Updated Thursday evening
Continuing the report from Monday:
Andrew Brown wrote on Comment is free taking issue with Simon Barrow, in Faith schools: is there really a better option?
Simon Barrow has now replied at Wardman Wire with Faithfully schooled for debate?
The Church of England Newspaper has published an editorial headlined Religious schools: open up or call time? That URL will only be valid for a week, but Ekklesia has reproduced the full text over here.
This mentions the Cantle report of 2001. You can find that as a PDF here. And the Church of England press release in response here.
Update
Jonathan Romain also wrote at Comment is free under the title I’m for faith, not faith schools.
The Dean of Westminster, formerly the Church of England’s chief education officer, replied to him, see Schooling for tolerance.
And the Economist weighed in with Religious rights and wrongs.
4 CommentsA new coalition was launched today, which aims to change the agenda on faith schools in Britain. The Accord website is here. The group’s aims are stated as follows:
We believe all state-funded schools should:
1. Operate admissions policies that take no account of pupils’ – or their parents’ – religion or beliefs.
2. Operate recruitment and employment policies that do not discriminate on the grounds of religion or belief.
3. Follow an objective, fair and balanced syllabus for education about religious and non-religious beliefs – whether determined by their local authority or by any future national syllabus or curriculum for RE.
4. Be made accountable under a single inspection regime for RE, Personal, Social & Health Education (PSHE) and Citizenship.
5. Provide their pupils with inclusive, inspiring and stimulating assemblies in place of compulsory acts of worship.
Advance press coverage of this, see for example New pressure over faith schools at the BBC and Faith schools accused on employment from the Press Association and Campaigners fight to stop schools recruiting staff based on religion in the Guardian produced some strong reactions, notably Melanie McDonagh: Faith schools work. Until you take the faith away at the Independent.
A counter-coalition called the Faith Schools’ Providers Group issued a press release reported in Mainstream religious leaders unite to defend faith schools.
And the Catholic Education Service also issued its own press statement: Catholic Education Service rejects ‘spurious’ claims of group opposing faith schools.
Today, Simon Barrow has written repeatedly about what Accord is really seeking:
Ekklesia A Christian case for Accord
Open Democracy Changing the agenda on faith schools
Comment is free Changing the faith schools’ agenda
8 CommentsThe report to General Synod (GS 1685A) from the House of Bishops on the legislation for women bishops was clear. A majority of that house wished to avoid the creation of any new structures, and considered that a national code of practice was both necessary and sufficient to protect the consciences of those unable to accept the ministry of women as bishops.
We knew before the 11 July debate that “a significant minority within the House” was opposed to the approach embodied in the draft resolution submitted. But we did not know the size and composition of the majority or the minority. Now we do. The results of the electronic voting in the House of Bishops are available, either here, or over here.
The final outcome saw 68% of the bishops present, and 72% of the House of Clergy voting in favour of a motion that had been amended only slightly from the text the House of Bishops had originally put forward. The laity were less enthusiastic with a majority of only 61%. (Overall, exactly a two-thirds majority.) So the Synod accepted the view of the episcopal majority, and rejected all attempts to adopt any of the other options that the Manchester Report had proposed.
Episcopal opposition turned out to be almost entirely limited to a core group of only twelve bishops. These included five who later signed the 15 August letter (see below) and who also have votes in Synod, i.e. the Bishops of Blackburn, Chichester, Europe, Burnley and Beverley. There were also seven others: the Bishops of Birmingham, Exeter, London, Rochester, Winchester, Dover and, significantly, the Archbishop of Canterbury.
At the end of the debate, the Archbishop abstained, and the other eleven all voted against the substantive motion. The only other bishop who voted “No” was the Bishop of Durham, whose earlier motion to adjourn the debate had support from only 46% of the synod. He had consistently opposed every amendment throughout the debate.
The group of twelve also supported several amendments that would have moved the outcome in a conservative direction.
First, all twelve voted in favour of an amendment proposed by the Bishop of Winchester. Only two other bishops joined in this action: Bradford and Southwell & Nottingham. This amendment sought to do two things:
Next, a small wording change, proposed by Prebendary David Houlding, to change “wish” to “wish of the majority” [for women to be admitted to the episcopate] was narrowly approved, by 62% of Bishops and 51% of Laity but by only by a single vote in the House of Clergy. Curiously, the Bishop of Rochester voted against this.
