ViaMedia

Author: Helen King

  • Swimming in the Deep End

    by Mother Arwen Ffolkes, Vicar of Eastbourne and member of General Synod

    Many years ago, during my discernment process, a conversation turned to the breadth of the Anglican tradition. Someone older and wiser than me remarked, “It is the shallow waters of the pool that always make the most noise.” I have never forgotten those words. Their truth is being borne out in our current time, when some of the loudest voices in our Church seem content to splash about in the shallows. There, amid the noise, hermeneutics, homiletics, and theology are too often reduced to something distressingly thin.

    I fear for some of my campaigning conservative evangelical brothers and sisters. I fear they have lost sight of the deep end and forgotten the joy of learning to swim freely in the vast and generous sea of God. Instead, they insist that those who venture into deeper waters have lost their way, and try to drag us back to the shallows, where the doggy paddle of literalism is the only stroke permitted.

    At General Synod, I often find myself asking: How small is your God? It is a question born not of anger but of grief. I have heard modernisms dressed up as tradition, literal moralism mistaken for orthodoxy, and in all of it, an astonishing blindness to the rotten fruit such distortions bear. Few of the early Christians would have recognised this way of practising the faith. To hang the whole of salvation on the nature of human relationships is perilously close to heresy. How small must one’s God be to imagine that human love could threaten divine holiness or undo redemption? It is not only incredible but tragic.

    I sometimes watch, with sadness, as the self-appointed defenders of God stand firm in their certainties, as if the Almighty needed protection from His own creation. In truth, they have lost their way – not because they are faithless, but because they have mistaken control for conviction and noise for depth.

    Increasingly, I find myself welcoming post-evangelicals who have outgrown the shallows. Life, in all its mess and mercy, has made the pool too small to hold their humanity. Instead of being cast out, they have swum upward and outward – to the deep end – where mystery and unknowing, silence and sacrament, become gifts rather than threats. There, they discover the God who truly walked among us: the One who meets us not in fear but in freedom, not in certainty but in communion.

    The beauty of Anglican faith lies in the holistic dance of Scripture, tradition, and reason – each speaking to experience with grace, charity, and love. It is not shallow. It is not new. It is the deep, living current of the early Church, flowing still, calling us to swim further in.

     

     

  • Winded After the Death of LLF

    by the Very Revd David Monteith, Dean of Canterbury

    Much metaphorical ink has already been spilt on the announcement from the House of Bishops of the death of Living in Love and Faith (LLF).  These reflections add nothing to that discourse but are an attempt to articulate something of what this announcement does to the likes of me as a person.  I had intellectually concluded months ago that LLF was terminally ill, but the actual death notice has a far deeper impact.

    Firstly, the document was issued about a process not about people.  It wasn’t in any way a pastoral letter to the church. I used to mark draft pastoral letters on ordinand selection conferences.  This would not have cut muster.  The same depersonalising dynamics have gone on at nearly every stage of this process.  This just doesn’t upset one or two people as Archbishop Stephen suggested. This is gut wrenching and hurtful for those of us most impacted. It seems there is need to return to a basic course in pastoral care.

    Secondly, this multiplies our shame which so many of us have and still experience as LGBT+ people in our families, churches and neighbourhoods. Dealing with internalised homophobia is often a life’s work for many of us, with the kindly welcome and acceptance by our Christian communities often being a key part of that healing. I found my life and heart constrict as I received this news once again; being told loudly and clearly that our minority lives and loves must remain marginal, hidden and uncatered-for like a vegetarian in 1980s France.

    Thirdly, I am asked to carry the public shame of this as a priest and in my case as the Dean of Canterbury.  Images of our cathedral accompany the press stories of ‘bishops do U-turns on gay blessing’ headlines. No matter what I do or say or no matter how I care or try to love others here, the iconography is clear: that LGBT+ people are never fully welcome here.  I am embarrassed and feel a deep sense of personal moral injury without even any remaining left-over crumbs to offer.

    Fourthly, the social media storms of recent days about our graffiti exhibition so often focussed on the fact that we worked with marginalised communities. This means I was ‘woke’ and what else was to be expected since I was in a gay relationship.  These vulnerable young people asked far from marginal questions; they were those all of us might ask. The haters piled in with force and now they have even more reason to pile in again. What could I say when these young folks asked me if the church excluded them? What could I honestly say?

    Fifthly, I realise that all this is so niche and of none or little concern to many people in the church, unlike for those in the wider world who mostly do not comprehend why love does not mean love.  None of my clergy colleagues have enquired as to how I am doing.  No one from the bishop’s staff on which I sit have said a word. None have even alluded to noticing that the bishops had issued their conclusions. Nothing.  We are invisible despite being present and our cares and concerns are best kept to our own little minority lives.

    Sixthly, this invisibility intensifies all the other experiences of invisibility. For example, when giving a talk and the last part of my biography is omitted; when a bishop asked me to make sure my partner was not around when certain clergy visited; when as a new Dean I didn’t get invitations from the county set because they didn’t want to invite my partner but were too polite to want to enact a social snub so didn’t invite me either. Being told directly never to mention my sexuality when dealing with visiting bishops from the Communion unless they brought it up, because many would see me as possessed. Talk about making me disappear. So many active processes, not just passive assumptions.

    Seventhly, there is little likelihood of anything improving and every likelihood of things getting much worse for LGBT+ people.  Many agree that it is now far harder for us in the church than it was 30+ years ago. The tide is turning in the world with gains in equality now being questioned and many, including me, are fearful that what we see with far-right parties elsewhere, we may see here too. From early in ministry, I learnt to respect bishops but not to trust them.  I couldn’t begin to make a list of the broken promises and quiet assurances that ‘all will be well’. When the chips are down for the church, both the institution and her leaders find us an easy victim to hurt in playing out politics of so-called normality. Why else was my sexuality highlighted when I was trying to uphold safeguarding during the departure of the last archbishop?  I don’t think we can trust the church to defend us if such a terrible day came. We would not justify care.

    Eighthly, I have bent over backwards over the years to be gracious and kind, to not walk away from the table, to become vulnerable in sharing my self in conversations and dialogue.  I have listened to those of a conservative view with grace.  I have watched them behave despicably in meetings, soaking up their violence against me and mine and so often with an annoying smile. Following Archbishop Rowan’s insight, I remember that unity is the quest which keeps on asking ‘who is not here?’ rather than ‘you do or do not belong’.  But it is exhausting and sapping of limited energies. Non-reciprocation of generosity breaks the relationship and yet apparently it is me bringing disunity to the church?

    Ninthly, many of us simply slog our guts out day in day out. This news has winded me and made me see that no significant change is likely in my life span. The sense of being an ‘alien in the household of God’ grows. As a Dean I spend a lot of energy on taking care not to demoralise our teams, despite the challenges, and to look forward hopefully.  There is no hope for significant change in the C of E with respect to LGBT+ people yet many of us are stuck having given our life to this ministry yet not being able to afford to retire nor having the heart to abandon our sense of calling.  Pay us all off to get rid of us and I may just rethink, if that is really where you want to head! Why, if you really do think that we are living without true repentance and are unworthy of blessings, do you not just get rid of us as that is the conclusion of the logic now received in this settled view ?

    Tenthly and finally, this is akin to a bereavement with all the usual feelings and thoughts.  I have no idea what to grieve well looks like in this situation. Of course, I can rely on the church and the bishops not to provide me with any assistance on that. In one theory of bereavement, key to recovery is to invest in the new future beyond the loss. The problem for me is that no new future is articulated in any way for LGBT+ people.  That which was perhaps previously imagined is killed off. The hollow words of apology never came to anything. Micro aggressions and visceral fear and anger continue to be experienced by us. The new Christian Inclusion is but fantasy. Apparently, as the bullies of old told me in school, I am to take it on the chin ‘like a man’ (clearly a heterosexual one) and just let these acts of violence and harm keep on coming.

    Perhaps the only lasting hope might be another victim who also had to take it – that is about all that remains.

     

  • Living in Love and Faith: Where is the Power?

    by Revd Ruth Harley (Vicar, Cowgate and Priest in Charge, Newbiggin Hall)

    Back at the start of the Living in Love and Faith process (LLF), one of the more useful resources to be produced was the ‘Pastoral Principles’ – a set of six concepts intended to enable better conversations across difference. One of the Pastoral Principles was “pay attention to power”. And yet, as we take in the latest update on LLF from the House of Bishops, it seems evident that little if any attention has really been paid to power in the course of the LLF process.

    Power is a slippery thing. It hides in plain sight, and works in ways which can be hard to grasp. And yet, if we do actually pay attention to power, and name how power is being used in in a particular situation, it can be deeply revealing.

    Power is an important theological concept. We speak of God as omnipotent – all powerful. We read Paul’s description of “Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.” We might hear someone describe “the Holy Spirit moving powerfully” in a particular church or event. But what kind of power is this? Very often we don’t stop to examine it too closely. And unexamined power is always dangerous.

