ViaMedia

Year: 2023

  • On the Exchanging of Friendship Bracelets; or: The Bishops are Asking us to Lie

    by Matt Drapper, an author who writes about church and queer culture. His book ‘Bringing Me Back To Me’ is an autobiographical look back at his experiences of Conversation Therapy Practices and homophobia within Christianity and his journey towards healing from trauma

    Imagine you have two friends, who are Christian women, who love their church and each other and you hear they have become engaged. Later, you are invited to a church service at which the couple, who have been recently married at a civil ceremony, will be blessed and their love for each other celebrated before God and the gathered congregation of their friends and family. You’ve dressed up for the occasion, written a card emblazoned with hearts and even brought a pocket full of confetti just in case they decide to take photos after the blessing. You’ve already heard of the couple’s disappointment; they cannot be married in the church with a traditional ceremony, and it feels a pity to have their blessing taped onto the end of a regular Sunday morning service, however you know this will be a wonderful celebration with family and friends. Except, when the minister stands up to pray, she describes the women’s relationship as “friendship” and instead of rings, they exchange friendship bracelets.

    The minister knows. The couple know. The gathered friends and family know. You know, this is an opportunity to come before God for a blessing on the relationship and civil partnership or marriage of a couple who love one another, but who have been denied the opportunity to be married in the church building they love (a right granted to straight couples simply for living in the catchment area of the parish.) However, everyone has (at the request of the House of Bishops and the Church of England Lawyers) been asked to lie and say they are just celebrating a friendship.

    For context, I’m referring to the documents recently released for General Synod which detail the ways Churches will be allowed to use the Prayers of Love and Faith. These prayers were ostensibly designed for the blessing of same-sex relationships, but, due to the inclusion of the phrase “with no change to the doctrine of marriage” in an amendment passed in February, have seemingly had their entire purpose removed from them, and worse, replaced with an encouragement to pretend they are something else entirely.

    One example of the prayers which some churches will be enabled to offer, begins with a promise of love and commitment, but ends with just friendship.

    For lifelong peace
    God of all grace,
    friend and companion,
    look with favour on N and N
    as they journey together through life. Deepen their love
    and strengthen their wills
    to honour the commitment they have made,
    that they may continue
    in lifelong faithfulness and friendship to each other; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
    All Amen.

    To what “commitment they have made” is this prayer referring? The Guidance offered for use of the prayers states: “Pastoral preparation with the couple should cover the fact that the service is not a marriage, or a Thanksgiving for Marriage, or a Service of Prayer and Dedication after Civil Marriage.” And yet, the blessing of a civil ceremony or marriage is exactly what these prayers have been asked for, and prepared for. No one was asking for a new form of pinky-swearing with our best friends and a promise to love them forever and ever and ever.

    “They are roommates,” used to be the whispered code for an Uncle or Aunt known to be living with their gay partner, back in the day. “They were good friends,” suggest descriptions below paintings of historical possible queer love in museums. And now the Church of England is asking us to use the same veiled language, whispered, between evening prayers.

    As if it were not enough that the latest Guidance of the Use of Prayers of Love and Faith (and its accompanying Theological and Pastoral Introduction to the PLF) consistently use the words “holy” and “ideal” to describe straight presenting marriage, suggesting an “unholiness” and “less than ideal” to same-sex partnerships, and as if it were not demeaning enough to describe the Prayers of Love as Faith as “Prayers on the Way” (on the way to what?), the Guidance appears to be asking Ministers, Couples, Friends and Family to be intentionally deceptive before each other and before God. I would go so far as to say, The House of Bishops are asking us to lie.

    We have spent our lives being told our relationships are not Holy. This new document enforces this feeling in some of the most unhealthy language I have ever heard. They may have swapped out the word “sin” for “unholiness”, and not aimed it at us directly, but they should say what they really mean, if they are proud of it. Call us sinners, please.

    In describing their purpose, the guidance continues: “The PLF fall short of affirming a couple’s entire way of life as made Holy by God, and blessed as a marriage service would do…The PLF do not seek to simulate marriage or pretend that our Church has made a decision to extend marriage to same-sex couples.” The Theological document could not be clearer. PLF is not to be used as a celebration of same-sex relationship. And yet, what else are they designed for? Throughout the recent documents, they are consistently described as celebrating friendship. Are we to believe the women’s football team will be using the prayers to bless their bonds? Are we to understand the men’s mental health support group will be showing up for a blessing over their budding friendships? Is this a blessing for besties?

    No.

    We know what it is.

    It is what it is.

    In the most outrageous sample from the Guidance, it is suggested as an image: “The minister may pray over rings worn by the couple (but) to avoid the impression that the service is a marriage service, rings are not given or exchanged.” Pardon? The minister knows, the couple knows, the friends and family gathered know what this service is for and what the prayers for the rings mean. Yet, the House of Bishops and Church Lawyers are asking us to pretend we don’t understand. To lie about it to each other and in front of God.

    The Guidance is also clear on another point: you cannot offer the blessings to people who are still going through an unsettled divorce. Why not? If it is a blessing for buddies, for two roomies who get on really well? Make it make sense.

    As a gay man who grew up in a Christian household, and then in evangelical Christianity, I was taught to whisper about my sexuality. I was told by my family, “You cannot Be Gay at home.” I was told by my church, “You will lose your leadership role if you are openly in a Same-sex Relationship.” Better to keep these things hidden, wrapped up in shame, secret, pretend to be something you are not. Queer Christians recognise a lie for what it is: Shame, Denial, Pretence.

    Asking ministers, couples, friends and families to lie to each other and before God is a sure way to invite destructive poison into a congregation. Is this really the best they can offer us?

  • ‘That Which He Has Not Assumed Is Not Redeemed’: Jesus, Sexuality and GS2328

    by John Seymour, a priest in the Diocese of London who recently completed doctoral studies in practical theology and education at IOE, UCL’s Faculty of Education and Society

    Jesus of Nazareth: fully human, fully God?

    I want to start with what, for many of us, may be an uncomfortable question. It’s one which we gloss over in our affirmations of the full humanity of Jesus. Did he have something which we would today call a sexuality? It may feel awkward or irreligious to imagine the God-man Jesus getting a spontaneous erection, masturbating for pleasure or relief, or indulging a sexual fantasy, but it is difficult to make sense of some of his encounters without Jesus being a human being with a sexuality.

    Many women had a strong affection for him, such that they provided for his material needs (Luke 8.1-3). He was able to understand the power dynamics at work in the life of the woman caught in adultery (John 8.2-11). Taken in context, it is interesting to ponder what kind of metaphor might be at work in the Samaritan woman’s retort, “Sir, you have no bucket, and the well is deep” (John 4.11). It is difficult for me at least not to suppose a sexual dimension to the intimacy of the beloved disciple reclining on Jesus’ breast (John 13.23) and the only disciple for whom Jesus cried was Lazarus: “see how he loved him!” (John 11.35).

    If human sexuality is to be redeemed then, on a Patristic understanding, Christ must have had a human sexuality. The quotation which starts this blog is taken from a letter from Gregory of Nazianzus to Cledonius, a priest he had oversight of. Gregory is addressing the Apollinarian controversy, and the suggestion that rather than having his own intellect, Jesus’ mind was replaced by the Godhead or Logos. Gregory’s humour is incisive:

    “If anyone has put his trust in him as a man without a human mind, he is really bereft of mind, and quite unworthy of salvation. For that which he has not assumed he has not healed, but that which is united to his Godhead is also saved.” (Epistle 101)

    That which is united to the Godhead is saved. In the sacrament of baptism, the believer is joined to Christ (Galatians 3.27; Romans 6.3-6), body, mind, soul (to use Gregory’s term), and with these, his / her / their sexuality, whatever that sexuality may be (and it seems to me that the spectrum represented by asexuality is included here). Sexuality is, then, a salvation issue. If our sexuality is not assumed it is not healed; and if we are not joined with Christ in every part of our humanity, we are not saved.

