically unregulated location, using peach pit chemicals to treat cancer? Exodus touts a change for high religious reasons; so probably is not among the most neutral, objective measurements of exactly that change. One suspicion clue is how quickly discussion of their outcomes – increased asexuality certainly, along with reports of increased opposite sex activities – escalate into claims of deep, lasting, sexual orientation change.

Plenty of contrary report – the plentiful ex-ex-gay stories? - suggests not running quite so fast, so far, with either S or E claims which are typically influenced by common sense biases in both subject and experimenter perceptions and measures.

Fourth, we must seriously question how widely we should generalize Exodus outcomes – even if we conclude they are solid, lasting change. Surely one needs to be an Exodus sort of strictly conservative religious believer, for starters. And one needs to be deeply interested, either in being able to become asexual for a while (up to a point), or in being able to have some incidence of opposite sex activities for a while (up to a point). Making do for a good while – asexually, opposite sexually? - is not precisely the same as turning a Kinsey 6 into a 1, or vice versa.

Any real success with empirical change factors will, so far as we know, allow us to flip the swtiches. A different configuration of similar causes will turn straight folks gay, then back again. Such a study would be a powerful test, indeed, though ethically dubious. Per current human subjects protection protocols. Exodus programs typically sidestep looking at ethical problems when it comes to these same human subjects protection protocols. Religious and reparative therapy practitioners regularly fiddle the protocols for informed consent, to a degree which would not be acceptable if we were reviewing peach pit treatments for cancer. They begin interventions or treatments by extolling their own virtues to a positive degree unwarranted so far by any adequately tested outcome study that rises to best practice double-blind standards.

Exodus may be pretty good at influencing perceptions and beliefs - provided you stick with it for long enough. After all the Exodus umbrella outfits are basically a range of religious communities, practically speaking. That does not empirically equal flipping the sexual orientation switches, reliably.

Exodus and other self-proclaimed change practitioners also have very bad ethical habits when it comes to all too promptly abandoning subjects, if or when turning straight or turning asexual fails. As science advances for real, it is probably only a matter of time before some former failed patient wins a malpractice court suit against such practitioners. That clock is ticking. Now.

Not yet, then. Exodus has Ethical issues plus empirical outcomes test problems.

John, I accept you are surely right about Jean Mayland, and indeed it is an excellent paper.

Thank you.

And, RIW, your words explain very clearly why none of us here, irrespective of our other differences, would ever want to even consider Vatican plc as representing the 'truth'!

RIW, I'll go even a bit easier on you than Ford Elms. I hope you will remember that there are many Catholics who are a bit more questioning, but won't leave the Church. Many are cradle, and have made their peace. The will be there to catch you if you start to fall.

But, meanwhile, decrees from the Vatican don't hold a great deal of authority with most Anglicans. It's just too much fun to search for the answers from all kinds of sources. And then when the definitive answer is in doubt - look to God. I've never known a time when I called for help when He wasn't right there, and no, the answers to my questions aren't always what I wish them to be.

"Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate. So ex gay is possible." - John Henry -

A Very different view-point from yuor illustrious name-sake, John Henry Newman - an eminent Anglican Divine - cum Roman Catholic Cardinal, whose own life witnessed to his own same-sex relationship. His commitment until death proved a real problem for his adoptive Church, which has separated him from his grave companion - in order to comemmorate John Henry's saintly character in another resting place than the one he himself had chosen. There would seem to be another culture of denial in that particular situation.

The APA states that there is no evidence that anti-gay therapy works (here.) But why let inconvenient facts get in the way of anti gay sentiment..

The KGB had a great success rate with making ex-Christians, as well, and with similar techniques! And, of course, according to their records they enjoyed a 100% SUCCESS RATE!!!!

I'm firmly with Ford and Dr Dan!

No further comment from John Henry I notice. Perhaps he knows that the numbers are meaningless and so small as to be insignificant anyway. Except of course the hurt and damage caused to vulnerable individuals is incalculable. Didn't the American Psychiatric Association (sorry probably got the name wrong) recently say that trying to convert Christian gay and lesbian people was dangerous and damaging and that they should be encouraged to find a welcoming church instead. Much more sensible as well as being much more Christian.

