Updated twice on Saturday
At Together for the Church of England Charlie Baczyk-Bell has written
B2 or not B2: that isn’t the question
At Psephizo Andrew Goddard has written
Why has the LLF process reached the end of the line?
The latter article is a summary: the full version (21 pages) is available here.
Updates
At Shared Conversations, Helen King has written
‘We need the theology’: what has now been released, and does it answer the real questions?
At ViaMedia.News, Peter Collier has written
Where Does the House of Bishops Currently Stand on the Use of Prayers of Love and Faith? Some Reflections
“Why has the LLF process reached the end of the line?” It hasn’t. It is the largest process of engagement the Church of England has ever embarked on, and it has birthed new groups and new ideas that have not gone away.. Rather, they are part of a journey that continues, to find ways we can love one another, live with one another, accommodate one another, and protect decent people’s consciences even when they differ. We need to seek unity in Christ, which is not the same as uniformity. Not if ‘uniformity’ means dominating the consciences and beliefs of half… Read more »
Some people (mainly con evos) are trying to assert that LLF is dead in the water. Primarily to convince the rest of the church that this is reality. Sleight of (under)hand.
It seems a little submerged
The main new element appears to be para 17 which may have increased caution about commending PLF for bespoke services but also weakens the existing commendation for PLF in regular services: …where a form of service is commended only by a majority of the House of the Bishops, with significant dissent, the position is less clear. Commendation of forms of service has conventionally been by the unanimous decision (or at least a decision from which no bishop actively dissented) of the House of Bishops. Where – as was the case with the PLF Resources – a significant number of bishops dissent, it… Read more »
Could you give me the very most basic level of respect and use my actual name?
I looked (without much hope, I have to confess) for one word in Andrew Goddard’s massive screed to indicate that he had any sense of sympathy or compassion for the people who are being excluded because of the legal and theological opinions he is expounding so eruditely.
I couldn’t find one.
From today’s gospel in the daily office lectionary of the Anglican Church of Canada, beautifully translated in the REB:
‘When (Jesus) came ashore and saw a large crowd, his heart went out to them…’ (Matthew 14.14)
Thanks Tim. I have to agree with you. When doctrine does not land somewhere – taking flesh in real lives and communities, it becomes an ideology and is experienced as coercive of those ives. And so it has become.
What I find most offensive (and I don’t mean Andrew here) is the conservative claims to have suffered during this process, from the Shared Conversations onwards. It is tone deaf.
Yes, I can disagree with them, but that claim is a real trigger for me too.
Something has long puzzled me, David, and this emphasises it. We believe, I understand, that we are no longer under ‘law’ but divine grace. That’s a basic foundation of our Christian faith. Why is it, then, that the evangelical wing – who talk so much about divine grace – are the first to run to legal ‘law’ in so many moral areas? Or so it seems to me.
Jesus reacted that way to a crowd of ordinary people but to make the point needed we would need to consider how he reacted to unrepentant sinners, on whom his Woes were sometimes laid. That’s how the other side in this matter view sexually active gays
Firstly, how many of those were unrepentant sexual sinners? I can’t think of any.
Second, how do we know that this was ‘a crowd of ordinary people’? We aren’t told anything about this crowd except (in John) that after the feeding they tried to make him king by force, which would seem to indicate that they didn’t exactly have a good read on his message.
There is no indication that sexual sin is treated less seriously than other sin though. People who gather in crowds often have political interests
Can you remind me of one instance where Jesus rebuked an unrepentant sexual sinner? I’m not saying he never did. I’m just saying that I have no memory of one in the gospels (John 4 is the closest I can come). The usual target of his woes were unrepentant religious hypocrites. That seems to have been his priority—that, and lovers of money.
I mean this is a respectful question. Since unrepentant sexual sin is ‘rebuked/condemned’ in the NT more broadly, and in the OT certainly, how does this affect what it might mean to try to isolate the matter by focusing on Jesus as depicted in the Gospels? I should have thought you can’t have the part without the whole. Biblical theology and ethics require a wider lens surely.
The discussion was based on my citing of a text from the gospels. This was what Martin was responding to.
I know. Just wondered. I thought it might be the red-letter Jesus Bible idea, as though the words of Jesus could come to us without the apostolic lens of inspired writing.
Well, I am half Mennonite, so I do see Jesus as the authoritative interpreter of the rest of the Bible. By the way, so did CS Lewis (no Mennonite!). In a letter to a friend (I forget the subject) he says, ‘If St. Paul is contradicting Christ, the authority of Christ overrides St. Paul’. And of course he’s famous for saying in another letter that ‘it is Christ himself, not the Bible, who is the true Word of God; the Bible (read responsibly and under the guidance of wise teachers) will lead us to him’ (I paraphrase). So i would… Read more »
Another good reason not to make CS Lewis a biblical theologian! He’s good at what he does, not when he moves out of his lane.