    I am not, here, attempting to offer a fully worked-out theology of power (for that, I recommend Anna Mercedes’ excellent book Power For). But I do want to consider the role of power which has led to this latest set of decisions from the House of Bishops.

    Sometimes it is helpful to separate out the church’s “espoused theology” – what we say we believe – from its “operant theology” – what the things we do and how we do them reveal about what we believe. Where those two theologies are at odds, it can be very revealing.

    The church’s espoused theology of power is one of equality and justice, but also of self-abnegation, servanthood, “God’s power made perfect in human weakness”. The story we tell about how power exists in the church is one of the foot-washing, self-emptying power of love which we see in Christ.

    But very often this is not the operant theology of power in the church, it is not how we really live and relate to each other. Certainly the operant theology of power in the LLF process is something very different, and if we really do pay attention to power, to how it actually works, rather than how it is spoken about, we start to see some of the theological problems underlying this latest set-back in the slow and painful process.

    Firstly, the espoused theology of power contained within the LLF process is one of equality: that we all approach the process from equal positions, with equal power, with equal concerns. This is demonstrably not so. And a failure to acknowledge an imbalance of power always works in favour of those with whom the power already lies. The operant theology of LLF is one in which LGBTQ+ members of the church (and to a lesser extent our allies) simultaneously have less institutional power, and more at stake – our identities, livelihoods, vocations, relationships, in addition to the theological, ecclesial and missional concerns which all parties bring to the LLF process. If this inequality goes unacknowledged, as it largely has, then everything that is built on that espoused theology of equal power will be at best precarious, and at worst false and manipulative.

    Secondly, the espoused theology of power within the church is one in which divine power, and therefore power within the church, functions very differently to worldly power. And yet, the attention paid to money and the threat of its withdrawal by conservative churches during the LLF process suggests a rather different operant theology.

    Thirdly, there is the question of whose voice is heard, and how. The espoused theology of LLF is that all voices are heard equally. And yet… The attention given to threats of schism, threats of diminishing numbers and income, by those promoting a conservative stance on sexuality is vastly greater than that given to the many LGBTQ+ folks and allies who have quietly walked away, or who have bravely spoken about the harm done to them and to those they love by conservative and sometimes openly homophobic church teaching, whose voices remain largely unheard, silenced or ignored. The operant theology of the LLF process is that some voices are worth more than others.

    Finally, there is the question of conscience. The latest update from the House of Bishops is keen to emphasise that the next stage of the process will “respect the conscience” of those opposed to using the Prayers of Love and Faith. Good – I don’t think anyone in favour of greater progress towards LGBTQ+ equality wants people to be forced or coerced into using prayers against their conscience. But the question of conscience, throughout the LLF process, only ever seems to cut one way.

    There are thousands of clergy currently forced to act against their conscience, myself among them. We act against our conscience every time we explain that we can’t marry a same-sex couple who wish to celebrate their love and commitment in the presence of God. We act against our conscience when we constrain ourselves to the meagre offerings allowed by PLF, instead of celebrating and blessing the fullness of what we see God doing in the lives and loves of faithful LGBTQ+ people. The cost of overriding our conscience is a form of moral injury, and a very real harm not only to individuals but to the church as a whole. But our conscience is of no concern to the House of Bishops, it seems.

    Whatever the espoused theology of the church, when the operant theology evident in the actions (or inactions) of its leadership reveals that some voices are worth more than others, some consciences more worth protecting than others, it is hard to escape the conclusion that some people are worth more than others: more fully human, more fully made in God’s image, more beloved.

    That, of course, is not true. And nor is it the church’s espoused theology. But it is too often, including in the House of Bishops’ latest (in)action on LLF, the church’s operant theology. And that operant theology damages the body of Christ because, whatever kind or well-intentioned words may be said, what is felt and known and experienced as the lived reality is a deeply damaging theology of power, which tramples over the lives and loves and the very humanity of LGBTQ+ folks (yet again) in the futile search for a false unity which will allow those who already hold power to hold onto it, without needing to pay any attention at all.

     

  • Representation and Celebration

    by Canon Dr Phil Groves, who was a CMS Mission partner and lecturer in theology at St Philip’s Kongwa in Tanzania. He served at the Anglican Communion Office for 10 years. He has attended two Lambeth Conferences, three Primates’ Meetings and four ACCs. He has a PhD on Partnership in the Anglican Communion and is Vicar of the parishes of Cuddington and of Stone, Dinton and Hartwell. He is dyslexic and a member of the Church of England’s Neurodiversity Working Group.

    A few months ago, I was infuriated by commentators assuming that the representatives on the Crown Nominations Commission from the Anglican Communion would block the nomination of a woman as Archbishop of Canterbury. I thought it was nonsense, and I was right.

    I am now amazed by the assumption that ‘The Global South’ will be incensed by the nomination of Bishop Sarah Mullally because she is a woman. Give me the evidence.

    I know that the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) objects to the appointment of a woman and claims that the majority of the Anglican Communion do not accept women as bishops, but claims that their churches and the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches (GSFA) represent 75% or 85% of Anglicans should not go unchallenged. What does such a claim even mean?

    It takes me back to the 2007 Primates’ Meeting in Tanzania at the height of the controversy over the consecration of Bishop Gene Robinson. The primates were divided, with a number refusing to take communion with the Presiding Bishop of TEC – Katharine Jefferts Schori. Some refused to eat with her.

    As the Sunday approached, speculation was rife as to her reception at the public service of Holy Communion to be held on the holy ground of Zanzibar Cathedral. Online, a popular ‘news service’ from an extreme conservative perspective carried a series of comments speculating that she may be taken out and stoned for her heresy (others suggesting being thrown from the spire might be more appropriate).

    All primates bar Archbishop Akinola of Nigeria (who was ill) were present at the service and the host – Archbishop Mtetemela of Tanzania – introduced them one by one. Each one was met with enthusiastic applause. When it came to Bishop Katharine, we wondered what the reception would be. It was astounding.

    The Diocesan Mothers’ Union were prepared and waiting: to a woman they rose in joyful celebration. Around 50, perhaps as many as 100 women in their specially designed dresses burst into song to welcome ‘their’ primate. Other women around the Cathedral stood up to join them and the dancing spilled into the aisles.

    Zanzibar Cathedral is an iconic symbol of the Oxford Movement and a bastion of the High Church movement. Her bishops – especially former Archbishop John Ramadhani who was present at the service – had been outspoken in their opposition to women priests. It was assumed his views were shared – that is he represented the women and men of his diocese.

    Not a bit of it. The women made their views known – Bishop Katharine was an inspiration: a symbol of hope. She represented them.

    No one would claim that her views, especially her views on the inclusion of LGBTQI+ people, were shared by those celebrating her presence; what they were celebrating was their own inclusion in the body of Christ as women.

    So, when GAFCON or GSFA say the small number of primates and bishops who support their cause ‘represent’ so many thousands or millions of Anglicans, I wonder what they mean.

    When the GSFA sought support from bishops at the Lambeth Conference for a renewed commitment to Lambeth I.10 they claimed that the three Church of England bishops who signed their petition ‘represented’ 47,000 Anglicans. Did they seriously think that all 47,000 worshippers in those three dioceses were of the same mind as their bishops? They were effectively claiming that every worshipper in those dioceses opposed the celebration of faithful gay and lesbian relationships. Unbelievable. We should be equally cynical if we think that any primate of any province has the full, unequivocal support of their bishops, clergy, and people.

    GAFCON and GSFA have used the tactic of boycotting to force the hand of a Communion that hates division. They seek to exert power by stamping their feet and walking out. In doing so they often talk of ‘representing’ their constituency. But when Archbishop Mouneer Anis – then Primate of Jerusalem and the Middle East – and Archbishop Eluid Wabukala – Primate of Kenya – announced their boycott of the Anglican Consultative Council in 2016, neither of them consulted their provinces and both of their provincial delegations attended. Who were they ‘representing’?

    I guarantee that when the future Archbishop of Canterbury visits Tanzania the Mothers’ Union – with a mighty membership of over 600,000 – will go wild. It will be a week-long ‘sharehe’: a celebration with music and dance.

    In my experience – and I have attended many church services across Africa – women outnumber men in every congregation. They can often be two-thirds or even three-quarters of the worshippers, and yet every leader of both the GAFCON Council and Advisors and the board of GSFA are all men. This is not representation.

    The African Anglican women bishops are celebrating the nomination. Bishop Emily Onyango told the BBC that ‘Gafcon’s view was neither theologically nor biblically sound, but more “patriarchal, which is not very useful to the Church”.’ She knows that Bishop Mullally is someone who listens and listening, she says, is our great hope.