TBL: "...with due account taken of the teachings of ecumenical partners also. A major change naturally needs a strong level of consensus and solid theological grounding. It would appear that, at least among a great deal of the communion...New Zealand, Australia, Canada, Sweden,and the US, there is wide acceptance."

Yes, exactly, TBL. Also, the other European churches that Archbishop Rowan is in communion with nearly all already perform same-sex blessings or are well on the way to authorising them(the Nordic churches and the Old Catholics), as well as the other comparable European churches (German Lutherans, Dutch Protestants and Swiss Reformed).

There is a lot of evidence of this which I've posted up, and am adding to as I find more, at http://viaintegra.wordpress.com/

From the Jones and Yarhouse report (Exodus)
"We found no evidence that the attempt to change sexual orientation was harmful on average for these individuals."

On average???

Words I fear most from my surgeon, "On average, the unhealthy testicle is removed."

Hmm - interesting. There does seem to be a little confusion though.

The C of E has - and has always had - statements of belief that it requires clergy and office-holders to adhere to (esp. the Bible, creeds, prayer book, 39 Articles and so on).

Bp Stephen Neill, for instance, defined Anglicanism's broadness as being both scriptural and intellectual - challenging readers (from memory) "if there is anything specified by the NT and we're not doing it; tell us and we'll do it; if there is anything banned by the NT that we're doing, tell us and we'll stop".

The problem is that, while the C of E has winked over the last 50 years, there are men and women who are now sincere pastors in a church whose doctrinal statements they do not believe.

Will there be a split? At the moment, I don't see another option. Should we allow out (graciously and with pension) all those who have been ordained, with all help to be established in a church* in accord with their conscience? Absolutely.

Elias

*: the Liberal Catholic Church comes to mind

The thing is, I wouldn't have a problem with groups like Exodus if their attitude was that they believed that the only acceptable expression of sexuality was in monogamous heterosexual marriage and they were offering support for unmarried people to remain celebate. Sexuality then would not be an issue, since celebacy is about persuing a life where sexual relationships of any sort are treated as distractions. Accepting their ideas would not require gay people to claim they are somehow sick or disordered, and the idea that we must all resist the temptation to express our sexuality outside of marriage would be credible. But they don't do that. It isn't about some concept of the "proper" expression of sexuality, it's about portraying gay people as suffering from sort of illness/moral flaw from which we are in dire need of saving.

This is wrong on so many levels. It treats certain sexual "misdeeds" as more grave than others. It ignores scientific advances in the understanding of human sexuality. It manipulates people's brokenness instead of seeking to heal it. And by pandering to people's fears and bigotries it invites the kind of behaviour we see in groups who support these "ministries".

Elias: "The problem is that, while the C of E has winked over the last 50 years, there are men and women who are now sincere pastors in a church whose doctrinal statements they do not believe..."

No, I don't think that is the problem, Elias. The Church of England never spoke about homosexuality at all in the past: English people with good manners never mentioned the subject in polite company before about 1980, in my recollection. Nothing was laid down, nothing was spelled out about it to the older generation of gay clergy at all.

That wasn't so much "winking at" anything as having a sensible and realistic policy. In the absence of a Stalinist polity (such as leads to the Roman Catholic Church's so-called "Duvet Martyrs"), you cannot police people's bedrooms. Nor indeed should you think it your business to, as my ordaining bishop once announced to his clergy.

What has changed is this very silly and ultimately cruel attempt by a group of Puritans (who have very little sense of, or love for, historic Anglicanism anyway) to create a holier-than-thou sect. That is not consonant with the Church of England's tradition, which has always been to resist Puritan narrow-mindedness. It is that Puritanism which has recently been allowed to fester unchecked within the C of E which is the problem.

I worry about the women who are encouraged or even recruited to rescue -- their term not mine -- men from gay identity or are used callusly as cover.I worry also about children who are born to these women.I've known too many of both. When the husband/father finds he must abandon the effort to pretend to be someone he is not the wife is made to feel it is her fault, her failing.
Columba Gilliss

"It is that Puritanism which has recently been allowed to fester unchecked within the C of E which is the problem."

Oh! Oh! Festering Puritanism! What an excellent and accurate characterization. Sort of like a boil or pimple festering. Eventually it will pop. Drainage. End of infection.