    The red lines of GS2328

    What does this say to our current debates? In the press conference of 20 January 2023 ahead of February’s synod, the Archbishop of York said, “We’re saying this is a good place to be where we can live together with our disagreements and fully acknowledge and welcome into our church LGBTQI+ people.” The implication was that the salvation issue had been addressed for LGBTQIA+ people: with the Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF), the Church of England had created a sufficiently generous theological space in which we could enjoy the fulness of life as Christians that comes with integration of body, mind, soul and sexuality within the church’s understanding of what it means to be human.

    However, with the release of GS2328 and the events that led to that paper, the Church of England now really is not in a “good place” in relation to the inclusion of LGBTQIA+ people. In its theology and the practical inferences drawn from it, the House of Bishops is communicating the same homophobic bias which led to the defeat of GS2055 in February 2017. It is painful to see that the investment made by many in the LLF process over six years, one that was costly, sacrificial, and often altruistically motivated, has borne so little fruit: the Church of England has moved backward in its inclusion of LGBTQIA+ people.

    Let me explain. I didn’t believe that the draft Prayers of Love and Faith presented in February 2023 provided for the welcome of LGB people, as the prayers did not affirm same-sex relationships through offering a blessing of a marriage or civil partnership, or indeed, of the substance of a relationship for a same sex couple.

    The ‘goods’ GS2328 claims it wishes to affirm arise from a motivation which derives at least in part from sexual attraction. Rather than accept and affirm this, GS2328 attempts to dissect sexual attraction from an innate, abstract sexuality by separating same-sex sex from the goods of same-sex relationships. There is continuity here with the tendency to affirm Jesus’ humanity whilst glossing over his sexuality as something real: GS2328 wants to recognise the goods of this category of relationship while erasing the actual part that human sexuality plays in producing them. In doing so, GS2328 simply betrays a homophobic theology. Any prayer which takes as its starting point separation of being human from being sexual communicates a commitment that is at odds with belief in the revelation of God in the person of Jesus Christ and is consequently hostile to LGB identity and to LGBTQIA+ people.

    That theological ‘red line’ drawn between being human and having a sexuality has now changed and moved. Arguably, in the February 2023 proposals, the red line was brought to synod intentionally blurred, with the prospect of that blurred line being affirmed at the November 2023 synod. Examples of this blurring include synod in February choosing (contra Higton 1987) not to assert that sexual intimacy could only take place in marriage, and not to assert that relationships outside of marriage could not be blessed (both of these were the subject of amendments that failed). Despite this, what has returned to synod in November with GS2328 is a well-defined red line. Whatever else that line might be, it is a dividing line between being human and being sexual. The prospect now is of that line becoming fixed in 2025. The line makes a false division between what is assumed by Christ and what is not.

    The Canon B2 route and a choice between homophobic theologies

    In the press release relating to the papers for synod, bishop Sarah is quoted as saying, “a majority of people would like to see a change in the Church of England’s approach to same-sex relationships. Based on what the Church has told us, no change is not an option.” Yet the last-minute adoption of a Canon B2 process for approval of PLF as a stand-alone service has proven to be enabling of a minority position. As a result of the intervention in the House of Bishops’ process, there are two outcomes that are possible in 2025:

    • The least negative for LGBTQIA+ people is that the Canon B2 process, with reference to the dioceses and then a vote in Synod requiring a two-thirds majority in each house, affirms the proposed PLF and underlying rationale. With this, a homophobic theology (articulated in the Pastoral Guidance and reflected in PLF) would be formally adopted by the CofE as the basis for ‘affirming’ the relationships of LGB people.
    • The other possibility that opens up – and this seems quite likely as an outcome with the current composition of synod – is that, whatever the dioceses say, PLF are felt to have significant doctrinal implications which synod is not minded to affirm. With this, not only the stand-alone PLF but also the PLF prayers due to be commended for use in existing services would fall, as being incompatible with Church of England doctrine.

    Whilst inadequate, the proposals of February 2023 offered a route to an incarnational faith which is saving for LGBTQIA+ people. In contrast, GS2328 offers options between theologies for LGBTQIA+ people, both of which deny the gospel of God incarnate in the person of Jesus Christ.

    It seems to me that GS2328 therefore heralds something of a pastoral crisis, as it tells me and my LGBTQIA+ siblings that the Church of England is not a safe place for us and that we are not welcome. It is also the occasion of a crisis in what the church is willing to transmit by way of salvation. With the decision to pursue a Canon B2 route, synod is set to determine whether or not LGBTQIA+ identities and lives may be joined with Christ’s and with this, to make a judgement on whether or not we may be saved. With the current politics of the Church of England, it looks like we are going to be damned to hell.

    Perhaps as they gaze over that precipice, the bishops might reconsider how closely they are willing to draw the line around who is saved and who is not. Synod has said that the bishops are not constrained by a doctrinal issue. In light of that, they need our prayers as they weigh their decision, as their own souls may be at risk in their judgment.

  • A Sum Total of Nothing: The Prayers of Love and Faith Return to Synod

    by the Revd Dr Charlie Bell, Fellow at Girton College Cambridge, Assistant Curate, St John the Divine, Kennington and a consultant to the LLF Implementation Pastoral Guidance Working Group

     

    Well, here we go again. Another set of consultations, conversations, demands that LGBTQIA people make themselves vulnerable, another set of raised hopes, quiet promises, and damned hard work, and…well, nothing. Nothing at all.

    It is almost unfathomable, yet entirely predictable, that we have ended up exactly where we started. This November Synod, where we had been told significant progress would be brought forward, what we are being given is absolutely sod all. Please don’t mistake this for hyperbole – I am speaking in simple factual terms. Nothing has changed. This is nothing, warmed up and then cooled down again, and presented as radical inclusion.

    Not only are we presented with a sum total of nothing, but we are back talking in the way some of us had hoped was now history. The Synod papers have next to nothing positive to say about LGBTQIA people, and we are back to the despicable language of both-sides-ism that the ‘apology’ (which has shown itself to be utterly meaningless) suggested we might have finally grown out of. The motion being presented has inexplicably returned to the language of pain ‘on both sides’, as though there is even a remotely comparable situation for LGBTQIA people and those who oppose us having even private prayers.  The motion doesn’t even mention us – we are once again at best an abstract issue, and at worst simply erased. It is hard to take any other message from this that they wish we didn’t exist, and they don’t really care that we do. We are ‘less than ideal’ (with very uncomfortable echoes of the Higton motion in 1987) – our lives are clearly, in the bishops’ view, a blight on the life of the church.

    The motion states, too, that we are in a ‘period of uncertainty’: we are not, a clear decision was made in February and the House of Bishops is actively choosing to frustrate its clear purpose. There is talk of ‘implementation’. Where, precisely, is this implementation?

    We have been told that we are not to see the results of the Pastoral Guidance until 2025! The bishops are attempting to impose two more years of Issues in Human Sexuality blighting the lives of LGBTQIA clergy, preventing married people from getting ordained, and handing coercive control over our loves and lives to the meanness and lack of imagination of episcopal discipline. The cruelty of this – a decision imposed by an (allegedly) entirely straight House of Bishops on LGBTQIA clergy, with ever-present calls for us to be patient. Enough. We have been patient enough – over thirty years of patience.

