Category: Education

Respecting Trans People, Part 2: Towards a Working Group

by Susannah Clark, a member of the Fellowship of the Love of God who has worked as a Prison Governor in charge of a national centre for sex offenders, as a teacher of teenagers for 25 years and, after transitioning 16 years ago, as a registered nurse

As I explained in Part 1 of my review of trans crisis in this country – and the lived experience of trans people – we have been ‘monstered’ by the media, whose campaigns have often framed us as predators and perverts in the minds of the public; they have formed part of a coalition including very conservative Christians, a sub-section of feminists who seek our exclusion, and politicians who have ‘weaponised’ rare and exceptional incidents to brand trans people as ‘threat’ out of fear of their voters shifting to Reform UK. The outcome for trans people has been their imminent exclusion from areas of life where they had previously been accepted by most people, who took a live and let live view on a tiny minority who, sadly, now find themselves confronted on the street by thugs and haters who believe they have been given a mandate for their abuse.

Sadly, the outcome of Living in Love and Faith (LLF) has not kept pace with this onslaught on trans people’s lives.

By its own admission, in the last four years the Church of England has side-lined work on trans issues. This could have been expected to form an integral part of LLF’s work on – in the words of the subtitle of the LLF book – ‘identity, sexuality, relationships and marriage’. Instead, huge energy and time are being invested in what has been nearing an existential crisis over same-sex blessings and sexuality. But trans people now find themselves faced with an existential crisis of their own. The need for a lead from the Church and a serious programme to deliver pastoral care to trans people – and importantly, their families as well – is now urgent. The ‘trans’ element of LLF should no longer be left in limbo.

Let me offer a review of the Church of England’s actions in the past decade.

If we start with the background, trans people had long been accepted and accommodated in their lived identities and gender, for example by the Church’s willingness to ordain trans priests/ministers. We still have transgender clergy today.

Further to this, in a more tolerant and generous time – July 2017 – General Synod overwhelmingly (over 75%) passed a motion recognising the need for transgender people to be welcomed and affirmed in churches.

This was followed in December 2018 by Pastoral Guidance: ‘the House of Bishops commends the rite of Affirmation of Baptismal Faith as the central feature of any service to recognize liturgically a person’s gender transition’… They further stated: ‘It is appropriate to identify the preference of a transgender person in respect of their name and gendered (or other) pronouns… the terms ‘trans man’ (referring to someone who has undergone female-to-male transition) and ‘trans woman’ (male-to-female) are sometimes preferred by the individual concerned.’ This has of course now been called into question by the recent Supreme Court ruling (though that only referenced one specific law).

The Church’s ‘Living in Love and Faith’ initiative began in 2017 and included a study of gender. People were invited to submit views and attend interviews. I myself was invited to an interview on 13 February 2019 with Eeva John, at that time leading the process. She was sensitive but, of course, opening up about one’s life trauma and journey to wholeness came at a cost. But trans people participated in this process in good faith.

Meanwhile, in July 2019, an updated version of ‘Valuing All God’s Children’ (Church of England’s Guidance for Schools) was published, which reflected the Church’s acceptance of trans identities up to that time. For example, it stated that adolescence… ‘is a time when the school culture needs to offer a compassionate acceptance that again allows young people to ‘try on identities for size’, and explore who they are and how best to be themselves, to grow into self-congruence, whilst acknowledging that they may struggle and be confused along the way. Young adults need to be offered the freedom that was afforded to the child in nursery of the metaphorical dressing up box of trying on identities without assumption or judgement.’ All students should be helped to ‘understand the issues for those who feel they are trans/transgender and may be in the process of transition, understanding the impact that bullying has on them. It is important to teach pupils to understand the appropriate use of gender labels and names for trans people and to explore why deliberately calling someone the gender other than that which they choose to identify as is a form of bullying.’

However, a counter-culture of ideologies started to emerge (and be promoted by a trans-hostile media): religious ideology, trans-exclusionary feminist ideology, and the ‘anti-woke’ ideology of the political right.

The work of LLF on the pastoral care of trans people was still being presented as an integral part of its purposes. For example, on 11 May 2021, the Next Steps Group tasked to continue the LLF work reported: ‘The group moved on to discuss the possibility of further work on questions of gender identity and transition. The group acknowledged that this is a complicated area and a first step will be to gather resources to enable the Church of England to be better informed. The group reiterated its commitment to do this together with people most affected by these questions and to do so with the utmost compassion and grace, creating as brave and safe a space for everyone as possible.’

By the following month, that Group proposed a Working Group on trans issues in the Church: ‘The question of how to take forward the proposal of a working group on gender identity and transition was discussed. The work will need to be undertaken knowledgeably and compassionately as it will involve inviting people to come together among whom there are deep and painful divisions. The Group reconfirmed its commitment to supporting those most affected by questions raised by the work.’ In July, they stated that ‘The group discussed the correspondence members had received regarding the proposed gender identity and transition work and agreed a response.’

And where is that Working Group? So great was the pressure on Church leaders over the threats of schism caused by the same-sex issue, that it was put on hold.

In the absence of action at the top, I initiated a very helpful interaction with a conservative ordained minister, who was gracious and decent. His well-known evangelical church was grappling with trans issues too. In collaboration (I also led a teaching session at the church) we developed a 40-point list of guidelines on the pastoral care of trans people (a diluted version can be seen here and was sent to the Next Steps Group on 6 April 2022).

There was no reply.

So on 25 May 2022, I reached out again to the LLF team, asking whether the group had been formed, and how many trans people were part of it. I noted ‘I am anxious that the latest review/process does not get overtaken by any individuals who attempt to de-construct trans identity, or subvert our lives, while I respect a place for a range of views.’

This was the reply: ‘The further work on gender identity and transition is currently on ‘pause’ as the Next Steps Group works out by and with whom and how this will be taken forward. So no group has been formed, as yet, and no further work has taken place. It will, of course, be vital for any work to involve the full range of diversities in relation to lived experience and convictions and, as you know, that in itself is a significant challenge in the current climate. It will also be vital to do this in a way that seeks to be authentically pastoral and welcoming of all. There is much work to do in gaining the trust of trans people who have experienced the deep and personal pain of being at the receiving end of so much unhelpfully and unthoughtfully articulated ‘debate’ both inside and outside the church.’

So that was official: The Working Group on trans issues, proposed the previous year, was ‘paused’.

That was disappointing, firstly because people had opened and given themselves in good faith to the LLF process, and secondly because the climate in society for trans people was by then worsening.

Since the trans element of LLF had been put on hold, it was saddening to read that the statement on 3 March 2023 by the Next Steps Group tasked with following through on LLF issues opened with the words: ‘The remit of the Next Steps group now having reached its conclusion…’

In July 2024 (three years after a Working Group on trans issues had been proposed) I wrote to Bishop Martyn Snow, who had taken over as lead bishop on the LLF process: ‘The reason I am writing is that I am confused and unclear about the state of play on future guidance/teaching/pastoral care for trans people individually in the Church, and for church communities themselves, trying to do the right thing if they have trans people – or, importantly, their families – who come to churches. It seems, predictably and somewhat understandably that the LLF workgroups will be preoccupied by the issues around gay sexuality, but I should love to know what the programme is with regard to trans people and the Church. Is there a working group specifically tasked with addressing trans issues? Does it work to a timeline? Who heads it up?’