Ten of the twelve then voted in favour of Fr Simon Killwick’s amendment that sought to allow new dioceses to be considered. London opposed this and Canterbury abstained. No other bishop voted for it. The amendment was defeated by 71%, 68.5%, and 61% margins in the three houses.
Eleven then voted for the Bishop of Exeter’s amendment, which aimed to allow a structural solution based on existing rather than new dioceses. Again London voted against, but two others (Bradford and St Edmundsbury) added support. It also was defeated by margins of 64%, 64% and 59%.
Finally, ten of them voted for the Bishop of Ripon & Leeds’s amendment to keep open the possibility of “statutory transfer of specified responsibilities”. Altogether 21 bishops supported this, but amazingly both Chichester and Birmingham opposed it, leading to a 21-21 tie in that House. (The chair of the drafting group, the Bishop of Manchester, abstained on many though not all votes.)
The amendment did obtain a 53% majority in the House of Laity, but failed in the House of Clergy where it obtained only 47% support. Had the vote not been by houses, the amendment would have passed by the slim margin of 203-200, with 3 abstentions.
For completeness, I should also note that two other amendments were both voted down by huge margins. The Reverend Steven Trott’s amendment, to keep open all the options of the Manchester report, was voted down by huge margins in all houses: 89% of bishops, 82% of clergy, and 78% of laity. Among all the bishops, only Chichester, Rochester and Beverley voted “yes”.
To match this, the Reverend Miranda Threlfall-Holmes’ amendment to adopt the “simplest statutory approach”, and exclude even a national code of practice, was also voted down by large margins, though smaller than in the previous case. The figures against were 82%, 59%, and 62%. Seven bishops were in favour of this, namely Southwark, Bristol, Liverpool, Bath & Wells, Hereford, Derby and Portsmouth. The Bishop of Ripon & Leeds abstained.
The net effect of all this is that the view of the overwhelming majority of the House of Bishops was accepted by the whole synod. The recent letter from fourteen traditionalist Anglo-Catholic bishops, only five of whom have votes in General Synod, highlighted that the House of Laity vote was below the two-thirds level that will be needed for final approval of the women bishops legislation. It also pointed to close voting on the amendment offered by the Bishop of Ripon & Leeds as another indicator of less than overwhelming support for legislation without “new structures”.
However, the final approval vote will not occur in the life of this Synod, but only after new elections have been held in 2010. This issue may well dominate those elections. The House of Bishops, to whom the letter writers are explicitly appealing, does not meet again until October. By that time, the Legislative Drafting Group should be halfway through its task of preparing a draft for the General Synod to consider in February. General Synod has clearly instructed the group to do so only on the basis of a statutory code of practice. The strength of support for that in the House of Bishops is now clearly on the record.
Note: Sheffield and Truro were vacant sees at the time of the vote, and there were six bishops who were either not present or who never voted at all (Coventry, Chester, Sodor & Man, Ely, Salisbury and Leicester).
22 CommentsThe Bishop of Ely, Anthony Russell has written On returning home from Lambeth.
Paul Richardson, Assistant Bishop of Newcastle, has written Analysis: Will the Lambeth Conference bring peace to the Anglican world?
The Bishop of Oxford, John Pritchard has written Bishop John reflects on Lambeth.
12 CommentsThis time from the Bishop of Gloucester, Michael Perham.
Read Bishop Michael’s account of the Lambeth Conference.
Earlier entries in this series:
Christopher Hill, Bishop of Guildford.
Michael Scott-Joynt, Bishop of Winchester.
Updated again Friday afternoon
The text of the letter from fourteen English bishops to the signatories of the open letter from 1,400 clergy to the Archbishops of Canterbury and York concerning the ordination of women to the episcopate is copied in full below the fold.
Original reports of the earlier letter, and a link to the original with signatures, are here.
Today’s Telegraph report by Jonathan Wynne-Jones is headlined ‘Substantial number’ of clergy will leave over plans for women bishops.