    I first met Onyango in 2008 in Oxford when she was studying for her PhD. She had just returned from the initial GAFCON where she had been a member of the theological commission. She talked to me of her experience of being sidelined and diminished. I later worked with her on Continuing Indaba and she is one of the most brilliant and insightful theologians of our generation. Her reflection on Sarah, Hagar, and Abraham in the context of her experience of fleeing ethnic violence in Kenya and her experience of polygamous societies from a female perspective is the most poignant pieces of biblical exegesis I have ever read. We rarely hear from her is because she is not offered the platforms for her voice to be heard; an exception is a podcast in the ‘Mutuality Matters’ series where she discusses the role of women in the East African revival movement and beyond.

    African Anglican women like Bishop Onyango encounter misogyny every day and they organise and speak out. The Mothers’ Union – often said to be the largest membership organisation in the world – campaigns against gender-based violence, female genital mutilation and for education for girls. African Anglicanism is a progressive movement for liberation.

    These women are not western liberals – they have a different agenda – but neither are they western conservatives. They are passionate followers of Christ. They remind me of the Samaritan woman in John 4, who was perfectly able to engage in theological dialogue, challenge, and be challenged and like her they then go out to proclaim the good news. They may not be ordained, but they are often the leaders of the church.

    When he reflected on GAFCON 2 in 2013, Andrew Atherstone remarked that ‘GAFCON will need to work harder to recruit and retain egalitarians if it is to enhance its appeal as a broad coalition.’ The response of the GAFCON chair to the nomination of a woman – even though he is the primate of a church that ordains women – shows that this work has not been done: the direction of travel is in the opposite direction.

    This has implications for those in the Church of England who are looking to ally themselves to GAFCON. Is their emerging structure sustainable? They are seeking to combine complementarians who believe that leadership in the church is exclusively male and those who do not, including women who are priests and bishops. The common response is that this is a second order issue, but the experience elsewhere is that women are asked to voluntarily forgo roles of leadership to maintain the unity of the movement. In England this is evidenced by the male-only leadership of  The Anglican Mission in England (AMiE) and the recent unorthodox ‘ordination’ of seven male deacons by a Bishop from REACH – a church that regards male headship as a first order issue. I wonder if women bishops and even priests or presbyters will continue to be welcome in the new movement.

    As for Archbishop-designate Sarah Mullally – she will discover that, across the Global South, women will be celebrating. They will recognise that they have someone who represents them. The Church of England has a kind, compassionate leader who exhibits the greatest of spiritual gifts as defined in 1 Corinthians 13. Let’s celebrate with the Global South women bishops.

     

     

  • The Cost of Political Violence: After Charlie Kirk

    by Charlie Bell, Fellow in Public Theology and Medicine at Girton College, Cambridge, Associate Vicar of St John the Divine, Kennington, in the Diocese of Southwark, and member of the LLF Vocations and Ministry Working Group

    The truly horrible killing – in front not only of thousands of young people but also of his own family – of Charlie Kirk yesterday evening must rank amongst the most viscerally disturbing and potentially dangerous events of the past year. It is not, of course, the only example of gun violence – indeed, not even the only example of gun violence in the US yesterday – and nor is it the only killing, or attempted killing, this year of a figure in the US political arena, yet already it is clear that its impact on public life will be profound. At the time of writing, we know neither the identity nor the motive of the killer, yet it is already being described as a piece of political violence – and sadly, given the state of politics across the Atlantic and even on this side, too, there may be outrage but there is rather less surprise. We have sunk to this level, and we know it.

    The political response to these kinds of acts of violence is often mixed, but mainstream politicians – indeed, those who genuinely represent the mainstream perspectives of much of the population who sit somewhere around the centre ground – will usually see times like this as an opportunity to speak of, and genuinely strive for, unity. For all we disagree – sometimes vehemently and fundamentally – actualised violence in the public square is universally acknowledged as something to be avoided at all costs. It is through words that we disagree, and it is through democratic forms of accountability that we challenge and protest actions taken. A gun is never – and can never – be the answer to our differences. That way lies ruin and destruction, and, in the end, nobody benefits from cycles of violence – it is a path to civil unrest and devastation. This has been the accepted narrative through most of our recent history.

    Yet something seems to have changed, for the worse.

    As I say, as yet we do not know the identity of the killer, or their motive. Yet already we have heard a clear line being pushed by a number of politicians on both sides of the Atlantic that lay the blame for this on ‘the left’. In doing so, they play a very dangerous game indeed.

    Trump was first out the gates blaming the ‘radical left’. Musk, Yusuf, Harwood, Jenrick, and many more, followed him. X is full of sanctimonious blaming of ‘the left’ for fomenting this political violence. Others, like Nigel Farage, have followed, with allusions to ‘free speech’ which intentionally leave little to the imagination and suggest that there is a grand conspiratorial plot by their opponents to meet calm speech with violence. Indeed, the pervasive and rather vague language of ‘martyrdom’ is as disturbing as it is bizarre – and plain wrong.

    This does three deeply pernicious things. The first is to – again – blatantly ignore the impact of gun ownership, and the accompanying ‘God given right’ philosophy, on the potential for political violence in the US. The second is to blatantly ignore the swathe of political violence committed against those who would identify as left wing over the past year, pretending into existence an inevitable link between left-wing politics and violence, and further escalating the rhetoric that politicises and makes more dangerous an already tinder-box situation. And the third? In the process of doing this, to try to divert the public conversation from the actual rot at the heart of much of our contemporary public life and its source – cheap, amoral populism. It is to employ what is a horrifying human tragedy, with its structural underpinning, to further political game-playing and propaganda.

    Nobody in politics, from whatever wing, is immune from criticism in the way our public debate has been debased. This is not, really, a question of right and left, but rather, ultimately, of good faith and bad faith, whatever the political philosophy. There are plenty of right-wing and left-wing politicians who are able to clearly state this, and there are right-wing and left-wing identifying politicians and political commentators who instead choose to fan the flames of anger and division rather than seek for common ground. Yet our political ground – here and in the US – seems to have shifted to favour those who offer easy answers and lazy stereotyping in place of serious and calm debate. Politics has become less concerned with the common good, and instead tends towards authoritarian and totalitarian modes of behaving that all too easily take hold in our public life.

    And whilst it is true that words do not kill, we must surely not be naïve and imagine that our rhetoric has no impact, whoever we are, and however important we believe our cause to be. As cheap populism of all forms has grown in recent years, we have sat increasingly lightly to the truth and made use of caricature and lies to convince and convict others of our point of view. We have bought into the idea that ‘to win at all costs’ is the most legitimate of political philosophies, and forgotten the simple idea that telling the truth, and engaging with actual people and their ideas rather than caricatures and easy targets is the way to build a stable and secure democracy.

    We have, in the process, allowed bad actors to increasingly influence our debate, believing in and promoting the lie that saying disgusting and demeaning things ‘nicely’ and with a sense of ‘politeness’ is some form of hallowed civil public debate. We have similarly increasingly accepted the idea that ‘free speech’ in a democratic society comes with absolutely no responsibility – that disinformation, lies, dehumanising language are all important to preserve as part of ‘healthy debate’. Those who speak into public spaces cannot, surely, have carte blanche to stir up hate and even violence, however carefully and casuistically they say these things, and however much they smile at the same time in a performance of ‘reasonableness’.  

    At the same time, we have failed to pay proper attention to power dynamics and the unequal impact of our words on others, imagining that when we devalue another’s humanity it is all part of ‘the debate’. Not all words are equal, and nor is their impact – yet this simple and self-evident truth is all-too-frequently ignored. We ignore the fact that if we keep hacking away at another person with our rhetoric – and, indeed, with our actions – we cause deep wounds that dehumanise both them and us. In our pursuit of the mythical ‘freedom of speech’, we fail to remember that another key watchword of healthy democracies is the affording of dignity to all its members.

    Yet we seem unable to join the dots between intentional divisiveness, the dehumanising of opponents, the deserved and undeserved loss of trust in the institutions that have held us together, the fomenting of violent disagreement, the trivialising and normalising of violence in the public square (thinking, indeed, of January sixth), and the increasing preponderance of violence itself. It is – frankly – killing us.

    So how might the church speak into this space – especially an Established church like the Church of England? What might we do to try to play our part in reviving the best of public life and in banishing those things that lead to this kind of devastation?

    The first thing we must do, surely, is get our own house in order. Our public debates – the way we have spoken to and about each other, and spoken of each other’s ideas, has been a disgrace far too much of the time. Our willingness to scapegoat others, to see an issue and not a person, to blame someone else rather than take responsibility for our own actions and words, appears endless, and similarly our determination to debate in bad faith means our ‘good disagreement’ is nothing of the sort. At its best, the church – particularly an Established church – should, surely, be a place of genuine discussion and dignified (in its truest sense) debate. Imagine an Established church that gave the space for opposing points of view to meet, not only to find common ground but to more carefully understand and outline the differences that remain. Imagine a Church of England that could be not only an example of how things might be done, but the agora in which they actually are done.