Gosh. Alrighty, then!
Indeed I cannot see why a statement about Jesus’ warm feelings about a crowd of unspecified people should have the least bearing on the question of what he thought of sexual matters, how he would react to continuing sin and whether he treated sexual sins with any special severity or leniency
Martin: I cited the verse out of frustration that the highly sophisticated legal and theological analysis in Andrew Goddard’s paper seemed to lack any pastoral sympathy and compassion for those whose personal lives were affected by what people like to call ‘this issue’. Jesus, we know, had compassion for the sinners he spoke to. The Bible specifically says, for instance, that he looked on the rich young man and loved him, and of course, his opponents called him ‘friend of sinners’. You then pointed out that my verse was in the context of Jesus addressing a great crowd and said… Read more »
The compassion of Jesus (which is the Greek there) is just ‘warm feelings’? Do you mean to sound as if you are mocking this? Compassion has everything to do with what Jesus thinks and how he responds to a sinful and needy world. Henri Nouwen wrote, ‘Compassion is such a deep and central emotion in Jesus that it can only be described as a movement of the womb of God. When Jesus was moved to compassion, the source of all life trembled, the ground of love burst open, and the abyss of God’s immense, inexhaustible and unfathomable tenderness revealed itself.’
’Esplagchnisthe’ – yes, his heart was broken for them and he went about healing the sick among them. As a presentation of this beautiful scene my choice of terms was at least inadequate, perhaps rather unpleasantly so – I apologise for that. As to the use of that scene for our purposes here I still think it does not help us and still think that we need, in contemplating the Gospel picture of Jesus, to balance text against text
Was the Samaritan Woman an unrepentant sexual sinner. Or was she, like many other women in the Bible, a virtuous woman with sexual sin or shame projected onto her by later patriarchal Christian scholarship.
Mary Magdalen, Tamar and Bathsheba come to mind. We have managed to rehabilitate Mary Magdalen, I think the Samaritan Woman should come next.
It is not at all clear that the Woman was a sinner. Her having had five husbands (some kind of allegory, I would think) isn’t a sin. She makes no statement about her future intentions. Mary M had mental health problems but the idea that she was a sinner, especially that she was a sex worker, is unsupportable, I think, since she provided Jesus with money, and it’s surely unthinkable that Jesus would have accepted a donation from immoral earnings. So no need to repent and still less question of persistence in previous deviant habits. Tamar believes she has rights… Read more »
Thanks Martin. I am with you on this. These are complex arguments one can argue either way. You and I both support these women, but for different reasons. But when one looks at the way that both Jesus and the villagers treat the Samaritan woman with absolute respect I can’t square that with the idea that she is in some way shameful. There are many ways of interpreting the multiple husband comment. For me there is an especial contrast with Chapter 3. Jesus is disparaging of Nicodemus and almost teases him. But not only is he respectful of the woman,… Read more »
Gregory the Great was the first to collate Mary Magdalen and the sinful woman, in the west. Not is the East are they confused.
That’s OK then.
Seriously, I have known and been friends with several women who are, or on the fringes of, ‘sex workers’, and they too deserve respect.
It can often be a passing phase.
Yes, Gregory the Great was the one who confused Mary Magdalen with other gospel women and started the teaching that Mary was a reformed/repentant prostitute. A false teaching that lasted well into the 20th Century, and a teaching not taught in the East. But on a more positive note another pope, Francis, undid the damage. A decree issued in 2016 (Apostolorum Apostola) corrected the damaging confusion. The decree also raised her commemoration from a from a memorial to a feast in the church’s liturgical calendar. This gives Mary Magdalen, a woman, exactly the same status as any of the other… Read more »
You are welcome to join pilgrims who walk with me from Les Saintes Maries de la Mer in the Camargue to Sainte Baume and then St Maximin Basilica.
Anglican Priest. I well remember your past mentions of the reverence for Mary Magdalen in Provence.
You and I have differed at times on Thinking Anglicans, so it is good that we can share a strong appreciation for this amazing woman.
The Church of England raised Mary Magdalene’s day to a Festival in the 1928 calendar (and probably some other Anglican churches did something similar, I haven’t checked) , a “proposal” offically confirmed in the calendar of the Alternative Service Book 1980 and continued in the 1997 calendar for Common Worship. So presumably Anglicans had come to that conclusion several decades earlier.
That’s interesting Simon, thanks.
In terms of equality, how would such a festival rank alongside the commemorations given to the male apostles such as James or Peter, or to Paul?
It has the same status. These days are all what Common Worship calls Festivals. They are largely the same as the “red-letter days” of the BCP calendar, with several additions and a couple of changed dates. All these have proper lectionary material for a full celebration of the Eucharist, Morning and Evening Prayer, and Evening Prayer on the preceding day (except when the preceding day is also a festival, i.e. the festivals falling on the days after Christmas Day). Almost all also have a proper Collect and many a proper Post Communion prayer. There is some common material for the… Read more »
Thank you Simon. There is a lot in that material which I really appreciate, especially the Song of Songs reading. That is a masterstroke. Is this some anonymous woman searching for her lover, or Mary searching for her Lord on resurrection morning?
