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Author: Helen King

  • Risking Reputations: The Process of Reconciliation and Belonging through the Lens of Ruth

    by Revd Joshua Askwith, Incumbent of Norbury Church, member of General Synod and Reconcilers Together, a partnership of peacemakers across the UK, Ireland, and North America

    Every so often my wife and I will come to the end of a long day and flop on the sofa in search of a movie to watch. We have our favourites, of course. We bicker over whether to pick something from the Universe of Marvel or Harry Potter. But, more often than not, we end up watching a romantic movie; ‘Notting Hill’, ‘Hitch’ or, if it’s Christmas, ‘Love Actually’. And who isn’t captured by a great love story? The story of individuals crossing boundaries, showing courage and, eventually, falling in love.

    I have often heard the Bible described as the world’s greatest love story. John 3:16 tells us that God loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life. God’s deepest yearning for His children is that we know that love and lean into it abundantly. Often, though, we don’t demonstrate the courage to cross boundaries; instead, we create communities of division. Entrenched by the views we think are correct, we do not ask courageous questions but instead belittle and degrade. We seem to fail to enact (or live out) that great love story that God invites us to be a part of.

    While it is not the most obvious of love stories, the book of Ruth is one of the greatest. Ruth and Naomi don’t always agree, but they model to us that need to cross boundaries, show courage, and to risk it all in order to learn to love and accept the family God has given to them.

    The story of Ruth begins with the tale of a Judaean family’s migration to Moab. Naomi, faced with the loss of her husband and two sons, has to make the courageous decision to return home. And so begins a process of reconciliation and love.

    This decision to return or repent in Hebrew is teshuva, from the verb lashuv. Lashuv appears eleven times in the remainder of Chapter 1 alone. It is a reminder that in repentance we can find love, reconciliation and hope. Any great love story needs more than a “first meet”. Each of our stories faces many moments of sadness and joy. Love stories are a process of learning to forgive and fall in love again and again. Teshuva towards God is a process with many acts of turning along the way: moments of repentance, reconciliation and love. This “return” or reconciliation is a process of journey, encounter and place (Lederach 1999, 26).

    While it may be Naomi who begins this journey towards reconciliation, it is Ruth who embodies the process through a series of surprising and risky encounters. From the outset, she’s a character of provocation and encounter, who takes the story into her own hands. Like Jacob wrestling with an angel in the desert, she grapples a blessing from God, and wrestles with society, risking her life in order that a family may return home. From fighting and following Naomi to risking her life in the harvest fields, Ruth seems willing to step out in faith and to trust that God will provide.

    These encounters are not the fluffy moments of the movies, but risky encounters of the most vulnerable. In each act, Ruth risks part of herself; physically and emotionally, she puts herself on the line and trusts in God. Any act of reconciliation involves such encounters of vulnerability and risk. Individuals put their lives, their belief, their love in the firing line.

    It is individuals, rather than the institution, who are in danger of being harmed. Through LLF, the Church of England has offered a dialogical approach, but this conversation is often one-sided. It is not the Church which is risking its reputation in starting the LLF process: it is those it has asked to risk themselves in taking part. Some of these conversations have been helpful. At a local level they have helped some congregations flourish and thrive. Others have not. I have heard of church members leaving congregations because they no longer feel safe. To enable an honest dialogue, the Church needs to take a risk as well.

    Towards the end of Ruth’s love story, she needs to take a life-threatening risk. Once the harvest season is over, Naomi sends Ruth to Boaz on the threshing floor. This is a moment of deep encounter but it is one which requires risk on both sides. Ruth could not have gone to Boaz if she had not already experienced some kind of grace or glimpsed some kind of hope. Yet the Church is asking individuals to take what can seem like life-threatening risks without offering any grace or pointing towards any hope.

    By taking risk, Ruth demonstrates that divine providence and human agency are inseparable; that the process of reconciliation cannot be completed without both God and us. Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, writes

    that this is still the work of God today and the Church is at its glorious best when it seeks to demonstrate the pure and holy love of God in breaking barriers and when with courage it stands with those whose experience is of being barred from leading a full life, what Jesus calls an abundant life (2022, 104).

    Many have been barred from leading a full life. Many have walked away from the Church because it asks them to risk too much, to be harmed too much. If we have learnt anything from the recent call to safeguarding it should be that individuals should not have to risk themselves in hope of grace. Reconciliation cannot happen if an organisation is not willing to demonstrate the courage to hold up its hands and say it has got something wrong. The church cannot expect people to continue to persevere in the process if it does not take bolder steps.

    For reconciliation to take place, those in leadership need to be willing to admit their failings and risk their reputations. Boaz’s offer of protection came at a great risk to himself and his community but he chose to do it anyway. Ruth’s response only happened because the person who held the power was willing to risk his reputation and offer radical and practical grace.

    In the coming months, the College of Bishops meets to discuss the “way forward”. These discussions need to be open to the risky potential of grace. For only by offering practical protection, safety, and love can the church expect others to risk their reputation. The reconciliation of Naomi to her community was not easy. It took Ruth risking something in terms of reconciling another. There will be those of us who can risk our reputations to see people return to the church. But before any of that can take place, the Church needs to decide if it is willing to take the risk, stretch out its hand, and affirm that unity is what it is seeking; and to show that with a practical response of love.

    Further Reading

    Lederach, J. P. (1999). Journey toward Reconciliation. Herald Press.

    Tuama, Ó. P., & Jordan, G. (2021). Borders and Belonging: The book of Ruth: A story for our times. Canterbury Press.

    Volf, M. (2019). Exclusion & Embrace: A theological exploration of identity, otherness, and reconciliation. Abingdon Press.

    Welby, J. (2022). The Power of Reconciliation. Bloomsbury Continuum.

  • Ordained, Commissioned, Faithful and Eternally Hopeful

    by Revd Andi Chapman, Chaplain in the Royal Air Force, serving in the south of England

    My name is Andi. I am an ordained Church of England (CofE) priest who is currently serving in His Majesty’s Royal Air Force (RAF) and is also in a same-sex Civil Partnership. Some years ago, when I began the journey towards ordination, the person responsible for my academic reference for the Bishops’ Advisory Panel (BAP) wrote: “Andi will be good for the church, but the church won’t be good for him”. At the time, I thought that my university lecturer was having a downer on the church, yet over the past 17 years since that time, what she wrote has in the latter part sadly came true.

    From the time of first receiving ‘the call’ to ordained ministry, I knew the journey would be far from easy.  I expected to encounter some views that could make me uncomfortable. Yet, throughout, from my diocese to the BAP and on to theological college, people were welcoming and promoted inclusion. I was not, by any stretch of the imagination, a rainbow flag-waving gay person, yet if you scratch my surface there would be a rainbow there. I have always been circumspect about ‘coming out’ to people on first encounter, so have applied cautious judgement when meeting new people.

    After three years at Cranmer Hall, I went on to the Lincoln Diocese where again I was welcomed with inclusion and love by the bishops and training incumbent. While not being ‘overtly out’ with the Parish, I did meet my now-husband there and entered a civil partnership which ultimately looked like a scene from the BBC comedy The Vicar of Dibley where the registry office was half clergy from various denominations and half Lincolnshire farm workers! There were a few people in the parish who did struggle with my same-sex relationship, yet for the most part I was supported. That does not mean there was not the pain of rejection from those who did not support us; indeed, some refused to receive communion from me while others left the church building when they saw me. It is important to note that these people were in the minority, and they had been perfectly happy with me being their curate before they knew my situation.