    Yet we must not fool ourselves that this will happen overnight. Not only do we need to be a place that practices what we preach, but we need to find a way of speaking into public debate that dials down the rhetoric and promotes free and dignified speech in which the humanity of the other is our first concern. This will mean naming power imbalances and pointing out where cheap populism would rather scapegoat than engage. It means, for example, making clear that the question of immigration is not as simple as some wish to make out, and that simplistic answers will therefore not do. It means committing to listening as much as to speaking, and to recommitting to the idea of being accountable to one another as part of what it means to be human. It means respecting the other enough to really hear them, and building a society in which we can expect that from the other, too, where we might once again find trust in the public square.

    This is a hard ask, and it’s not something that’s going to happen overnight. Indeed, as much as the church wants to think of itself as a place and agent of reconciliation, let’s not be hasty and imagine we are at that stage yet. Perhaps the Church of England’s vocation, right now, is instead to call the nation to a period of reflection – one in which we need to share. This is not some nice-sounding but fruitless exercise – it is painful, and self-examining, and purposeful. This reflection is an active process – one where we have to be willing to attend to and address the rot, before we dare rebuild upon it. It is to call the nation – those of good will – to an active willingness to reject cheap populism and instead choose graceful truth-seeking, and be changed in the process. It is to reorient our public life. Perhaps, simply, this is the church’s vocation in such a time as this. If the Body of Christ cannot do it, then who can?

    And with God, nothing is impossible.

  • Whose Toilet Is It? A Personal Theological Reflection on Bodies and Spaces

    by Alex Clare-Young. Alex is a thinker, facilitator and writer. They are a minister, member of the Joint Public Issues Team and patron of the Open Table Network

    I am going to write about toilets. I should probably explain a few things first: I am trans and I am disabled. Both of those facts mean that I cannot use gendered toilets any more. In fact, they mean that I have lost access to an awful lot of public spaces in general.

    Anyway, back to toilets. I grew up living as female, before I transitioned, which meant that I spent 18 years of my life using a mixture of female-designated and accessible toilets. I have been attacked multiple times in single-‘sex’ toilets. Every single time it has been by a cis woman – a woman who wasn’t trans.

    It may not come as a surprise to hear that I don’t think that public toilets have ever been safe spaces.

    The context: gender and public spaces

    I don’t like the term ‘culture wars’. It implies a dynamic of equal powers battling it out with mortal consequences. It also lends a sort of unearned gravitas to the political gameplay that instrumentalises trans people. Nevertheless, I will use the term here as it is the one most often used to refer to the situation we find ourselves in.

    Trans people have been the game-pieces of culture wars for some time. We have been banned from bathrooms in various USA states for over a decade. This has extended to the separation of gender-nonconforming children and young people from their families and a significant reduction in access to healthcare for trans people.

    In the UK, culture wars are different, with many people largely uninterested whilst those on the margins find themselves pushed increasingly farther out of the rapidly-shrinking middle ground. Recently, this has been particularly apparent in three areas: 1) horrific clashes over the housing of human beings who are seeking asylum in local hotels, 2) the provision of vital benefits to human beings who happen to be disabled and 3) the presence of human beings who happen to be trans in public spaces. So as a disabled trans person things are increasingly difficult.

    The EHRC Guidance

    The particularly challenging piece of this current phase of the UK’s Americanesque journey, for me, is caused by corporate and local responses to the EHRC interim guidance on gender and the Equality Act. The guidance effectively states that trans people may not use the gendered space that accords with their gender identity and should not use the gendered space that accords with their gender identity if this is likely to cause concern.

    That means that many trans people are left unable to use gendered public spaces – including public toilets – at all. The EHRC’s way of handling that has been to suggest that premises should ensure gender neutral toilets are available. This is not only unhelpful, it is a mishandling of the Act which requires the necessity of any exclusion based on protected characteristics to be rigorously proven – it has to be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. This means that it needs to be the least discriminatory way to meet that aim.

    The myth of the accessible toilet

    Now I’m going to take off my trans hat and put on my disabled one (I wish I could effect this switch, in both directions, in real life). Since becoming a full-time wheelchair user, I now have to use the accessible toilet at all times. The thing is, accessible toilets are already kind of a unicorn.

    So-called accessible toilets often have toilet roll you can’t reach, filthy floors that you wouldn’t want to wheel over (remember, many wheelchair users effectively have to touch very near the soles of our shoes with our hands for every move we make), and small-to-nonexistent turning circles crowded by overflowing bins.

    So, when I realised that several moto service stations had responded to the EHRC guidance by labelling their ‘accessible’ toilets as ‘inclusive’, I began to worry. It’s not that I don’t want trans folks to be able to use accessible loos. Of course I do. I want every trans person to feel safe, and to feel like they – we – have public spaces we can access. If those are intersectional spaces, what’s not to like.

    However, this label was not only targeting trans people. The big wheelchair on the door had been replaced with a big man symbol, a big woman symbol and a tiny little wheelchair in the bottom corner. The radar key lock had been removed. This was now just a big toilet. And there was only one.

    The more public spaces I go to, the more I realise that this has been the general response to the EHRC guidance – taking already limited space away from disabled folks and opening up accessible loos to anyone who can’t be bothered queuing. Yes, invisible disabilities exist – mine used to be one. Yes, trans people deserve toilets we can use – I am one. Yes, women are not safe in toilets – I learnt that the hard way.

    The thing is, taking away spaces is not the answer. No-one can win this so-called battle. All that we have gained is toilets that are less safe for women because anyone with a beard can access one by claiming to be a transman, accessible toilets that are predominantly used by able-bodied cis men, and a general increase in both transphobia and misogyny.

    The theology: Christ in public spaces

    So how do we reframe this woeful web of misinformation? How do we take the power out of a rapidly-escalating human rights battle? I believe that we need to unpick the underlying threads. To do this, I would like to consider three ways of looking at fair, safe and just uses of public space.

    Inclusivity

    Firstly, let’s consider what inclusivity means. An inclusive space is a space where everyone is welcome, just as they are. It is often held up as being the gold standard. And yet, inclusive spaces can be undermined by scarcity narratives. Remember when a woman poured expensive perfume on Jesus’s feet and was accused of denying the poor? No-one has been policing gendered toilets to date and trans people have been using them without causing harm. So why now? Are we, like the early disciples, playing whataboutery with Christ’s own body?

    Exclusivity

    So what about exclusivity? That seems to be the next logical move. Scarcity leads to protectionism. MY flag, MY taxes, MY spaces. You can’t have our spaces – get your own. It has seriously alarmed me to see so-called feminists arguing that the tiny minority of folks who are trans should simply create our own spaces. Last time I tried to build a public toilet without planning permission it didn’t go so well… I wonder what the un-named convert to Christianity in Acts 8 would have done if, when they asked, “Here is water, what is there to stop me being baptized?”, were given the response, “Not until you dig your own well”.

    Practicality

    I’m aware I may be using too much humour here. It’s a defence mechanism. This stuff is actually scary to me. Disabled people avoid leaving our houses due to lack of safe, sanitary, accessible public facilities, trans people are being attacked in public and often sadly losing their lives in private, and women are not any closer to real solutions to the actual causes of sexual violence in public spaces, not least the lack of any form of adequate justice.

    The only way to get through this is to stop looking for convenient scapegoats and to start helping each other. Can’t get to the soothing water? OK, I will carry you. Can’t reach Jesus? OK, this roof has to go. What’s to stop me being baptised? Nothing.

    We need to work together to create safe and accessible public spaces for trans people, disabled people and women, and that journey does not start when we attack each other. It starts by shifting the narrative. Are public toilets safe, accessible and inclusive? No. Why? Because systemic injustice and capitalist motivations have led to flimsy stalls and unsanitary spaces. Are trans people the problem? No. So how do we solve it? We build something better. Together.

    In practice: what now?

    10 hours before I wrote this, the EHRC submitted an updated code of practice to the Minister for Women and Equalities. They did not complete a full and proper public consultation and Parliament has not yet had a chance to debate the advice. The chair of the EHRC is encouraging people to preempt the process, stating that “We have been clear that service providers, associations and public functions should not wait for the code of practice to be published”. This irresponsible weaponising of legal process is what has caused the chaos I have described throughout this article.

    So firstly, please wait. If you own a space, please don’t change the rules before the rules actually exist. Secondly, please speak. Whatever happens, the draft code must be laid before Parliament for 40 days before it is in effect. Speak to your MP urgently and ask them to insist on a debate on this guidance, before it is too late. Finally, counter the misinformation. Trans people are not the problem. Women are not the problem. Disabled people are not the problem. The systems that use us as pawns are. Can we not just stop fighting and start building the solutions ourselves? Please?