This is from Matthew chapter 5, addressing another large crowd.
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.”
“People who gather in crowds often have political interests.” Indeed. And people who gather crowds or fill a room often have political interests. The historical Jesus qualified. The titulus, for example, may well be historical.
Or as Sting said in a very moving song about the death and burial of his father….
men go crazy in congregations, they only get better one by one
Speaking of songwriters, Leonard Cohen has an interesting poem titled, The Faith. Here is one stanza. ” A cross on every hill/A Star, a minaret/ So many graves to fill/O Love, aren’t you tired yet?” Religion can indeed make people go crazy. Tunnel vision blind to nuance and complexity is characteristic in my experience. I’ve often thought Leonard Cohen’s poems and lyrics should be added to the book of psalms. They are passionate, Jewish, insightful, and would fit right in with the lore, legend, and poetry found there. The poem above is found in its entirety in his, Book of… Read more »
Excellent! I agree.l
Amid all these masses of words, much of which seems like prevarication, I hope that some clergy will just go ahead and use these prayers and creative variations on them, particularly if they know that their Bishop is sympathetic. Public opinion will defend them
This pretence that all we call LLF is over. Like the end of the war? As if all those this process was always for and about will now simply cease to exist – by sleight of legal advice. It really is a rather desperate fantasy. Offensive. And pastorally bankrupt
Thanks, David. It seems to me that the thinly disguised desire of conservative evangelicals for LGBTQIA+ people ‘simply to cease to exist’ is why one will look in vain for pastoral sympathy in their writings. For some time now, I have been concerned that what they are engaged in – albeit subconsciously – is a form of modern-day scapegoating. It is a psychological process that would at least account for the virulence with which they have been attacking LGBTQIA+ people since the HoBs’ original apology and commendation of the PLF in 2023. What neither they nor the HoB seem to… Read more »
And another reminder that trans, queer, intersex, asexual, and + people have full marriage rights, it’s lesbian and gay people who cannot even have blessings. Same with the concentration camps: only homosexuals were sent there. The forced teaming is offensive.
Plenty of trans people are gay or bi too (and plenty who are not will be treated as if they are by people who refuse to accept their transition), and plenty got sent to concentration camps. Why are you trying to play oppression olympics?
No, transgender people were as well. Us transgender people have always been a part of the LGBT community; the forced separation is ahistorical and inappropriate, and a very modern invention.
And I’m a gay transgender man, so I *still* can’t get married in the Church of England, unless I want the vicar to misgender me all the way through, so we’re all losing here.
This is what the Museum of Jewish Heritage has to say:
“Hitler’s Nazi government, however, brutally targeted the trans community, deporting many trans people to concentration camps and wiping out vibrant community structures. “
https://mjhnyc.org/events/transgender-experiences-in-weimar-and-nazi-germany/
Not necessarily that thinly disguised – It’s not many months since a member of our Diocesan Synod said (in a Deanery meeting, and in their role as a congregant, admittedly) that what really was needed was for all ‘these people’ to go and form their own church and leave ‘us’ to get on without them….
To those who are variously depressed or elated over the rumours of LLF’s death, ask yourselves this. Can things can go back to the status quo ante?
LLF is not ‘over’ in the sense that the issues it seeks to grapple with will go away. The debate will continue. It’s over, though, in the sense that people are finally accepting that nothing that is currently on the table is capable of succeeding in the terms in which it has been proposed. There isn’t a sufficient ‘sensus fidelium’ among the bishops, or in Synod as a whole, or across the wider Church of England that this is what God is calling us to do, in such a way, at such a time. I personally think it would unwise… Read more »
LLF has not been a waste. We have PLF, thin gruel maybe, but what did we have before? And even if the HoB had handled things better, what about the maths? Jane Charman’s description of ‘radical libertarianism’ may be overstated, but she has a point. I worship in an AC church which welcomed a partnered, gay, female priest as their incumbent. Yet there is little appetite to do away with traditional marriage. Do we really want to alienate these good people? And do we realise what a gift the acronym LGBTQIA+ is to those who believe our sexuality is a moral… Read more »
People who want heterosexual marriage will be as free as ever they were to enter into that state. We should not learn patience by asking not to be disturbed in the practice of discrimination which insults loving partners and organises scorn for the reasonable values of our society. Our sexuality is not a moral choice but is imposed on us by nature, some say by God. What we do to express our sexuality is one of the moral choices that God sets before us. Those who set out on loving and genuine partnerships make a good choice and we should… Read more »
“Our sexuality is not a moral choice but is imposed on us by nature, some say by God.” Isn’t that my point? And if our sexuality is God-given, then it would be a cruel god who would not want it to flourish.
