Thinking Anglicans

LLF Programme Board members announced

The Church of England has published this: LLF Programme Board update.

Details of LLF Programme Board membership confirmed

Following an update last month on the new Programme Board to steer the next steps of Living in Love and Faith (LLF), progress has been made in forming this Board, together with the three working groups.

The Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell, has agreed to Chair the Programme Board, supporting the Bishop of Leicester, Martyn Snow, in his ongoing work as the lead bishop of LLF.

Additionally, the Bishop of Stockport, Sam Corley, the Acting Bishop of Coventry, Ruth Worlsey and the Bishop of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich will also serve on the Programme Board, with a further member to be appointed.

Ex Officio members will be Jamie Harrison, Chair of the House of Laity, Alison Coulter, Vice-chair of the House of Laity, Luke Miller, Prolocutor of the House of Clergy and Kate Wharton, Prolocutor of the House of Clergy. They will be supported by staff from the National Church Institutions (NCIs).

Full details of the membership of the three working groups – Pastoral Guidance, Pastoral Provision and Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF) – will be shared once all members have been appointed.

Together for the Church of England has published this Public Statement on LLF from Together (April 2024)   (This organisation is an amalgamation of GSGSG (General Synod Gender and Sexuality Group and MOSAIC (The Movement of Supporting Anglicans for an Inclusive Church).

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Fr Dean
Fr Dean
6 months ago

Do any of these people identify as being LGBTQI+?

Mark
Reply to  Fr Dean
6 months ago

That’s a very good point: I can’t imagine the C of E having any committees looking at other groups in the Church – women clergy or people from ethnic minorities, for example – that weren’t composed more or less entirely of people from that particular group. The fact that it seems impossible for the C of E just to let gay Anglicans themselves get on with defining their own place in relation to the rest of the Church, rather than being told by everyone else how it has to be, indicates the lack of fairness with which this one minority… Read more »

Janet Fife
Janet Fife
Reply to  Mark
6 months ago

On the contrary, it’s normal practice in the C of E for committees to consist almost entirely of people who don’t have a stake in the subject at issue. Which is one reason why so many daft and insensitive decisions are made. See, for instance, Martine Oborne’s account of the Swinson Report: ‘Swinson flags up that the Church of England has still not done the work that was recommended by her predecessor, Sir Philip Mawer, in 2017 on the theological and pastoral work that urgently needs to be done to take account of the impact on women’s ministries and well-being when they… Read more »

David Hawkins
David Hawkins
6 months ago

Yet again the Church of England sets up a huge and expensive bureaucracy despite all the evidence that huge and expensive bureaucracies are simply a millstone around the collective neck of our national church. God’s love is unconditional and our love should at least try to be unconditional too. In all this there is only a grudging acceptance of difference. My lesbian and gay brothers and sisters in Christ are still “a problem” and by implication flawed human beings. My experience is quite definitely the reverse. And in the meantime Genocide is happening in Gaza and my church is silent.… Read more »

Froghole
Froghole
Reply to  David Hawkins
6 months ago

I think it will be necessary to promulgate a new law of Christian cowardice: that the degree of silence about issues of first order importance (such as genocide, imminent threats to world peace or nuclear war) will always be in inverse proportion to the garrulousness of Christians about issues of second, third or tenth order importance. As may be evident from much Christian media. In which case, what is the point of the churches? Where is the Anglican peace movement, for instance? The British record on the present conflict, with a few lonely exceptions, has been notably egregious. However, it… Read more »

Mark
Reply to  Froghole
6 months ago

I do just wish we could all stop rushing to be so moralistic! To me, it is the least attractive aspect of British Christianity, and I find it a welcome contrast to be living on the continent where the culture is not like that, and none the worse for it. Being moralistic (and virtue signalling) is not the same thing as being moral.