  • A Heavy Yoke: Selina Stone on Power

    I wanted to review Selina Stone’s new book, published today, on Via Media News, because this is such an important and accessible reflection on themes which are currently being discussed widely in our churches, particularly as we continue to reel from awareness of sexual and other forms of abuse: the themes of power, leadership, trust and success. While her approach is a theological one, Stone rightly points out that theology is expressed in practice and can be shaped and distorted by our personality and prejudices. And that was where I found her book was especially valuable, because she challenges each of us to face our own power in order to understand just where it is held, and how it can be abused.

    Stone writes from the Pentecostal tradition, but everything she discusses applies equally to other denominations. Leaders’ use of the church for their own ends is only made possible by the cultures in which they function and the Christian theology they can call on; certain theologies encourage particular power dynamics which increase the chances of spiritual abuse. In a comment which reminded me of the objections some individuals make when required to do safeguarding training, she notes that “Christians … imagine that there is no need to be trained to understand sexual harassment, toxic behaviour and racist abuse, since these are ‘worldly concerns’; instead, apparently, we simply need more Bible studies” (5). And, for those of us who are at least able to recognise abuse outside the Church, she argues that we need to do far more to understand what happens inside. Using Matthew 5’s “You’ve heard it said… but I say”, she invites churches “to critically engage with the traditions they have inherited” (11).

    I particularly appreciated Stone’s dissection of the current tropes of “disagreeing well” (31) and “servant leadership” (26), the second of these identified as virtue signalling, since it can disguise the immense power such a leader may wield over others, feigning service while keeping all the power. Stone uses the example of Jean Vanier’s abuse of nuns and lay women, which also leads her to explore the danger of concepts of spiritual fatherhood and of marriage imagery when talking about spiritual union.

    The chapter on the potential of preaching in grooming a congregation to accept abusive behaviour takes as its text a sermon by Mike Pilavachi, where he used the story of Jacob and Laban to argue that God sometimes sends toxic and abusive people into our lives because… He loves us. As a Black lay woman, Stone also knows all about churches “where white married couples occupy the highest rungs of power”, noting that the concerns of the “little people” were only properly heard after Matt and Beth Redman spoke out about Pilavachi.

    Another case study is that of SPAC Nation, whose wealthy leaders told young people to give them more money, including from selling their own blood, because this would become the seed of the church and would enable them to become rich too. To encourage this behaviour, SPAC nation drew on scripture about sacrifice and obedience. Here, Stone shows how we are still too quick to assume that dominance and numerical growth are evidence of success; and focusing on God as “Almighty” can stop us seeing how God can also be breath, or possibility.

    A further section focuses on John Smyth’s abuse, which was supported by specific readings of the Cross and theologies of atonement focused on God’s wrath. Here, Stone draws on the resources of Black female and womanist theologians, and on their interpretations of the “power in the blood”. After showing the different ways in which oppressed groups have drawn on this theology, she concludes that “God does not delight in the shedding of our blood, any more than he did in the torture and murder of Jesus” (106).

    She also explores the meaning of unity, uncovering the ways in which the word can be used to push the less powerful to remain silent so that the dominant group is able to continue as before, with any expression of disagreement being silenced as a threat to unity. But the price for unity should not be paid by those “who are already forced to carry burdens too heavy for them” (86). She asks what it really means to love each other, as opposed to merely tolerating those with whom we disagree.

    This is a book which fully grasps the complexity of power. When writing on the power of vulnerability as an element of good leadership, Stone shows how controlling leaders can pretend to be vulnerable as a technique to make others reveal their own stories, and also shows how the term “vulnerable adult” can be used to suggest that the survivor is somehow the cause of the abuse. She is very aware of body theology, particularly when analysing Vanier’s views on touch, which dangerously ignored boundaries and power. She contrasts Vanier with Jesus, who knows his power and what it is for, and always waits for consent.

    What is most challenging of all is when Stone turns from the shocking cases which have become familiar to us in the last decade or so and makes us look at ourselves, at “the wolf who might be within us” (13). For this, the most important chapter is the final one, on discernment. Here I remembered what I found most powerful in recent safeguarding leadership training: the Social GGRRAAAACCEESSSS. Taken from a social science context, these emphasise that we are all disadvantaged in some contexts and privileged in others, based on who we are. The long list used in C of E safeguarding training covers: gender, geography, race, religion, ability, accent, age, appearance, class, culture, education, employment, ethnicity, sexuality, sexual orientation, spirituality, and “something else”.

    Stone looks at discernment in the sense of a community and an individual working out how best to use their gifts in ministry, but also considers its less obvious aspects, such as knowing when to speak and when to remain silent, and recognising the spiritual influences behind people’s actions. She argues that we can’t ever spot every abuser and we don’t even know what we ourselves may be capable of doing. This is not made easier when we are not taught how to discern. Even within a church community we need to recognise the sense of something being “off”, perhaps from taking seriously our own bodily reactions. A church is which is a healthy space will have a sense of community, of making space for others, of leadership which does not control but develops other people. It will understand the importance of accountability and cultivate a culture of reflection.

    This is a clear, confident theological and personal appeal for a better understanding of power; I hope it will find its way on to the recommended reading sections of all diocesan safeguarding training materials.

     

     

     

  • The Ten Parish Eucharistic Benefice

    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 Sunday Scriptures for Reading Aloud, ssra.uk

    The Ten Parish benefice is coming – and it is sustainable. All it needs is people, and liturgy. We have both. All we lack is a decent liturgy book. So let’s make one.

    Oh, and there’s that word ‘eucharistic’. Let’s talk about that too. Spoiler: no lay presidency involved.

    Let’s start in Wales

    In the middle of a piece in Church Times nine days ago, surrounded by all the obvious and noisy things that people want to say about the new Archbishop of Wales, the three paragraphs that really matter are sitting quietly, waiting for their moment. “Between 2020 and 2023, Monmouth diocese underwent the pastoral reorganisation of 121 parishes into 16 ministry areas.” That’s an average of 7.5 parishes per Ministry Area. It’s page 2 in the print edition, or at this link online (where the three paragraphs are split into five).

    The Ten Parish Benefice – with a single priest – is coming. Wales has been honest about it, and made it explicit. But it’s coming in England too, in cities, towns and villages alike. Most people just haven’t admitted it yet.

    To quote very roughly – twice – from the gospel reading (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke%2012.49-56&version=NRSVA) that followed two days later, this is where we really should be reading the signs of the times. And it might be divisive, rather than peaceful, to say so. But if we take a deep breath and actually prepare for it – rather than turning a blind eye, or running around in ever-decreasing circles – we really can stop being so afraid.

    The Ten Parish Benefice has existed in corners of England already for well over a decade. Almost everyone’s trying to deny it. Save the Parish (www.savetheparish.com) can see it coming, but think that empowering parishes with information about legal rights, and trying to wrestle money from the powerful to the weak, will stop it happening. We can wish, but sadly, while justice may be on their side, I don’t think justice is going to prevail over the vested interests of the powerful. The Five-Ten-Fifteen-Twenty Parish Benefice is coming regardless. But Christ is Risen and the Holy Spirit is amongst the people, and that’s on top of God the Father being God the Father, and from time to time there’s even a priest in the benefice, so what exactly is supposed to be the problem?

    It was easier when we had some resources. When there was a Book of Common Prayer (BCP) in every parish church in every village (and a King James Bible and a bell, wasn’t that the official minimum list?) the churchwardens could keep the show on the road perfectly well in the absence of a priest; indeed that was both their right and their duty, and we trust was also their joy. Problem solved – even in a ten-parish benefice. Until the end of 1999, the Alternative Service Book (ASB) was just as comprehensive, better laid out and in (fairly) modern language – the entire Church of England in one hand – and the same principle applied: anyone could open it and keep the show on the road. And now, just when we need it the most, we have nothing. Common Worship (CW) is a scattering of loose papers that have blown away in the wind. Even most clergy (and *cough* most bishops) can’t find their way around the main volume, and most of what you need isn’t in there anyway. And the Ten Parish Benefice is coming. But don’t panic. It can be done.

    To the north of England

    When I started in a four-parish benefice in 2012, I maintained a pattern of services in every parish every Sunday, and very soon even persuaded three of the four to ensure that the service was at the same time every Sunday. With help from retired clergy, the vast majority of services were eucharistic. I did persuade myself that four was the limit, and five would be impossible. Six years later, I was actively negotiating to combine the four-parish benefice with the neighbouring benefice of six churches, to form a combined united benefice of ten, and for this I had the agreement in principle of all four parishes, and the departing half-time incumbent of the six, in order to proactively secure the future of the benefice before any less-considered alternative was imposed upon us. So what had we learned during those years that made the impossible seem possible, not only to me, but to four contented, and indeed enthusiastic, PCCs?

    Those paragraphs in the Church Times article conclude, “It wasn’t possible for every church to have their own vicar, because we don’t have enough vicars.” But all four parishes in that four-parish benefice knew they had a vicar, because they had learned how to make the model work.