Update Friday
Church Times report Bishops offer lead to Catholics: Wait and be charitable by Pat Ashworth
Church of England Newspaper report English bishops dismiss Code of Practice proposal by Matt Cresswell
The Bishop of Gloucester, Michael Perham has set out his thoughts on the latest General Synod debate on the ordination of women to the episcopate.
49 CommentsSavitri Hensman has written an article on Comment is free which is titled Too big a tent with the strapline:
Rowan Williams preaches tolerance, but the Anglican church would rather pander to bigots than fight homophobia.
Her article concludes:
36 CommentsMeanwhile, at the Lambeth conference, the Archbishop of Canterbury appealed for a “covenant of faith” that would “promise to our fellow human beings the generosity God has shown us”, and suggested “a Pastoral Forum to support minorities”. But to him, those needing greater generosity and pastoral care were mainly Christians with strong objections to same-sex partnerships. While he is a humane man, his priorities seem strange. If Anglicans are to remain relevant, and a force for good, bishops need to listen more carefully to people like Michael Causer’s family.
This one is from the Bishop of Guildford, Christopher Hill.
Read the transcript of his audio interview in this PDF file: Lambeth Conference 2008 Mark Rudall talks to Bishop Christopher Hill, Bishop of Guildford.
The audio itself is linked from this page.
2 CommentsUpdated Thursday evening
Today, the Bishop of Winchester has published a lengthy article, The Lambeth Conference 2008 – and the future of the Anglican Communion A Report to the Diocese of Winchester although I cannot at present find it on the Winchester diocesan website, but only on the Global South Anglican website, and, in part, on the Anglican Mainstream website.
Anyway you can read it all here.
Update
Jonathan Wynne-Jones has written about this letter, see Senior bishop predicts Anglican battle ahead.
The Church of England issued this press release today:
13 CommentsLambeth Conference: Funding
11 August 2008The Board of Governors of the Church Commissioners, and the Archbishops’ Council of the Church of England have both met within the past few days to discuss an approach from the Lambeth Conference Company* for financial help. The Board met this morning (August 11th) and the Council on Thursday August 7th.
The Company has assured the Board and the Council that it is continuing to make further approaches throughout the Anglican Communion to meet the full cost of this year’s Conference. It cannot, however, be confident that these will generate funds sufficiently quickly for it to meet all of its obligations as they fall due over the coming weeks and months.
The Board of Governors of the Church Commissioners and the Archbishops’ Council have therefore each agreed to make available to the Company up to £600k as required to enable the Company to honour its commitments while fundraising efforts continue. At this stage both bodies regard these amounts as interest free loan facilities.
They will be considering these matters again at their September meetings when they expect a further report from the Company about the progress of its fundraising efforts.
Notes
There has already been generous support from the Church of England for the Lambeth Conference. Parishes and dioceses have made donations towards the costs of overseas bishops attending and the Church Commissioners have met the fees of the English bishops and their wives attending the Lambeth Conference, the costs of some of the conference organising staff, and some of the hospitality offered by the Archbishop of Canterbury.
More information about the Lambeth Conference is available at www.lambethconference.org.
*The Lambeth Conference Company is the body given responsibility for managing the finances and administration of the Lambeth Conference 2008.
Updated again Thursday 14 August evening to include new letter from Deborah Pitt
The original batch of material in The Times itself was linked here, together with the first reports in other newspapers.
The response of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the letter to The Times from 19 CofE bishops was linked here.
The Times also published on 8 August, Dr Williams ‘has made a split inevitable in the Anglican Church’ by Ruth Gledhill.
Today, The Times published another article, Bishops back Rowan Williams in gay sex row – even though some don’t agree with him.
Here’s how some others covered this story:
Religious Intelligence first had Gay relationships ‘comparable to marriage’, says Archbishop of Canterbury , followed by Letters put fresh pressure on Archbishop and then had Bishops decalre their support for ‘magnificent’ Williams.
George Pitcher at the Telegraph has written Rowan Williams and sex: a clarification.
TIME magazine had Anglican Church Gay Row Heats Up.
The BBC had Gay ties like marriage – Williams.