    Then the commissioning came along. I joined the RAF as a chaplain and began my travels around the different stations within the service. It has also taken me to other parts of the world. My aim has always been serving others and showing God’s love through the wonderful, yet maybe apocryphal, saying of St Francis: ‘Preach the gospel always, use words if you must’.

    Yet there is one constant in my story that has remained: that I live in a tri-tension between Church, ministry and love. The Church has remained clear, with Lambeth Resolution 1.10 and Issues in Human Sexuality and its standpoint on same-sex attraction. While I have entered a Civil Partnership, that is as far as I can go. Some years ago, I would have been keen to marry my other half, yet in the interim my views towards marriage have adjusted, and say to me that love does not need to be measured by marriage. Paradoxically, it has been from Christians that I have experienced some of the most disappointing and painful behaviours. Overt homophobic opinions have peppered many of my interactions during my ordained life.

    When I first meet LGBTQ+ church members they often seem surprised that I have found a home within the RAF, as many assume that the Armed Forces would be intolerant towards varying sexualities and gender differences. I can say with confidence that the RAF has given me the space to exercise God’s calling, which primarily involves me living within the community in which I serve. It has given me the securities, inclusion, and scope to work without fear of homophobic attitudes. My role is based around offering pastoral and welfare support to those who serve their country, their families, civil servants, and contractors. The work is predominately diaconal in its output.

    While the RAF has offered me a safe environment to do this role, that does not mean I have been immune from homophobia. On Easter Sunday this year, after the service, one person asked me how my husband was and I answered openly and honestly. I was aware of one retired service person’s reaction to this. I recognised the hostility and tried to prevent any negativity. However, by the following week I had noted that the church numbers were halved. I was not surprised by this, but deep down I did feel a sense of anguish and frustration.

    I am who I am and have to accept the tensions within the doctrine of ‘Church, ministry and love’ for the rest of my life. Yet that is where the need for an unshakeable faith comes into play. Although I know that change is slow, I believe that in my own way I can help precipitate that change, and that I can have value to those in the church, the RAF and my partner.

    Thank you for taking the time to read a little bit about my story. Peace and all good to you!

     

  • Getting Hot under the Collar about Sex

    by Mother Fiona Jack, curate at St.Barnabas, Ealing and member of General Synod

    A motion to urge the government to take action to limit children’s access to pornography was passed with an overwhelming majority at the July sessions of General Synod. There was also a recommendation for programmes to increase awareness of its pernicious influence on the young. There’s currently an Online Safety Bill at Committee stage in Parliament; if passed, it will go some way to bringing in legislation to address the problem. No-one, I imagine, would take issue with this; we heard evidence from professionals, parents and confessors attesting to the damage done when children access age-inappropriate material.

    I have a particular interest in this as, in my other life, I run a qualitative research business. Recently, we conducted a study for a major platform provider on the same topic. We discovered that not only do children access 18+ sites, but they are often more tech-savvy than their parents and can circumvent parental controls because they know their parent’s login and password details. The issue is much broader, however, than pornography. Equally harmful for children is violent content or horror. I remember my own daughter (despite warnings from me) watching a horror film with a 15 rating when she was about 12. She discovered, to her regret, why such films are not recommended for younger children. As well as horror and violence, online gambling and other online purchases can present problems: not only can children manipulate their parents’ email accounts, but they sometimes have their bank and credit card details and can run up large bills through online purchases of – for example – computer games, which also sometimes have violent or other adult content.

    Given this potential broader remit, I was somewhat disturbed that the debate in Synod focussed on pornography, to the exclusion of these other risks to children’s mental health and well-being. Coupled with other debates in Synod and the subsequent furore around same-sex relationships and marriage at the Lambeth Conference, this led me to reflect on why, as a Church, we seem to have sex on the brain. The overriding narrative from the Church seems to be that sexual sin is more serious than any other. What about the many other besetting sins of our age? Why don’t we hear much about pride, greed, envy or anger?

    I would argue – and I don’t think this is particularly contentious – that the underlying message of the Gospels is love. We hear plenty about agape love, certainly, the kind of selfless love a parent has for their child or the love God has for us. In the Church, we’re all comfortable with this kind of love. Love is OK as long as it’s pure and spiritual, right?

    There’s also the eros kind of love though, as so breathtakingly portrayed in the Song of Songs. What is it about the eros kind of love that makes some people in the Church get so hot under the collar? Being embodied is part of our identity – we are not built or intended to be pure spirit either on this or the other side of the grave – have you noticed how nobody talks about the resurrection of the body these days? We interact in the world for good or ill with our bodies. In a lecture entitled “Towards a Christian Sexual ethic for the 21st century”, the Revd Dr Carla Grosch-Miller pointed out quite rightly that the only function of the female clitoris is pleasure. If we believe we are fearfully and wonderfully made by our Creator, then we can only assume that enjoyment of sex was part of God’s plan for women in the first place. And for how many centuries have women who have enjoyed sex been thought of as whores – not to mention the cultures which still practise FGM for this very reason?

    There can be no more beautiful expression of love than the joy of sexual union between two people who love each other in the context of a committed relationship – and that’s equally true for heterosexual and homosexual couples. If we theologise sex into something shameful and sinful, then we deny a fundamental part of what it is to be human, and life becomes beige not red-blooded. In the words of the Song of Songs: ‘Many waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it’. If we are fortunate enough to find this kind of love in our lives, we might find in it a window into the love of God which is both passionate and fervent, full of desire and longing, eros as well as agape. Sadly, we are taught not to want certain things or certain people: we don’t choose who we love – how much easier would life be if that were the case?

    Going back to our starting point, our children must be protected from all kinds of harm online, not just pornography. Over-emphasis on sexual sin can make us look like people for whom it is always Lent and never Easter (Pope Francis) or like Narnia without Aslan where it’s always winter and never Christmas. Here’s a radical thought: instead of disapproving attitudes and a tone of moral outrage towards the secular world and our fellow Christians, what if the Church were to send a message of understanding and encouragement, a message that speaks of joy and hope even in the midst of suffering? Perhaps then we’d be following in the footsteps of Jesus Christ.

     

  • What is Marriage? Living in Love and Faith… and Denial

    by Rachel Starr, tutor at The Queen’s Foundation for Ecumenical Theological Education, Birmingham

    As someone shaped by Methodist tradition, it has been an interesting experience engaging with Living in Love and Faith (2020). As you may know, the Methodist Church in Britain has spent the past few years debating its own report on marriage and relationships, God in Love Unites Us (2019). There are some similarities, and of course many differences, between the two reports. Both in their own way seek to reflect the changing social context from which and into which they speak. And yet there is little acknowledgement of how church teaching around marriage and relationships has had a limiting and sometimes deadly impact on women and other marginalized groups throughout the centuries.

    My own study of theologies of marriage began while living in Argentina. It was there that I began to see how the everyday violence that many women (and some men) experience within the context of intimate relationships, was legitimated by dominant church teaching around marriage and gender relationships. Living and studying alongside Latin American women theologians and activists helped me to see the everyday violence that occurs in homes, on the streets, and in other contexts. Many of our interactions, structures and institutions are formed and maintained through violence. Such violence may not be obvious at first, but once seen it is difficult to ignore.