    A vicar in every parish

    I ran PCC meetings like they were house-groups. In the smaller parishes the PCC was like a full congregation meeting anyway. After a year or two, I realised “minutes and matters arising” could bog down the meeting early on, so I put “mission and ministry” as a standing agenda item before “minutes and matters arising”. I now realise the agenda was similar to those parishes that have a short service before PCC, except that we were having a short house-group meeting first, to discuss where we were up to as a parish, that month. They knew they had a parish priest. They knew they were cared for. And they knew it would continue the same, even if they were one of ten. I prioritised this as the heart of my ministry. It was the way I kept in touch with all the key lay folks. I held the larger churches’ PCCs monthly (so they would only take an hour, which delighted everyone); the others every six or eight weeks. The people are the resource: a PCC run like this is where you meet the people, and help keep the church joyful, focussed, and full of life.

    A weekly Sunday service in every parish

    BCP provided a straightforward model that made a weekly Sunday service sustainable in every parish even in the absence of the vicar: it mandated that the layfolk (specifically the churchwardens) would lead the service; and within its covers, it provided everything they would need to do so; ASB was just as comprehensive. Mandating, encouraging, and supporting the layfolk to lead the service should be just as straightforward in 2025 as it was in 1662; the only tragedy is that we haven’t had a decent practical liturgy book for the last 25 years.

    Making the liturgy sustainable across four parishes began with the Sunday morning readings. BCP gave us collect, epistle and gospel for every Sunday, clearly set out, easy to find, but in archaic language and in solid blocks of text. ASB gave us the same, with improvements to layout, and readings in a mixture of RSV and three paraphrases: the Jerusalem Bible, the New English Bible, and the Good News Bible (under its earlier name Today’s English Version, TEV). Common Worship gives us nothing. Every lay person in the church is dependent on the vicar, and every vicar is dependent on a paid subscription, and even then has to choose week by week from a bewildering list of unexplained (and to most, incomprehensible) options, and then choose a translation, and then source the readings, and then print them out, and then distribute them to the lay folks, and then… what on earth have we done?

    I have spoken to two of the people involved in compiling the programme: one about the multiple errors I had spotted (which Synod later had to correct – it turned out that they knew about them but angrily blamed others in the group on a partisan basis); and one who was blissfully unaware that CW deviates at all from Revised Common Lectionary, when CW actually deviates from RCL more than any other implementation of the three-year cycle anywhere in Christendom.

    When I started, the four parishes were subscribing to the independently-produced Redemptorist Anglican Mass Sheets, but those didn’t have our patronal festivals or harvests, and more and more often I was producing sheets locally to replace the ones that arrived from Redemptorist, and ssra.uk began to evolve: ultimately an all-new implementation of the three-year lectionary, in an all-new translation; first just for us, now for the whole church.

    I added to this a locally-produced service book, and placed one in every church, with just the parts you need, but all the parts you need, including a good selection of triple-kyrie confessions, all the collects, introductions to the Peace, seasonal prefaces, eucharistic and post-communion prayers, seasonal blessings; 55 pages in all, including all our local patronals and harvests, in a user-friendly format and a top-quality binding. Other clergy look at it jealously. I would like to offer something similar to the wider church. I wrote a week ago by email to the relevant copyright holders; I await acknowledgements and replies.

    Power to the people…

    This service book made my job easier from week to week, but the question hanging in the air is how it became empowering for the laity. And here lies the final element in making the Ten Parish Benefice sustainable. We can make the resources. We also have to let the people use them.

    There are two realistic options for a meaningful weekly liturgical Sunday service in every parish in the absence of a priest: antecommunion, and Holy Communion by Extension. People often don’t want to gather at a different time or on a different day. So the lay-folks can read antecommunion – that’s the communion service as far as the Peace. It qualifies as “a service of the word”. It maintains continuity with the liturgy of the benefice, and the worldwide church both catholic and ecumenical. It’s a substantial biblical and prayerful liturgy, sustaining for regulars, and welcoming for newcomers. Every parish can do this. All they need is a decent lectionary (ssra.uk) and a decent liturgy book (watch this space).

    …for the Ten Parish Eucharistic Benefice

    Cherry Vann, the new Archbishop of Wales, says, “at least with [the Monmouth] model every church gets a eucharist at least once a month, some of them get twice a month, some of them get four times a month.”

    If they can have a priest that often, that’s great; and they should. But there’s absolutely no reason why they shouldn’t have communion every Sunday in between as well.

    That’s the point of Holy Communion by Extension.

    If you read the official 2001 House of Bishops statement on Communion by Extension, it is clear that it took a lot to get anything at all past a group encompassing bishops with eucharistic theology doggedly protestant – almost anti-eucharistic – as well as sky-high catholic. But churches throughout the land keep the reserved sacrament. Using the reserved sacrament to give communion to the people when the parish priest is away is normal practice in the Roman Catholic church, and quite probably therefore in many Roman-rite parishes in the Church of England as well, courtesy of the infinite elasticity of Canon B5, under which every Roman-rite parish, and every totally non-liturgical charismatic-evangelical parish, survives.

    The model envisaged in 2001 – that some poor soul has to go to early communion somewhere and rush fresh sacrament to the Communion-by-Extension parish (as if nobody else owns a car or an alarm clock) is bizarre and surely undignified in comparison to giving the people communion from the reserved sacrament. In the four-parish benefice, the two parishes that had never reserved before immediately understood the etiquette to be kept around reserving the sacrament and worked out an appropriately dignified regime.

    Most liturgies of Communion by Extension go to great lengths to ensure that no part of the service looks like what might clumsily be called ‘the consecration’, lest the laity become ‘confused’. The House of Bishops 2001 text allows a version of the institution narrative to be read at the beginning of the service only, and one other vaguely-eucharistic bible passage to be chosen, to be read later, in place of the eucharist prayer. This is like replacing a joyful hymn of praise, and centuries of carefully-crafted expression of all that surrounds the eucharistic mystery, with some sparse early draft jottings on the subject, ‘lest the laity become confused’ by what they see and hear. I say, don’t be so utterly patronising. The laity will most certainly not be ‘confused’ by a simple explanation such as this, at the offertory: “In the absence of our vicar (who is leading a service elsewhere this morning), we bring gifts of bread and wine which have already been present on the altar at an earlier service of holy communion led by our vicar. We remind ourselves now of the words which will have been used at that earlier service.” Our Anglican theology rightly acknowledges the eucharist to be a mystery, and best expresses that mystery in the words that we have agreed to use together, from the Book of Common Prayer to Common Worship. What better than to remind ourselves of those words as we participate in the very particular mystery that is Communion by Extension, a service that expresses our unity with our benefice and our parish priest, as well as each other and the worldwide and eternal church; not ‘saying’ those words in the particular way that the president said them, just – um – reminding ourselves of what was said. The eucharist is a mystery anyway; the laity understand that Holy Communion by Extension is somehow different, but somehow also participating in one and the same. Feel free to go sit in an ivory tower and tie yourself in a knot over this, while one ten-parish benefice crumbles, and this one thrives. Our laity are not confused; they are prayerful, grateful, and fully understand that they are in the presence of the profound mystery of the eucharist.

    Whether any part of our vast, powerful, and wealthy church hierarchy will capture any part of this vision, I simply cannot know. Our bishops, our General Synod, our liturgical commission, and our diocesan offices, have brought us to where we are. A challenge lies ahead, and it isn’t clear that the needs of ordinary parishes are high on the agenda; they just get combined into ever-larger benefices, and left to sink or swim. So lobby where you can; and in the meantime, maybe take Canon B5, and the fact that nobody’s looking, and step out and do what needs to be done. SSRA.uk is there to help – promote it where you can. Perhaps a liturgy book will follow soon; and in the meantime, for collects at least – handy tip – it’s page 268 onwards in Canada.

    The Ten Parish Eucharistic Benefice is possible. As far as I can tell, so far, it’s either this, or it’s nine (or ten) empty churches. Which will it be?

     

     

     

  • Bleeding While Leading: A Theological and Leadership Reflection

    by Revd Dr Augustine Tanner-Ihm, Lead Minister of Saint Nicholas Church, Kingsway, Manchester

    Introduction: The Wounded Healer

    To lead while bleeding is to embody the paradox of Christ crucified and risen. It is to stand at the altar with wounds still fresh, to proclaim resurrection while still buried under the weight of systemic injustice. This reflection is not just theological—it is incarnational. It is the story of a Black, queer curate in the Church of England, navigating a decade of racism, homophobia, classism, and xenophobia, first as a layperson and then as a clergyman. The Church, which should be a place of refuge, has often been a crucible of suffering. The Gospel of Luke tells us that Jesus “set his face to go to Jerusalem” (Luke 9:51), knowing that the journey would end in betrayal, rejection, and death. To lead while bleeding is to walk that same road, not toward triumph, but toward truth.