Sunday update
Austen Ivereigh, writing for the journal America has No longer the ‘Labor Party at prayer’ in which he reveals:
What the 19 bishops do not realise is that the letters arrived on the desks of the religious correspondents of The Times, the Telegraph and the Guardian two whole weeks ago. But because the reporters were at Canterbury following the conference, they did not see the brown envelopes until after they got back. Amazing but true: no-one opened their mail in their absence. Because journalists no longer receive scoops by post — fax and email are the usual channel these days — their staff do not bother to open their mail.
Update Thursday See this letter to The Times from Deborah Pitt herself, Why I leaked the Archbishop’s letters.
13 CommentsThe Archbishop of Canterbury has issued the following statement in response to the release of the Pitt letters.
Friday 08 August 2008
In response to the recent coverage of the correspondence dated back to 2000, The Archbishop Canterbury has made the following statement:
In the light of recent reports based on private correspondence from eight years ago, I wish to make it plain that, as I have consistently said, I accept Resolution I.10 of the 1998 Lambeth Conference as stating the position of the worldwide Anglican Communion on issues of sexual ethics and thus as providing the authoritative basis on which I as Archbishop speak on such questions.
That Resolution also recognises the need for continuing study and discussion on the matter. In the past, as a professional theologian, I have made some contributions to such study. But obviously, no individual’s speculations about this have any authority of themselves. Our Anglican Church has never exercised close control over what individual theologians may say. However, like any church, it has the right to declare what may be said in its name as official doctrine and to define the limits of legitimate practice. As Archbishop I understand my responsibility to be to the declared teaching of the church I serve, and thus to discourage any developments that might imply that the position and convictions of the worldwide Communion have changed.
The Bishop of Durham and 18 other bishops have written a letter to The Times which begins:
35 CommentsSir, As bishops in the Church of England, we wish to protest in the strongest possible terms at what we regard as a gross misrepresentation of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
The last update on here was CartoonChurch and the owner of the former SPCK bookshops.
Matt Wardman now reports: Dave Walker/SPCK Bookshops Campaign Moving Soon.
The place to which this move is taking place is: SPCK/SSG: News, Notes & Info.
2 CommentsHere’s a piece I wrote for Lambeth Witness. It’s in this issue here (PDF).
Lambeth: The View from the English Pew
by Simon Sarmiento
Thinking Anglicans
I’m fairly sure the average English churchgoer thinks that the Lambeth Conference is something of great importance to bishops. After all it gives them a chance to get away from home with their wives for over two weeks, and the Church Commissioners will pick up the full tab. Unlike their American counterparts, they are already accustomed to the primitive plumbing facilities of English university residence halls, which they experience every July when General Synod goes to York. But hey, it’s free.
I don’t believe though that many Church of England (CofE) parishioners think that the Lambeth Conference is of importance to them. They know that the Church of England is ultimately controlled by Parliament, via powers delegated to the General Synod, but they also know that the General Synod is very rarely able to agree on anything very quickly, if at all. So the chance of anything changing in their parish church because of something a Sudanese bishop said is rather remote.
And most parishioners know that what the national newspapers and television tell them about the CofE is rubbish anyway. They know this because their parish clergy, especially those who are members of General Synod, tell them this all the time.
And because the average churchgoer doesn’t read the Church Times, the only thing they will ever learn about Lambeth is what they hear in the pulpit. Lots of sermons have been preached in England recently about the Conference, and how important it is to pray for the bishops, including those not coming. In fact the main thing most people know about this conference is that hundreds of bishops are staying away. They may not be very clear about why this is, but one thing they are all certain of: it’s not the Church of England’s fault.
4 CommentsStonewall has issued a report which Ruth Gledhill describes in The Times, see Faith leaders out of touch about gays and also Lambeth Diary: faith people ‘moderate’ on gays.
The Stonewall press release says:
Many faith leaders inadequately reflect their followers’ religious objections to lesbian and gay sexuality, new research has found. Love Thy Neighbour – published today by Stonewall and based on interviews with Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and Christian participants from across the north of England – found that many hold significantly more moderate views of homosexuality than is often claimed on their behalf. Participants suggested to researchers from the University of Leeds that when the perceived tension between faith and sexual orientation is discussed in public, the agenda often becomes so dominated by aggression and sensationalism that levels of respect between faith communities and gay communities are overlooked.