David Hawkins
David Hawkins
Reply to  Mark
6 months ago

Six year old Hind Rajab was trapped inside a car in Gaza with her dead relatives. This terrified little girl phoned for help and help was coordinated with Israel but despite this Hind and the two paramedics sent to rescue her were gunned down. It is not virtue signalling to care about the death of a terrified little girl it is surely what followers of.Jesus are supposed to do and when my church obsesses about bureaucratic naval gazing and has nothing to say about Hind Rajab then I say something is seriously wrong. And I question the whole point of… Read more »

Mark
Reply to  David Hawkins
6 months ago

I disagree: we belong to a religion in which we are enjoined not to judge, that we be not judged; not to look at the speck in our neighbour’s eye rather than the log in our own; and not to emulate the self-righteousness of the Pharisees. I think that other Europeans have understood that much better than the British, where the baleful legacy of the Puritans and the Victorian middle-class conscience have sadly not died out, but rather been resuscitated in their current generation of direct descendants, the moralistic Guardianista progressives of today. I think other Europeans may well view… Read more »

Francis James
Francis James
Reply to  Froghole
6 months ago

Froghole, my wild guess is that you are not a naval expert, let alone a submarine expert, and the article you quote does a lot of heavy lifting with supposition. Suffice it to say that having an extended conning tower (or ‘sail’ in  American terminology) is much more likely to be for special forces, or drones, than it is for SLBM. Although back in distant past the Soviet navy did try this in two submarine classes (one conventional & one nuclear), and the North Korean may be doing the same with conventional boat, it is a low-tech limited stop-gap &… Read more »

Simon Kershaw
Admin
6 months ago

They might have spelt Ruth Worsley’s name properly. And the Bishop of Eds & Ips doesn’t get a name.

Michael H
Michael H
Reply to  Simon Kershaw
6 months ago

I’m surprised Bishop Ruth has the time. She’s bishop of Taunton and Acting bishop of Coventry, commuting hundreds of miles every week.

Wandering minstrel
Wandering minstrel
6 months ago

Which members of staff? How many? And in precisely what capacity?

Shamus
Shamus
6 months ago

The longer this is all dragged out, the more like a sham exercise LLF looks. The can kicking in so many areas of the Church is scandalous. And a waste of money.

David Keen
David Keen
6 months ago

How much is this costing?

Lorenzo Fernandez-Smal
Lorenzo Fernandez-Smal
6 months ago

“This organisation is an amalgamation of GSGSG (General Synod Gender and Sexuality Group and MOSAIC (The Movement of Supporting Anglicans for an Inclusive Church).” The people’s Front of Judea and the Judea people’s Front. I think I’ll stop trying to catch up.

Janet Fife
Janet Fife
Reply to  Lorenzo Fernandez-Smal
6 months ago

The term ‘inclusive church’ does of course refer to disability, race, and women’s issues as well as LGBT matters.

David Runcorn
David Runcorn
Reply to  Lorenzo Fernandez-Smal
6 months ago

Joking aside, if there is to be a coordinated response to the way conservatives have been filling key jobs and committees and blocking and controlling the agenda, this organisation is absolutely vital and I, for one, am very grateful. This is hard work.

Michael OSullivan
Michael OSullivan
6 months ago

After the Martin Sargeant fiasco, just how is Luke Miller being allowed near anything of any importance whatsoever?

Fr Dexter Bracey
Fr Dexter Bracey
Reply to  Michael OSullivan
6 months ago

I wondered that too. Any other member of the clergy who had fouled up so badly on anything safeguarding-related would have been dragged through a CDM.

peter kettle
peter kettle
Reply to  Michael OSullivan
6 months ago

Well, Luke Miller was elected to General Synod by London clergy; and then the House of Clergy on GS elected him as their shop steward or whatever it’s called. So he obviously has quite a following.

It amuses me that his wife is a priest!

Homeless Anglican
Homeless Anglican
Reply to  peter kettle
6 months ago

I think that she is a permanent deacon.

Peter Owen
Admin
Reply to  Homeless Anglican
6 months ago

According to the London diocesan website his wife Jacqui is a SSM assistant priest at St Peter’s Eaton Square.

peter kettle
peter kettle
Reply to  Michael OSullivan
6 months ago

Well, he was elected to General Synod by the clergy of London Diocese; and then elected by the GS clergy as their shop steward or whatever the post is called. So he must have a following …….