I note that for Elias the issue of homosexuality is just a front to make a wider doctrinal point about the basis for division, though he'd better specify on to which Liberal Catholic Church (they do vary) he'd dump these "sincere pastors".

Must we really quote the APA and the AMA? Because the "science" changes every year. I think that being gay is just who a person is. I only know that from life observations: my friends and family. The APA told us that Lobotomies were perfectly alright. Until everyone was incapacitated. And then they said woops..nevermind.. They also said that homosexuality was a life long sexual disorder caused by multiple problems including the lack of male bonding. Until they received alot of hate mail and said..nevermind! Oh and by the way: Until it was socially acceptable to be gay in the USA, the APA said that homosexuality could be cured using electro-shock therapy. Whatever is correct at the time is what the paying members of the APA vote for.

"Even if there were a consensus, the institutions of the Anglican Communion have neither legal nor moral authority to impose it on provinces which dissent."
Exactly.
If conservatives wish to submit to their hierarchy, it seems pointless to deny the authority under which they have placed themselves.
If progressives seek neither to submit themselves nor the submission of others, but rather to unite in common action and purpose, their authority to do so is irrelevant.
Such is the history of Christendom.

Ford wrote: "This is wrong on so many levels. It treats certain sexual "misdeeds" as more grave than others. It ignores scientific advances in the understanding of human sexuality. It manipulates people's brokenness instead of seeking to heal it. And by pandering to people's fears and bigotries it invites the kind of behaviour we see in groups who support these "ministries"."

I think the answer lies with the advent of Modernity.

Our gradual descent into Medical, Scientific, Psychological explanations and pseudo "explanations" of reality.

Ron....I can't agree with your psychological analysis of John Henry Newman. Its rather dangerous reading something into a former life.. just like the ladies of Llangollen.. two Anglo-Irish aristiocratic ladies who set up home in Wales ( not far from where I live ) , rather than marry. Of course they are now interpreted as lesbians...not just good friends. Isn't that sad?

Leave the judgement of the dead to God, Ron...and not conjecture.

"Other good news is that Exodus Ministries reports almost a 60% success rate. So ex gay is possible."

That's the most IGNORANT thing I've read here in 2 years!!

Some people NEED TO THINK, before they TYPE!!

Of course you don't hear about the DEATH associated with these so-called ministries, the suicides, the Major Mental Illness, oh and the internal HATE.

"BARNA: What does the establishment of the ACNA accomplish?

ARMSTRONG: ACNA was created at the request of the archbishop of Canterbury as a way to gather all the orthodox Anglicans in North America into a single coherent entity with which he and the primates could communicate and eventually name as a replacement province for the Episcopal Church as it departs the Communion.
- Mark Barna, in the Colorado Springs Gazette -

Thia little gem, just culled from the 'Pulpit' section of the Colorado Springs Gazette, speaks of the supposed initiative taken by the ABC to encourage the ACNA soldality into being.

I don't for one moment believe the truth of this statement (above), which is supposed to have been made by one of the primary ACNA spokespersons in the USA, bears any resemblance to the truth. But while a US newspaper is propagating it's provenance, the ABC is open to being misinterpreted by the ACNA crowd.

What is needed, perhaps, is an outright denial of this suggestion of collusion by the Archbishop of Canterbury in the plan for ACNA's establishment - before further damage can be done to the Communion by this blatant piece of propaganda on the part of ACNA.

RIW: it was Faber's 1933 work "The Oxford Apostles" which first dared to discuss the sexuality of the Oxford Movement fathers, as I recall. There is nothing inappropriate about regarding Newman (and indeed, though he ultimately married, Keble) as gay. Newman suffered a degree of excoriation from his Roman coreligionists on account of his perceived old womanishness, something that was evident to his contemporaries and allied to his manifest romantic attachments to men throughout his life. I think most people understand what that indicates in terms of sexual orientation, don't they?

It isn't reading sex into everything to say that British society from c. 1840 to c. 1959 was sexually very repressive, and tended to sweep a lot under the carpet: excisions from correspondance and posthumous letter-burning were features of that age, and certainly went on in Newman's case - years ago I went through piles of the originals of his letters in Birmingham, and saw the chopped up and blacked out passages, and wondered what exactly some of them betokened. The same could be said for a large number of well-known figures in Victorian society. My reaction is how sad that they had to live with such repressions, which were always bursting out in alarming ways: it wasn't healthy for them, and wouldn't be healthy for the Church or society to impose today either.

