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  • The House of Bishops on Clergy and Same-Sex Marriage – Further Personal Reflections

    by Peter Collier KC, retired Senior Circuit Judge and former Vicar-General of the Province of York

    Further to my recent reflections on the House of Bishops’ October statement on the future use of the Prayers of Love and Faith, I have now also reflected on their statement about the future of clergy and same sex marriage.

    Again, they say they have been influenced by the legal advice they have received and the papers provided by the Faith and Order Commission (FAOC).

    My reflections, as one who until not so long ago was engaged in the practice of the law, begin in a different place. I begin by looking at what marriage is generally seen to be in cultures across the world and then consider how, in England, the relationship between Church and State has played out over the centuries in changing attitudes to marriage in both Church and State.

    Family, Household, Marriage and Law

    I am no anthropologist, but as I understand it the basic units from which societies have been formed are tribe, and family. In most cultures there is a social group that broadly accords with what we would describe as the family. The core may be two people or, in cultures recognising polygamy or polyandry, more than two people. In some cultures, the wider household grouping plays a significant role.

    It is usually in the context of such groupings that children are born and brought up. The core couple relationship in such groups is commonly called a “marriage”.  How a “marriage” takes place, with what degrees of social customs, or required formalities, varies from society to society. Many of us will have had some exposure to different customs through attending Muslim or Sikh weddings in this country.

    As societies become more complex and sophisticated, the regulation of any particular society through a system of law will inevitably develop. The law may require preliminaries and formalities if a marriage is to be recognised as such, and to regulate both initiating and ending such a relationship.

    More complex societies will accord different consequences as a result of a marriage being recognised, treating the two (or more) people as a unit to be dealt with differently from those same people as individuals. This can have an impact on taxes required to be paid or on monetary or other benefits that the state may provide. In our society there is also a significant amount of law about the place of children and how they are to be dealt with if a marriage breaks down.

    As a young Christian, I was taught that marriage is a creation ordinance – it was God’s intention that people would find a helpmeet with whom they would share their life and they would together bring up children. And so this unit has always been the bedrock of a society. Of course, that has traditionally been interpreted as showing that marriage is between a man and a woman and only between a man and a woman. But additionally Genesis can be said to speak of permanence and in Matt 19 we have Jesus using the Genesis phraseology when asked about adultery. That led to the Matthean exception about which volumes have been written; and we will come to remarriage after divorce in due course. I would add that the church that taught me about creation ordinances also taught me that the world was made in 7 days; an article I wrote in the school 6th Form magazine (in 1965) advancing that cause led  my Headmaster to write on my report that term: “his Philistine attitude to science will be recorded on his UCCA form”.

    Since then, I have learned how to accommodate my interpretation of the Genesis account of creation to a growing understanding of what science shows us. Similarly, I have learned how to accommodate my understanding of what the Bible teaches about marriage, based not only on what science has shown us, but also and perhaps more significantly from getting to know some same sex couples and seeing the fruit of the Spirit in their lives. As my wife often reminds me, just as in our encounters with Christ, “conversion is in the meeting”.

    Whose Law?

    Throughout much of Europe, and in this country for nigh on a thousand years, the way marriages were initiated and thereafter controlled was governed exclusively by the Church. As the Christian church developed so did its Canon law through various synods and councils. In relation to marriage, perhaps the most significant of those was the 4th Lateran Council (1215). Its published Canons about marriage included Canon 50, prohibiting marriage in the 2nd and 3rd degrees of affinity, and Canon 51, forbidding clandestine marriages and priests witnessing such marriages, and providing that all marriages must be announced publicly by the priest in church so that legitimate impediments might be made known and the priest could investigate whether any impediment existed. That same duty and very similar phraseology remain in our own Canons today, over eight hundred years later – see Canon B33 (Of the duty of the minister to inquire as to impediments).