    Living in Love and Faith presents an idealized view of marriage, which fails to account for problems perpetuated by Christian teaching on marriage. As one example, the document makes reference to prophetic descriptions of the covenant as a marriage, but does not acknowledge the violence of this metaphor and how it has been used to justify domestic violence over the centuries. This despite decades-long discussion of the violence of these texts by scholars such as Renita Weems.

    To read either Living in Love and Faith or God in Love Unites Us is to be presented with a view of marriage as a vocation, over which churches are divided as to who can be called and who is able to benefit from the gift of marriage. But what if marriage was less of a gift and more of a problem? Of course, marriage can offer stability and friendship, as well as significant social and financial benefits. But some studies suggest that women who marry have a lower life expectancy than single women, whereas men who marry have a higher life expectancy than single men. Such studies suggest that for women marriage is, at a very basic level, life-limiting.

    My concern with how marriage is presented in Living in Love and Faith is that the negative impact marriage can have on women is not acknowledged. While the report does make mention of domestic violence, it seeks to contain what is an everyday reality for one in three women worldwide by literally ‘containing’ the brief discussion of domestic violence (written by myself) in a text box. As such it does not inform the wider discussion of marriage.

    In my own work, Reimagining theologies of marriage in contexts of domestic violence (2018), I explore Augustine’s notion of the good of marriage. Augustine proposed that marriage should be valued because it can generate fidelity, children and lasting union, a view which continues to shape the church’s understanding of the purpose of marriage. In contrast, I suggest that a good marriage is one that is concerned with the bodily wellbeing of both partners, and that contributes to the positive transformation of the wider community. The need for marriage to be life-giving for those both within and beyond it is reflected in Willie James Jennings’ criticism of what he sees as the church’s obsession with married couples. In his commentary on Acts, Jennings argues that for a marriage to be good, it must locate the couple in the wider community, so that there is a shared sense of purpose and distribution of resources. Jennings’ words came to mind recently when I read about the marriage of actor Sophia Bush and social entrepreneur Grant Hughes which took place in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 2022. The couple designed their marriage celebrations around their commitment to social justice, inviting guests to spend time with local activists and artists, all the time asking how their marriage might generate more sustainable, equal and inclusive ways of living.

    In Reimagining Marriage, I look also at two models of marriage which dominant western Christian traditions: marriage as covenant and marriage as sacrament. Both of these are present within Living in Love and Faith and God in Love Unites Us. Yet neither report critically assesses these models or acknowledges their limitations. To summarise from my own research: the covenantal model is marked by exclusion, inequality and violence; and the sacramental model encourages self-sacrifice and limits access to divorce.

    While I recognise the importance of equal access to marriage, I wonder whether it is really the goal many perceive it to be. Is marriage unavoidably problematic, a relationship built on inequality, restriction and control?

    The new Methodist service of marriage, designed for the celebration of marriage between any two people, is a hopeful sign that marriage can be reimagined in more equal ways. The marriage party enter the church together; and since the couple is non-gendered, there are no assumptions about who speaks first.

    Alongside more equal forms of marriage, I suggest that marriage should be reimagined as a place of grace, in which bodies are honoured, everyday struggles are acknowledged, and new more just and equal ways of relating are anticipated. Rather than describing marriage as a sacrament or covenant, perhaps a more helpful, inviting image for today is that proposed by the medieval English theologian Aelred of Rievaulx, who described marriage as a rickety boat, which takes constant work to keep afloat, and which, if it is to survive, must be focused on the common good.

  • Entering Creationtide: The Church and the Climate Emergency

    by Revd Ruth Newton, parish priest of St John’s Sharow, tutor at St Hild college, and member of General Synod and the Environmental Working Group. Ruth is undertaking a doctorate into the theological motivations of environmental activists

    There is no longer any question that anthropogenic climate change is happening, with an overwhelming scientific consensus that the climate is warming at an alarming rate due to human activity. In 2021, the UN Secretary-General suggested that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change findings were nothing less than “a code red for humanity”, that “the alarm bells are deafening”, and that the evidence is irrefutable. The record-breaking temperatures experienced this summer have hammered home to those of us in this country a message that our brothers and sisters in the global South have been telling us for some time: that climate change is a present reality, not a future threat.

    Consensus for action has been growing within the Church too. Striving “to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth” has been recognised as a mark of Anglican Mission for over 30 years. It’s the aspiration of General Synod that the Church be “Carbon Net Zero” by 2030, and this has placed environmental actions firmly on the agenda of PCCs and Diocesan Synods.

    In a Church which is divided, not least on human sexuality, environmental mission has the potential to provide the common ground around which we can coalesce and where the Church could give unequivocal moral leadership. The recent “Lambeth Calls” on the environment and sustainable development attracted less publicity than the more controversial one on human dignity, precisely because, as one bishop reportedly said, they were a “no brainer”.

    Nevertheless, in a Church recovering from the impact of the Covid lockdowns and facing the immediate challenge of the cost-of-living crisis, I wonder if “the environment” is seen as just another issue to be ticked off an ever-growing to-do list. For too many, environmental mission is still seen as a distraction from the “core business” of being Church – the evangelism, youth and children’s work, pastoral care, social advocacy, and the myriad of other things we need to attend to.

    However, “the environment” is not one issue amongst many, or even the issue of our times. I would argue it is not “an issue” at all; it is bigger than that. It is not a distraction from “core business”, but rather the backdrop to it, the horizon against which all our theology, mission and ministry are undertaken. Our apologetics and evangelism will prove ineffective if we present a version of the Gospel which fails to address the pressing questions the ecological crisis is raising. Those engaged in pastoral care will find themselves faced with people who are, with some justification, suffering eco-anxiety. Those who advocate with and for the poor will discover, as so many relief and development agencies have done, that climate change and ecological degradation intersect with and amplify poverty to the extent that one cannot be dealt with without addressing the other. All our theology, mission and ministry will need to be recalibrated to meet the challenges of “the environment”.

    Doing this will not be easy, as even finding the appropriate language is a struggle. I wrestle with the idea of stewardship. I find little scriptural warrant for it, apart from a contested interpretation of Genesis 1:28, and, given our track record to date, I have little confidence in the abilities of humans to proactively manage the natural world. I wonder if we might do better to think in terms of human restraint in using natural resources.

    Thinking in terms of creation-care is preferable, but only if we recall that we too are created beings, dependent upon both God and the non-human creation. We need the rest of creation more than they need us. Since we have tended to think of ourselves as separate from the rest of creation, the language of creation-care does not always sufficiently emphasise the degree to which the ecological crisis is also a humanitarian one, affecting people, and affecting them right now.

    Climate change disproportionately affects the global poor, black and brown people, women, and children. Those who, historically, have been least culpable are also the ones who are bearing the most cost. Those who are already marginalised will be marginalised further. We have a responsibility to future generations who bear the consequences of our actions and inaction. So I prefer to think in terms of justice. Whilst I am unsure whether God has given Christians a mandate to “steward” creation, I am confident he has given us one to do justice and love mercy, and to love our neighbours as ourselves.

    This month, as we celebrate creation-tide, we may well rejoice in the beauty of the natural world and the splendour of all that God has made. We may even consider our culpability in the world’s problems and may commit to live differently. But let us not shy away from addressing the human cost of the ecological emergency, and our prophetic role in addressing that.

    A Christian response to “the environment” cannot be left to those environmental enthusiasts and nature lovers who have heroically advocated for decades. Nor can the theology be delegated to the specialism of eco-theologians. It will involve the whole Body of Christ, in all its diversity, uniting, as the Church takes up its calling to announce and signify the Kingdom of God. I am probably slightly too fond of saying “in the face of global heating, we cannot be lukewarm”. But really, as those who seek to follow Christ, we can’t afford to be anything other than “all in”.