Fr Dexter Bracey
Fr Dexter Bracey
Reply to  peter kettle
6 months ago

His election as Prolocutor may reflect the unpopularity of his predecessor as much as anything else.

Andrew Godsall
Andrew Godsall
6 months ago

“supporting the Bishop of Leicester, Martyn Snow, in his ongoing work as the lead bishop of LLF.”

Am I imagining it or did Martyn Snow not state that a condition of him staying on as lead bishop of LLF was that a replacement for Helen-Ann Hartley, who resigned, be found and that the appointment was also someone who was affirming of same sex relationships?

Helen King
Helen King
Reply to  Andrew Godsall
6 months ago

Andrew, you’ll be thinking of the 1 February press release in which +Martyn was quoted as saying ‘The Archbishops will need to appoint a successor to Bishop Helen-Ann who commands similar respect across the House of Bishops and General Synod. It is important to model an approach of people with differing views working together.’ That was then overtaken by the 8 March announcement of ‘a new programme board’. One possible conclusion to be drawn from the change of model would be that no bishop was prepared to take on the role which +Helen-Ann had vacated.

Andrew Godsall
Andrew Godsall
Reply to  Helen King
6 months ago

Thanks Helen. I was assuming +Martyn’s ‘proviso’ in the 1st Feb press release still stood and hadn’t been superseded by the Programme Board stuff. Because +Martyn is still called ‘lead bishop’. I had also come to the conclusion that no one else was prepared to take the thing on from +Helen-Ann. And then come to the conclusion that was because her ‘inclusive’ approach was clearly a non-starter. Perhaps I am being too pessimistic but I am certainly very tired of this whole process. Sadly I am not confident there will not be a few of the ‘usual suspects’ in the… Read more »

Adrian Clarke
Adrian Clarke
6 months ago

At last, these are the first stirrings that this issue is being treated with the seriousness that it deserves on both sides of the debate on same sex blessings/marriage. It should no longer come as a surprise that some sort of legal differentiation/separation is needed, a process which could take as long as 5 years to complete.. Painful and bold decisions are needed both collectively and individually, which can’t simply be glossed over, and much love and sensitivity will be needed along the way. An end to the posturing – time for the real work to begin!

Shamus
Shamus
Reply to  Adrian Clarke
6 months ago

“…5 years to complete…” And at what cost? Financially and personally for people who want to move on from this ridiculous process. What a distraction this all is from things that actually matter.

Susanna (no ‘h’)
Susanna (no ‘h’)
Reply to  Adrian Clarke
6 months ago

What a fascinating set of assumptions…..

Francis James
Francis James
Reply to  Adrian Clarke
6 months ago

Adrian, are you saying that the whole LLF process from 2017 up until now has been a complete waste of time, effort, & money, & that CofE now have to go back to square one? Perhaps I misunderstand you, but the idea that we can anticipate at least another 5 years of money being chucked down the drain to no avail is too depressing for words.

Kate Keates
Kate Keates
Reply to  Adrian Clarke
6 months ago

Can you not see that the Swinson report will remove any last scrap of confidence LGBT Christians might have in such a separation?

John Davies
John Davies
6 months ago

Funnily enough, J K Rowling’s opinions came up among some of my fellow workers at church this morning. As I don’t even begin to understand the issues, I kept schtum, and listened. Fairly clearly, my friends were most certainly not supportive of anything to do with ‘trans’ or equality, and not particularly open to any new or ‘progressive’ ideas. At another event last night, in another CofE church noted locally for its minister’s opposition to either gay or female equality, they were promoting Vaughan Roberts’ book “Faith in a Time of Crisis”. I thought it meant the political chaos in… Read more »

Kate Keates
Kate Keates
Reply to  John Davies
6 months ago

I suspect that the archbishops know that the gulf is unbridgeable but live in hope while delaying as much as possible.

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