    It is a bare-faced lie to say that there is no draft guidance – I have seen it, and it has been presented to the House and College of Bishops. Very substantial votes in favour of change have been registered amongst the bishops. So what exactly is going on? We need to be told specifically what needs to be done for it to be brought back, and we need it to be brought back in February 2024 for final sign off at the very latest. We need, too, for Issues to be rescinded immediately, at this November Synod. As a wise priest friend said to me: what the bishops have done may be legal, but it is not honest. Bishops, it is time you remembered the wording of our ordination vows. Our obedience is not without caveats.

    The commended prayers are – extraordinarily – a backward step. They quite literally amount to no more than our being able to pray for the gays in the intercessions of a regular Evening Prayer – and nothing more. The accompanying document makes it clear that the prayers can be used privately or ‘only in acts of worship where Prayers of Love and Faith are not the principal focus or form’ (and the guidance bizarrely suggests that nonetheless we ought to warn our parishioners in advance in case they want to avoid the beastly homosexuals!). This means that the commended prayers serve no pastoral purpose whatsoever – absolutely nothing has changed. I repeat, nothing – the commended prayers change nothing. So out of years and years of patient work, all we can do is pray for people like we already could do, and now we are specifically banned from holding special services for them. This is a scandal and the General Synod must demand that this ridiculous, offensive, unacceptable stipulation is removed if this motion is to be passed.

    And finally, the accompanying document for discussion in Synod has gone against the express will of Synod by entirely errantly eliding the ‘doctrine of marriage’ (for which we might look to Canon B30) and ‘the place for sexual intimacy’. Laying aside the fact that the bishops have still not actually defined what that means (itself rendering Issues utterly meaningless), the press release from the Church of England contains within it a lie – stating that ‘Synod also voted for no change to the doctrine of the Church of England around marriage and sexual intimacy.’ No, it objectively and absolutely did not, and nor did it agree that the doctrine of marriage included the assertion that ‘marriage between one man and one woman’ is the ‘proper’ place for sexual intimacy.

    The bishops accepted (including alleged ‘affirming’ bishops) – foolishly, as we told them, time and time again – an amendment that stated that Synod ‘endorse[s] the decision of the College and House of Bishops not to propose any change to the doctrine of marriage, and their intention that the final version of the Prayers of Love and Faith should not be contrary to or indicative of a departure from the doctrine of the Church of England’. Synod also rejected two further amendments that stated that ‘sexual intercourse as an expression of faithful intimacy belongs within marriage exclusively’ (motion 44) and a motion that required ‘instructions making it clear that [the prayers] should not be used so as to indicate or imply affirmation of sexually active relationships outside Holy Matrimony or to invoke God’s blessing on such relationships’ (motion 68). Synod therefore specifically did not vote for no change on sexual intimacy when presented the opportunity to do so, and nor is there anything in our doctrine that supports the claims made that sexual intimacy and marriage are one and the same thing.

    Whoever drafted, or is ultimately responsible for, the press release and the paper accompanying the Synod motion is attempting to pull wool over the eyes of Synod and the wider church. Throughout the process, we have had long and fruitful conversations about teaching and doctrine, development and refinement, and yet here we are presented with a blunt and dishonest summary.

    Yet why are we surprised? The level of backroom deals, conservative backchannels, central church dishonesty, wink-wink nudge-nudge antics, power-play, poisoning with fear, secret promises, (arch)episcopal grandiosity, and silly letter writing has finally won out. It is now fascinating to see that the sad cabal of bishops who ‘dissented’ ultimately didn’t even want LGBTQIA people to get – nothing at all anyway!

    Well, the bishops should not be allowed to get away with it. The ‘affirming bishops’ need to take a stand, publicly, now. LGBTQIA people have spent quite long enough being the sacrificial lambs on the altar of unity – bishops, find some courage and speak for us, and that right soon. And frankly the ‘oh we don’t really know’ bishops need to recognise that that kind of fence-sitting has never been a Christian virtue, and most certainly is not now. We are real people whose lives are being wrecked by your indecision and refusal to look us in the eye. We carry the image and likeness of God in us, and you are marring God’s image when you slam the door in our faces.

    We have had enough. We have been taken for granted in Synod, and you should know, bishops, that you are no longer guaranteed inclusive votes based on private assurances. You are called to ‘serve and care’ for your whole flock, and that includes us. You are called to have a ‘special care’ for ‘the outcast and those who are in need’, speaking ‘for those who have no other to speak for them’. It is time to do so – and it is time to end this sham once and for all.

    You offered us bread but gave us a stone. You still have time to knead the dough.

     

     

     

     

  • The Difficulties of Differentiation

    by Revd Neil Patterson, Chair of the Gender & Sexuality Group on General Synod

    Followers of the increasingly torrid debate about sexuality in the Church of England will generally have noticed that the most prominent conservative group, the Church of England Evangelical Council, have been arguing for some time for something called ‘structural differentiation.’ In responding to this, I am informed by the private discussions over some years known as the St Hugh’s Conversations, and also the recent Living With Difference meetings convened within the LLF process. But to the credit of those representing the CEEC, they have maintained a very consistent line throughout, and I have not heard proposals different from those already in the public domain at CEEC – The Church of England Evangelical Council. However, I hope those who make them can read here a sense that I have genuinely sought to listen to their perspective, and will know that I am more open to making space for all views in a broad church than some. And I recognise that this is partly because, unlike others, I have not been subject to the sort of harmful pastoral ministry as others. However, even so I find that on reflection there is a serious problem with the proposal for differentiation, as I shall explain.

    In considering the possibility of some settlement that allows for the cohabitation of different views, it is inevitable that, as a historian of church legal structures and a member of General Synod since 2012, I should be drawn to consider the evolution of the 2014 settlement around women bishops formalised in the House of Bishops Declaration and the Five Guiding Principles, and it is here that I find the important contrast. From the discussions in 2012-14 and the regular perspective of New Directions which is kindly sent me each month, the central concept emerges of ‘sacramental assurance.’ Most Anglo-Catholics would hold, I think, to the theology that the sacraments (this works whether you think there are two or seven, incidentally) are by their nature about certainty – if the Church does what the Lord commanded, faithful to matter and words, the sacramental graces promised are assured. Even if, as for me, that approach raises other questions, I am quite happy to accept it as the legitimate belief of many, and also to see that, if you are uncertain about the ordination of women, that leads to the need for ‘sacraments we can receive with confidence’ as the slogan is.

    What became apparent in the discussions over women bishops was that, if those who doubted their orders were to continue in sacramental assurance, a higher degree of separation would be needed than before, because, as one bishop pithily put it in one of the small group discussions at Synod, “priests are sterile; bishops can breed!” It is more complicated than that; I have yet to be convinced by any argument for what is for shorthand called ‘taint’ – the refusal to receive the sacraments from a male bishop who ordains women. And the ambiguous phrase ‘mutual flourishing’ positively invites criticism from anyone who does not feel that they are personally getting what they want. But nonetheless most of the arrangements made since 2014 make sense to me, as a sad inevitability if we are to remain one church whilst allowing different convictions to exist in their own integrity. There is differentiation, but it is differentiation as a means to an end.

    Reflecting on the CEEC proposals, however, they seem different. The House of Bishops decision to commend the Prayers of Love & Faith, as an option for those places that wish to use them, does not impose any changes at all on the life of non-affirming parishes. It will not prevent conservative candidates entering training for ordination, or conservative clergy being appointed. And it is difficult to see how the provision of alternative structures, either designed by the Church of England or, it seems today, unilaterally by CEEC, is intended to meet a need for acceptable ministry. Rather what I find, both in some of the supporting texts and in the various meetings, is the expression of a much more troubling desire. That differentiation is needed to show that ‘orthodox’Anglicans (as they style themselves with little regard for the established use of that word to describe the churches in communion with Constantinople) are distinct from those of us who are moving with the House of Bishops to seek God’s blessing for same-sex relationships. In other words, it is differentiation for differentiation’s sake.