He replied the next day, and I am grateful for his honesty: ‘The short answer is that, since I took on this role, we have been totally absorbed with the PLF and questions of marriage. And as you know, LLF was intended to be about so much more than this… it is certainly the case that there is no working group on pastoral support for trans people.’

I appreciated Martyn’s forthrightness, but although he proposed to find out the state of play and get back to me ‘in the next few weeks’, nothing happened.

It is now nearly summer 2025, and the Working Group on the pastoral guidelines to address the pastoral needs of trans people in church communities remains on hold.

However, there are growing tensions building up against various previous policies of the Church: for example, on the affirming use of pronouns in church schools. The Department of Education released non-statutory guidance in 2023 which stated: ‘It is expected that there will be very few occasions in which a school or college will be able to agree to a change of pronouns. On these rare occasions, no teacher or pupil should be compelled to use these preferred pronouns.’ That implies a state expectation that ‘birth’ pronouns should normally be used, not ones the student identifies with. That conflicted with the Church’s own 2016 guidance on affirming pronouns a student identifies with.

In April 2025 the Church of England provided new and updated guidance for church schools addressing bullying (Part B:2.2). It still says schools must challenge discriminatory and dehumanising language and not allow deliberate misnaming. Schools are to avoid causing harm. However, there is ambiguity here in that this new guidance alludes (Footnote 81) to the use of a pronoun with which a child does not identify being potentially harmful. That much maintains the 2016 assertion that this could be seen as a form of bullying, but there is growing political pressure to close down chosen pronouns in most cases.

At this point, I wrote yet again about the non-appearance of that Working Group that had been proposed four years ago.

I understand this week, after yet further enquiry, that the LLF team are now passing on the handling of trans issues to Richard Sudworth, the director of the Church’s Faith and Public Life Team. The leads on LLF now tell me (26 April 2025): ‘The challenges we face in capacity and focus on current LLF work remain… in that me and my team are having to place almost our full focus on seeking fuller use of the PLF (alongside appropriate pastoral reassurance). However, I recognise that this is not an adequate situation given the pastoral needs and care for trans people that you rightly remind us of.’

I appreciate the frankness, and I’ve been offered a meeting which I believe may take place this month. But to be plain, it’s not about me. I would rather follow my secluded life of prayer. However, I feel very badly for young trans people and all those trans people in vulnerable situations. While trans people have been left ‘on ice’ in the outworking of LLF, events in the country have moved on – as we’ve seen with the terrible ‘vilification’ of trans people by media, politicians, and those with antagonistic ideologies. There is urgent need for leadership from the Church because many in the trans population feel in crisis, and face growing hate on the street. The very identity of trans people has been called into question. This will impact Anglican provisions like schools, and will undoubtedly lead to calls from some for changes in official guidelines. I don’t believe gender identity issues can be left in limbo any longer. I know that some trans people I respect prefer to ‘let sleeping dogs lie’ but then the other parties – including some who oppose transition altogether – will push and push. We need re-affirmed guidance and respect for who we are, and that has got to involve a working group at last, if only to home in on advice over pastoral care (which impacts not only trans people but their families, and churches uncertain about how to meet the present developments).

What is needed is not passive toleration of trans people, but positive leadership and guidelines on welcome, inclusion, and acceptance (just as Synod overwhelmingly affirmed in 2017). How best can trans people be cared for, protected from subversion of their identities and self-worth, and offered space to flourish and open up? Following the way of the Cross, how can we become the whole of who we really are, in Christ?

May 2, 2025
Theological Colleges: Being a Community in the Midst of Disagreement

by Revd Mark Vasey-Saunders, Centre Head of St Hild Sheffield and author of Defusing the Sexuality Debate (SCM, London, 2023)

One of the places where the current Church of England debate over sexuality is being felt quite acutely is in theological colleges. Ordinands may come into training from churches with a variety of different views, and their wider support networks may include people who are heavily involved in the debate. This means that ordinands may be faced with questions from friends and family like ‘where does College stand on this?’ or ‘what teaching are you being given on sexuality?’ where the expectation is that, if the College is not aligned with the ‘correct’ position, the ordinand should distance themselves from them in some way. They will have sponsoring bishops whose views are likely only now becoming clear (and some of whom may have acted politically within the debate in ways that are coming under intense scrutiny.) This can leave ordinands feeling very vulnerable if their bishop (who has the authority to agree or disagree to their ordination) holds a different view than them. For some ordinands towards the end of their training they may already have a curacy set up, but this will have been agreed before the vicar and PCC would have discussed how they want to respond, and views on sexuality may not have come up. Some churches may have since announced they will be using the Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF). Others may have announced they will be diverting their share to the Ephesian Fund.

On top of all this external pressure, ordinands will have their own views. Some will have very clear and decided views already, but these may have been formed before they began their theological training. Part of any educational process is to unlearn some of your earlier assumptions, and this places such ordinands in a difficult position (whether they are progressive or conservative) – do they resist the theological training they are given if they feel it might undermine some of their previous certainties, or embrace it, accepting the risk that this might change them in a way their wider support networks might find difficult? Some will never have given questions of sexuality serious thought before, and are now having to explore these questions in a highly politicised environment. All of this tends to put pressure on theological college communities, which can feel like pressure cookers at the best of times, with students wrestling with the stresses of constantly being assessed whilst going through a process of ministerial formation that often exposes areas of vulnerability and doubt.

I work within St Hild College, which is a non-residential community training people full-time or part-time for ministry mainly in Lincoln and the three Yorkshire dioceses of Sheffield, Leeds and York. I’ve asked two of our students (names have been changed), who would take different positions on sexuality, to give their reflections on being part of the college community at this time:

Andrew writes:

I am entering my third and final year of theological training prior to ordination and have spent the last two years at college. As such, with the initial synod vote on the Prayers of Love and Faith coming in the February of my first year of study, this debate has, in one sense, dominated my time at college. I hold to a conservative theological position regarding gender and sexuality, and arrived at college having journeyed alongside friends who have been exploring these questions in their own lives, and having already done significant theological reflection myself in this area.

I have found college to be a relative silo in the midst of these wider discussions in the Church of England. I have had the opportunity to re-explore more progressive approaches to gender and sexuality on their own terms through study and through conversations with other ordinands and students. I am thankful for the insight this has given me as I now feel more confident that I am able to explain progressive arguments in their own terms, rather than as a caricature. I have learnt how to better communicate my theological convictions in a way that makes it easier for me to be heard and understood by those who do not share my convictions. Similarly, I think many of my fellow students who hold to a more progressive theology are better able to articulate the conservative argument.

