by the Revd Canon Rosie Harper, Chaplain to the Bishop of Buckingham, former Member of General Synod and Trustee of the Ozanne Foundation
This is my thoughtful quote of the week: ‘The apostles remembered what many modern Christians tend to forget – that what makes the gospel offensive isn’t who it keeps out but who it lets in.’ So said the wonderful Rachel Held Evans. Her prophetic voice did exactly that. It drew people in. Oh my, do we miss her!
It’s easy to jump to a pious interpretation of this radical inclusivity of the gospel, but the truth is more incarnational than sacramental. Jesus includes real embodied people, not their notional ‘souls’ (whatever you imagine a disembodied soul might actually be!). Because there are prostitutes and beggars, refugees and tax collectors in Jesus’ life we can’t avoid the message our faith is giving us. That message, because it is embodied, can’t help but be political.
When the policy of exporting refugees to Rwanda was first mooted, I thought it was a joke. It seemed so off the scale of normal morality that it couldn’t be true. More than failing to welcome the stranger amongst us, a code which most world religions hold dear, the proposal was to export them. It looks like a government-sponsored form of human trafficking. People who are in the most desperate need being sent against their will to a country they don’t want to go to. A country which for many will prove dangerous.
As a country we badly need more people willing and able to work. The NHS, care services, farms, haulage, airports are all struggling to deliver. We need people, but not, it seems, refugee types of people. The layers of prejudice are astounding.
All this stirred the hearts and consciences of our Archbishops and Bishops. They wrote a stiff letter which appeared in The Times on June 14th. I’m tempted to say: ‘What took you so long?’ Even Prince Charles pronounced before them. But yes, it was a good and helpful intervention, and yes, for some, this dose of gospel truth was offensive.
As I write, we have seen a plane loaded with a mere handful of men stopped on the tarmac by the European Court of Human Rights. They are now saying it might be a year before another flight is attempted. The government is managing not only to be cruel and immoral but also ludicrous!
I am left with a question: a question about this united action of the bishops. They understood that you don’t exclude people, you welcome them, and they knew that this was at the heart of the gospel. They were prepared to tolerate the consequent offence that some felt because they deeply believed that what they were saying was right.
Why then can they do the right thing at a national level, but not within their own institution? If you are a gay priest and you get married you are excluded from any further preferment. If you are gay and married and feel the call of God to ordination you are excluded before you even get on to the first step. Many are put into the intolerable position of being asked to choose between the call of God on their lives and the person they love most deeply. Somehow the Church of England thought it was OK to embark on yet another cycle of study and discussion about the theological rationale for excluding people simply for being the people God made them to be.
I know some folk defend Living in Love and Faith, but frankly it stinks. It stinks because it only exists because we have accepted the premise that discussing other people’s sexuality in order to determine whether they can be fully included is a legitimate thing to do. It is not. It is abusive and simply repeats the abuse that the church has perpetrated over the decades.
Only this time it is worse.
Worse because we’d reached a point where it looked as if change might happen, but maybe it never will. Worse because privately many and possibly the majority of bishops know what is the right, faithful, gospel-led thing to do, but remain silent. Worse because the way we exclude people is the primary cause for the collapse of numbers. Not the language we use or the music we play, but the way the Church spits out the people we love.
I could have written the same article about excluding black people, or disabled people, or people with mental illness, or alas survivors of abuse. There is a long list because in so many areas we still get our sense of identity by who we keep out of the club. We know it’s not right, but somehow we can’t help it!
Dear Bishops, why keep the good ‘you’ hidden? Why follow the crowd? You could have a rush of blood to the head and decide to tell one another what you really believe, and acknowledge that we have a huge gospel imperative to stop excluding anyone. That’s not only at a national level, but within the very heart of our church. In this past week you have rather magnificently conquered your fear of causing offence, for the sake of the gospel. You are still standing. It was OK. You can do it again. Take a long hard look at who is being excluded from our church and resolve to stop doing it…..for the sake of the gospel.
Any thoughts?