The Church of England has published LLF Autumn Update: Preparing for Key Decisions. It starts
This Autumn, the House of Bishops will meet to consider further proposals on LLF, with a view to reporting their progress back to the meeting of the General Synod in February 2026. Extensive theological work by the Faith and Order Commission (FAOC) will be available to inform the bishops in their decision making. This includes advice on the nature of doctrine and how it develops, the text and context of the Prayers of Love and Faith, and the exemplarity of clergy life. In order to assist the bishops in their discernment, feedback received from the informal diocesan consultations will also be considered.
and continues with
‘the exemplarity of clergy life’ Never was there a more ominous phrase. In a few words LGBT love has already been condemned. Absolutely no point hand wringing about homophobia or criminalising gay people or spouting about welcoming LGBT people or appointing Chaplains to the LGBT community, or supporting Pride parades if you are going to continue in this vein. If you condemn clergy same sex marriage you condemn all same sex marriages What does it say to LGBT lay people if we’re saying ‘clergy have to be exemplars and so they can’t get married’? It says ‘we disapprove of your… Read more »
You’re absolutely right. The church cannot have it both ways because it cannot give house room to utterly opposed world-views without becoming risibly incoherent, unmanageable and riven with incommensurable factions hamstrung by unending conflict with each other.
It has to choose – like Israel in the time of Elijah. Limp on with two opinions and embrace unending dysfunction. Or choose the LORD, or choose Baal.
I would agree with the ability to have it both ways is limited, but your Biblical analogy disturbs me. Many decades ago I decided to give up my aspiration to ordination and to retreat to the pews at the back of the church in reaction to I Kings 20:43, in which the King of Israel is heavy and displeased because he has spared an enemy. It just came to me at that moment that I was heavy and displeased by the fiercely intolerant teaching of those texts and was never going to be able to preach on their basis. I… Read more »
If both conservatives and progressives are saying ‘the centre cannot hold’, might that be telling us that the range of Anglican sensibilities is simply becoming unsustainably wide?
I would hope there are many Anglican clergy who can affirm the teachings of Jesus and avoid the bellicose and violent happenings in the OT. Does one have, as an Anglican priest, to affirm the goodness of all the OT stuff?
See article 7 of the 39, a hedge against the Marcionite (and possibly antisemitic?) tendency of sundering Jesus from the Hebrew Scriptures
Jesus said it is impossible to serve two masters. That’s the point. Anglican priests have to choose which one to serve, the same as the rest of us.
And is the author of I Kings the one Anglican priests have to serve? Or can they choose instead the teachings of Jesus?
Though (ironically enough given the Ephesians fund etc.) the context of that quote is Jesus teaching about God and money not, I suspect a general rule for everything in life.
What biblical analogy would better illustrate a matter of pressing existential choice between irreconcilable alternatives?
I used to struggle with this same question, but more recently I have learnt to treat these texts, from Abraham through to Exile, like the earlier Genesis texts about Adam and Noah. They are religious texts with profound spiritual, psychological and emotional truths to tell us about humankind and God and their relationship. But they are texts created for a religious and political purpose at a specific time in history, and with limited actual historical content. I hesitate to use the contentious words “mythical” or “legendary” but that is what the evidence points toward. Despite repeated attempts by archaeologists it… Read more »
I thought it meant clergy in gay relationships could be exemplary of how a good relationship works…… As with so much of the discussion : Too Much Ambiguity!