I think this has been possible due to the relatively unique nature of St Hild as a “scattered” college community. By having lectures on only one day of the week, and not living in a relatively closed community, there isn’t the build-up of pressure around hot button issues that I have heard can occur in residential colleges. This potentially also allows for more direct conversations; we aren’t going to bump into each other tomorrow morning on the way to chapel or beginner’s Greek after a particularly sharp conversation the evening before. Further to this, we are all in our own parishes. Our conversations are divorced from many immediate pastoral situations. We are, in many ways, able to extract ourselves from our pastoral contexts for a day, discuss theoretically with others, and then return to our parishes.

The most fruitful result of these conversations has been the mutual realisation and agreement that gender and sexuality is merely the presenting fruit of a more fundamental disagreement. I have been encouraged by several conversations that I have had with fellow ordinands who are as liberal as I am conservative, where we have mutually agreed that to truly respect each other we need to acknowledge the deep differences between our understandings of who Jesus is, what he calls sin, and what redemption and salvation look like in the lives of Christians. Not just this, but also that there are significant, potentially mutually exclusive, differences in our basic philosophical and theological presuppositions regarding the nature of God and revelation. This has been accompanied by a mutual dissatisfaction with what we perceive to be the position of the House of Bishops: that these are minor disagreements and really we can ‘all just get along.’ This feels disrespectful of both of our theological positions, underestimates the differences in how we believe we need to respond pastorally to those most deeply affected by questions of gender and sexuality in our respective communities, and by downplaying all of this is increasing the division we perceive in the church, not reducing it.

This perception has only increased for me since the July 2024 Synod. The conversations mentioned above initially took place in April 2022. Even then, at the very start of the discussions about PLF, both these self-described liberal ordinands and I knew that legally protected forms of differentiation, as defined by those who would need it, such as transferred episcopal oversight, would now be a necessity. (Though we did not have the precise language at the time.) It is frustrating that, to an outside observer, similar conversations and acknowledgments would not appear to have been forthcoming from the House of Bishops or at General Synod. This is essential not only for the wider Church of England, but also for colleges such as St Hild. The conversations across the breadth of tradition and theology in St Hild that make it a unique place is highly dependent on there being a breadth of tradition and theology amongst ordinands. Unless the House of Bishops take seriously the need for suitable, legal, provision these conversations will quietly cease, not because ordinands don’t want to have them, but because there will not be ordinands of different theological convictions around to have them.

Ben writes:

There are few things more dangerous on the motorway than a theological debate taking place at 70mph. This is the temptation, however, at 7am on a Monday morning when driving to St Hild Sheffield. With three students in the car, two of whom are Church of England Ordinands, the subject of Prayers of Love and Faith has come up multiple times. Whether it’s the interpretation of scripture, or the drama of a synod debate, there is often something discuss, and each of us in the car holds a different opinion. (Pray for us ordinands when we think this is where we should get our excitement.) There have been no motorway accidents thankfully, but I have learnt that sometimes what it is most important to remember is that we are sharing the same car. Safety for all means keeping your eyes on the road, not scoring a point in the current debate, however heated it’s got. This principle has also applied to discussions of PLF outside of the car too.

For myself, I have grown up in evangelical churches but also come to a broader view on the issue of LGBTQ+ inclusion than I had 15 or some years ago. For me the question over same sex blessings is not a “first order” or “salvation” issue, and I am happy to let the issue sit with the conscience of each individual. I am also convinced that churches need to be a genuinely safe space for any LGBTQ+ individual who walks through the door.

While studying, I have found discussing these issues with other students from different perspectives to be hugely beneficial. Conversations have always been respectful and constructive, with nobody’s views being dismissed out of hand. At times, the college has provided guided conversations with updates on PLF too, where tutors with differing opinions have set a tone of understanding and provided context to the debate. As ordinands, questions as big as these do create worry about our future ministry and where we might fit into the Church of England. Many of us will not have publicly declared a position on these debates before, or been asked to make decisions which will change how our church members and communities will see us. I found sharing these worries with other ordinands to be reassuring, especially as we are all still finding our feet. Also, having tutors who can help calm some of these worries and address the wilder speculations on where the church might be heading is essential. This is just as beneficial for those still working out their opinion on PLF, and for those who feel stuck in the middle of the debate, simply worried that a church they love is about to tear itself apart.

For me, if holding Christian unity over this issue means anything, it means that we must see those with a different view as still loved by God, and accept that God may still be speaking to others, even if they seem to be heading in a different direction to ourselves. A college with a diverse range of students with differing views has been a vital way to model this in a safe environment. My biggest fear in all of this are the calls for structural differentiation of ordinand training, which may create a college environment where ordinands never meet someone from the other side of the debate. After all, once you arrive in a parish, no church is going to hold a uniform view on this either, and the world certainly won’t. If we can’t speak to each other civilly about issues of sexuality, what hope does the church have of speaking to the world? Similarly, if formation and training is to be a place where we can be made more like Christ, there has to be the possibility that we might get something wrong at times and there needs to be grace for trainees to change our minds.

The St Hild experience may not be the same for all Theological Colleges. The fact that ordinands have been prominent signatories to various statements within the ongoing LLF debates demonstrates that in some places ordinands have felt their very ability to continue training for ministry to be threatened by developments in the wider church. As Andrew notes above, there is something peculiar about the nature of a non-residential college that both creates enough security and sense of shared community to allow vulnerability and genuine conversation and allows enough space for tensions to dissipate. It is part of the nature of theological training to allow and encourage debate and reflection however, and to this extent I suspect that these sorts of experiences are true of many of the Church of England’s TEIs.

It’s important not to romanticise the kind of discussions both Andrew and Ben describe above as valuable parts of their training. These are costly conversations, and there have been times where that has been felt keenly by the community as a whole. Students with passionate convictions on either side may at times have to carefully weigh up the costs of speaking openly to both themselves and the wider community, and find themselves self-editing or remaining silent as a consequence. Some students are deeply vulnerable in ways others aren’t, and in ways that may not be immediately clear to those around them – not least because when the topic of discussion is sexuality, some students will find themselves the ones being discussed. Staff must carefully weigh up how to frame teaching in these areas in order to allow students of any and all convictions to engage with the strongest exponents of positions they may find offensive or personally threatening, whilst maintaining a safe learning environment. All of this in the knowledge that if they get the balance wrong, and students feel they are being attacked, or a particular view is being forced on them, then the reputational damage to the College can be immense.

Creating a space where people can learn means creating a space where people feel vulnerable (even if that vulnerability is simply the admission of your own ignorance). But creating a space where people can be vulnerable carries the risk that people can be hurt. To borrow Ben’s metaphor of debating while driving at 70 mph, we want everyone in the car to hold an awareness of the inherent riskiness in what they are doing. The really dangerous thing is for people to not feel that they are in danger. To not have the conversations and pretend none of this stuff matters very much. Or to have the conversations without much awareness that some outcomes will dramatically affect all the occupants of the car you’re driving in.