     

  • Two Things Which Really Matter

    by the Very Revd Dr David Ison, former member of General Synod, who next month retires as Dean of St Paul’s 

    This is my last blog as Dean of St Paul’s. After 43 years of stipendiary ordained ministry, it’s time to let go of doing in order to do more being. I’m glad to make space for a younger generation of Christians to have the opportunity and responsibility to lead Christ’s church into the future. And I’m hopeful for them, and even for the Church of England, because there are many wonderful lay and ordained Christians committed to following Jesus, and that’s what Christian churches need in order to face the many challenges and crises coming to a head for this country and for humanity across the globe as capitalism and imperialism reap what they’ve sown.

    Over the last four decades there are two key things which I’ve learned which I think are at the heart of what Christian faith, mission and ministry are about.

    The first is how to do church and mission in an increasingly pluralist and contested public space, where the narrative of ‘scientism’ (that the universe, however amazing, is meaningless) undermines spiritual as well as mental health and reasonable faith, leading to superstition and extremism. The Church has lost plausibility, made worse by its failures of safeguarding and its moral divergence from what many people regard as reasonable. The Church’s temptation is either to take refuge in dogma and draw hard boundaries around itself as ‘counter-cultural’, or to become just one interest group alongside others competing in the market-place for people and resources. The ‘Save the Parish’ movement is a belated response to a crisis which was known to be coming long before I trained for ministry in the 1970s, as the inability of many parishes to maintain numbers of laity and clergy and financial viability in the face of heritage building costs and other challenges has been predicted for over 50 years.

    My experience of what works in mission is fairly simple. It is to pray – to love God; to love our neighbours by serving them inside and especially outside the church; to love one another as a diverse group of disciples; and to do these things together, building a shared vision for a loving and serving church. Being people of spiritual integrity, living in the truth, welcoming other people without judgement (see Matthew chapter 7), meeting them in their personal and community needs – that’s what attracts people to the Christian gospel. In an incarnational faith, it’s Christian lives, not doctrines or techniques, that build the kingdom of God.

    I’ve never understood the emphasis in the Church of England’s ordination services on ‘proclaiming’ the gospel, as if it were passed on by megaphone. The third-century Christian writer Tertullian pointed out that the Christian community attracted people, even though it could mean persecution and death, because they could see the love which Christians had for one another and for others, and they wanted to be part of it. Proclaiming isn’t of value in itself: it’s drawing people into following Jesus (‘making disciples’) that matters, and love in action, not words, is at the heart of it. And thanks be to God that many churches and Christians do it!

    Jesus says to his would-be disciples, ‘you will know the truth and the truth will make you free’ (John 8.32). It’s that living in integrity that people respond to; and the heart of the Church’s problem is that it hasn’t been living in love and integrity. The inability of heterosexual men to cope with their own sexualities has led to the projection of those inner conflicts on to others including in the Church, impacting women and children in safeguarding cases, sexual and domestic violence, and ongoing legal and cultural discrimination against women and LGBTQ+ people. The Church’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ culture of official disapproval but covert acceptance of sexuality has had a huge impact on the lives and mental health of LGBTQ ordained and lay ministers, and has perpetuated a culture of dishonesty and lack of accountability which has allowed other abuses to occur, as seen for example in the surfacing of safeguarding cases over the last decade and the recent news around fraud in the Diocese of London. Whatever the outcome of the Living in Love and Faith process and debates in General Synod, the Church must end up with real love, truth and honesty at its heart, lest it continue to be seen by the rest of the world as hypocritically less moral than the majority of our society.

    The second main thing I’ve learned in ministry is that it’s about following Jesus. That sounds obvious! But it relates to the question of integrity. Years ago I wrote an article entitled ‘The Pharisees will always get you in the end’, making the point that the Pharisees are there in the gospels to show us what we as religious people can be like when our religion becomes more important than God and people. In his encounters with the Pharisees, Jesus subverts the dogmas of his day: healing on the sabbath, being unconcerned with purity laws, forgiving sinners without due process – he is focused on the person and their motivation and relationship with God, rather than on the expectations of others. Jesus is still challenging, but he gets to the heart while the Pharisees look at the outside; Jesus is concerned with holiness rather than purity, while Pharisees then and now confuse the two.

    The Diocese of London has for a number of years had as a unifying statement the concept of ‘Generous Orthodoxy’. It’s akin to ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ in that it allows Christians with very different views to agree on a slogan while not engaging with their real differences, with people putting differing emphases on the level of generosity and the content of what orthodoxy is. My experience of church politics in London and on General Synod has been of increasing power games over the last several years, based on churchmanship and dogma rather than on the reality of people’s lived Christian experience, with less powerful groups (including LGBTQ, Global Majority Heritage, disabled, women) being pushed to the margins, and a lack of integrity between what’s said and what is actually done in practice.
    There’s a tendency in the Church, following after the world’s culture, for extremism and division which does not reflect the love of God, and which is unbecoming to followers of Jesus and unattractive to Christians and non-Christians alike.

    My hope in Christ is that everyone matters equally in the Church, and that’s what the LLF process has been trying to pursue. I pray for the outcome to be love and to be really truthful, centred on people not dogma. The irony about so many of the arguments in church circles is that much of the language about judgement in the New Testament is about our actions and their outcomes, not concerned with our beliefs and doctrines: ‘by their fruits you shall know them’. I do wonder whether some who describe themselves as ‘biblical’ have really taken on board St Paul’s words on love in 1 Corinthians 13…

    When finally, in the words of a key fob my children gave me, I ‘get called to head office’, I don’t expect to be examined on my understanding of penal substitution, but on whether I truly loved God, and my neighbours as myself. That’s what really matters.

  • The Church and the Body: Becoming a Safe Space to Talk about Dating and Sex

    by Andrew Godsall, who was ordained in 1988 and has held various posts in London and Exeter Dioceses. From 2010 to 2017 he was a member of General Synod. He spent the early part of his career with BBC Radio, including as a Producer of Religious Programmes, and it was there that he encountered Monica Furlong. 

     

    The late Monica Furlong – writer and astute observer of all things religious, but especially the Church of England – wrote a wonderful little paperback in 1975 called Christian Uncertainties. Writing about sex she notes: ‘That sex can be healing and joyful (sometimes outside marriage as well as in it), that it can lead to personal growth, that it is a way of knowing God, above all that it is Good, still takes a certain nerve to say in Christian circles’. Has much changed since 1975?

    Whilst it has been possible for many years to meet a potential mate through the personal columns of various newspapers, online dating apps have proliferated that possibility of coupling. Local churches have long been a way for single Christians to meet others and so naturally even Christian dating sites have become a thing. Why do people ‘date’? I want to explore four reasons, though I’m sure there are others that make up the fullness of our desires to ‘couple’.

    Firstly, as a means of intimate companionship. By that I mean a companionship that is different from work colleagues, or friends, or members of a club of some sort. Intimacy is not simply about sex but rather about making a deeply personal connection with another person. It’s a remedy for loneliness, although that can make it sound rather sad. The second chapter of Genesis expresses it like this: ‘It is not good that the man should be alone. I will make him a partner as his helper.’ Whilst Genesis goes on to describe the particulars of the first man’s partner, the general and more inclusive principle is located in the need not to be alone. We seem to have an innate need to couple up.