    The problem is that some distinctions, like the 2014 settlement or now-accepted varieties of worship or theology, lead to the minimal separation necessary for co-existence, the success of which is how far unity is maintained. But if the objective is to show that you have separated yourself from the unclean, the only success is the sight of clear blue water. And that is not differentiation, it is schism. And unlike the much-debated issues of sexual intimacy that appear nowhere in the Creeds, 39 Articles or law of the Church of England, schism does stand condemned by Canon A8 for the sin that it is.

  • Don’t Preach. Just Don’t.

    by Chrissie Chevasutt, ‘Outreach and Development Worker with Transgender, Intersex and Non-binary People’, for St Columba’s Oxford. They have lived and worked in the city for 33 years, across a wide spectrum of churches, and in varied roles, thus having a unique perspective on church history and practices over that period

    I’ve been the Outreach and Development Worker with Transgender, Intersex and non-binary people at St Columba’s United Reformed Church in Oxford since 2022, and I wrote about my role here. When I started in this work, I described it as “a prophetic act, a ministry of social justice and an expression of God’s outrageous love for the marginalised and oppressed.” I have been making connections, publicising what I do, and hearing people’s stories. And I have been becoming aware, even more, of how much work there is that needs to be done, in Oxford and beyond. The Oxford Safe Churches project just underlines that.

    I attended St Aldate’s Church in Oxford for many years. It’s a parish church with a large student membership and describes itself on the front page of its web presence as somewhere you can “feel right at home”. Really?

    That doesn’t seem to apply if you are LGBTQIA+. One of the sermons given at the church which was preserved online makes that very clear: ‘The Truth Will Set You Free’, link to the audio here. Full transcript here. I’ve mentioned it before but here I want to say rather more about it. It was given by Simon Ponsonby; I don’t know exactly in what year, except that it is definitely pre-Covid. The sermon summarises nearly 20 years of campaigning against LGBTQIA+ people, their dignity, equality, rights and spiritual freedom, by him and by the previous Rector, Charlie Cleverly, for which there is much evidence, all readily available online. Letters, articles in the press and media, both local and national, all confirm the deep prejudice towards us of this church’s leadership.

    I’ve described on my blog how I am both angered and wounded deeply, by Simon Ponsonby’s abuse of power in this sermon, and I have for the last few years been ministering to many of those he has damaged, wounded and broken by his attitudes, beliefs and homophobic campaigning and preaching, which both produced and resulted from this sermon.

    It’s hard to know where to start with the academic, intellectual, scholarly, theological, and pastoral reasoning in the sermon. A key factor to me seems to be the tone; Ponsonby presents himself as the oracle or avatar of the divine message; ‘absolute truth’. There is no sense of humility or self-reflection on his part, either upon his own very limited understanding or his own deeply sinful nature; he has not pursued all the way that conservative evangelical notion of the human heart (even his own), being wicked and deceitful and bent towards pride.

    One last glaring dissonance which jars heavily upon many listeners who are either LGBTQIA+ or allies, to the extent it leaves one almost stunned in unbelief, is the chasm between Simon’s tone of voice and delivery, and the words he uses to describe us. I was dumbfounded on first hearing this sermon, and have had to go back and study it, several times over, to understand how such a gulf could exist in a person’s lack of self-awareness, and to try to find an explanation for it.

    Simon’s tone is calm, measured, and oozes compassion. This draws the listener and audience in because it soothes them, making them believe this is God’s heart of compassion, being reflected by the preacher and teacher. Part of this tone is his continual refrain in both introduction and conclusion, of ‘We love you.’ Easy to say, but the content of the sermon gives the opposite message.

    I know the preacher well, perhaps better than many. In every other sermon I have heard him preach I know this to be a genuine and authentic reflection of his heart but I am so shocked and sickened by this sermon and its content that I have had to question whether in this case the compassion is real, or feigned.

    While his voice oozes compassion, his words drip hatred, judgement, condemnation, exclusion, and rejection towards us as LGBTQIA+ people. Simon demonizes us and pathologizes us, pouring shame upon us; all in the name, and supposedly for the glory, of God.

    The sermon is divided into three parts, of roughly equal length, and they, to a large degree, depend upon each other for their integrity, or rather lack thereof. Each informs and builds the argument of the other. In each part – history, theology, and psychology – he indulges both flawed science, history, and experience to substantiate his argument, whilst his reasoning in each is deeply flawed, if not deliberately and intentionally skewed to favour his presupposed starting point. He offers snapshots of history, wrenched out of their true context, to prove the ‘gay lobby’ was a bullying, manipulative and destructive force against Christian morality and belief.

    He points the finger at the ‘liberalism and relativism’ of modern theology, informed by both science and human experience, labelling it ‘a pick and mix’ of whatever truths you choose to believe, but fails to see that he is indulging exactly this ‘pick and mix’ approach to truth in his own versions of history, theology, and psychology. He quotes from a particular selection of work from these disciplines, without giving his hearers any sense of how limited a selection this is. He claims that he “sets some facts straight” but there is no indication that these are not objective facts. It is a shameless hypocrisy of the worst possible kind, because he is using his failure to apply academic, intellectual, scholarly rigour and discipline to the arguments he presents as ‘absolute truth’, and he is doing so, in order to exalt his own authority as a theologian, preacher and teacher and stigmatise, demonise, pathologize a vulnerable and already oppressed group.

    His approach to other academic disciplines reminds me of what’s known in psychological analysis as the Dunning-Kruger effect. This is when someone who assumes themselves to be an expert or authority in one field, science, or discipline, believes they are therefore an authority in other sciences or disciplines.

    I have heard Simon preach many, many times, and he always rejects the liberal theology and theologians of the last thirty years, often men and women of far greater intellectual, academic, and scholarly rigour, research, and theological depth than his own. They are seen as irrelevant because he is preaching ‘absolute truth’ and they are preaching lies.

    But that repeated insistence that ‘We love you’, simply does not wash, it is meaningless, after we have been so cursed by his authority, power and words.

    Why does he do this? He, like so many of his tribal mates, genuinely believes that by converting gay and LGBTQIA+ people to being straight, he is saving us from hell.

    We clearly see here homophobia being embedded, maintained, and perpetuated in a parish church. It is homophobia which is using erroneous history and psychology to destroy young and vulnerable LGBTQIA+ lives. I have watched young LGBTQIA+ people, caught in cycles of shame, despair, self-hatred and self-harm, even suicidal ideation, after being subject to this type of ministry. I was one of them once. This sermon is spiritual abuse.

    Did Ponsonby ever stop to think that within his congregation, listeners to his sermon, there might by young church members who are LGBTQIA+?!

    If Jesus is our model of ministry, it is plain, simple, and so easy to see in the gospels, that his whole ministry was built around breaking shame from people’s lives, to restoring the oppressed and marginalised back into community, that they might flourish. The contrast I am seeing and hearing between Ponsonby’s ministry here, and that of Jesus, is so far apart, that I can only label this sermon as a manifest evil.

    It is God’s loving kindness that leads us to repentance. No threat of hell, or fear of hell can draw us into the loving heart and mind of God. No theology of judgement, condemnation, exclusion, and separation, as Simon so espouses in his sermon, can reveal God’s perfect love.