There is an extent to which having difficult conversations with a high awareness of risk is what the wider church needs to learn to do. LLF was originally conceived as an invitation to engage in learning together. But in many places LLF courses weren’t run. The difficult conversations didn’t happen. But when we avoid the difficult conversations we don’t avoid risk. We’re just not aware of it. As I reflect on Andrew and Ben’s experience of difficult conversations and what they’ve learnt from them I find myself feeling hopeful for the future of the church. Neither of them have massively changed their mind on these questions through their time at college. But they’ve learned and grown through the conversations they’ve had, and they’ve become a lot more used to talking to people they disagree with and still recognising them as brothers and sisters in Christ. Ultimately, having had difficult conversations once, they are likely to see the value of doing it more in the future and helping to build a church where having difficult conversations is normal.

We need to get used to church not being a comfortable place. Because, for some people, it never has been.

October 8, 2024
Equality, ‘headship’ and authority: drawing the line in schools and churches

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

It should go without saying that all schools in this country want to teach children that all people are equal and should have equal opportunity. And it is important that schools should do this, as young people may be picking up other messages in society, in their home lives and from religious leaders.

A couple of weeks ago I was at a Church of England school giving a talk to a group of sixth formers, who were studying Religious Education for A level, about gender equality and how equality is at the heart of the Christian faith. The class was a mixed group of boys and girls, Christians, Muslims, and others of other faiths or none.

After the talk, I opened the floor for questions and was a bit shocked when one boy put up his hand and said, ‘It’s God’s will that men should be in authority over women.’ A couple of boys sitting next to him smirked and a number of the young people shifted in their seats uncomfortably. I challenged what he was saying, arguing that scripture can be and has been interpreted this way, but it also can and should be interpreted differently. Christian or Muslim, I strongly believe that it is God’s will for us to all see each other as equal – that there is no one lesser or greater than ourselves.

The boy pushed back, quoting scripture, and explained why he believed women need to be controlled by men. I saw the teacher give him a look, but I calmly responded to his questions, giving alternative interpretations to the scriptures he referred to. He and I could have continued back and forth all day, but I tried to involve others who might have different opinions.

At the end of the class, when the young people had gone, I had a chat with the teacher. She said that it is a problem that some young people are being taught by faith communities that it is men’s role to lead and women’s role to submit to that leadership. She said that in RE, a few years ago, she would have given some input about the interpretation of different texts regarding gender in scripture and then allow the students to discuss in small groups. She says she can no longer do this, as it causes so much upset and abuse. Another RE teacher I later spoke to about the experience confirmed that, more and more, boys are goading girls at school that they are the superior sex.

As Chair of WATCH, a campaign group for equality for women in the Church of England, and as a vicar in West London, I spend a lot of time arguing that equality is at the heart of the Gospel and that we shouldn’t be discriminating against people on grounds of sex or other protected characteristics. WATCH calls for an end to the institutional discrimination, whereby it is still permissible for parishes to advertise just for a male vicar or to refuse the authority of a female bishop. Personally, it troubles and upsets me that our church is divided and some priests won’t receive communion from others because they are female and some of my colleagues don’t believe women should be vicars or bishops, or even preach (other than to women and children.)

Nonetheless, I had not realised that the theologies that underlie these positions, especially headship (or ‘complementarian’) theology, are having such an impact on young people – at least, as evidenced by my visit to that Church of England school.

Recently there has been some discussion about whether schools, particularly Church of England schools, should be teaching children about the ‘white supremacy pyramid’ and systemic racism. Some dioceses already recommend using the ‘pyramid’; for example, Derby. Whether this is a good idea or not, we all accept that schools should be teaching that it is not right for anyone to consider themselves greater or lesser than anyone else on the grounds of skin colour. But what about gender? How should schools respond to young people who are being taught in mosques or churches that men need to have power over women? Not only is this situation unpleasant and offensive for girls to contend with in schools, it is also dangerous. There is much evidence that in cultures that teach and accept male privilege over women there are higher levels of violence against women and girls, than in cultures which promote equality between the sexes.

The day before my school visit, I was in York at General Synod and had a number of conversations with Conservative Evangelical Christians while I was there. I was campaigning, along with the Student Christian Movement, for an ‘Honest Church’ where, if we are going to continue with institutional discrimination against women, then we should at least be transparent about this, and churches that limit women’s roles should be clear about their position. Talking to one man, he admitted that his church says nothing about its headship theology on its website, but he said that they do teach headship theology in the church at least once a month, so anyone going to the church for any length of time should soon realise this. When I heard this, I thought that this was probably a good thing so that at least people knew the situation and could choose whether this church was for them or not. But now, having gone into the school, I am not so sure.

Religious leaders have a lot of power and influence, especially over younger people, and headship teaching is possibly being accepted without any critical analysis or any acknowledgement of alternative approaches. As a result, some men may be hearing that they need to control women; indeed, that it is their role to show authority over women. I’d like to see the Church of England give a clear edict to our schools that it is not God’s will that one sex should have authority over the other. But, given that we allow this teaching in our churches and that we state in recent legislation that we want such churches to flourish, then that currently seems impossible.

And the goading, or worse, seems set to continue.

July 28, 2023
Learning Lessons? Leading a Church Where Abuse Has Happened

by Revd Canon Mark Bennet, Team Rector in the Thatcham Team and member of General Synod

I reviewed a book a while back for the journal Practical Theology. Written by Gail Cafferata, and based on research mainly in the US, it was called The Last Pastor: Faithfully Steering a Closing Church. It was about how to close a church well, and what happens to people and buildings and resources and memories afterwards. Published in 2020, strangely it appears not yet to have appeared on the reading list of any course I am aware of in Church leadership – in spite of the fact that there are in fact many people who do close churches, and closing them well is very much better than closing them badly. If it is a common task – and Cafferata contacted over 130 pastors in five different denominations – then why are we not intentionally learning lessons from those who wear the T-shirt? It is an example of the learning we don’t want to do – we’d rather be (against the trend) growing churches and doing exciting things rather than attending to what is actually in front of many of us.

None of us want to face a major safeguarding issue in our context – my own context is a parish. But if we do face such an issue, it would be good to have some deep research which goes beyond crisis and reputation management. Within six months of taking on my role of Team Rector I had to deal with two situations involving two different youth leaders in the parish, one of whom ended up spending time in prison. I mentioned an outline of my issues in a speech at the July 2023 General Synod in the debate on safeguarding reviews. ‘Lessons learnt’ is a term used all the time in these reviews, but I mentioned in passing the learning we apparently don’t want to do, about treating victims and survivors well over the long term. But my main focus (which the Church Times missed in its Synod report) was on the learning we haven’t even thought of doing: about the impact on, and care of, communities in which abuse has happened. When it happened to me, I had no body of learning to which I could refer to guide me in my unexpected and unwelcome new context.

I hope that such experiences have a low incidence, but over time even a low incidence of scarring and damage unhealed can start to have a substantial impact, as cases mount up. Do you know what it feels like to face the prospect of doing youth work in the face of the “younger and more diverse” agenda when there has been a double betrayal in the parish? That has been one of my questions, but if the damage is low incidence, we must note also that our contexts of ministry are very diverse. Not many will have a single church building serving a parish of over 25,000 people. So I was arguing at Synod that we need, as a church, to capture, consolidate and reflect on the learning from the contexts where abuse has happened, so that people like me have resources which have a chance of mapping onto something like their own situation if the worst happens to them. It may be that reviews are the wrong tool for this work and that ongoing intentional research would capture the learning and the stories more effectively.