"Whatever is correct at the time is what the paying members of the APA vote for."

Yes, yes, everyone with any kind of authority at all is in some way or another conniving to keep The Truth away from the public. Yawn.

I must disagree with JLs urging us to abandon in one fell swoop, science, plus the medical and psychological associations. I also must disagree with his proposing that we choose between science evidence and the first-hand knowledge of queer folks that daily life offers us.

In that regard, choosing would completely ignore the fact that the preponderance of peer-reviewed published studies agrees with and strengthens the positive evidence of everyday daily life. It is a plus, not a minus, that science can test things and change, slow or medium or fast. And in this instance we have a plus, since everyday life and science pretty much agree with one another.

The psychological association and the psychiatric association changed their professional positions, after being confronted vigorously with the emerging evidence of their own basic research which pointed (and still, points) to the basic human competencies of queer folks. Both associations are fairly young enterprises, with Benjamin Rush founding the psychiatric group in 1844, and G. Stanley Hall founding the psychological group in 1892.

No association absolves medicine, psychology, or psychiatry from the worst of bad past practices. Each was in its own ways, instrumental in correcting those practices, not least through encouraging patient protections and professional ethical standards.

These professional associations are imperfect human enterprises, no doubt; but I still would not want to be without them in a totally unregulated professional market where the rule was caveat emptor. To the extent that they support scientists and science upon which professional best practices are based, I surely do not wish to do without them.

I am very familiar with the Colorado Springs Gazette. It is a politically conservative newspaper.
I found the blog Fr. Ron Smith excerpted from. The reporter says that the quotes he uses in his blog are edited excerpts:

http://thepulpit.freedomblogging.com/2009/08/22/acna-spokesman-we-are-starting-down-the-path-of-recognition/2421/

Here's the original article the reporter wrote for the paper itself that he then blogs about above. So, the reporter is blogging about an article he previously wrote. There's a crude American term I could use, but instead I'll just say it all seems like an exercise in journalistic narcissism:

http://www.gazette.com/articles/episcopal-60600-fanfare-creation.html

Fr Mark:
Interesting observations of yours about Newman and Keble, as it never entered my mind of what their private life could have been.

Yes, thankfully those days are gone, at least in metropolitan America, but the fine line of keeping correct things quiet and private are often pulled in opposite directions from the right-wing crazies and in-your-face types of the opposite side. You can make progress and be tasteful about at it the same time.

Mark...it is a crude stereotype to deem that men who do not conform to a masculine image are gay. leave well alone...was Faber a Cathlic?

Apparently a lot of evangelicals tried to undermine the Oxford movement by deeming it unmanly and sexually suspect.

Thank you drdanfee. I appreciated reading your post.

"was Faber a Cathlic (sic)? - R. I. Williams -

Obviously, Robert, you never - in your Anglican days - studied much about the Oxford Movement, or you would have heard of the famous Father Faber, who was a Catholic (sic) of some renown in the Church of England. Perhaps someone local could lend you a book about the Oxford Movement - this might just afford you some insights into why the movement itself remained Anglican and did not *pope* en masse. Deo gratias!

RIW: "Apparently a lot of evangelicals tried to undermine the Oxford movement by deeming it unmanly and sexually suspect."

Really! What an extraordinary and unwarranted intrusion it would be to undermine the Oxford Movement by suggesting there was a "sexually suspect" aspect to it! I cannot believe anyone would stoop so low as to ascribe any beastliness to anyone involved in it... especially any of those fey unmarried clergy dripping with lace and sharing their vicarages with their special chums that it so often attracted.

W.S.F. Pickering's "Anglo-Catholicism: a study in ambiguity" (recently reissued: I'm the deacon in the cover photo of the latest edition, in fact) also has a good deal about the Oxford Movement and what Pickering referred to (he was writing a good while ago now) as "sexual ambiguity."

Tush and pish, Robert, I think we're well aware of what is what in these areas not to over-protest in Edwardian ladylike fashion at their articulation, are we not?