    It is grace, love and truth that leads us to repentance. I offer Simon that grace, love and truth and I urge him to make a full and public repentance and attempt some kind of apology and restitution to his victims. If he has moved on from his beliefs here, then he needs to publicly clarify what his new beliefs are. Yet his recent teaching in the St Aldate’s podcast series ‘Unscripted’ suggests he has not moved far at all.

    What scares me the most? It’s that the church applauds the preacher for this sermon…

     

     

     

     

     

  • A Plentiful Harvest: Growth in Inclusive Churches

    by Revd Dr Augustine Tanner-Ihm, Team Curate at St James & Emmanuel, Didsbury, Manchester and winner of the 2020 Theology Slam

    Just over 19 years ago, my life took a profound turn when I pledged myself to the teachings and person of Jesus Christ. This powerful, transformative experience occurred during a Pentecostal service in a small village located approximately 90 minutes outside of St. Louis. At the time, I was a 14-year-old adolescent grappling with depression and the harsh realities of homelessness, as my family and I were living in a shelter near Chicago. As narrated in the parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32), I was lost, and then found, embraced by a divine love that forever altered the path of my life.

    In subsequent years, I discerned a profound call to ministry, resonating deeply with the Great Commission as found in Matthew 28:19-20: “Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.” This call from our Lord Jesus Christ provided me with a sense of purpose and value, igniting a fervour in me to spread the gospel in a way that was contextual and geared towards spiritual transformation.

    Today, nearly two decades later, my mission and focus remain steadfast. I value church growth not out of ambition for worldly success, but from a deep-seated desire for more individuals to come into a saving faith in Jesus Christ. As Paul writes in Romans 1:16, the gospel is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes. This conviction transcends denominational lines and theological differences within the Christian community. Despite these disparities, my spirit rejoices when individuals come to know Christ, and my zeal for evangelism remains unabated.

    Upon answering the call to priesthood, I was initially apprehensive that my primary role would shift to being a chaplain to a congregation, rather than an evangelist. Further, my theology, which affirms the inclusion of marginalized groups, seemed to conflict with the prevalent notions of church growth I observed in the United Kingdom, where I have resided for the past decade.

    Often, churches that baptized and discipled many individuals either remained silent on inclusion matters or made very clear statements affirming traditional views on human sexuality. However, my experience serving under Revd Dr. Nick Bundock, Rector of St. James and Emmanuel Church, Didsbury, deviated from this pattern. Under his leadership, our church has adopted an inclusive theology while simultaneously producing ordained and lay leaders, establishing a Church of England Primary School, an Anglican School trust, and playing an active role in the community.

    Last August, we held a confirmation service where over 95 people from our parish were confirmed. It was a deeply moving experience. A few weeks later, we baptized an entire family who had converted to Christianity from Islam. Earlier in the year, a man who found our church through our online presence started attending our church. All of these individuals came to our church because of our bold and inclusive message of the gospel.

    Initially, I feared that advocating for inclusion might lead to the closure of our church. However, what we have experienced has been a profound affirmation of God’s love for all people. We have seen faith manifest itself in a myriad of ways within our community. We have seen belonging leading to believing, and believers becoming disciples. We serve a God who, as expressed in Acts 10:34-35, shows no favouritism but accepts all who fear Him and do what is right.

    We do not believe in inclusion because it is trendy, but because we are convinced it is a faithful interpretation of Scripture and the work of the Holy Spirit. We are praying and sowing the seeds of the gospel as described in Matthew 13, the Parable of the Sower. As we look to the future, we pray for a revival of faith among more inclusive evangelical churches. We believe we are witnessing a new harvest, one that affirms the beautiful diversity of God’s creation.

    Our congregation, under the guidance of Revd Dr. Nick Bundock, has cultivated a vibrant community that seeks not just to declare God’s message but to live it in practical ways. We have participated in various missions in Salford, Uganda, India, and beyond, demonstrating the global scope of our gospel mission. We emulate the apostles in the Book of Acts, particularly in Acts 1:8, where Jesus proclaims: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

    In a notable instance of domestic outreach, a man who was seeking understanding of autism in relation to Christianity stumbled upon our church’s inclusive website. He happened to live in the parish, and has since become an active participant in our spiritual community. This striking experience exemplifies the far-reaching power of the internet as a tool for ministry in the digital age, drawing parallels with the apostle Paul’s innovative communication techniques in his time.

    Another powerful instance occurred during a marriage course, designed by my fellow curate Revd Lex Russell and her partner Johanna Russell. This course allowed couples to explore the intersection of the gospel and relationships, facilitating spiritual growth in a unique context. In one case, the bride of a couple I was preparing for marriage expressed her desire to be baptised and begin a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. This serves as an exemplary instance of how relational ministry can lead individuals closer to God, echoing the teachings found in Ephesians 5:22-33, where the relationship between partners ikened to that between Christ and the church.

    Reflecting on these and numerous other experiences, I am struck by how our explicit message of gospel inclusion has fostered such rich and diverse spiritual growth within our community in Manchester. Every person, every story, is a testament to God’s love and grace extending to all people, mirroring the teachings of Galatians 3:28: “There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

    In conclusion, we do not view inclusion as a fleeting trend, but rather as a central tenet of our faith derived from a thoughtful understanding of Scripture and underlined by the Spirit’s conviction. This belief in the inclusivity of all God’s people guides us as we pray, sow seeds of faith, and wait in hope for a plentiful harvest.

  • Why Only 1 Diocesan Bishop in the Last 10 Appointments in the Church of England has been a Woman

    by Rev Martine Oborne, Chair of WATCH (Women and the Church), a group that works for gender equality in the Church of England

    **updated 28 September 2023**

    Congratulations to Bishop Debbie Sellin, whose appointment as the next Bishop of Peterborough was announced today, and prayers for a fruitful ministry. The Church of England will now have 7 female Diocesan Bishops out of a total of 42 Diocesan Bishops and will have made 8 appointments of women as Diocesan Bishops out of the 29 appointments made since women became eligible as bishops in 2015.

    Congratulations to the Peterborough Vacancy in See Committee which stated, during the discernment process, that it was seeking to appoint someone who ‘wholeheartedly ordains men and women.’ Vacancy in See Committees all need to make clear statements like this, otherwise it may well be assumed in the appointments process that a candidate who does not ordain women or accept women as church leaders is acceptable.

    Congratulations also to Bishop Debbie for being selected, despite the disadvantages that female candidates face when appointments of Diocesan Bishops are made. This un-level playing field is evidenced by the fact that the Church of England has appointed three times more men than women as Diocesan Bishops and, most recently, over five times.

    Let me explain what’s going on. First, when a Diocesan Bishop is to be appointed, a Crown Nominations Committee (CNC) is assembled. This CNC has 14 members comprising: the two Archbishops; 6 members elected from the Diocese concerned; and 6 members from a group of CNC members that have been elected by General Synod to serve in this capacity for a term of five years. Synod elects 6 “pairs” of CNC members for this purpose and, for each appointment, the pair can decide which of them will sit on the particular CNC.

    So far, so good. But three of these “pairs” comprise Traditionalist Anglo-Catholics who do not believe the Church of England has the right to ordain women and/or Conservative Evangelicals who question whether women should be church leaders. This implies that at least 3 out of 14 members of any CNC do not believe that women should be bishops, or even priests. And that is before we take into account the 6 locally elected members of the CNC where there is often representation of those who do not fully accept women’s ministry too.

    When it comes to voting, a candidate needs 10 out of the 14 possible votes of CNC members to be appointed. We don’t know how individual members of the CNCs vote, because they are allowed to do this in secret and are therefore not accountable. Under the process, members can claim verbally to be supportive of certain candidates but then not vote for them in the ballot. Furthermore, if a member abstains that is equivalent to a No – because the candidate still needs 10 votes in their favour. A few years ago, in the Oxford diocese, the CNC had two female candidates and neither were approved because of abstentions. The process had to be repeated, and then a man was appointed.