What I do know is that if no-one is learning, then mistakes will be made – and no-one has yet put themselves out to learn from me and my experience. It is hard work to be the pastor of a congregation in which abuse has happened. In many cases it seems to divide the community between those who believe the stories are true, and those who would defend a “good person” or the reputation of the church. My journey covered five years, conflict, unexplained decisions and judgments and a serious case review encompassing the church and two schools (I was chair of governors of one – not, as it happens, a church school). The impact lasted for longer than that. Just to illustrate some of the questions which arose for me over this extended period:

How do you preach over time: are there problematic Bible passages?

How do you negotiate your relationship with local schools where you are a governor and parents are getting their best information from the local newspaper?

How do you deal with newspaper stories in those community contexts?

How do you manage a PCC which knows little of the story? And Churchwardens likewise?

How do you manage a team when some can know things that others do not?

What are the considerations about continuing the youth work in the parish (other partners may be involved)?

How do you survive the incorrect comments and factually inaccurate narratives which emerge in your community when you can say nothing to challenge them?

How do you cope with being called “paedo” in the street or in a public place?

The demands and pressures of being embedded in a community where abuse has happened over a considerable period are not comms issues, or problem solving, or even sometimes actually safeguarding issues – they are issues of relationship and trust, and at heart are pastoral issues. As I mentioned in my speech, a community can be strongly divided, with emotion running high – as a work context, it can be demanding and at times relentless.

I hope I never face the same issues again – my learning is of little use to me. But it could be of huge value to an unknown colleague facing some of the same challenges in a different context. What do we lose by putting ourselves out to learn the lessons?

July 21, 2023
Leadership for Change: A Response to ‘The Sexism Women Continue to Face in the Church of England’

by Rev Dr Stacey Rand, Senior Research Fellow in Social Care at the University of Kent

Revd Martine Oborne’s recent article explored the experience of discrimination faced by many female clergy in the Church of England. It offers an honest and truthful description of the cost carried by female clergy, as they try to faithfully serve their communities.

However, as many female clergy will know first-hand, it is risky to voice these experiences openly. Why? The view of many, including of female clergy themselves, is that it may deter other women from exploring vocation to ordained ministry. It presents the Church of England in a negative light.

I am a priest: how I express this on my Twitter bio is “Somehow, also a priest in CofE”. I want to bring my own experience to the points about discrimination made by Martine, particularly around issues that relate to access to theological education and support in ministry. Both of these have had – and continue to have – an impact on my own ‘flourishing in ministry’.

Access to theological education

I was recommended at selection in 2013 (aged 30) to begin training for ‘incumbent status’ ordained ministry. I was strongly guided towards part-time training, which was self-funded (except fees) and up to Undergraduate diploma level.

This is an unusual pathway for a younger candidate. The Diocesan Director of Ordinands (DDO) explained that I was perceived to be a ‘risk’ as a ‘young married woman, who may become pregnant’. It was also said that it would be better to train part-time, as it was far cheaper than full-time residential training. There was no conversation about or consideration of my training needs, formation or future ministry.

My experience is not unique. Ministry statistics for younger candidates (under 40) show that, whilst roughly equal numbers of women and men train on non-residential pathways, men are more likely than women to train full-time, residentially. Of course, part-time pathways may enable women (and men) to train alongside family, caring, work or other personal commitments. However, my experience warns that these differences may also reflect bias – conscious or unconscious – that assumes women are ‘risky’ and not worth investing in.

Support in ministry

Martine comments that:

“More women are ordained later in life than men and they tend to get directed towards leading smaller churches or groups of small churches – often without a salary.”

Since the ordination of the first cohort of women as priests in 1994, women have been over-represented among ‘non-stipendiary’ (unpaid) clergy. Currently, 35% of female clergy are unpaid by comparison to 22% of male clergy. Some of this may be explained by age profile. Women tend to come forward for selection later in life, so the impact of policies offering people over a certain age (usually in their 40s or 50s) no option but non-stipendiary ministry will disproportionately affect women.

After my pre-ordination training, I was asked to complete a non-stipendiary curacy. In conversation around why I had been asked to do this, rather than being supported with a stipend (as I had indicated as my first preference), again, some assumptions had been made. It was expected that I would give up my paid work to be a parish-focused full-time unpaid curate and that, as a married woman, my husband would support me.

Again, I had been stereotyped due to my sex/gender and marital status. Those who had made these assumptions would no doubt express their full support for women’s ministry, but allowed their internal assumptions about gender roles to shape their decisions in an unhelpful way. They had not been able to really see or understand the person in front of them. We are all capable of such mistakes; the issue is about creating a culture of self- and mutual accountability that mitigates against this.

Does it matter?

Why does the Church of England not act more decisively on this discrimination? There are only approximately 2,400 female clergy serving in paid or stipendiary roles and a further 1,300 non-stipendiary clergy. Perhaps some think we face more important challenges: recent census data, for example, shows that affiliation with the Church of England has continued to decline since 2011.

But discrimination against female clergy does matter. The Church of England serves communities, locally and nationally, from local community projects to the House of Lords, and needs to maintain some degree of alignment with those communities. We live in a society where women have equal access to education and opportunities to paid work, even if barriers and challenges remain.

Martine’s article alludes to the settlement intended to protect and accommodate those who are unable to accept women’s full ministry. While greater transparency – for example, requiring local churches to clearly state their position on websites – could help to some degree, the discrimination faced by female clergy is not limited to those churches, which from their complementarian or traditional catholic convictions conclude that women cannot serve in leadership roles and/or be ordained priest.

The experiences of training for ministry, which I’ve described here show that, sadly, the problem goes beyond the small constituency of churches who do not recognise or support women’s ministry. Sexism remains persistently embedded, in a way that goes far deeper.

Next steps?

We need greater accountability, transparency and shared commitment to specific actions; for example, the development of consistent maternity leave policies across the Church of England. Local or national review of access to theological education should show full commitment to the idea that women should be allowed to flourish in ministry.

While organisations such as WATCH work on national level awareness-raising, or local advocacy and case work, individual bishops make their own policy and, if such policy discriminates against women, there is no accountability. Consistency across dioceses is lacking in many areas, including in training for ministry.

But we also need to develop a culture of attention, with space to listen and understand people, rather than relying on short-cut assumptions about individuals that may be inaccurate, misleading or even harmful. We are all part of the problem – when we collude in silencing each other when we ought to speak, reflect on and discuss the issues, or when we minimise or ignore the negative impact of discrimination on human flourishing. Therefore, we all need to share the leadership for change.