RIW, I think the point is that you, without even thinking about it, consider it "sad" that someone would speculate that two women who had spent their lives together "rather than marry" were lesbians. How is that sad? For some of us, it's actually rather sweet to think they might have been lesbians, and lived out their lives comfortably and happily, finding a role and fitting in to a small community, being accepted on the terms they and the community had tacitly agreed on. There were women in the same situation in my home town, and while it wasn't a topic of conversation, that they were lovers was pretty much accepted. The more masculine of the two was jokingly referred to as the other woman's "husband". And yes, there was a bit of disparagement in that, like there would have been in dismissing the quirks of any other person. Sometimes, acceptance is shown by being subject to the same criticism and dismissal as anyone else. Whether or not they were lesbians is another matter, but that is what they were perceived to be, and they were accepted as members of the community with roles to play like everybody else. The only way you would consider it sad to speculate on these women's sexuality is if you believe there is something wrong with being lesbian. Indeed, if these women were accepted by the community in which they lived and functioned as part of that community, like the women of my experience, it would seem you have more difficulty with the ill defined sexuality of these ladies than any of the people who lived with them from day to day. Now, THAT'S sad.

"Was Faber a Catholic?"

He was one of the leading Catholic converts of the 19th century, and founded the English branch of the Oratorians. My great great grandfather was Rector of the last parish which Faber served as an Anglican priest before his conversion. I understand that Faber's private papers show a strongly homosexual orientation.

As for the ladies of Llangollen, I think it is sad that you think it is sad that the lifelong devotion and love of two women for each other who make a single passionate life together should be characterised as lesbian. It's not sad at all.

Mae rhai pobl yn hoyw. Deliwch â’r peth!

Robert Ian Williams, the Ladies of Llangollen were neither the first nor the last... The Genus Montebancum was well known at the time. Bluestockings.

For inststance Miss Bowdler, sister to you know whom...

You're welcome JL, when a person is ill or injured, there's nothing quite so bad at the moment as getting a bad doctor or shrink or therapist; and nothing quite so handy at the moment as getting a good or even excellent one.

On another note: I notice that an Orthodox Rabbi in Washington DC seems to putting a Marin Foundation sort of perspective into practice, as a conservative Jewish leader.

See: http://www.tabletmag.com/news-and-politics/13912/unorthodox-position/

"was Faber a Cathlic?"

Are you serious, RIW? For a hyperbolic RC convert, you don't know your RC converts very well!

"the ladies of Llangollen.. two Anglo-Irish aristiocratic ladies who set up home in Wales... rather than marry. Of course they are now interpreted as lesbians...not just good friends. Isn't that sad?"

Um, no. Not at all (not that I know the history, much less sexual orientation, of the "ladies" involved). But an interpretation of someone as being LGBT is not "sad", RIW. Perhaps inaccurate---never sad.

"Leave the judgement of the dead to God"

Indeed. Including the judgment of persons' sexual orientation as being anything other than the way God (blessedly) made them.

Actually, a different Faber -- same family, though.

It's Geoffrey Faber, not Frederick W.

That RIW isn't familiar with the lesser Faber, though, is still odd.

drdanfee, thank you for the link to the Tablet magazine article!
Imagine, a religious person of Orthodox beliefs who accepts what Scripture says ... and is welcoming of gay people. Who would have thought of such an approach? ;-)
Now if we could just get some of our Orthodox Anglican brothers and sisters to go and do likewise?

I understand that Faber's private papers show a strongly homosexual orientation.

As for the ladies of Llangollen, I think it is sad that you think it is sad that the lifelong devotion and love of two women for each other who make a single passionate life together should be characterised as lesbian. It's not sad at all.

Mae rhai pobl yn hoyw. Deliwch â’r peth!

Posted by: badman on Wednesday, 26 August

Very Well said !

Some folks is gay and it is certainly time to get over it, yn wir!

And who could forget Fr Faber's inspired hymn !

'W.S.F. Pickering's "Anglo-Catholicism: a study in ambiguity" (recently reissued: I'm the deacon in the cover photo of the latest edition, in fact) also has a good deal about the Oxford Movement and what Pickering referred to (he was writing a good while ago now) as "sexual ambiguity."' (Father Mark)

Can't wait to see this book !