    9 of the last 11 appointments have been men, including the appointment of one Diocesan bishop who is on the Council of The Society, a network of Anglo-Catholic clergy within the Church of England who do not believe the Church of England has the right to ordain women. For a Church that claims, in its famous Five Guiding Principles, that ‘it is fully and unequivocally committed to all orders of ministry being open equally to all without reference to gender,’ these arrangements seem extraordinary. I can’t help wondering whether the skewed and secretive system, by which Diocesan Bishops – of whom many sit in our House of Lords – are appointed, is actually even legal. While the Church of England has certain exemptions under the Equality Act 2010 to discriminate on grounds of sex, it does not have carte blanche.

    This is a sorry state of affairs, especially given the many episcopal appointments that are due to be made in the next few years. According to a recent survey conducted by The Times, about two thirds of participating clergy want to see the provisions allowing parishes to reject women’s ministry come to an end and over 80% said they would be happy to support a female Archbishop of Canterbury. But, to become Archbishop of Canterbury, candidates are generally expected to be experienced Diocesan bishops first – and, at the moment, only 7 out of 42 are women.

    All this implies that not only is there a long way to go in ridding the Church of discrimination on the grounds of sex but also there is something badly wrong with our governance and, in particular, how minority voices have gained such a lot of power in General Synod. Overwhelmingly, Anglican clergy and laypeople want equality for all people in our Church – but the skewed composition of the bodies that elect our bishops means that many senior clergy do not reflect these views. Furthermore, about 8-9% of bishops are Traditionalist Anglo-Catholics or Conservative Evangelicals, when only 4% of parishes have passed resolutions to restrict women’s ministry. No wonder many frontline clergy and lay people see senior clergy as becoming more and more out of touch.

  • Keeping Students Safe: the Oxford LGBT Students Safe Churches Project

    by Chrissie Chevasutt, ‘Outreach and Development Worker with Transgender, Intersex and Non-binary People’, for St Columba’s Oxford. They have lived and worked in the city for 33 years, across a wide spectrum of churches, and in varied roles, thus having a unique perspective on church history and practices over that period.

    As part of my work in the city of Oxford, working with the transgender, Intersex, and non-binary community, I work alongside and with many LGBTQIA+ students. The stories I hear from them are constant, consistent, and repeated many times over. They experience spiritual abuse and religious trauma in some of the city’s churches. They are traumatised, and often suffer many secondary conditions; deep emotional, mental, social, relational, and spiritual wounding, some of which can work itself out in psychosomatic physical illness, chronic anxiety, and struggles with mental health.

    These same churches – who would describe themselves as ‘conservative’ – then add to the students’ pain by teaching that all their struggles are because they are gay, bi, trans, or queer. These churches and leaders refuse to accept that the judgement, condemnation, exclusion, and separation, sometimes even damnation, that flows from their lips, hearts and pulpits might be the cause. The consequence of their theology, preaching and teaching is to inflict guilt and shame upon many vulnerable young lives. From this, withdrawal and isolation are a common experience for students who are driven away from church and God.

    Self-loathing, self-hatred, despair, and shame can cause self-destructive behaviours and compulsions, almost impossible to control or contain, from eating disorders and self-harm, to suicidal ideation, suicide attempts and sadly, suicides.

    All this poison flows from the systematic homophobic theology that emerged from post-WWII USA. It’s a theology undergirded by the threat of hell.

    This theology is grounded in the claim that those who enjoy same-sex relationships are indulging sexual immorality, drawing on a Christian fundamentalist and biblical literalism that leads from 1 Corinthians 6 v9, through Ephesians 4 v17-19, 5 v3-5, to the eternal damnation of Revelation 21 v7-8.

    I was recently approached by a student who felt forced to leave a church where this theology was being preached. Even after 18 months in the church, they had no idea this was the theology of that church. They are in a same-sex relationship, their partner already badly wounded by a conservative evangelical church. They were told this church they’d started to attend was ‘youth friendly, progressive and liberal, welcoming everybody’.

    Confirming this, another three students have told me separately how they had shared within their student fellowship group meetings that they are gay, and in same-sex relationships. None of this appeared to trouble the group, or the student pastors, some of whom are paid church staff. On the contrary, they felt loved and affirmed by everyone present.

    (Most of the older members of the Christian LGBTQIA+ community in Oxford, however, know this church to have a long history of campaigning against LGBTQIA+ people’s dignity, equality, rights and freedom.)

    This pastoral policy of conservative evangelical churches marketing themselves as ‘Everybody Welcome’, in order to draw in as many students as possible, may make them ‘successful churches’ but only by hiding their homophobic theology and pastoral policy, a practice which is deceitful, disingenuous and dangerous, and potentially fatal to vulnerable young lives. We know that the incidence of self-harm, suicidal ideation and suicide attempts are far higher amongst LGBTQIA+ youth, and this increases again amongst LGBTQIA+ youth from Christian fundamentalist homes, families, churches, and faith backgrounds.

    It appears certain city churches now hold a policy of strict silence over their staff, of not saying anything about gender or sexuality that might go public. They realise that, if they are known to hold homophobic theology and pastoral policies, they will lose many of the students who flock through their doors.

    In September 2022, Bishop Steven published his proposal, outlining his theology for equal marriage: Together in Love and Faith. I read it and was impressed and blessed, until I got to page 46. The LGBTQIA+ Christian community has absolutely no doubts about the courage and compassion of Bishop Steven, in becoming the first bishop to put forward a proposal for same-sex marriage. We feel both indebted to him and want to protect him from the storm he faces from those clergy in his diocese who disagree.

    Many of us, however, have grave doubts about his commitment to protecting us, especially in the matter of our Safeguarding within his churches. There are doubts over his own history and proximity to colossal Safeguarding failures that have had tragic out-workings.

    On page 46, Bishop Steven repeatedly expresses extreme reluctance to place responsibility for the spiritual abuse of LGBTQIA+ people upon individual clergy or churches. This is a red flag waving right here, threatening effective Safeguarding of LGBTQIA+ people in his own Diocese.

    After being approached by the student who had felt forced to leave the ‘welcoming’ church that had been their spiritual home for the previous year and a half, on account of the attack upon their same-sex relationship, I began to research further. I discovered an audio recording of a 45-minute Sunday sermon on homosexuality.

    It is without a doubt the worst homophobic teaching I have heard in 43 years of church life. It is an appalling distortion and manipulation of history, theology, and psychology, used by a priest, to deliberately stigmatise, pathologize and demonise LGBTQIA+ people.

    This sermon was applauded by the church.

    This is exactly why the students’ Oxford Safe Churches Project had to happen. We have a Bishop who supposedly stands for us, but won’t stand with us and protect us; so, who will?

    Students who are driven away from church have nowhere to go. They know they will not get a fair hearing from the church’s Safeguarding Officers, many of whom will hold similar beliefs to the church’s leadership, and they have zero confidence in many of the denominational or Oxford Diocesan Safeguarding structures and current practices. The evil of Pilavachi in Soul Survivor, and the Church of England’s total failure in safeguarding young people there, has destroyed what little faith they may have had in any safeguarding process with which they might have otherwise engaged. They know they will most likely suffer further abuse and retraumatising in any internal safeguarding process they enter.