January 10, 2023
Another Year Gone: What’s Wrong with the Church of England?

by Helen King, Professor Emerita in Classical Studies at The Open University, authorised lay preacher, member of General Synod and vice-chair of its Gender & Sexuality Group

As another calendar year draws to a close, and those who make resolutions write them down, it seems like a good time to ask my headline question. Your answer to it may revolve around the Living in Love and Faith process, as well it might. What’s wrong with the Church of England? The abuse by some of our number of those who don’t fit the male white cis-het model? Being obsessed with peripheral matters? (I’m not a fan of Twitter posts showing the clergy in their swankiest rose vestments for Advent 3). Having a total disregard for what is good in the society in which we are placed? Going too far in accommodating our message to that society? Not being sufficiently faithful to whatever we see as the central message of the Bible? But I’d like to take this question back further and reflect on what I see as the four ‘oppositions’ which I think lie behind many other aspects of the Church of England today; and none of them is conservative/progressive, because I think the problems run far deeper.

This blog post is stimulated by something I was doing back in September, when I was invited by those running a church committee I’m on to offer my reflections after joining it. I did as they suggested, although I’ve heard nothing from them since. Was I too forthright? Or was it all too obvious? The four oppositions I offered there, and have developed here, are all ones which I think about in other aspects of my life and work, too. They are binaries, but could also be spectrums, if we accept that both of the poles are equally important and that much lies in between, rather than prioritising one term over the other.

The first would be access vs excellence. As someone with Open University experience, I strongly believe in access to any sort of education or training or anything else being entirely open. You don’t need any previous exam passes to start an Open University degree. Similarly, I believe that baptism should be freely offered to anyone asking for it; think of the Ethiopian eunuch, “Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?” (Acts 8:36). And yet we hear of churches where the child of a couple who are same-sex isn’t welcomed to baptism… While baptism ‘courses’ should be offered to those who would find them helpful, they shouldn’t be compulsory. Yet only once have I been at a C of E service at which the bishop asked if anyone else in the congregation would like to be baptised on the spot… but I thought that was a really Scriptural invitation!

In churches, access should continue after baptism as we want everyone to feel welcome, to be able to join in. That means being accessible to people of all ages, every class, every race, every gender identity or sexuality. But we need to know where the barriers to participation lie before we think about how to overcome them. That’s difficult because the people whose views we need to hear may well be those who aren’t in the room. There can be little more depressing than a group of middle-class people discussing how to attract more working-class church members; unless it’s a group of straight people and same-sex attracted people who think they must never have a sexual relationship, discussing lesbian and gay people in committed sexual relationships (that was rather how the process of writing the Living in Love and Faith book felt).

At the other end of things, there’s the need to enable everyone to be their very best self. That may mean encouraging or even pushing them. Sure, open the choir to everyone, but there’s nothing wrong with training; with expecting choir members to join in rehearsals! And that applies everywhere else too. Those preaching need opportunities to think about what a sermon is for. Everyone helping in the Sunday School needs to do the safeguarding training, not just the leaders. Access is not the end of the matter. And we need to go further still; we need to think about how to recognise and honour excellence. That means transparency in finding out who is outstanding, and encouraging them to go even further. We shouldn’t be afraid of excellence and we should be ready to recognise it in anyone, not just those who turn up with all the advantages already, or those who fit our expectations about what sort of person would make a good preacher or a good welcomer. What if you’re a woman in a church with a ‘complementarian’ position where you would never be allowed to preach, let alone to lead? How is your excellence to be encouraged? And who is going to do this work of discernment?

The second is local vs national, and that one seems to me to be the key fact about the Church of England’s dual identity which we rarely face. General Synod may make some decisions but, back in their dioceses, bishops rule. The Church of England may declare a national policy, for example on maternity leave for clergy, but does that mean every diocese follows it? I think you can guess the answer to that. If you challenge any instance where something isn’t done consistently they’ll cite ‘subsidiarity’ or ‘local context’ – both highly important, although dioceses often contain a mixture of rural areas and large urban centres, areas of poverty and pockets of wealth, so claims that they need to do things differently from the next diocese along fail to convince. But we are a national church, and the implicit assumption that people grow up and develop within just one diocese doesn’t really wash any more. So, what happens when those people move house? For example, is it right for one diocese to have its own lay training scheme, or should this be centralised? Does ‘local ordained ministry’ make any sense? In a recent case, someone on the Reader pathway in one diocese moved, and found that the new diocese would not support them because of their sexuality – which hadn’t been seen as an issue in the previous diocese. What is best done at a local level? Who decides?

The third opposition, and this one is really obvious, is lay vs ordained. Going by my own experience, if you are in a middle-of-the-road Anglican parish church and you go to see your vicar to say that you are feeling that you are being called to something new but aren’t sure what, the default assumption is that this must be ordained ministry. I wasn’t comfortable with that assumption but agreed to work with a spiritual director for a while. She affirmed my calling to be lay. But the assumption persists that the ordained ministry is the ‘gold standard’ and everything else is a mere shadow of it, and this is one reason why not getting through the selection process leaves people so badly bruised. In the last few years there have been various Grand Schemes in the C of E; ‘Renewal and Reform’, ‘Vision and Strategy’, the ‘Transforming Effectiveness agenda’ and so on. These involve throwing large numbers around (10,000 new lay-led worshipping communities, 3000 new paid leaders of work with children and young people).

I remain unconvinced about these plans. Leaving aside what I see as the dubious wisdom of embarking on all this when numbers have still not returned to pre-pandemic levels, and when we can’t get enough volunteers for existing roles, where will these lay leaders come from? And what will they be allowed to do? In a conservative evangelical church where women can’t lead, will women be among these new lay leaders, or is it only men – and straight men at that – who will lead? How will they be trained? Locally? Nationally? What are the safeguarding implications? Meanwhile at the same time as the C of E is discussing expanding lay ministries, it is also piloting schemes to fast-track people to ordination. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to decide what we mean by laity and clergy before doing any of this?

And that brings me to speed vs depth. The C of E doesn’t usually ‘do’ speed. Look at the long process culminating in ordaining women, or the decades spent on producing various reports on sexuality. At the moment, though, speed suddenly seems to be OK when it comes to training as a priest. I’ve heard from someone whose church hosted a person who’d done one of the new one-year ordination schemes and who was very happy with this; so, maybe it can work, although it’s early days. The language I’ve seen in C of E papers is that of ordaining ‘seasoned saints’ (we do love our alliteration, don’t we?). I would like more assurance that this isn’t shorthand for ‘people like us’. But, in any case, is this sufficient formation? I remember about 20 years ago when a friend was accepted for ordination quite late in life, and was allowed the two-year training, that he said this was the one chance he and his wife had to gain the depth which would sustain them.

And are we ordaining people mainly so that communion services can continue, because since the Parish Communion Movement it’s all been about communion? (I’m old enough to have grown up with Mattins) Paradoxically, this ‘keeping the show on the road’ mentality can also lie behind encouraging lay leadership: one published report into lay ministry suggested that the laity were being seen as “a new source of voluntary help in maintaining existing patterns of public worship and associated activities”. Have we yet gone beyond that to appreciate lay ministry in a more distinctive, more positive way? My own parish is in interregnum at the moment and is fine as far as services go, not least because we have three retired clergy and a team vicar who are sharing them out. But there is so much more to church than services!