I think we have to admit that some forms of sexuality are dangerous, but simply being same-sex is not one of these
I expect heaps of scorn for this, but the fact that a human instinct exists, does not mean that it necessarily Godly and approved by God.
We all have many desires (unhinged libido, envy, pride etc etc) but we don’t argue they are God-given.
‘God made me like this’ is a very weak excuse for bad behaviour. I use the excuse all the time.
So, the question is which instincts are God-given and Godly approved, which instincts are present and are not Godly-approved.
Please do not jump on me. I am merely exposing the insufficiency of the argument.
These desires are not self chosen, though. I don’t have that many difficulties in believing in God but the presence in some people of desires which seemingly cannot find good expression is one of them
You’ll be relieved to hear I have no intention of jumping on you! The trad (1928) rite of marriage puts it well: marriage is ‘ordained in order that the natural instincts and affections, implanted by God, should be hallowed and directed aright’. The tragedy of our condition is that very often they are not.
Nigel, you make a very good point which goes right back to the origin of the modern gay rights debate 160 years ago. The neologisms “homosexual” and “heterosexual”were created by the Hungarian Karl Maria Kertbeny, writing in German to Karl Heinrich Ulrichs. The letter dated 6 May 1868 still exists. Kertbeny and Ulrichs could be described as the first gay rights activists of the modern era. Ulrichs had “outed” himself in 1862, and in lectures and publications had been using the argument that homosexuality was an innate disposition and not a choice, and therefore should not be outlawed. Kertbeny criticised… Read more »
Thanks. Also in response to Kate below – that is I think where I am moving towards, the fruits. Take a simple desire – pride. There is some pride which has positive fruits. [decorating on of my rooms today, I hope I take some pride in my workmanship, or I can have pride in the behaviours and accomplishments of my children]. Other forms of pride are harmful (for example, leading to lack of listening skills). So we should look at fruits of relationships. Does it lead to mutual comfort and care? Does it lead to care of others in the… Read more »
Nigel, Again thank you for a nuanced and helpful response. Your “fruits” argument is vitally important. There are a huge number of straight people who have changed their mind, to being in favour of gay relationships, not because of any theological or philosophical argument but because they have met and got to know people within a gay relationship. It is my understanding that Bishop James Jones (ex of Liverpool), for example, changed his mind due to spending significant time with a gay member of his family. This reinforces the importance of LGBTQ people “coming out” whenever possible if it is… Read more »
Just to follow on from mine and Nigel’s comments about bearing fruit and pride.
For those who have access to BBC i-player, this is the Royal British Legion Festival of Remembrance from last night.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m002m3r4/royal-british-legion-festival-of-remembrance-2025
Watching from minute 45 shows how the British Legion, and the British Armed forces regard the fruits of LGBTQ service, and what can be done to restore LGBTQ Pride.
Did the world change in the 1960’s?
Does Bob Dylan teach us more about forgiveness than many in the church?
Does Eric Clapton almost bow down to Dylan in this performance?
Talk about a bromance.
https://youtu.be/5tnRMZyaWPE?si=slphooehQ9vkR6Nj
Pride isn’t a desire but a feeling about oneself. There is such a thing as a desire for respect and praise, which I suppose we all hope to satisfy in a good way. That is not the same as a sexual desire of which one cannot rid oneself but cannot be satisfied in any way which is good and acceptable – and that is very close to a curse on one’s existence. As for bearing fruit, there is no reason to think that desire which involves same sex has any inherent difference, in the fruits it bears, from desire of… Read more »
I can see the argument but Jesus taught us to examine the fruit a vine bears. Stable, same sex relationships bear good fruit.
Suspicion, scorn and hostility to people because they have this disposition is a tree that bears horrible fruit
1662 is at least honest about our “carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have no understanding.”
This is where it can get very difficult, according to which type of Christian attitudes you were schooled in. As I mentioned in an earlier thread, some of us with an evangelical background were very firmly grounded in the idea that you could / should only marry if it was in God’s will or ‘plan’ for you as a specific individual. Given the strict, very narrow prohibitions on sex which usually belong to that school, the individual’s ‘God-given sexuality’, be it gay, straight or anything else is not likely to flourish. As a long-term single lady remarked when intrusively asked… Read more »
Our sexuality can of course flourish – and also be misused – in ways other than ‘having sex’, the call to celibacy being one with a long history in Christianity. Then there’s intimacy in its wider sense, rather than just a rather coy way of describing copulation. That said, a couple giving themselves to one another in love – having sex – is surely more than ‘physical fulfillment’. As the Preface to our modern marriage rite has it, bringing ‘husband and wife together in the delight and tenderness of sexual union’, even in the absence of an intention to procreate.… Read more »
I can’t see a reason to continue to insult the deepest feelings of those who seek loving commitment same-sexually by reference to the fact that there are other people who seek something else
Of course LLF hasn’t, by episcopal fiat, reached the end of the line, and of course, bishops, can’t demand that parishes and priests refrain from ‘stand alone’ services. How can they? And, what are they actually going to do when parishes and priests just get on with them? Again, probably nothing. The LLF process has totally and utterly undermined the practice of episcopacy, and if the bishops try to police parochial practice in relation to services of blessing it will continue to do so. The so called liberals just need to get on with it, and the so called conservatives… Read more »
You do not need a bishop to institute proceedings against a priest or deacon to test the law here. You just need six adults on an electoral roll. I suppose you need a bishop to agree the complaint is justified, but it will be problematic if these kinds of complaints are not taken forward at some point.