    In March 2022, I met with one of the university transgender reps, who represents both their college and the LGBT Student Society. They happened to be profoundly Christian, in faith and character. One of the subjects we wrestled with was the knowledge we both shared, of students getting badly damaged, and spiritually abused, in some of the city’s conservative churches. We both felt we could not call out the damaging churches, and that whoever dared to do so might be subjected to character assassination for attempting such a daunting task.

    When we met again at the beginning of this year, our hearts and minds had totally changed. Both of us had seen, in just that one year, too many students being wounded by homophobic, transphobic theology and pastoral practises. The suffering and pain in those lives, and even in our own, led us to conclude we could longer tolerate this happening on ‘our watch’.

    Together we wrote up a proposal for the Oxford University Student LGBT Society (of which, as a mature student in the city, I’m a member), to begin a project to signpost safe churches and flag up churches we knew where students were being broken.

    This was unanimously passed at the end of Easter term, and plans developed for the project.

    A team of students has laboured right through Summer term and the summer holidays, sending out questionnaires to 30 of the main city churches, collecting testimonies, researching churches’ history in archives online. From this they are collating all their information into a simple traffic-light-coded review, to assess which churches might be safe, and which are potentially damaging for queer students.

    Their passion, desire, and objective is to stop freshers getting sucked into churches who promise welcome, but inflict spiritual abuse. Most of them have been through this themselves, or seen friends whose student life in Oxford has suffered irreparable damage. They know this is a war over students’ lives and souls. They have paid a heavy price doing this research, which for most of them is triggering, traumatising and affects their mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical health. They are watched over by professionals in the university, clergy from various denominations and non-ordained pastoral workers like myself.

    The project has gone live in time for Freshers Fayre. Its bottom line is to save young lives; literally. They know their time in Oxford is short, but they are determined to leave a lasting legacy, that might see more churches becoming fully affirming at best, and at the least, force conservative churches to become honest, transparent and open about their core theology, pastoral policies and practises for their LGBTQIA+ potential members.

    They believe the Oxford Safe Churches Project has the power to achieve both those aims.

     

     

  • Trust is a Hard Thing to Come by Right Now…

    by the Revd Dr Charlie Bell, Fellow at Girton College Cambridge, Assistant Curate, St John the Divine, Kennington and a consultant to the LLF Implementation Pastoral Guidance Working Group

    Of all the things that the revelations and revolutions of recent years have impacted upon, trust must surely be front and centre. Whether it is in the societal recognition that trust needs to be earned rather than merely assumed, or the endless, devastating examples of where trust has been so badly abused and misused, no part of society can claim exemption from the new reality in which we live. Those in positions of responsibility are no longer simply blessed with the trust of others, however uncomfortable that might feel, and protestations fall on the deaf ears of a society that knows it has had its fingers burnt.

    The trouble with trust is that once it’s broken, it’s so much harder to rebuild. The Church – not only but certainly including the Church of England – is a place where that trust has, in so many places, been broken, and is also a place where so many in authority seem to be smarting from that very fact, blinking in the sunlight and disoriented by the new world which it reveals. We hear it as a constant theme in debates about safeguarding – extraordinarily in some places about, even, the need for it, and across the board in a failure of recognition by those who hold authority and responsibility that those to whom they are making promises find those promises hard to believe. ‘We are acting in your best interests’ quite simply no longer cuts it, and nor do the rather unedifying tantrums of authority figures that appear all too frequently when great assertions and promises are not believed or taken at face value. Not only has the trust gone, but the people who need to listen to why this is the case, rather than complain that it is the case, don’t seem – in the main – to be willing to do so.

    In the Church of England, our church culture does not help things. The church, by nature, is hierarchical – and in many ways, that isn’t a problem in and of itself. Yet in recent years whilst we’ve seen increasing examples of the toe-curlingly embarrassing ‘call me Dave’ attitude creeping in to episcopal communications and engagements (the church, once again, being around fifteen years behind the Conservative Party), the reality is that this is little more than window dressing. For all the guff, we retain a hierarchy in the church that is fundamentally unnecessary – a hierarchy that shows very little introspection about what is rightly hierarchical, and what is not. The endless lack of transparency and accountability in many parts of our leadership is not of necessity part of the life of the church – it is a failure of our common life. Of course, it is easier to wear jeans and a tee-shirt and talk about your favourite football team, but the reality is that, for all this window dressing, the unhelpful power imbalances that sit at the heart of the way episcopacy is lived out in the twenty-first century Church of England remain. And it doesn’t need to be so.

    To address those imbalances would take more than a few hundred words, and I would argue should be front and centre of the discussions of the College and House of Bishops as they move forward. The issues are not insurmountable, yet whilst there remains a centralising, fortress mentality, nothing will change. The reality, of course, is that if it were to change, then everybody would benefit – bishops included. It remains a stain on our church fabric that nobody seems willing to lift the lid for fear of what they might uncover.

    The College of Bishops meeting this week, and on their agenda must be – although, of course, we mere humble workers in the vineyard are not told – the proposed outcome of the Living in Love and Faith project. There are, of course, too many groups from which to choose that have faced a total breakdown in trust with church authorities, but one of them must surely be LGBTQI people. It has become increasingly clear to me, as someone who has been involved in recent discussions on the Pastoral Guidance, that we are not suffering from a trust deficit – we are suffering from a total lack of trust in church authorities from LGBTQI people. And, frankly, for good reason.

    For years, LGBTQI Christians have been led up the garden path, misled, openly lied to, faced broken promise after broken promise, and lobbed on the bonfire of unity, treated as means and not ends in the dirty world of church politics. In conversations with bishops, I have heard disbelief and hurt expressed when I suggest to them that their words are worth very little to so many LGBTQI people who have – frankly – seen it all before, and are yet to be convinced any change is coming. There seems to be a collective outrage when LGBTQI people express hurt and caution, which is far too frequently cast by those in power as cynicism and prickliness (with more than a dash of unconscious homophobia dwelling in those kind of characterisations).

    Now it’s certainly true that many of those currently in purple are different individuals to those who have previously let us down so badly, but there is a real need for some corporate responsibility to be taken and some introspection undertaken as to why this mistrust remains. The faces may be different, but many of the structures remain the same, and throughout this process LGBTQI people have been treated – unconsciously or consciously – as political footballs, our lives and loves used as bargaining chips in the endless debates around unity (which are really about money, buildings, pensions, and power). A failure to see – or recognise – this doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. Burying one’s head in the sand, or saying ‘just trust me’, doesn’t work. In short, where’s the evidence we should do so?

    Many promises have been made to LGBTQI people – publicly (‘radical new Christian inclusion’) and privately – about what will be decided (about – not with – us) in the coming weeks. These promises have been made in what purports to be a genuine, well-intentioned, honest way, alongside an apology for the way we have been treated in the past. All of that means very little unless something is actually delivered, and actual change occurs. We are all pretty much done with hearing nice things said.

    The ball is now in the court of the College and the House of Bishops. LGBTQI people, despite our reservations and our painful memories, have been cajoled into placing our trust in this process. Some LGBTQI people cannot bring themselves to trust that anything will change – and who can blame them? Others, me included, do believe that, at last, change is on the horizon, and the bishops will finally have the courage of their convictions – for that is what it is – to do what they know to be right, and to open the windows of the stuffy misery that is institutional homophobia and transphobia. This is their chance to prove that we’re not just naïve.

    Yet let’s make no bones about this – if these meetings end up with no change being made, no freedom for LGBTQI Christians to follow their consciences, no light being let in, no acknowledgement of the queer holiness that seeps out of LGBTQI Christians and enlivens the body of Christ, then we will enter into a time of crisis out of which it will be nigh on impossible to ever regain the trust of LGBTQI people – within and without the church. This really is ‘it’, and the stakes could not be higher.