For me, when the normally slow C of E suddenly decides to move quickly, as in one-year ordination courses, alarm bells ring (because, normally, “Like a mighty tortoise/Moves the Church of God”, etc). I’m even more worried when the people sent on the ‘cheaper’ training options or expected to end up in self-supporting (i.e. unpaid) ministry tend to be women.

So: access vs excellence, local vs national, lay vs ordained, speed vs depth. Do you agree that these are the four oppositions, or spectrums, behind a lot of our discussions? And would it advance those discussions if we were able to bring them up to the surface and address them directly?

December 30, 2022
Gatecrashing God’s Party: Parish Ministry Today

by Jo Stobart, a parish priest in South Somerset. Along with fellow parish priest Claire Lording, she is standing as a ‘pair’ for election to the Crown Nominations Commission

I was recently asked, ‘What has changed about your calling since you embarked on exploring a vocation to ordained ministry?’ It’s a question I found myself reflecting on again as I sat in Taunton Minster last weekend, watching our benefice’s curate being ordained priest. It’s almost five years since I made those vows myself. Although in ministerial terms that’s a blink of an eye, now seems a significant moment to pause and ponder the answer I gave to my original questioner.

My first response was that I could never have predicted just how much I would love this role. If Buechner’s oft-quoted ‘The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet’ is true, then I am blessed to find myself at that sweet spot of intersection. I serve as Vicar in places that, alongside Fr Alex Frost’s parish, do a pretty good job of representing the breadth of the Church of England. Ilminster is a small market town in South Somerset and Whitelackington an outlying village.

The Minster sits right at the heart of the town and generations of families are connected to the building by baptisms, weddings and funerals. The church still has a recognised place in the life of the town. Most of the children attend the Church of England First School and civic events regularly find expression through a church service. I’m often greeted in the main street with ‘Morning Vicar’. Parish ministry here looks remarkably ‘traditional’.

But traditions change too. On the list of vicars in our Lady Chapel, dating back to the Norman Conquest, I’m the first woman incumbent. I’m still asked tentative questions about how I should be addressed (‘Jo? But Vicar’s fine too.’). People here would instinctively tick a ‘Church of England’ box on a form, but this connection now usually relies on the regular attendance of a parent or, more often, a grandparent. The story of Christianity is one that’s remembered as an echo through the generations.

What this means is that doing the work of a parish priest doesn’t need to be ground-breaking to be innovative or ‘fresh’. Each day brings the opportunity to share our faith, potentially for the first time with that person, and Mary Lennox-like to open together the overgrown door of The Secret Garden. As well as sharing faith in traditional ways, as so many parishes up and down the country are doing so faithfully, we are blessed to have pioneers working on the margins. There are voices calling us to work alongside those of good will in the community on green issues, or the refugee crisis. Our churches, alongside other Christian communities here, run the town’s food bank.

And at the heart of it all there’s the worship we offer to God. Sunday by Sunday we celebrate the Eucharist – when the mystery of God’s love in Christ is made present to us – and listen to Scripture – discerning words of hope that are for all people.

I love being a parish priest.

But my answer to that original question contained a second part, which on the face of it was more ambivalent. I said, ‘I’m less patient.’ While five years ago I had some sense of the way in which the Church of England might need to change, I didn’t feel the same urgency I do now. I’m not from a Christian family but as a child the Church of England nurtured my faith and, for all its flaws, is my home. I have worshipped across the breadth of our denomination and, whilst some of that breadth I find personally challenging, I remain committed to finding a way for our whole church to flourish. As one we should be sharing the joy of the Good News.

Given half a chance, I’d spend all day reading a novel because stories give me life. So it won’t come as a surprise that my faith is profoundly shaped by the stories we encounter in Scripture – especially the parables that Jesus told. In those parables two themes particularly shape my life as a follower of Christ, and then as a priest.

First, the faithfulness that God requires of us. The sowing of the seed with no sense of what the return will be. And second, the generosity and hospitality of the God we worship – a God who bids us welcome. It’s a picture of abundance, but in my day-to-day life too often I’m forced to see things through a lens of scarcity. Post-pandemic, the volunteers we don’t have, the funds we can’t find, the stipendiary ministry roles we need to reduce, the scale of the need we are facing in our community and the struggle to keep pace with that. Sometimes it’s hard to remember we’re serving a God who invites us to a party.

I long for our church to recapture that vision of a party so good you want to bring all your friends along as well, the festival you’d climb the fences to get into. And perhaps that last Glastonbury-based allusion is the root cause of my impatience. We’ve been invited to the best headline act ever and yet we’ve built high fences all round it to keep others out. Whereas God goes out on to the streets to welcome everyone in, we’ve too often been a church that serves only the people who look and think like ‘us’.

My sense is that those of us who might describe ourselves as either ‘Inclusive’ or ‘liberal’ can sometimes be perceived as lukewarm in our longing to make Christ known. Of course this isn’t true, but I think those of us who hold those perspectives need to tell in a compelling way the story of a God whose arms are open wide to all. A God whose invitations to the party are surprising and unsettling to the older brothers of the world. A God who delights in and loves each and every one of us.

Five years on from ordination to the priesthood, I’m impatient for a church that tells that amazing story with one voice.

July 1, 2022
The Invisible Privilege of Being Voiceless in the Church: Creating a Platform for Bisexual Christians

by Hattie McInerney, a second-year Theology and Religion PhD researcher at the University of Birmingham

In 2019, when writing my Master’s thesis, I decided to interview 10 university students who identified as Christian and LGBQ+. Personal and thought-provoking, these interviews gave me a real insight into how queer Christians navigated their faith lives, both in their home churches, and on their university campuses.

During my research I discovered Carol Shepherd’s work Bisexuality and the Western Christian Church: the first time I’d read an academic, theological piece that focused purely on bisexuality. It led me to reflect on my own personal experiences, as a Christian with faltering faith, and someone who had been questioning their sexuality for a long time. I was keen to know more. Diving further into the bisexual Christian field, I was surprised to see only a small handful of names turning up. Why wasn’t there more research in this area? Why were bisexual Christian voices smothered so deeply under the experiences of lesbian and gay Christians? Why did some texts, proud to reference bisexuality on their covers, then fail to mention it even once within their work?

These questions, alongside the fantastic interviews I’d hosted with some bisexual participants, spurred me on when identifying a topic for my PhD. I decided to explore every nook and cranny of Church of England attitudes, policy and paperwork: what exactly did the Church have to say about bisexuals?

It was then that I was introduced to Issues in Human Sexuality.

Don’t get me wrong, I was aware of Issues beforehand, but I certainly couldn’t say I’d read it cover to cover. Looking further into the text led me to discover Section 5.8, a neat paragraph of 119 words arguing bisexuality’s ambiguity, labelling bisexuals as ‘inevitably unfaithful’, capable of redemption only through heterosexual marriage or by seeking some form of professional help. At the November 2021 General Synod, it was vehemently stated that this passage does not encourage conversion therapy, but the call for bisexuals to ‘seek their truth’ and to gain ‘inner healing’ through counselling says otherwise.