    The Master’s Tools and the Architecture of Oppression

    Audre Lorde’s prophetic insight—”The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house”—speaks directly to the ecclesial structures that perpetuate exclusion. The Church of England, with its colonial legacy and hierarchical governance, often uses tools forged in whiteness, patriarchy, and heteronormativity to assess vocation and worth. These tools are not neutral. They are instruments of gatekeeping. My rejection from a parish post in 2020, citing discomfort with my ethnic background in a “monochrome white working-class” parish, is a stark example of how these tools operate. The rejection was not about theology or capability—it was about race. It was about maintaining the architecture of comfort for the dominant culture.

    Conversion Therapy: A Theology of Violence

    On 6 August, the Church Times reported that New Wine has formally apologised to me for the abuse I endured during a 2013–2014 internship. This included forced participation in a “LIFE Ministry” group aimed at “setting people free from homosexuality.” This was not pastoral care: it was spiritual violence. It was a theology of erasure. Luke’s Gospel offers a counter-narrative. In Luke 7, Jesus says to the woman who anoints him, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.” He does not demand she change her identity. He affirms her dignity. The apology from New Wine, while necessary, came after years of silence and dismissal. This confession echoes the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37), where religious leaders pass by the wounded. It was the outsider who stopped, who saw, who healed.

    Kinship and Betrayal: Not All Skinfolk Are Kinfolk

    The African American proverb “Not all skinfolk are kinfolk” painfully captures the reality that solidarity is not guaranteed, even among those who share racial identity. Within the Church, Black and Asian clergy have sometimes perpetuated homophobia, aligning with conservative theology that excludes LGBTQIA+ siblings. The same theology which held them in chains of oppression they use to oppress the queer people. Something that many liberationists had to realize is that we are not free until everyone is free. This betrayal is reminiscent of Judas, who shared bread with Jesus but still handed him over. In Luke 22, Jesus says, “But behold, the hand of him who betrays me is with me on the table.” To be betrayed by those who look like you, who worship beside you, is a unique kind of crucifixion.

    Formation and Fragmentation at Theological College

    My experience at theological college was not one of formation, but one of fragmentation. Theological colleges are meant to be places of discernment and growth, yet they often replicate the very systems of exclusion they claim to challenge. Time and time again I get pastoral emails, calls and invitations to coffee from people in theological college struggling because of racism. The Gospel of Luke begins with Mary’s Magnificat (Luke 1:46–55), a song of reversal: “He has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly.” Formation must be rooted in this radical reordering—not in conformity to oppressive norms.

    Psychological Safety and Leadership Development

    Psychological safety is a shared belief that people can express themselves without fear of reprisal. In church leadership, this is essential for fostering trust, collaboration, and authenticity. Research by Dr. Amy Edmondson and others shows that teams with high psychological safety perform better and experience less burnout. The Church of England’s Living Ministry research highlights the importance of wellbeing, especially in the face of systemic challenges. Clergy wellbeing must be supported through leadership development that prioritizes emotional health, vocational clarity, and relational support.

    Rejection, Anxiety, and the Fear of Homelessness

    I have been rejected from over 15 curacies and 14 roles post-curacy. I have watched friends receive parishes and roles without even applying. If I do not find a role by Christmas, I will be homeless and without a job. As someone who grew up in homeless shelters, this reality is terrifying and anxiety-inducing. At 35 years old, I believed I would be leading or helping to lead an evangelical fresh expression or pioneering something new to help people come to know Jesus. Instead, I find myself fighting for survival in a system that claims to be built on grace but often operates on exclusion.

    Resurrection and Hope

    Despite the trauma, I continue to serve faithfully. My story echoes that of Zacchaeus (Luke 19), a man rejected by society but embraced by Jesus. Zacchaeus responds with restitution, giving back what was taken. The Church must do the same. Apologies are not enough. There must be structural change, reparative justice, and a reimagining of vocation that includes all bodies, all identities.

    Conclusion: A Theology of Hope

    To bleed while leading is to live in the tension of Holy Saturday between death and resurrection. It is to believe, like the women at the tomb, that the story is not over. The Church must become a place where wounds are not hidden but honoured, where leadership is not sanitised but sanctified through suffering. May the Church of England dismantle its house not with the master’s tools, but with the carpenter’s—tools of justice, mercy, and truth. May it become a place where all are welcome at the table, not just tolerated in the pews. And may those who bleed while leading find not just healing, but resurrection.

  • In the Beginning: Sex, AIDS, Judgment and the Church of England, 1986-1991

    by Professor Helen King, an authorised preacher in Oxford Diocese and an elected lay member of General Synod

     

    As soon as I typed this title, I could see what is likely to happen. That allusion to Genesis is going to bring out the usual comments about how it was Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve; the assumption that Adam and Eve were “married”; and no consideration at all of the questions raised by scholars like Diarmaid MacCulloch about whether there was any sex at all in the mythical Garden of Eden. So be it. I want to look back at an earlier period of our history, well before Living in Love and Faith began in 2017, and to ask how far that history is still influencing our discussions.

    I’m writing in the aftermath of this July’s Synod’s near-unanimous decision to end the use of Issues in Human Sexuality and replace it with Guidelines for the Professional Conduct of the Clergy in the process of vocational discernment. Issues was published in 1991, as a “Statement by the House of Bishops”. As the paper supporting Synod’s recent debate, GS 2413A, noted, Issues was never intended to be used in the process of discernment and ordination. It used some very strange terminology which seemed to date to the 1950s, with much of that period’s thinking. It included not only the assumption that someone bisexual must by definition be incapable of a faithful relationship, and advocacy of conversion therapy, but even the hope that in time homosexuality could cease to exist, if science could “eliminate that orientation in future generations by genetic engineering” (paragraph 4.4). And now this “Statement” has not only been recognised as misguided and toxic but has also been removed from the role it had come to play in the discipline of Church life.

    But before we celebrate, let’s remember that there’s an influential booklet that’s even older than Issues: Sexuality and the Church, aka The Higton Report, published in 1987. My copy last came to the top of the pile of books on my desk back in 2017, when I wrote this. Where Issues was a “Statement”, Sexuality and the Church looks somehow more formal; its subtitle is A Report to General Synod and, as it bears the embargo stamp which was used in those days when documents were sent out to Synod members (embargoed until 29 October 1987, so two weeks before Synod met) it looks like an official part of the Synod paperwork. Looking back, I find this confusing. It’s not an official Synod document, unlike Issues which carried a GS identifier (GS Misc. 382). The Higton Report was printed not by Church House but by “Action for Biblical Witness to Our Nation”, a charity run by Tony Higton and his wife. I can’t remember, thinking back, whether it came with other Synod mailings or arrived separately; perhaps the latter. But there’s some boundary-blurring going on in the way the booklet is presented.

    I want to reflect on my reading of the document when it was published, when as a Synod member I made some notes in the (very tiny!) margins, but also to look at it from my perspective now. Some of it seems very much of its time, but there is much that is still being repeated or – more dangerously – lies behind what is actually being said out loud.

    Synod and sex in 1986-87

    So let’s backtrack to 1987, when I was on Synod as one of the five youngest members. Who was I, in 1987? I was a sexually inexperienced straight cis-woman who had recently completed a PhD on ancient medicine. Despite my research interests, I initially found Synod’s apparent obsession with sex, with who is doing what with whom, somewhat alarming. I had spoken in a debate in November 1986, when I successfully had “virginity” replaced by “pre-marital chastity” in a motion around Victoria Gillick’s campaign to prevent doctors prescribing contraception to under-16s without parental consent. My rationale here was that “virginity” was a loaded word, rather too technical; my research had made me aware of the complex cultural history of what counts as “virginity”, and of the concept of “technical virginity” when someone has avoided penis-in-vagina sex but has enthusiastically experienced pretty well every other option that exists. It was because of this that I preferred the term “chastity”, focusing on an attitude rather than a (disputed) female body part. Clearly, I wasn’t afraid of standing up in debates of this kind.

    Tony Higton’s Private Member’s Motion became available for signatures at the July 1987 Synod. Did I sign it? I don’t remember. It’s perfectly possible that I did, because I would have been interested in such a debate. As Higton tells us proudly in the Introduction to Sexuality and the Church, “168 members signed it during the four days of the Synod, more than for any other Private Member’s Motion, which means it took priority for debate at the next Synod”. The Report says it is “background material” to the imminent debate, which could be a deliberate misrepresentation, presenting it as an official document which formed part of the PMM. While these days we are urged to write such supporting documents with a maximum of four pages, this ran to 79 pages. I’d add that the label “Report” is misleading, as it wasn’t really a “report”, but a collection of essays by an all-male line-up:  Higton, David Holloway (on Synod’s Standing Committee at the time), Gordon Wenham and David Wright, with a reprinted piece by two psychologists, John Green and David Miller.