    Now is the time for our leaders to deliver. Let us pray for our bishops to have the courage to begin the rebuilding of trust – and in so doing, to start rebuilding the church for whom they are called to care.

  • Jesus Did Not Call a Woman a Dog

    by Michael Hampson, a published author devoting his early-retirement from parish ministry to producing practical resources for busy clergy and lay-led congregations, beginning with the weekly lectionary resource ssra.uk

    There is a fundamental problem with the art and science of translation.

    Every word in the original text contains nuances that we cannot capture in a single word in our own language. And every word available in our own language introduces nuances that are not there in the original.

    In the end, the only accurate rendering of the original text – is the original text.

    The specific example that prompts this piece is the word kynarioi in the Gospel reading four weeks ago, on 20 August – because, let’s be absolutely clear, Jesus did not call a woman ‘a dog’.

    But the problem is more general. It’s not just the wince that most of us suffered that day, or the misogynistic Twitter-storm that I endured that weekend for daring to produce a lectionary resource that managed to translate that day’s text perfectly well, without using the d-word.

    The question for a translation is not whether it is accurate or inaccurate, because compared to the original, it is always inaccurate. The question is whether it fulfils its specific intended purpose as a translation.

    We are very fortunate – in English – to have access to so many translations. And equally fortunate to have ready access to the original texts.

    And for each translation in turn: the question is whether the translation fulfils its specific intended purpose as a translation. Is it for academic study, or for clergy-led parish study, or for individual study by lay people at home? Is it for line-by-line analysis, or for reading in long chapters like a novel? Is it for the first-time reader, or for someone already familiar with the text? Is it for someone reading alone, or for reading aloud in public? Is it for reading aloud in short verses, or in long chapters? Is the reader a professional actor, in front of a huge audience, or a member of an ordinary local congregation, on an ordinary Sunday morning?

    You have to be kind to all our modern translations, for having a go at fulfilling at least one of these hugely diverse purposes.

    As its name indicates, the resource I’ve produced, Sunday Scriptures for Reading Aloud, is designed to be read aloud, by members of ordinary local congregations, in ordinary local churches, on ordinary Sunday mornings. It is laid out on the page to be easy on the eye. It aims to be easy on the tongue, and easy on the ear. The three readings for the day are set out, ready to go, on one page. It offers clear, poetic, timeless, dignified translations with uncontroversial inclusive language. Less than a year after launch, dozens of churches have the print edition on the lectern, hundreds more access the live online edition every week, and the number of users continues to rise steadily month by month.

    As to the fundamental question faced by all translations, of how to render each word or phrase of biblical Hebrew or Greek into English, SSRA determines that, on balance, it would rather risk missing an occasional nuance from the original, than risk introducing into the English text a significant nuance that isn’t there in the original.

    And that is why there is no place in the English rendering of Matthew 15.21-28 for the d-word: because the d-word has a misogynistic nuance in English that is not there in the original Greek.

    Imagine this scene enacted between Jesus and a male challenger, instead of a female challenger. The d-word immediately loses nine-tenths of its harshness. And that proves the point. It still sounds harsh, and perhaps it is; some even speculate that the challenger’s riposte, in this encounter, is significant in the incarnate Jesus’s realisation that the work of the Messiah is for all humankind, not only the people of Israel. Others speculate that there is no harshness, just playfulness; that this is a riddle, a game, from the start. But what we know for certain is that the exchange takes place two thousand years ago, dozens of cultures away, probably in Aramaic, and we have it only in Greek. Kynarioi may mean something vaguely like ‘puppies’ (it is a plural diminutive); it absolutely does not have the atomic-blast nuance of the d-word. Jesus absolutely does not call a woman a dog, and any translation that still uses that word is – well, frankly, for virtually all purposes, and certainly for reading aloud in church, just wrong. It introduces a commonplace, widely-understood nuance – a meaning – that is simply not there in the original Greek. That is a serious error in translation, with terrible consequences. We should not tolerate it. We should not tolerate it when it comes around again on 16 August 2026.

    For the purposes of SSRA, I reluctantly decided that the word kynarioi is untranslatable – but the sentence in which the word appears is not. The sentence is perfectly translatable. In verse 26, the small mammal (kynarion) wants feeding. In verse 27, it crawls under the table to eat crumbs. Both sentences can be translated perfectly adequately without having to compare the woman to a dog, or indeed to any specific mammal at all. Having to eat waste, and having to crawl under the table to collect it, is humiliation enough. The rest is nuance and commentary, and indeed speculation; and that is for the pulpit, and not necessarily for every time the text is read. As it says in the blurb, “a preacher may wish to refer to a more literal study translation (or indeed the original Hebrew or Greek) when making a word-by-word or line-by-line analysis of the text.”

    Jesus said, ‘It is not right to take food away from the children.’

    She said, ‘Yes, Lord, but surely there will be crumbs that fall from the table.’

    It is enough.

    There is only one other passage in the entire three-year cycle that is as problematic as this one. And it is only eight weeks away. On 12 November, the Gospel uses the v-word, and it is unacceptable for all the same reasons as the d-word. By using the v-word, the standard translations of Matthew 25.1-13 take ten women with dignity and agency, and reduce them to objectified ridicule.

    For SSRA, I have kept the context of a wedding, because it’s upbeat, and it’s the context that Jesus chose, even though we have absolutely no idea, from any source, why ten young women would be waiting up all night, specifically for the groom, before, during, or after, any part of a wedding celebration. But I have translated this opening image of being up all night before the wedding feast as a single concept, rather than letter-by-letter or word-by-word (though the single word ‘people’ might reasonably describe who they are in 2026, given the principles set out above).

    Jesus then gives these ten people agency. They are determining their own futures, when they decide how much charge to put in their lamps; or, in the meaning of the parable, how much effort to put in to being prepared for whatever may lie ahead, including for the coming of the Kingdom.

    But instead of recognising their dignity and their agency, we have objectified them, sniggering at them with the v-word, and making it worse with the f-word.

    The final puzzle was the gender of the group, and I know there are valid arguments both ways, but on balance – with the gender wars ready to hijack every conversation – I decided not to risk a late hijack on this one, having just rescued it from that very war zone. So I chose gender-neutral language, so the focus can be on the oil in those lamps.

    My first challenge to every preacher on the day is to get through the sermon without making any reference at all to any part of the traditional title of this parable – because if you do, you just reinforce, yet again, centuries of misogyny, and that is all that anyone will remember. And don’t preach about the art and science of translation either, or about misogyny (there are other days for that); preach about oil in lamps, and the coming kingdom; it is Remembrance Sunday, after all. You might even, you might just, find space to say, that in the original Greek text, those preparing for the wedding feast through the night are actually all women; and by analogy, those preparing for the coming of the kingdom, in this parable, are women; Jesus is taking the opportunity, in telling this parable, to highlight the fact that women have agency, just like men, in the work of the kingdom.

    Misogyny continues to objectify women by dividing them into the two passive categories of d-word and v-word.

    It is no coincidence that the traditional translations of these two gospel readings do precisely that as well. The traditional translations take women who, in the original Greek texts, have dignity and agency, and objectify them, for humiliation and ridicule, into each of these two passive categories in turn.

    Translations that continue to use these two English words, with their heavy misogynistic nuances not present in the original Greek, are unfit for purpose – especially where that purpose includes public reading in church.

    I guess over the last month I’ve been genuinely surprised to find – after thirty years of just getting on with ordinary parish ministry – that the debates of thirty years ago are still so fiercely contested, in Synod and online. Perhaps The Times clergy survey, three weeks ago, was evidence that in the vast majority of ordinary parishes – thank goodness – they’re not.