I can't imagine what you are saying about all that lace !
Amgiguity it occurs to me must be one of the great C of E - (if not anglican) virtues...

Of course I know that Frederick Faber was a Catholic..but he was not the Faber who wrote the book Oxford Apostles mentioned
earlier! Furthermore there is no evidence tha the former was homosexual in the modern understanding of the word.

The issue of self designation in sexuality is a complex one. The two ladies of Llangollen were viewed by contemporaries as having something very like a marriage which is what made them such celebrities. Certainly by the end of the Victorian era, Frances Power Cobbe described herself as being in a'female marriage' (with Mary Lloyd, the sculpture). However, people did and do have very passionate relationships which are either not expressed physically or are only minimally expressed physically. This is plainly true of both straight and gay people, and occurs for a great variety of reasons.

But sexuality is a continuum. There are plenty of 'metrosexual' men who don't want to buy into the 'straight' stereotypes, don't enjoy the kind of stereotyped behaviour and tastes which have been the masculine ideal. Just as women are now more free to, oh to enjoy science, and paint, and compose and build houses than they were, so men need to be free to sew and all the rest. We need to remember that some of the outrage at gays comes from their daring to be male differently.

We need, for everybody's sake, to lose the straightjacket on 'maleness'.

"Furthermore there is no evidence tha the former was homosexual in the modern understanding of the word."

And, yet, you are certain that the ancient Greek words used in Paul translate accurately into the modern understanding of homosexuality.

"What is needed, perhaps, is an outright denial of this suggestion of collusion by the Archbishop of Canterbury in the plan for ACNA's establishment - before further damage can be done to the Communion by this blatant piece of propaganda on the part of ACNA."

Agreed, Father. How best to bring the Archbishop's attention to +Anderson's claims, I wonder? I assume he does not regularly read any Colorado newspaper.

RIW: ... and, of course, if you've read David Forrester's "Young Doctor Pusey", then you'll have been shocked that (the heterosexual) Dr Pusey had a sexual interest in flagellation... but then the author of that book is a Roman Catholic priest, so I suppose it must be accurate?

L Roberts: Pickering's book is one of those, I'm afraid, that sounds more interesting than it in fact is, though well worth shelling out on for the cover photo alone, of course...

"Furthermore there is no evidence tha the former was homosexual in the modern understanding of the word."

So don't go saying something so utterly horrible about a good man, thereby besmirching his name forever, right Robert? I mean, what an absolutely awful thing to even SUGGEST about someone! Oh, but this is about historical accuracy, right? It has nothing to do with how horrible it is to even think someone might be gay.

"We need, for everybody's sake, to lose the straightjacket on 'maleness'."

Read Self Made Man, by Norah Vincent. She's a lesbian who "passed" as a man for an extended period of time and wrote about her observations. As she says, it's not some scientific commentary or anything, just one woman's observations about what it is like to be a man. It's very interesting, blows away a lot of your stereotypes as to what manhood actually entails, and about how women misperceive what is going on between men. It is also an eye opener for me as a gay man, or perhaps just as a guy who didn't socialize well, to see how peripheral I am to some "man" stuff. You might find that what you consider to be "maleness" is really just the stereotype of maleness popularized as a result of the rise of a kind of feminism that only accepts stereotypes of the "other".

And don't let us forget that these "ideals" are late, 20th century. The man as brute and the woman as refined...

" Sort of like a boil or pimple festering. Eventually it will pop. Drainage. End of infection." - earlier comment -

This sounds strangely like the modern erruption which is now known as ACNA!

Robert I.W., please do get a life. If you want to be considered seriously in these conversations on the topic of the LGBT community, and possible candidates from both Anglo- and Roman-Catholic perspectives, try to get your facts right. Try to listen to people whose own experience tells you something about the reality of what it means to be gay - not what you have assumed it might be like. Or, at least, do a bit of serious reading around the subject. I hope by now you've heard the difference between what fundamentalists have decided was thought to be St. Pauls's references to 'homosexual' in his letters, and the reality of what that word really means in today's context

'Speaking after the Synod ended, the Archbishop of Cape Town, the Most Revd Thabo Makgoba said:

"In Bible studies and discernment sessions during the Synod, I felt the people of the Diocese were committed really to wrestling with the Scriptures and with what they meant in our context.