    The Higton Report is clearly out to shock its gentle synodical readers and have them clutching their pearls. In the first essay in the booklet, Higton tells us of a visit to the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement (LGCM) office at St Botolph’s Church in London where, among other things, he found leaflets describing various sexual practices and how best to prevent AIDS while doing them; he calls these sexual practices  “homosexual acts” but those he names here have nothing intrinsically homosexual about them. I’d never even heard of some of them before; whoever would have thought Synod debates could be a source of my sex education? Higton’s assumption seems to be that heterosexuals have access to a far more limited sexual menu, as well as having far less sex; he positively luxuriates in detailing how much sex per hour can be had in “the baths”. Today, we still hear claims about “the homosexual lifestyle” which are shorthand for assumptions about inevitable promiscuity, which are somehow supposed to be absent from “the heterosexual lifestyle”. Here and elsewhere, Higton’s statistical claims are, frankly, a mess; when he discusses rising abortion rates in young girls he can only see this as evidence of promiscuity among (heterosexual!) teenagers, rather than considering that some of these pregnancies may have been the result of girls being exploited by much older men. He really doesn’t get the relationship between power and sex.

    In its original wording, Higton’s PMM began by asking Synod to reaffirm “that sexual intercourse should take place only between a man and woman who are married to each other” (interestingly, the other Canon B30 phrase, “for life”, didn’t feature because this was all about sex, not about marriage). The motion condemned “fornication, adultery and homosexual acts” as “sinful in all circumstances”. This assumed that everyone understood the term “fornication” to mean the same thing, which it doesn’t. The motion was passed in an amended version, in which the fornication – still undefined – and adultery occupied one clause, with a separate clause using the more specific phrase “homosexual genital acts [my italics]”, which incidentally would mean that at least one of the “homosexual acts” named by Higton would be entirely blameless, no genitals being involved.

    The original PMM also asked Synod to affirm that “Christian leaders are called to be exemplars in all spheres of morality, including sexual morality as a condition of being appointed to and remaining in office”. That is a precursor of the wording of Issues. And that may have been the main intention; to drive out any ordained men (remember this was pre-ordination of women) who were homosexual. During Higton’s speech in the November 1987 debate, this was certainly his main focus. However, Higton’s PMM was amended to “all [my italics] Christians are called to be exemplary in all spheres of morality, including sexual morality, and that holiness of life is particularly required of Christian leaders.”

    Throughout the Report there’s a not-entirely-convincing attempt to do the “hate the sin, love the sinner” thing. The original wording of the PMM ended with a call for “Christlike compassion to those who have fallen into sexual sin” but also for “the ministry of healing to all who suffer physically or emotionally as a result of such sin”. I assume we are talking “conversion therapy” there; but it didn’t make it to the motion as passed.

    Sex in the time of AIDS

     As Higton notes in his section on visiting the LGCM office, the Terrence Higgins Trust was sending mailings to Synod about AIDS, and it’s AIDS which is clearly one of the main drivers of the PMM. Its first mention is on page 4 of the Report. While accepting that it could be spread by any form of sex, Higton claimed it is spread “primarily by sexual promiscuity”. I noted in the margin of my copy, “So far.” He insists (again) that “homosexuals tend to be more promiscuous than heterosexuals”. David Holloway’s chapter goes further and blames the spread of AIDS on the Church’s failure to speak out on homosexuality.  Demonstrating a dangerous ignorance he writes that, except for “a very small number of cases”, he does not think mother to child transmission, nor “contaminated blood”, are relevant. I wrote in the margin, “these 2 points [church silence/AIDS cases increasing] are not related.” 

    And here we come to another aspect of how my life in 1987 intersected with these debates. As someone with an interest in the history of medicine, I had been following the emergence of HIV/AIDS since 1981 and I clearly remember a friend who had just returned from the USA telling me about the news stories that were emerging there in the earliest days. But in 1987, I was also undergoing tests for a familial blood condition, and at the time of the Higton debate I was seeing some of the panic at first hand. During tests at St Thomas’s Hospital, some of my blood was spilled and the staff went into the sort of official protective drill that leaves the patient terrified. While Higton’s “primarily” may have been accurate at the time, I thought it was still unhelpful to make out that sex was the problem when there were so many other possibilities.

    Memory is a funny thing. I knew that Synod had also debated a report (GS 795) from the Board for Social Responsibility on AIDS; indeed, I remember speaking in that debate, from my experience of my own blood condition, reflecting on the unhelpful emerging terminology of the “innocent” victim. Another speaker, Dr Jim Somervell, talked about being a surgeon with the risk of pricking oneself on equipment during an operation. But until this week, I hadn’t remembered that this was on the day before the Higton debate (yes, November 1987’s Synod was quite the experience). With AIDS and the Higton Report featuring on consecutive days, the spectre of the first of these very clearly hung over the second. How could it not?

    How far can you go?

     The question of what counts as “sex” is something on which I’ve written before, so I won’t go into graphic details here. But in the margin of my copy of the Higton Report, responding to Holloway’s chapter’s characterisation of “the Biblical tradition” being that “full sexual relationships are exclusively for heterosexual marriage”, I wrote “does this imply ‘partial sexual relationships’ are OK?” I was reminded of this last week when reading an account of the trial for rape and sexual assault of Chris Brain of the now infamous, but once thought to be missionally cutting edge, Nine O’Clock Service, where his “open relationship” with his wife meant that everything other than “full sex” – those words again – was considered fine; at least, by him.

    Looking back on this now, I am again struck by our doomed attempts to divide physical pleasure into neat categories of what is acceptable and what is not, carrying on the proud tradition of the medieval penitentials. Even the heterosexual/bisexual/homosexual division doesn’t work for everyone. From the “How far can we go?” questions which I remember from church youth clubs, to supposedly adult relationships, we seem incapable of getting away from these imagined categories and lists. Full/not full… Acceptable/going too far… Can a kiss be just a kiss? How long should a hug last? As if these things can easily be quantified! Assumptions about these categories also hover behind the convenient fiction that civil partnerships don’t involve “sex” and so are OK where civil marriages are not. Our attempts to construct classifications mean that we miss the big picture of what relationships are about: equality, consent, fidelity, commitment.

    The wrath of God?

     So where does this lead us? Of course, the title of this blog post is misleading because 1986 and the debate stimulated by Victoria Gillick’s campaigning, followed closely by the AIDS and Higton debates, and then Issues, were not ‘the’ beginning; Christian churches had been failing to come to terms with human sexuality for a long time. But something was happening in those five years. In the early days of AIDS, with the level of fear matched with the level of ignorance, the Church of England’s statements of the 1950s and 1960s, when “the Church was in many ways ahead of much of the wider society”[1] in supporting decriminalisation of homosexuality, were forgotten. Led by the evangelical wing of the Church, the general panic about HIV/AIDS was used not only to support the view that homosexual promiscuity was the underlying cause of the pandemic, but that HIV/AIDS was God’s judgement, sent to punish gay men.

    Anthony Petro, author of After the Wrath of God: AIDS, Sexuality, and American Religion (2015), noted that the conservative right supported the “wrath of God” approach to HIV/AIDS because they were already convinced that the 1960s had led to “an epidemic of sexual immorality”. He observes that it was in the mid-1980s – the era of Gillick/Higton – that mainstream Christian writers in national USA magazines like Christian Century and Christianity Today called for attention to the HIV/AIDS crisis. That’s not to say that all Christians thought the disease was the result of “the wrath of God”: responses differed. But research has shown that, in some quarters, the idea persists that HIV/AIDS is not the result of people’s behaviour but is God’s judgement on homosexuals; as, for example, in a 2011 study of a Christian university in Nigeria.[2]

    I suspect that these ideas of judgement continue to lie beneath some people’s approaches to Living in Love and Faith today. HIV/AIDS continues to feed into the language of homophobia. Staying with Nigeria, in 2021 the Primate of Nigeria, Archbishop Henry Ndukuba, described homosexuality as a “deadly ‘virus’” or as “a Yeast that should be urgently and radically expunged and excised lest it affects the whole dough”. The language of the virus cannot avoid evoking HIV/AIDS. The Nigerian Anglican Church is of course part of GAFCON, but Archbishop Justin Welby wrote to criticise the language used by Ndukuba. And it was the same Archbishop Ndukuba who was predictably quick to condemn the Church in Wales for appointing Cherry Vann as their new Archbishop, calling on church members “to denounce, reject, condemn and expel the rebels in our midst”.

    I believe that we should recognise how the debates of the past, with the language of disease, surgical excision and judgement, continue beneath the surface even today. We can ask for “more theology” as much as we like, but there is far more going on here than simply theology, and it needs to be named.

     

     

    Notes

    [1] Mark Chapman, ‘Living in Love and Faith: The Failure of History’ in Theo Hobson and John Inge (eds), Created for Love (2025), p.85.

    [2] Surveys such as this, carried out in a Christian university in Nigeria in 2011, try to break down these views by the sex, age and educational level of the respondents.