    Secondly then, in daring to date another and so overcome that sense of being alone, we discover who we really are ourselves. We might find our worth in work. We might find our ability to be part of a team at the club. But we find our intimate selves with a partner as our helper. Too often that phrase from Genesis has been taken to imply that the ‘helper’ is somehow an assistant; the secondary to the primary who is the man. Yet our understanding by the practice of companionship is that help is a truly mutual process. The helper is more truly a partner. Both those who prefer a partner of the same sex, and those who prefer one of the opposite sex, will find that this partner becomes a co-equal helper. The fact that Eve is described as the first helper doesn’t detract from the principle. The blueprint is for partnership, and not subordination. With a partner, as part of a couple, we discover who we truly can be.

    Thirdly we have a need to be desired. In the animal kingdom, birds will often display extreme beauty as a way of attracting a mate. Think of the peacock. It is natural to need to be desired. Even those of us who are shy and reticent about our attractive qualities will want the affirmation that goes along with being desired. Jessica Martin’s wonderful book Holiness and Desire: What makes us who we are? explores some of the theology of desire. She notes that ‘behind all the desires for connection is the desire to be fully known’. That of course echoes the transcendent beauty of St Paul’s assurance to the Corinthians that even though we know only in part, a time will come when ‘I will know fully, even as I have been fully known’. To be desired by someone, especially when we are stripped naked and are particularly vulnerable, gives us some fleeting assurance that our journey of courtship, our coupling, is an echo of a movement towards God. In being more fully known by a partner, we sense what it could be like to be fully known by God. We don’t call sex ‘making love’ for reasons of politeness. In making love we have the potential for transcending the ordinary. As Jessica Martin puts it, ‘desire is our bridge out of the rule of time’. When someone desires us, we glimpse something of the eternal.

    Fourthly, in dating we find the need to express the intimacy of partnership in physical contact. ‘Bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh’ is ultimately expressed when bones and flesh are coupled in mutual sexual expression. I don’t know about all the ‘rules’ that Christian dating sites might want to enforce, or at least recommend, about online dating, but I am certain that some would insist that sexual expression is not permitted outside of marriage. Indeed, the C of E officially continues to take that line.

    Monica Furlong was prophetic. ‘That sex can be healing and joyful (sometimes outside marriage as well as in it), that it can lead to personal growth, that it is a way of knowing God, above all that it is Good, still takes a certain nerve to say in Christian circles.’ I am not persuaded that the Bible proscribes a sexual relationship in dating prior to marriage. Marriage was in any case a very different relationship, arranged by families rather than by the couple, and dating in our sense did not exist. I am aware that custom and tradition would make it risky and could cause a couple to be ostracised. That was still true relatively recently, until reliable contraception made sexual intercourse the ultimate intimate expression free from the outcome of childbirth. I am also fully aware that while dating, many people find creative ways other intercourse to satisfy each other sexually, ways which have always been available to the unmarried as well as to the married.

    Custom and tradition have so changed in the last two generations that a guide to intimacy in dating needs to be reclaimed by Christians. I don’t believe that can, or should, be done by forbidding sexual intimacy. I believe it should be done by having the courage to be honest about the healing, and joy, and personal growth and goodness that sexual expression, including before marriage, can lead towards. It can lead towards God. This means that the Church needs to own the myriad of sexual expressions that are viable agents of help for the individual and the couple who are daring to date. It is not good for people to be alone. Especially perhaps because, when it comes to sex, people start alone.

    The Church needs to be a place where people can find the key to not being alone, even if it isn’t necessarily the place where people will find a date. So the Church needs to be a safe space to talk about sex. This is far better in Church than in the playground or online. Just as many parents conclude that they would prefer their children to be having sex safely under their roof rather than in more degrading circumstances, so the Church could offer hospitality for more honest and open conversations about sex and sexuality if it isn’t to face further rejection. Dating and sex are too good and too important to leave to secular society alone.

  • The Global South Fellowship of Anglicans – Power and Numbers?

    Canon Dr Phil Groves is a parish priest and convenes the Anglican Peace and Justice Network. His PhD is on Anglican Missional Ecclesiology and he was the Facilitator for the Listening Process in the Anglican Communion and Director of Continuing Indaba. He is Canon of Mpwapwa Cathedral in Tanzania and fluent in Kiswahili. 

    Following the Lambeth Conference, bishops are returning to their dioceses with renewed energy, and an expanded vision as they realise the wonder of being part of a global communion of churches. While the external narrative might be about splits and an obsession with sex, they will tell a different story, barely recognising the conference they attended for the one reported on.

    At Canterbury, the conversations were around being followers of Jesus in a world in crisis. Seminars and private conversations often focused on a world defined by authoritarian and corrupt governments, and climate disaster. The pressures are more acute among the poor, and as our poor face hunger, the poor in the socio-economic global south are facing starvation. Our prophets of justice face ridicule: theirs face death.

    The ‘Lambeth Calls’ focused minds on potential action: especially for indigenous peoples, those still oppressed by the inheritance of slavery, young people facing an uncertain future, those living under threat of persecution for their faith and for standing for oppressed peoples. For a wonderful seminar presentation on justice from an African contributor – please click here.

    However, one group called the ‘Global South Fellowship of Anglicans’ (GSFA), has been driving a divisive message that has distorted the reality of the conference. They claim to speak for those who have historically been marginalised and silenced through the dominance of power in the socio-economic global north. They claim to speak for 75% of Anglicans – an overwhelming majority. These claims are impressive and make them very significant, especially to progressives who are aware of the dangers of racism and the value of democracy.

    But are these claims true? In order to fact check these claims we can look at the GSFA website, which lists 25 Provinces as belonging to, or associated with, the Fellowship. Belonging requires fully signing up to a constitution that relinquishes provincial autonomy in favour of a global ecclesial body. The site no longer says how many are ‘members’ and how many are ‘affiliates’.

    The constitution is clear that, despite its name, the GSFA no longer claims to be defined by ‘geography’: rather, it is increasingly defined by ‘orthodoxy’.[1]

    The Diocese of Sydney and the Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) are both listed among the 25 members and affiliates, showing that despite its name it is not exclusively a voice for the socio-economic global south. Also, all members of the secretariat are from the Diocese of Singapore and Singapore is classified as being in the socio-economic global north.

    This means that, rather than being a voice for the complex diversity of Anglicanism in the socio-economic global south, GSFA is claiming to be the voice of ‘orthodoxy’: an orthodoxy defined by a common view over a single key issue. This is reflected in almost every statement issued by the block for the last twenty years. The focus of these statements is on condemning the growing number of Anglican diocese and provinces where LGBTI+ people are included and their relationships celebrated, rather than issues that actually affect people in the socio-economic global south.

    The first thing to note is that only 22 of the members/affiliates are Anglican Communion provinces. In addition to Sydney Diocese (not a province), the ACNA and the Anglican Church in Brazil are breakaway churches. In the Anglican Communion, 31 provinces have all their dioceses in the socio-economic global south with another 4 (Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia, Jerusalem and the Middle East, South East Asia, and The Episcopal Church) having dioceses in both global south and global north. For example, TEC’s biggest diocese by numbers is Haiti, the biggest francophone diocese in the Anglican Communion. This means that GSFA claims to speak for 22 of the 35 Anglican Communion provinces with dioceses in the socio-economic global south, not all provinces with dioceses in the global south.