This point is actually discussed in the legal advice when explaining why bishops cant just promise to ignore the law on this: “Under the Clergy Discipline Measure 2003, the bishop does not have the final say on whether a member of the clergy should face proceedings. (Bishops will have considerably less of a role under the forthcoming Clergy Conduct Measure.) “
Peter Collier, in his blog posted above also discusses this and concludes that no bishop is likely to want to follow the law (for reasons he outlines). “In all the circumstances, it does seem to me that the threat of litigation is vastly overstated in the papers that have been produced so far.”
After a decade there is still a large part of the Church of England who cannot see that emphasising the sex aspect of marriage rather than love is a massive own goal.
There’s strange, Kate; before seeing your comment I’d posted something in reply to Allan Sheath which is built around that basic dogma. I suspect it will shock a few people, but is an honest and, for me, realistic personal opinion. And, rightly or wrongly, it is far too late now, physically, emotionally or spiritually for me to change how I think. (I expect there will be some outrageously shocked responses to my comment – we will have to agree to differ….. And it won’t matter in heaven anyway – it would appear from Jesus’s comments that we’re sexless up there,… Read more »
The own goal has already been scored. LLF, especially on this platform, isn’t even a reliable echo chamber. The endless pro LLF comments on this thread add nothing to the discussion. It’s all “ back slapping and justification for not following the rules”. A number of my family have already decided to leave the C of E, after many years of both worship and employment in the church, because of LLF and , even with the pause in LLF, they have had enough. I shall possibly hang on a bit longer but any more deliberate disobedience and blind eye turning… Read more »
The remarkable thing to me is that so many LGBTQI+ people continue to be so loyal to the church which seems determined not to stop abusing them. Were I in their situation and living in England, I know I would not have stayed.
People on both sides are leaving the church. It’s not a good outcome.
Looking at the way this is all being handled, is it any wonder the CofE has has such difficulties identying abusers, and so little time for the survivors of that abuse? The turgid briefings and commentary about the latest LLF developments just seem to be driving the church deeper into a collective psychopathy, it all feels incredibly unhealthy and damaging.
When a same-sex couple comes to me asking for some service to celebrate their love, I always tell them to go somewhere else, either another denomination actually able to marry them or any old “celebrant” who will do justice to the occasion. The Church of England is so mean-spirited and grudging (remember even most Anglican liberals don’t want equal marriage) that, even at its best, PLF is nothing less than relegating others to the back of the bus as second class citizens. We’re not even on the bus yet, and all you offer us is the very back “some day”.… Read more »
“remember even most Anglican liberals don’t want equal marriage”
I’m not sure that’s the case. Provinces that lack the CofE’s large conservative evangelical faction have largely embraced equal marriage, and polling of self-described CofE members, and of clergy, points to them supporting equal marriage too. It’s the blocking minority in Synod that is the problem.
David, send them to me or to any number of my colleagues in the SEC. We will gladly marry same-sex couples with the full and exact same liturgy we use for heterosexual couples.
If LLF, a rather bland proposal, is dead in the water then so is the Church of England.
‘The words of prophets are written on the subway walls’ AGAIN!
And the people of England become increasingly indifferent to the Church and walk by on the other side.
What WOULD Jesus do?
He really did not go in for throwing stones, or am I missing the point of the whole Christian venture?
Talking without speaking, hearing without listening is about where we are isn’t it ? Loving our neighbour as ourselves-only providing they are the right sort of neighbour? The pain of those who were expecting even thin gruel from what is now being pompously dubbed the finished LLF process has spilled over the last series of TA posts, and in doing so has eclipsed any thought of Makin Survivors or the Durham University report looking at the victims of Soul Survivor- Anglican in Exile has touched on this above So can the Church of England be revived or has the silence… Read more »
‘What is, of course, missing from them is any sense of the real people for whom this is not an exercise in definitions and history and logic, but part of the pain or the joy they experience in their daily lives.’
Thank you, Helen King. That omission is also glaringly obvious in the Andrew Goddard piece.