"I was very encouraged by the way in which the Synod was sensitive both to the pastoral needs of gay and lesbian couples and at the same time affirmed the stance of the wider Anglican Communion, not charging ahead and doing our own thing but rather committing ourselves to a process of listening and dialogue on how to move forward." ' - Capetown Diocesan Synod report -

This record of the Archbishop of Capetown's statement made at the recent Synod of his diocese, on the subject of the acceptance of committed gay partnerships in Southern Africa, clashes (like the ECU's headline topic) with the reluctance of the ABC's and +Durham's to recognise the justice of the inclusion of committed gay partnerships being listened to, recognised and ministered to in the Church.

Perhaps TEC, the Anglican Church of Canada and the Anglican Churches in South Africa will lead the way in this inclusive Gospel mission to the LGBT community within the Communion. But where will that leave the Church of England?

Fr, Ron Smith:

"Perhaps TEC, the Anglican Church of Canada and the Anglican Churches in South Africa will lead the way in this inclusive Gospel mission to the LGBT community within the Communion. But where will that leave the Church of England?"

Wherever it wants to be. Some hard realities are going to have to be faced within the C of E, but that is their job, not mine.

I am hopeful that the Episcopal Church in the US will seek full union with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, with the Lutheran Churches of the Porvoo union. Other unions of various kinds are possible (e.g. with the Methodist and Moravian Churches, even the United Church of Christ and the Presbyterian Church USA).

I am sure that TEC will maintain its existing full communion with the Anglican Church of Canada. Other churches in the Anglican Communion may be willing to follow the Lutherans in respecting the bound consciences of all; these will no doubt wish to remain in full communion with the North American churches.

As for the others, including the Church of England, it is up to them.

As a former resident of South africa it is very sad how the Anglo-Catholic Church of the Province has rapidly descended into liberalism. There is already an alternative " Anglican " body which has been sustained for 70 years by Sydney..the Church of England in South Africa
(CESA).

However despite claimng to be conservative it us a virtual divorce mill and its presiding bishop, Frank Retief has authored a very liberal ( he would say Biblical ) book on Divorce.

CESA has lay celebration, ribena at Holy communion and a Prayer Book where baptismal regeneration and the word Catholic in the Creeds are struck out. It is the Sydney vision of Anglicanism with the Reformation completed.

Hard choices are going to have to be made within the Church of England. The global economic crisis has hit all of the Churches of the Communion. The Sydney Anglicans, according to news report, lost a full 50% of their endowment in the crash. TEC was also hit hard. So was the C of E.

TEC did pick up the tab for Lambeth 2009, covering the massive deficit incurred, but it may not be able to do so in the future. TEC has already had to reduce its support for the Anglican Communion Council. No one else in the Communion is in a position to replace this funding at the moment.

Nor is Sydney in a position to continue to fund the Global South organizations. The right-wing US foundations who have in the past supported breakaway movements have taken hits, too -- because, as we know, everyone has.

So: what will the Church of England do now? For the past thirty years, the Episcopal Church (US) has funded Communion-wide meetings, at which an Archbishop of Canterbury dressed up in his former imperial regalia and pretended to be at the head of a worldwide Communion. The said Communion dedicated itself to bashing the Americans for a few weeks, then presented the tab for same to the Americans, who obediently signed it and went home to do what they had already decided to do.

In sum, an utter charade. These ritualized activities had no connection to what I might call the "real existing Anglican Communion." Even by the standards of traditional British politics, these shenanigans were disconnected, unreal, and bizarre. There is some point to taking up the Clandestine Outlawries Bill directly after the Queen's Speech, you know. There is no point, there has never been any point, to the Anglican Communion's charades.

This has to be faced, and a way forward found that takes account of the realities of the Church of England's situation. But it is not the job of Americans like myself to do this for you. We have our own problems to solve.

Sorry Charlotte but American bishops have played - and continue to play, a leading role in the development of Anglican Communion structures. In fact I would say that -UP TO NOW - American bishops have supported the idea of an "ANGLICAN CHURCH" and have funded all the developments.
Let's not pretend otherwise please .... these are, after all the same crowd who gave os BO33 ....
The news thar Sydney has lost half its 2billion$ is a big story though ...... but 1billion$ is still a lot!