The Church’s most recent sexuality publication, Living in Love and Faith, was released in November 2020. The 400+ page document takes an awful lot of tree to say very little at all, and if anything demonstrates the lack of clarity surrounding what today’s Church actually thinks of human sexuality. Has the Church really progressed? 31 years since the release of Issues, ordinands are still expected to assent to a document that calls those in the bisexual community confused, frisky individuals needing help.

As I continued to examine policy, I began to think back to my MA interviews, alongside my own personal experiences. I only returned to church in September 2021, and one month prior to this, I became happily engaged to my male partner. When considering my positionality in this project, I began to face a roadblock. Many methodologies in qualitative research argue a strong ‘insider’ or ‘outsider’ position for their researchers, but where did I fit in? Male-only relationships throughout my life, a slightly broken relationship with the Church after leaving the ordination process during my MA; how could I call myself a Christian, when sometimes I felt God and I were constantly on different paths to one another? How could I call myself bisexual, when despite the gender of my attractions not mattering to me, I only ever seemed to end up in ‘straight’ relationships? I consistently found myself floating in the grey space between inside and outside, unsure of exactly where I’d fall.

For my PhD, I have so far spoken to ten participants; six identifying as bisexual and Christian, and four who worked on Living in Love and Faith. These interviews reveal the disparities between those who are involved in policy and documentation processes within the Church, and those who experience what it’s like to live as bisexual Christians; and let me tell you, their experiences are far from those promiscuous and ambiguous lives depicted in Issues. Whilst not wanting to give away all my research, one key point from a bisexual Christian has really stood out: that bisexuals experience a truly invisible privilege in the Church.

April 18, 2022
We Can’t Go Back…to 2020 Vision

by Dr Rachel Jepson, Member of General Synod, Teacher and PhD in Education ? “Death and Life After Death: Children’s Concepts and Their Place in Religious Education”

“I have come in order that you might have life ? life in all its fullness.”

John’s Gospel, Chapter 10 Verse 10

Engaging with what is happening in the world around us is both a personal and collective privilege and responsibility. COVID-19 has vividly reminded me of the importance of fully living in the moment ? that this is the only moment I can influence.

This pandemic is a chance for our education system to be far more holistic than it has ever been. All those who are responsible for, and are a part of our formal education system ? the students, teaching and non-teaching staff, parents/guardians, governors, inspectors, the Department for Education, and the teaching unions have a golden opportunity to reflect on and assess the purpose of education and how that should be manifested.

More joined-up thinking, action, and discernment is desperately needed. As a consequence, there should be less compartmentalisation and separation of the formal place of learning in school, college or university from the home and the community in which people live. The pandemic is starkly reminding us that how we live is interwoven with our neighbours whether they are family and friends, or acquaintances and strangers. We do not live mutually exclusive lives. Thus, a greater and more consistent willingness to be alert to and informed by each other’s narratives and realities is imperative. In turn, this should lead to greater understanding and acceptance of one another.

The pandemic keeps presenting us with the harsh realities of life. Consequently, it is important for schools to embrace this chance to facilitate their students being able to explore the concepts of death and life after death. Research affirms that children, including young children, are capable of considering these concepts and they should be given the opportunity to explore them further. School is an advantageous and universally available place where meaningful consideration of the search of these concepts should occur as school is a familiar environment for discovery, learning and understanding for children. Religious Education is the most relevant area of the school curriculum where children’s discovery and learning can be focused on the exploration of these concepts through investigating ultimate questions with the rites of passage and doctrines of the major world religions. Accordingly, the meaningful and worthwhile updating of Religious Education syllabi for implementation by teachers and those responsible for Religious Education should be a priority.

Furthermore, it would be healthy and wise for every school, college and university to make sure that they have a bereavement policy in place, and for the plan to be discussed and disseminated to every member of staff. Familiarisation with it is key.

Those in education are being forced to embrace digital technology. In many places there is increased staff confidence with it as a result, for example, of daily staff communication which has, in turn, helped colleagues to work together. Hopefully, this should mean that in future it can be used more to communicate with the aim of reducing workload. Similarly, for many students there is increased confidence in digital technology. Yet for others, such as, in some rural communities, it has led to confusion and anxiety. Significant numbers of students do not have any idea how to open, access or write an email, yet this is what is being expected of them by their teachers. It is not part of their every-day experience. Parents in rural communities are not necessarily equipped to support their children in this digital age either. As a result, for too many students a gap is emerging between the progress made by some of them and those sadly left behind. There are cases where students have been provided with laptops with internet connection paid for and set up. The issue is that without the knowledge, the students are unable to use them. It would appear that the information technology curriculum has not been sufficient in embedding these skills which many adults take for granted.

At the same time, the pandemic is providing more opportunities for families to learn together. Sometimes this is through the range of tasks the schools have facilitated for the students’ learning; sometimes this is through how families are choosing to navigate the situation and seize opportunities, especially for their children to develop life skills.

Excitingly, there are numerous, fantastic examples of students of all ages engaging in learning in and from their local environment and community ? from exploring the seaweed found on the beaches of Orkney and uploading their findings to the British Seaweed Survey; to observing the barge loads of granite being delivered to the shores of Withernsea in the East Riding of Yorkshire. Secondary school students, including GCSE Geographers, had been learning about coastal management before lockdown. During their walks, students became curious and knowledgeable about what they were witnessing. They then sent photographs to their teacher, enthusiastically informing her. These experiences make for far better awareness of our environment and an appreciation of where we live.

From my teaching experience in the UK and South Africa, I am keen to see those in education continue to go outside and explore, as well as members of the public continue their personal journey with nature which has been evolving throughout lockdown. This will create and build relationships with the environment which will, in turn, promote pro-environmental behaviours and, hopefully, mark the furtherance of saving our planet for which we have been given the charge of custodians.

During COVID-19 fresh, creative ways of teaching are having to be used, particularly through experimenting, observing, playing and researching rather than classroom-based lecture work. The lockdown has also seen a vast expansion of life skills being taught ? from cooking to sewing to maintenance skills. These skills are generally not taught by parents anymore, due for instance, to the pressures of home life, work, after-school activities. However, lockdown has forced us to stay together and pass on these important skills. These relationship building activities have shown that education can happen in different ways, as well as, teaching our children and young people on how to become resilient and to deal with issues that face us in life head on. They are tangibly realizing that they can survive, and in some ways, thrive in challenging times and come out the other end. Without them necessarily knowing it, these too, are vital life skills which will help them to have the courage to take risks as they journey on through life.

This pandemic is a golden opportunity to embrace the change and feel empowered to choose to live life in all its fullness. Every educator, regardless of location, has the privilege and responsibility to encourage and inspire the grappling of ideas for the sake of the children and young people in their care. Face-to-face interaction is a necessary component for meaningful learning. All in all, enabling them to become engaging, joyful, global citizens.

My hope and prayer is that everyone has the willingness, ability and confidence to hold onto what they know to be worthwhile, to those whom they cherish, and come alongside the rest of humanity. While remembering the power and impact of loving kindness on us all.

June 30, 2020