Ben Summerskill, Stonewall Chief Executive, said: ‘Witnessing the saddening divisions in the Church of England demonstrated at this week’s Lambeth Conference, it’s telling that so many people of faith say they actually live, work and socialise with lesbian and gay people, and that significantly reduces negative ideas about difference. Many Christians, Jews, Muslims and Hindus are clearly markedly more moderate that we are often allowed to believe. The stark conclusion to draw when it comes to religion and homosexuality is that it may be time to start listening to the voices of the many people of faith in Britain which have until now not been heard enough.’
Interviewees suggested that new legal protections for lesbian and gay people, including civil partnership, have had a ‘civilising effect’ on British society. The increased acceptance of gay people on a national and political level has also had a positive impact on attitudes at a local level, they said. This confirms the findings of Living together, a YouGov survey of 2,000 people published by Stonewall in 2007, which found that 84 per cent of people who identified as religious disagreed with the statement ‘homosexuality is morally unacceptable in all circumstances.’
Ruth has made the full report available here. It’s a 200K PDF.
6 CommentsUpdated again Tuesday afternoon
There was a press conference today at Canterbury, at which the Archbishop of Canterbury answered questions.
A full audio recording of this can be downloaded from the ACO website, go here.
A video recording of it is available at ENS, go here.
Navigate to the video by date: 07/21/08.
Jim Naughton has posted about it, see Live: ABC meets the press.
I will add links here to further reports about this event.
Anglican Journal Communion not headed for a schism, says Archbishop of Canterbury
BBC ‘Alienation’ over women bishops and also Robert Pigott’s Lambeth diary: Saying sorry
Guardian Riazat Butt Church is not wounded and bleeding, says Williams
Telegraph Martin Beckford Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams: Traditionalists ‘alienated’ by women bishops
Tuesday afternoon
The Times Ruth Gledhill Archbishop confirms church’s anti-gay sex stance
16 CommentsThe detailed reports in the Church Times of the recent Church of England General Synod are now available to non-subscribers.
The reports on the women bishops debates
Women bishops: debate: ‘I know people say that bishops can’t be trusted, but I think I can’ – reports of the Bishop of Manchester’s preentation on the Friday evening and the take note debate on the Saturday.
Women bishops: the vote – the main debate on Monday 7 July
Below the fold are details of clergy votes in the debate on women bishops on Monday 7 July similar to my earlier details for bishops. So far only three of the votes (the Packer amendment, the vote on the adjournment and the final vote) are included.
I have matched my list of members and the voting lists by synod number. My list is based on the June 2008 list of members, which may not be totally up-to-date.
13 CommentsVoting lists for the electronic votes at the recent sessions of the Church of England’s General Synod are now online. I have summarised the bishops’ votes in the debate on women bishops held on Monday 7 July, both in a table below the fold and online as a pdf file.
The table records whether each bishop voted for or against each motion or amendment, or recorded an abstention. Some of the 45 bishops present missed some of the votes altogether and this is indicated by a dash.
Bishops are listed alphabetically by surname, and their synod number is given in the first column.
I have already given the text of each amendment and of the substantive motion, and the overall voting figures here. The table includes my very brief summary of the purpose of each amendment.
Note: Not included in the table are the bishops of Sheffield and Truro (sees vacant) and the bishops of Coventry, Chester, Ely, Leicester, Salisbury and Sodor & Man, none of whom took part in any of the votes. The bishop of Coventry was only consecrated on 3 July, the bishop of Leicester was on duty at the House of Lords and the bishop of Salisbury was ill. I don’t know why the others were absent.
25 CommentsThe Government has published yet another White Paper on Lords Reform. You can find it over here.
The section relating to Church of England Bishops is reproduced below the fold.
Ekklesia has already published its opinion, Time to remove Bishops from the House of Lords:
11 Comments…The Church of England, an external institution with its own particular agenda, would be able to parachute whomever they choose into the second chamber of Parliament as a matter of right. This would not be a step forward but a step back into the dark ages of special political privilege. With the Prime Minister’s power to appoint bishops being ended, that section of the House of Lords would be more unaccountable than it has ever been…