Andrew Goddard puzzles me. He has always been someone who has sought to contribute to the wider debate – not just writing for his own constituency. I have not agreed with him but respected this. So I asked him a while back why he chose to post his contributions on a conservative site that many simply avoided because it was so inhospitable and often hostile place to those with progressive views. If he wanted a receptive, wider readership this puzzled me. He professed not to be aware of this – and promptly posted another long blog on that website.
Why are Christians so obsessed by physical sex? Are they not getting enough of it?
But have you noticed the obsession is with physical sex other Christians should NOT be having ?
And there is a pretty deathly hush concerning all the pornography readily swilling about on social media including strangulation-during-sex videos which are so damaging particularly to girls/ young women .
Interesting.I wonder where the disconnect lies.
Sins are clearly what other people do.
I am very far from a prude, but there are forms of pornography which I hear about, but never seen, which leave me speechless. Also there are non-pornographic social media which also cause harm (self harm).
There have been recent attempts to make access for under 18 yr. olds more difficult (for all forms), but the practical ability for legislation to change anything is difficult, the way the internet works. But not impossible.
It does get difficult – do we ban depicting anything illegal? Crime and Punishment?
I agree that the priorities need re-examining.
I can’t contribute much to the conversation about LLF directly. However, beyond the discussion of prayers, blessings, liturgical updating, and ecclesiastical politics , are real people. Of interest is the view of biblical scholars who have changed their mind based not only on scholarship but on their increasing personal interaction with members of the gay community. See the Commonweal piece about Richard Hays (NT) and son Christopher Hays (OT). https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/did-god-change-his-mind In the case of both father and son, then, life experience—increased contact with gay and lesbian believers and those accepting them into communion, as well as increased concern with the… Read more »
my bad, last para. line 1 should read ” and do or not do…” and line 2, should read ” are well advised to forget their holy huddle….” Long post, long day. lol.
Thanks for this really helpful contribution Ruairidh. God surely speaks to us through scripture, tradition and reason, but also experience. The idea that we know what God thinks about a particular thing strikes me as more and more presumptuous. How can we possibly know the mind of God? All we can do is approach that knowledge in humility, hope, and a great deal of wariness. The Apophatic tradition has much to teach us. And is thoroughly orthodox.
I was taught that Anglicans – having resisted the radical Protestant impulse to look on tradition as an encumbrance – should always read Scripture in conversation with tradition. Even that – once seen as essential to our ecclesial identity – seems to be questioned by sola scriptura Anglicanism (if that isn’t an oxymoron). As for reason and experience…
Yet there’s hope! Donald Rumsfeld (who I don’t think you or Ruairidh ever had on speed dial) showed a chink in his armour when his experience of having a gay daughter caused him to fundamentally rethink his opposition to gay rights.
And it is important to unpack the notion of ‘experience’. There is my individual ‘experience’ as I encounter another. But there is also the collective and articulated experience of, say, of previously silenced and marginalized communities or groups. Their articulated experience acts as an heuristic, tells me there is something I do not know, something which confronts and challenges me, puzzles me, and which I now have to take into account, must work to understand at both intellectually and emotionally. I may discover that previous pat answers no longer appear viable. There is an echo of this to some degree… Read more »
🙂 Thank you both. The mind and consciousness of God is so great, we run risks when we claim to ‘know’ God. Indeed it is dependence on what we claim is knowledge that so often divides us. As you mention, the apophatic tradition – the ‘via negativa’ – is deeply orthodox and a conservative spiritual tradition stretching back to the earliest Christian centuries. In many ways, it is when our own knowledge and desire for control comes to an end, that we may make space for encounter with God. And at that point, by God’s grace, what we may sometimes… Read more »
But if we believe that we are told on divine authority that certain things are abominations and worthy of death we cannot simply commune in love with those who practise these things, surely.
I can’t see any way round this. We either have to say that we don’t accept the relevant parts of what we generally consider to be God’s word to us or we cannot be in true communion with those who are subject to the relevant condemnation
But there are all sorts of things that are declared in the OT to be abominations pubishable by death. Many of them we don’t worry about and the others we don’t punish by death. Where does that leave us? What is the justification for same-sex activity being so special? That God regards it as so special?
Can I throw in a ‘thank you’ for the contributors over the last 24 hours here? Reading the various comments, particularly about the Hays family and similar experiences helps immensely, by confirming what I have seen for myself. Working with and knowing LGBT etc people socially makes an enormous difference in terms of your own attitudes – or it should do. If life’s a level playing field – we’re all fallen sinners after all – then we accept one another as such, as God accepts us. And we have to accept that life is more than a collection of doctrinal… Read more »
Well the usual response is that these OT commands regarding same sex relations are reaffirmed in the New Testament. Actually I would agree with Martin Hughes but would go for the option of ‘not accepting [all] parts of what we generally consider to be God’s Word’. This is what I understand by ‘general inspiration’, that represents my view of biblical authority.
Martin surely it’s possible to say that the scriptures are God’s word written without saying that they are infallible? Humans get things wrong. All study of scripture has to begin with the question “what did they believe then that made them express themselves in the way that they do?”.