    During the conference, the GSFA-EFAC Lambeth Resource group[2] distributed a letter to bishops asking for them to sign a document to reaffirm Lambeth I.10 and to indicate the number of Anglicans worshipping in their dioceses.

    The voting was monitored by a UK-based accountant and General Synod member, Debbie Buggs. She ‘checked all email reaffirmations to ensure the information was accurately transferred from email to the official record, and that each affirmation recorded has been validated by a relevant Bishop’s Lambeth Conference Pass’. It is not made clear if she ensured that bishops were not supervised as they voted – that is, that they voted without pressure being applied. It is not clear if she validated the numbers of Anglicans declared.

    While this was probably intended as a show of strength, an examination of the result from the press release issued at the conclusion of the process instead brings into question the claim to speak for the 22.

    The reaffirmation was signed by 125 bishops claiming to represent nearly 8 million Anglicans, but the result demonstrates that GSFA neither speaks for the Anglican provinces in the socio-economic global south, nor for a majority of Anglicans globally.

    In their press release, GSFA recognises this, and indicates that they expect bishops from the GAFCON provinces of Nigeria, Uganda, and Rwanda (who stayed away from the Lambeth Conference) to sign up in the future, which would swing the numbers in their direction. This may be the case, but it is not clear that these churches actually support the whole of Lambeth I.10, including the commitment to listening to LGBTI+ experience. The Church of Nigeria, in particular, has made it clear that listening to the experience of ‘homosexual persons’ is at odds with their position. They support the ongoing criminalisation of LGBTI+ people, which they assert is GAFCON policy.

    The Primate of South Sudan, as Chair of the GSFA council, was to the fore in pressing for the reaffirmation of Lambeth I.10, and 40.8% of the signatories were from South Sudan (51). The next biggest block comprised IAMA bishops (bishops from the new province of Southern African Lusophone countries).

    The third biggest block vote comprised bishops from TEC (8) – a province not listed as either a member or affiliate. On the other hand, no bishops from 5 provinces that GSFA claims to represent – Bangladesh, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, South Africa, and West Africa – signed.

    The claim to representation is especially interesting when the Province of South Africa is considered. The pre-Lambeth documents from GSFA include a paper rejecting the ‘Indaba’ model embraced by the design group of the last two Lambeth Conferences. This model was championed by the Primate of Southern Africa, the chair of the design group. GSFA claims to represent Southern Africa in objecting to the Indaba model. Now that we know that it does not have the support of a single Southern African bishop, this appears a hollow claim.

    The number of signatories from Australia (4), Canada (4), England (3), and Ireland (3) was greater than signatories from Burundi (1), Central Africa (3), Kenya (2), and Tanzania (3), all provinces in the socio-economic global south with significant numbers of Anglicans. I had conversations with several bishops in these African provinces who were adamant that GSFA did not speak for them. They asked me who these people were, and said they had no authority to speak for them. I was given access to WhatsApp groups in Kiswahili formed with encouragement to ignore the representations received from GSFA.

    The GSFA does not appear to represent 25 provinces of the Anglican Communion. We can say that it represents one very big one – South Sudan – and some smaller provinces, but not 25. It is a minority group in the global south.

    The next question is whether it represents 75% of Anglicans globally.

    The claim to overwhelming numbers was intended to be reinforced by Bishops being asked to declare the number of Anglicans worshipping in their dioceses. There are two problems with this; firstly, this was not validated and secondly, it is rare for worshipping Anglicans all to support the opinions of their bishop. It is unlikely that all – or even a majority – of the 19,800 Anglicans in the dioceses of the three Church of England Bishops who signed the document agreed with it. While it may be an accurate number, it may not be a useful number.

    The numbers in Tanzania are probably accurate, but again illustrate weakness. The three bishops there claim to have 88,000 worshippers. However, the Diocese of Central Tanganyika on its own has between 700,000 and a million worshippers in just one diocese. The three signing bishops are bishops of very small dioceses.

    This goes to demonstrate just how unreliable numbers are as a way to judge anything: they are a terrible way to judge truth – Jesus would have failed completely! However, what GSFA has shown by its own documents is that it does not represent 75% of Anglicans.

    There are bishops in provinces in the socio-economic global south who support equal marriage. The Province of Brazil has revised its prayer book to welcome same-sex couples. There are dioceses where same-sex unions are blessed. However, they are a minority.

    The clear message of the support for the Archbishop of Canterbury’s carefully worded address was that, although most bishops in most provinces will continue to support Lambeth I.10 in their dioceses and provinces, they are willing to continue in mission with those dioceses and provinces that think differently.

    This is also backed up by what I observed. TEC bishops were planning mission initiatives with African bishops. The South Sudanese bishops were very excited by their invitation to the Diocese of Salisbury.

    And the role of the Bible in all this?

    Archbishop Makgoba has shown that it is the Indaba way that is biblical. He shows that Paul gave local churches such as the church in Corinth the responsibility for cultural integration and dispute transformation. Paul never suggested that conflicts in local churches be referred to the Jerusalem Council. Paul founded a communion of churches, not a single institution. It is a Communion-based global church that images the missiological ecclesiology of Paul.

    In contrast, the GSFA champions a non-biblical approach to conflict resolution based upon Western European understandings where definitive judgements are made by majority in council and imposed on the whole. This way is the way of division. The splintering of the GSFA demonstrated why it must be resisted.

    So where are we?

    No one actually agrees with the whole of Lambeth I.10. They may say they do, but it was a compromise between a desire for a harder line and the sop of the promise of listening. When churches have genuinely listened to LGBTI+ people they have questioned the advice not to bless same gender unions and ordain LGBTI+ people.

    In many countries where Anglicans seek to decriminalise LGBTI+ people, the Lambeth I.10 formula is actually useful to them, because the language of human dignity is better than that of ‘human rights’. The human rights agenda is played as the new colonialism – imposing the will of a powerful Western lobby on the cultural norms of independent nations. The Call to respect human dignity is being seen by some as a call to act for decriminalisation. We should pray for and hope for action here.

    And for the Churches considering the deeper inclusion and celebration of LGBTI+ people? The message should be that the Anglican Communion will not fall apart if they go ahead.

     

     

    [1] Communiqué from the 8th Global South Conference, 2021, Para 10:
    ‘Under this Covenantal Structure, the Global South Fellowship is transitioning from being a grouping based on geography to one based on orthodoxy while appropriately keeping our historical roots.’

    [2] GLOBAL SOUTH ANGLICAN LEADER SETS FOUR PRIORITIES FOR ‘ORTHODOX DELEGATES’ ATTENDING THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE – 7 July 2022 notes: ‘A Resource Group to support Orthodox archbishops/bishops attending the Conference has been set up by the GSFA, and the Evangelical Fellowship in the Anglican Communion (EFAC).  It comprises Bishop Henry Scriven (Hon. General Secretary EFAC), Bishop Rennis Ponniah (Hon Director, GSFA Executive Secretariat), Bishop Keith Sinclair (National Director, Church of England Evangelical Council), Canon Charles Raven (Director Relay200, The Relay Trust), Rev William Mok (Deputy Director, GSFA Executive Secretariat) and PR Consultant, Revd Paul Eddy.’ Rev William Mok is from Malaysia in the global south, but works in Singapore in the global north.