"Perhaps TEC, the Anglican Church of Canada and the Anglican Churches in South Africa will lead the way in this inclusive Gospel mission to the LGBT community within the Communion."

If nothing else, events in SA certainly do give the lie to the idea of a homogenous "Global South" - and to the myth that homosexuality isn't really an African phenomenon. Of course, I would have thought that the existence of Anglican New Zealand and Brazil would have torpedoed the GS™ ship of state, too, but it didn't.

"Ritualized activities"... is the word.

"As a former resident of South africa it is very sad how the Anglo-Catholic Church of the Province has rapidly descended into liberalism. There is already an alternative " Anglican " body which has been sustained for 70 years by Sydney..the Church of England in South Africa (CESA). - RIW -

What, precisely, are you ttrying to convey here, Robert? - that somehow the Anglican Province of South Africa can be equated with C.E.S.A, which may have links with the Syndey Anglicans, but in no way cna it be connected with the Gospel initiatives of the Anglican Provincer of South Africa.

Do try, Robert, to keep your comments to the point at issue. Your ducking and diving on this web-site are beginning to make me dizzy. Is this the direct result of your paddling in the Tiber, or do we look for another reason for your aberrant dabbling with the folderols of worship and liturgical niceties. Get a grip, man!

"As a former resident of South africa it is very sad how the Anglo-Catholic Church of the Province has rapidly descended into liberalism."

Hmm, for most of us ignoramuses, this descent into liberalism is associated with the end of Apartheid and the eminent figure of Desmond Tutu.

"I am hopeful that the Episcopal Church in the US will seek full union with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, with the Lutheran Churches of the Porvoo union. Other unions of various kinds are possible (e.g. with the Methodist and Moravian Churches, even the United Church of Christ and the Presbyterian Church USA)."

Please keep Roman Catholics apprised. By the way did you know that God sent a tornado to punish the ECLA for their ungodly decision?

Surely the tornado was the sign of Divine Displeasure that the ELCA had not implemented Divine Will unanimously........

What's the right sign off, here? Oh yes:

Here I stand. =:-)

Martin, I rarely disagree with your well-informed viewpoint, but I do disagree this time. I think you are misreading the mood of the Episcopal Church. Please keep in mind that the Episcopal Church is not run by its bishops only -- laity also have a strong voice in the polity of our church, including its budgetary decisions.

If the US Episcopal Church (not just "the bishops") have consented to fund Anglican Communion structures up until now, it is because we have been members of them.

If both houses of General Convention (not just "the bishops") consented to B033, it was because B033 was the price of maintaining that wider Communion.

We have since clarified what was meant by B033. (Again, it wasn't only "the bishops"!) The Archbishop of Canterbury read what we wrote and said he can't abide it. Well, then, he can't. So now --

The Church of England will have to sort out what its position and role will be in a nation whose laws uphold equality for gay/lesbian people. They will have to figure out how they can fill their pulpits (and their churches) after they drive gay and lesbian clergy out of their church. And they will have to figure out how to pay for the Communion-wide structures without us, because we won't be members any more.

We had to cut our budget pretty severely at the last General Convention. Yet we maintained 3/4 of our funding for the Anglican Communion structures that are maneuvering once again to eject us (and probably won't, because the whole thing is just an expensive charade). We'd be much better off using that money for useful and productive purposes.

If the Anglican Communion does anything useful and productive, now is the time to let us know!

(PS: As one of our politicians once said: "A billion here, a billion there -- and pretty soon you are talking about real money." Hate to tell Sydney this, but even two billion isn't that much money if you are trying to engage seriously in the world political arena. The Jensens were always punching above their weight, it seems.

The ELCA tornado was proof that God works with out-of-date information and has bad aim, as it struck a building across the street from the meeting-place of the ELCA General Assembly, one that was not currently in use.

Either that, or it was a coincidence. I leave it to you to decide which it is, though I know what evos and charos will say!

The ELCA tornado was the physical manifestation of the Holy Spirit as it moved the ELCA to welcome gay and lesbian people fully into the Christian community.

Why do we always regard weather phenomena as signs of divine displeasure? If so, then one thing we can all agree upon is that God really hates trailer parks.