As to communing in love with others, no matter what they are or what they do….isn’t doing exactly that the very heart of the Gospel?
‘I can’t see any way round this’. Can I ask you if you have read any scholars who suggest ways interpreting the meaning of those ‘certain things’ in the texts and what a faithful but non literal reading might look like in our context? No one I know in these long discussions has simply taken scissors to certain pages in their bible. As Simon says, we have not taken some of the texts literally for some time – while believing we have not ceased to be faithfully biblical.
Martin, certain scholars have suggested ways around this for quite some time now. My favourite is Edward Carpenter whose “Reformation” theory draws an analogy between the homosexual issue and similar histories related to Judaism and the Protestant/Catholic history. In each case as one religion succeeded another (or one Christian understanding succeeds another Christian understanding) the later authorities engaged in violent polemic, and often violent murderous actions, against proponents of the previous religion. We have seen how Protestant authorities took violent action against Catholics. And how Christian authorities took violent action against Jews. Similarly Christian authorities disparaged pagan religions in the… Read more »
“Similarly Christian authorities disparaged pagan religions in the first few centuries, but because many pagan practices were sexual, and homosexual/transgender practices were prominent within that, then the polemic against sexuality became tied up in the polemic against paganism.”
This so misrepresents the reality of the first four centuries as to be risible.
Thank you Martin. I know these issues of doctrine raise challenges for many over maintaining fellowship in Christ. That has been true through the history of Christianity. I think the core principle is that ‘being in communion’ is not about uniform doctrinal views, because whatever a person’s various human views, we are only ever One in Christ, and our communion is with Him. Our unity is not in identical views. Our unity is in Christ. If two people with differing views on sexuality have both offered their lives in sincerity as Devotions to God, then both of them may be… Read more »
Scripture contains ‘all things necessary to salvation’. Yet our God-given powers of reason are needed to interpret Scripture if we are to avoid words stripped of meaning and context. And insights that we gain are best learned in community, not lone forays bounded by our own worldview. Taken together, Scripture, reason and tradition honour one another in helping us to make sense of the world.
The Hays and Hays book is engaged with in the FAOC document on ‘The Exercise of Discipline’. You may like to see what the document does with it.
Ok. I took a quick look via the FAOC link but do not readily see it. Is there a direct link? For me the big story is people like Richard Hays who have changed their positions as a result of interaction with people. What they do/did with their scholarship afterwards is a secondary issue. Luke Timothy Johnson whom I referenced as in example of a scholar wrestling with the issue as the result of interpersonal interactions is also the one providing an interesting and insightful critique of the Hays’ scholarship after the fact. Bernard Lonergan talks about intellectual conversion and… Read more »
“Sometimes, as I’m sure most of us know, it takes time for the head to catch up to the heart.” This is a key insight. For most people our heart is moved first, and then after a period of sometimes difficult reflection and study the intellectual understanding moves to the same place as the heart. But I don’t want to play down how hard and challenging such a process can be. It may take years. But for that to happen one needs to get to know LGBTQ people. In places where such people are forced into the closet (such as… Read more »
Statistically, it has been shown that contact with a minority group tends to reduce prejudice (King, Winter and Webster, 2009, developing Allport’s 1954 classic contact theory).
Allport, G. (1954) The Nature of Prejudice. Cambridge, Ma: Addison-Wesley.
King, M., Winter, S. and Webster, B. (2009) ‘Contact Reduces Transprejudice: A Study on Attitudes towards Transgenderism and Transgender Civil Rights in Hong Kong’. International Journal of Sexual Health, 21, pp. 17-34.
I think that the whole idea of all those conversations and deliberations leading to these prayers was that people with moral disapproval of gay sex would by experience and communing with gay people see that their views should change, transformed by personal exchange in the way that has happened with some of the famous people mentioned here. But it didn’t work, I fear. The effects of the same experience are quite varied can be quite varied
I can’t comment on what the whole idea of all those conversations was because I’m in Canada. So as stated, I can’t contribute much to an analysis of LLF. I gave a couple of examples of fairly high profile theologians who have changed their views based on getting to know people, by focusing on relationships with people, by getting past “moral disapproval” to relate to people and listen to their articulated experiences. Such is in juxtaposition to a position based upon having the ‘right’ biblical exegesis, or engagement solely on the level of ideas. However, I would never underestimate the… Read more »
NB: The 2nd and 3rd paras in my comment above are both direct long citations from two Commonweal articles by Luke Timothy Johnson–in the 2nd earlier one he discusses the impact of his daughter on his views. I included them as ‘teasers’ for the articles. If readers click on the links beneath each citation, the entire article from which they are taken is available. (The first and final paras of the comment are mine.) Reading Commonweal and The Tablet are left over habits from the days of my Catholic education. lol.