     

  • Embodying Lambeth: Homophobia, Hope and Honesty

    Embodying Lambeth: Homophobia, Hope and Honesty

    by Fr Jarel Robinson-Brown, Co-Chair of OneBody OneFaith and Visiting Scholar at Sarum College, Salisbury

    ‘To encounter oneself is to encounter the other: and this is love. If I know that my soul trembles, I know that yours does, too: and if I can respect this, both of us can live. Neither of us, truly, can live without the other…’

    – James Baldwin, The Devil Finds Work, 1975

     

    It would be fair to say that I have been wrestling recently, quite deeply, with what place hope should have in my life. Not just as a Christian, but as a priest – I’ve wondered whether hope is all it is made out to be, and whether hope (real hope) is even possible as someone who exists in a body whose skin invites violence and micro-aggression and whose sexuality endures inequality, oppression and injustice. For years, as someone Black, Gay and Christian I have wrestled with what part of me really ‘came first’ in that list of identity that I carry not by choice, but because the world is a place where labels, compartments, boxes exist. And they exist, on the whole, to make those who do not carry them – feel safe.

    One thing people often say in relation to my recent book is that a shorter title would have been better. But ‘Black, Gay, British, Christian, Queer’ defines those of us who live at the intersection of race, religion, sexuality and culture. As I wrote: ‘as Black Queer Christians  … we feel pressurized to choose at times between our Blackness and our Queerness, our Britishness and our African-ness, our religion and our desire, our life partner and our families, our bodies and our souls…To some we are no longer Black, to others we are no longer Christian. We live then faced with an impossible ultimatum between ‘life’ and life – to live as we are expected to live, to live in the freedom that is ours but will cost us nothing short of absolutely everything to inhabit’ (p.24).

    So to return to hope, I still remain uncertain as to what place hope should have in my life – and I went to the Lambeth Conference fairly hopeless but left with more hope than I imagined possible. Getting on the train to Canterbury, I was already apprehensive – the 15 year-old child sat in tears around the family dining table defending his right to exist was back…, “this is just who I am” in the face of “you can’t be Gay and Christian, the Bible says it’s wrong”. Standing in the truth of who I am does and has cost me much, not least my relationship with my father and other family members – but when the only options before you are staying in the closet and death (and both are the same thing I think) the choice was clear.

    By the time I arrived in Canterbury a statement had been released by the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches which stated that they would table their own call to re-affirm Lambeth resolution I.10 as the “Anglican Communion’s ‘official teaching’ on marriage and sexuality” and to impose sanctions on Provinces which ordain bishops in same-sex relationships and conduct same-sex weddings. Rather than receive communion alongside such bishops, they announced that they would stay seated, as one of “a number of ‘visual differentials’”.

    It was of course, like stepping into the lion’s den. Seeing those who had decided that receiving the sacrament of the Eucharist alongside people like me was impossible. My black body stood at an LGBT+ stall was clearly quite confusing to some of my brothers and sisters from other parts of the world. To embody an “issue” in the skin of those who are most vocal against it was an interesting experience.

    At the forefront of my mind was the reality that I am one among many whose ancestors did not leave Africa willingly, but who were taken from their homes to far off lands. Whilst I am a citizen of the UK and Jamaica, I am also an African Gay man, and a Christian. Sometimes I wonder what my life would look like if we were never taken – what language would I speak, what clothes would I wear, what God would I know. This sense of unknowing is powerfully articulated by Cole Arthur Riley in her work ‘This Here Flesh’:

    ‘I do not know from where my ancestors were abducted. I cannot tell you what the air smells like there. I don’t know what sound the waves and soil speak. These things were stolen from me as they were from them. I think it is one of the deepest evils to become a thief of place, to make someone a stranger to their home, and then mark their relationship to the land by bondage instead of love.’ (p.22)

    Although at times the space at the Lambeth Conference felt occasionally hostile rather than violent, I was surprised by the deep, warm and meaningful encounters I had with Bishops and those invited spouses who were willing to engage – even inviting me to their countries to engage in dialogue around LGBTQ+ lives. It would take more courage than I perhaps have to go to countries where homosexuality is still illegal, but then I already do so whenever I go to Jamaica.

    It seems to me that not enough attention has been paid to cultural aspects of this dialogue. There is, for example, a huge issue with seeing Africa as one homogenous anti-gay continent. Southern Africa is not Nigeria, Ghana is not Swaziland and Brazil, also part of the ‘Global South’, is extremely LGBT+ affirming. It is claimed that homophobia in Africa is pervasive, indigenous, deep rooted and normative, when in fact it functions on many levels: Political, Cultural, Theological.

    In his work ‘Out of Time: The Queer Politics of Postcoloniality’ Dr Rahul Rao notes:

    ‘As countless media reports purporting to analyse attitudes towards sexuality inform us, ‘homophobia is rife in Africa’. Contrasted with the queer freedoms of the West, such discursive constructions of Africa produce what Jasbir Puar has described as ‘homonationalism’ – an assemblage in which LGBT rights have come to be mobilised as new markers for an old divide between the civilised and the savage.’ (p.33)

    What this construction of Africa does is locate homophobia in Africa in such a way that removes agency from Africans to define their attitudes themselves rather than having them instrumentalised and manipulated by outside factors. Rahul Rao also names ‘homoromanticism’, a view which sees African people as blameless pawns caught up in a white, western culture war into which Africa has been dragged. Like ‘homoromanticism’, ‘homonationalism’ removes African agency to tell the story of indigenous queer identities and anti-queer attitudes from within the African cultural context.

    Rahul Rao also reminds us that postcolonial critique needs to go beyond simply reminding us of the enduring legacies of colonialism. Formerly colonised states have become colonial in their own right, and “the project of decoloniality might itself become a vehicle for the politicisation of ‘homophobia’”, as happened at the 1998 Lambeth Conference, when conservative evangelical American Anglicans capitalised on the demographic strength and financial weakness of the African Churches when weaponizing homophobia.

    For me, the very notion of a distinctly ‘African’ homophobia is essentially an orientalist narrative setting up Africa as the antithesis of Europe. The positions taken by many African clergy at the Lambeth Conference are driven by anxieties from the global south related to the preservation of culture, of customs, the notion of the family against the perceived and real threat of Global North hegemony. Nor is the UK the haven of equality and justice which the binary narrative claims – as my experience in this black queer body within and without the Church in Great Britain shows.

    What struck my black body most starkly whilst being present at the Lambeth Conference was that all, literally all, of our LGBTQ+ material and literature was in English. We understand ourselves as the centre of a universe which is so much more diverse than even we, who are wanting the Church to be more diverse, realise. Few know much about the cultures of Kenya or Sudan as well as other parts of the Global South, and so much of our queer theology and scholarship is shaped by our Eurocentric categories which neglect non-western epistemologies, conceptual and intellectual frameworks. When we commend LGBTQ+ justice and equality we do so not only across a theological divide but a cultural and linguistic divide. For a Bishop from along the Nile whose diocese is not even 10 years old, whose people suffer from floods and civil war, a conversation therapy booklet is baffling when his people have no access to good healthcare or the vaccine.

    So am I hopeful? I don’t know. What I do know is that there is no hope that things will change so long we fail to encounter difference. The Lambeth Conference hasn’t met for 14 years: many of the Bishops who are there now were not Bishops when it last met: the world, in just the past two years, has totally changed. We need to hold our English bishops to serious account for their cowardice, whilst paying careful attention to the dialogue around other parts of the Communion. There is, at the heart of this, just so much fear – perhaps what drives this fear is the reality that a Church which becomes more inclusive is fundamentally one which is more honest…more honest about the world God has made, and the people that make up that world – and maybe the illusion that God’s world is straightforwardly heterosexual is finally crumbling. But without encounter of the ‘other’, each of our worlds become smaller, less real, less true – whatever the future holds if it is a future shaped by God, and of course it is – it will be made up of all of God’s people. And a Church which is honest about the world is a Church which can attractively proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ whose love knows no bounds.