I think that the litmus test of whether people are putting the “LLF” issue on the back burner will be next year’s elections to General Synod. My prediction is that it will once again be a major election issue across the spectrum of desired outcomes.There are many other factors that will come into play, but the one that might have traction to make the elections rather more than a one issue referendum is the financial viability/resourcing of parish ministry. The thin pipeline of candidates for stipendiary ministry sits in the background and will come to be more visible and more… Read more »
It’s so interesting that Peter Collier’s article which was added to the original item later on Saturday has drawn no comment. My take away from it- and I may not have understood it properly- is that the piece of legal advice offered was not that amazing or different from what has probably been offered before. What is different is that it has been seized upon and spun into the silver bullet to try and put an end to the LLF process . So how did this happen and who was/ were the driving force/s? Was it some form of an… Read more »
House of Bishops seriously on the back foot here. Peter Collier’s seminal analysis reinforces Simon Butler’s views big time. His (Simon’s) bishop won’t have been best pleased, but he wouldn’t ever have been would he?! The Faith and Order Commission paper (GS Misc 1429) needs to be seen for what it is. A disingenuous attempt to justify why the spineless bishops have acted as they have. It deserves the same fate in General Synod as GS 2055 in 2017 (which I was pleased to coordinate some of the lay opposition to) but won’t be presented in the same way. If… Read more »
Are you really suggesting that the bishops didn’t want to bless gay relationships and paid the experts to say what the bishops wanted to hear?
They absolutely don’t want to bless gay relationships in any understandable format and setting, or if they do they first want to hit the pause button for an indeterminate amount of time. The issue has now become solely one of democracy (and justice). Until such time as there is a super majority of clergy and laity in the General Synod (properly reflecting the Church of England at large) they don’t dare commend (then making them authorised – in their view) PLF in any form other than the current ‘crumbs under the table’ approach in a regular service. Trouble is they… Read more »
I find it surprising that you “boast” of breaking the rules and getting away with it. If I shoplift and don’t get caught, does it justify my act of shoplifting as righteous?
Just because you have a grievance against our accepted doctrine and historic formularies you have zero entitlement to deliberately flout the rules.
I doubt you will ever be disciplined for your rule breaking but that speaks more of the complete lack of authoritative leadership that currently exists within our church rather than your servant hearted obedience to any vows you may have taken.
Geoff:
‘Rules’ which are commonly broken by evangelicals in the Church of England include:
I’m not sure how much ‘disciplining for their rule breaking’ goes on around this stuff.
Canon B8 allows the minister, with the agreement of the PCC, to dispense with robes when it “will be acceptable and will benefit the mission of the Church in the parish”.
But they did it for decades before canon law was changed to allow it. And of course no-one asks to see the extract minute from the PCC giving agreement.
Indeed they did. Just as in the other direction many wore more vestments than the canons permitted for many many years before the canons were changed.
That’s true, but none of those people are (a) still in this life or (b) banging on about other people not following canon law.
Simon, what happens with Bishops ? ….I attended a confirmation service and the Bishop arrived in a dishevelled state, no robes to be seen. Thank you.
No need to identify the ‘culprit’, but was this a diocesan or suffragan (or any other bishop), and what did they wear during the service and the laying on of hands? Did other participating clergy wear robes?
Rowland, he was the Suffragen Bishop, arrived in a crumpled, tattered suit, purple clerical shirt, shoes which hadn’t seen polish for many months. (He was on official duty !). It was held in a neighbouring church which styles itself as evangelical and its own minister does not wear robes. The minister was wearing a smart suit. The annoying thing for me was that later that month I attended another confirmation service in the local Cathedral and the same Bishop was resplendent in all his finery. (I merely wondered if there were protocols on this as guests at the first service… Read more »
Yes, I am aware of this. Here in Canada, robes are not a canonical matter; they are not mentioned in the national church canons and as far as I know not in any diocesan canons either. But there is an almost universal expectation that they will be worn. There have been times when I’ve dispensed with them myself, for various reasons (including a church building with huge clear glass windows, no air conditioning, and very hot indoor temperatures in summer! My point remains, though: those evangelicals who are banging on about people breaking rules need to be careful about glass… Read more »
If a same-sex couple, who were regular worshippers, come to you and say they have had a civil marriage and want a blessing, what would you (assuming you are ordained – I have no idea) do?
Include them explicitly in the general prayers? Ask them to come up to the front to be blessed? Arrange a separate service? Show them the door? Tell them it is not possible, gently, because it is breaking the rules? Announce something in the after-service cup of tea?
Serious question, I’m not attacking.
Invite some family/friends and have a separate service of blessing. When I last did this and told the couple it was illegal, they laughed like drains and I think felt empowered. They certainly appreciated the pastoral response. I now realise I was probably wrong. It wasn’t illegal.
Happen to engage with you further on this if I knew who you were. TA contributors who hide behind the parapet can’t expect others to respond, especially to ad hominem comments.