    ‘…There is no promised land without a multitude. You think you can get there alone, and maybe, by some rare chance you do. But what will become of the promise when it is collapsed by loneliness? Who is going to drink all that milk and honey with you? Look down in the cool, running stream. You cannot see yourself.’

    – Cole Arthur Riley, This Here Flesh, 2022

     

  • Purist, Principled, Pragmatic? A Good Friday Agreement for the Church of England

    by Simon Butler, former member of Archbishops’ Council and member of General Synod 2005-2022

    The death of David Trimble was announced this week. Tweeting about Lord Trimble, Alistair Campbell, who knew him well through the Good Friday Agreement negotiations, said this: “He could be a difficult and mercurial character but he was the right man in the right place at the right time.”

    That got me thinking about where we go next as we approach the end of this part of the Living in Love and Faith (LLF) project. As we move from the phase of listening and learning, and await what emerges from the Next Steps Group and forthcoming House of Bishops meetings, who might be the right people in the right place at the right time in seeking a way forward beyond the current position we find ourselves in, which both conservatives and progressives find equally unsatisfactory and toxic? Setting aside questions of personality and temperament, which make some people less suited to negotiation and compromise, who needs to be talking to whom, when and about what?

    Looking across the divide as a progressive towards my conservative colleagues, I see two broad positions being taken. This first I might describe as purist. Purists don’t just hold a conservative position but appear to believe that such a position is the only position that can legitimately be held by anyone who claims the name of Anglican. The purist position was articulated well by Dr Ian Paul who, speaking on BBC Newsnight recently, said this: “To say that there is a plurality of views [about same sex marriage] is to claim that the two different views are of equal value and of equal significance … the 2016 Primates’ Meeting said that the moves in North America are a fundamental departure from the faith.” The full quote does more justice to the Primates, “Recent developments in the Episcopal Church with respect to a change in their Canon on marriage represent a fundamental departure from the faith and teaching held by the majority of our Provinces on the doctrine of marriage.” The Primates didn’t unchurch the North Americans by this statement, they didn’t claim that the American Church is apostate because it has changed its marriage canons, and they didn’t claim the historic view held by the majority is one universally held, as developments since 2016 have shown. So, while the Primates expressed dismay at the emergence of same-sex marriage in The Episcopal Church, the predominant theme then, as now with Lambeth 2022, is of ‘walking together’. Dr Paul allows the rhetorical moment to get the better of him, and he claims more than the Primates do. Still, he articulates the purist view with skill and passion: there can be no compromise. Changes to the teaching on marriage imply it’s time to walk apart.

    It seems to me that purists want not just to uphold the historic teaching of the church; they want to impose and reassert their view on all Anglicans, whatever position scholarship, prayer and pastoral discernment directs our conscience towards, whatever the historic polity of the Communion allows. Delegitimising sincerely held matters of conscience is as profoundly un-Anglican and un-Reformed as it is unworkable. It is a form of theological totalitarianism.

    Alongside the conservative purists are those who I might describe as principled but pragmatic. Perhaps adopting the wisdom of Gamaliel, these hold their principled opposition to any non-heterosexually married sexual activity, while recognising that progressives are part of the Church of England (and the Anglican Communion) and that they are likely to remain so. For these conservatives, what they are looking for is some form of provision rather than simply suppression of their opponents. For example, take the position of the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC) in its 2016 paper Guarding the Deposit. Having first articulated what seems like a purist view, namely a reassertion of traditional sexual ethics while disciplining more effectively those who live outside of this sexual ethic, the author then moves on to what is described as ‘visible differentiation’, an ecclesiological solution in a church which is not prepared to enforce the purist view. This is both principled and at the same time pragmatic, for it opens the possibility that a future Church of England might remain made up of conservatives and progressives, albeit in a very different ecclesiological structure.[1]

    There is much that I baulk at in Guarding the Deposit, ecclesiologically-speaking, although it is interesting to ponder, building on the insightful arguments of Neil Patterson in a recent Via Media article, what ecclesiological compromises could become necessary for progressives if the opportunity to make progress on LGBT+ inclusion genuinely existed. But that is for the future. What I think we can acknowledge, however tenuously, is that the official position of the main Evangelical lobby group in the Church of England can foresee a shape to the Church of England where both conservatives and progressives can ‘walk together’, even if (what I would describe as) progress towards the full inclusion of LGBT+ people were made. I don’t think this has been sufficiently recognised.

    So, if this is the case, I think two clear consequences flow. First, the argument has moved on from purist versus progressive, and there is little value at the moment in progressives in engaging with purists in any meaningful sense. They hold their position with principle and passion, and inevitably they will be a vocal presence in social media. But nothing will satisfy them until people like me change our views, or shut our mouths, or leave our partners, or abandon the ministry of the Church of England altogether. None of that is going to happen, not least because God and his Church keep calling and ordaining LGBTI+ clergy. Purists have nothing to offer the post-LLF church except more conflict. Instead, I think progressives should start treating those who are principled but pragmatic conservatives with greater seriousness and respect, acknowledging their consciences as much as they must acknowledge ours. As we approach the end of the LLF process and are inspired by it, this is where future conversations will need to happen.

    Secondly, and this will be a particular challenge to those who have purist tendencies on the progressive side of the Church, we will have to compromise on what we talk about, how we talk about it and the way we talk about it. Painful and challenging as it may be for us to go through the familiar dissection of our most intimate feelings and sense of ourselves, we have to listen to our principled, pragmatic conservative colleagues without rushing to judgment; we might believe they are wrong, cruel, missionally-misguided or even a safeguarding risk to LGBTI+ people,[2] but just as we find it profoundly upsetting and beyond tiresome to be called sinners by conservatives, they do not find it at all easy to listen to or accept what we say if it is regularly coated with liberal judgmentalism, which is just our more coded way of calling them sinners too. We must learn to talk about what we want and the consequences not just for us but for them, and to explore the sort of issues that emerge for them should LLF produce a more progressive outcome than the current status quo.

    The Good Friday Agreement was an agreement between two parties who were principled and pragmatic, led by Gerry Adams and the late David Trimble; the purists in Northern Ireland, led by Ian Paisley, campaigned vigorously against it, but eventually even they agreed to work within the settlement that emerged and was democratically settled. That is not to say that things are at all easy in the Six Counties, but at least the Armalite has been replaced by the ballot box. Most progressives and principled, pragmatic conservatives probably would live with the ecclesiastical equivalent of a Good Friday Agreement in the Church of England. We certainly need a long-term settlement on which trust can be built.

    So maybe now is the time for the principled pragmatists on both sides to emerge. Perhaps, in God’s mercy, they can be the right men and women, in the right place at the right time too.

     

    [1] It is worth noting that Guarding the Deposit seeks provision for conservatives, which is only one way provision could be made; a wider conversation is necessary – whatever progressives like me want, we recognise that it is not what the Church of England has ever done in the past. It is we who are seeking provision at a different level.
    [2] A matter for safeguarding professionals in my view; being LGBTI in and of itself does not make someone a vulnerable adult.