    The Church was able to impose its view of marriage – what it was and how it was to be solemnised and regulated – on the whole of English society. Consequently, for several hundred years the church and the state views about marriage were one and the same. Church courts had exclusive jurisdiction in enforcing the Church’s view of marriage. It was therefore the Canon law that was applied in all circumstances. It was only in church and in accordance with the rites and ceremonies of the church that anyone could enter into a marriage in England.

    The theology of marriage as understood by the reformers is set out in the introduction to the ‘Form of Solemnization of Matrimony’ in the Book of Common Prayer (BCP) – a man and woman come together in the sight of God and the face of the congregation to be joined in holy Matrimony; they declare (by their silence) that there is no impediment to their marriage; they then make various vows of lifelong commitment to one another; they are then blessed. In medieval times the making of vows had often happened in the churchyard or in the entrance to the church and the couple then came into the church for the blessing.

    However, there is nothing in the 39 Articles about marriage, apart from it being lawful for bishops, priests and deacons to marry (Art 32).  The wording of Art 32 is very interesting: “… therefore it is lawful for them … to marry at their own discretion, as they shall judge the same to serve better to godliness”. I think that many who are wanting to enter into a same-sex marriage would claim those words for themselves. The Canons of 1603/4 had no statement about what Holy Matrimony was, just details about its preliminaries, and the permitted place and time of marriage (Art 42); who can grant licences to marry, and other details about licences (Arts 101, 102 & 103); and finally various provisions about divorce (Arts 105,106 & 107).

    Recognition of marriages

    It is perhaps reasonably well known that how countries deal with other countries’ systems of marriage forms a very complex area of law; not all forms of foreign marriage are recognised in this country as valid. Currently, the government is considering how to enable humanist weddings, and those performed in accordance with other religious traditions such as Islam, to be equally recognised as those carried out in accordance with English law.

    But what is perhaps not quite so well-known is the origin of that non-recognition of forms of marriage other than those carried out in accordance with the rites and ceremonies of the Church of England. There were exceptions for Jews and Quakers, provided it could be proved that the marriage had been carried out according to the practices of either of those two distinct groups. However, the theological (and therefore the legal) position was that a couple were not married by a priest, but they married each other by the exchange of promises. The priest’s role was to register and to bless the marriage.

    So, there grew up the practice of “clandestine marriages”. These were marriages conducted secretly without following the legal formalities required. In England that meant they had not gone through any of the necessary Canonical preliminaries and had not been performed in accordance with the BCP service for the solemnisation of Matrimony. They were sometimes referred to as Fleet Marriages as many of them were conducted in the Fleet Prison or nearby. By 1740 it is estimated that half of London weddings took place there. Such marriages were often witnessed by a priest.

    The beginning of state intervention

    With the intention of bringing the practice of such unsatisfactory marriages to an end, the Clandestine Marriages Act 1753 (Lord Hardwicke’s Act) was passed. It put all English Canon Law about weddings on to a statutory basis. It made invalid all marriages that were not performed in accordance with its provisions, unless performed according to Jewish or Quaker rites. So, those apart, a marriage had to be carried out in church after the publication of banns, or the obtaining of a licence from the ecclesiastical authorities (i.e. in accordance with the Canons). This Act was significant because it was the first time that the state law makers made laws about marriage, even if the law they made was simply adopting the church law.

    With the growth of non-conformity, members of other religious denominations and groups also wished to be able to be married other than in and by the Church of England. In particular, Unitarians were very unhappy about the Trinitarian language of the marriage service. This was eventually resolved by the Marriage Act 1836. I have referred to this in my earlier paper and noted the Bishop of Exeter’s distress at this invention of “civil marriage”. I also referred there to the removal of any religious service from civil weddings in Register Offices in 1856, bringing about the difference between religious and secular marriages.

     Some other state-led changes in our attitude towards marriage

    The relationship of a husband and wife within a marriage was again shaped by the ecclesiastical law which was based on scripture, as then understood. Some of that understanding remains to some extent among those who hold to “complementarian headship principles”.

    The tradition developed that a woman was given by her father to her husband – passing from the control of one man to the control of another. For a long time, a married woman had no right to own her own property and on marriage her husband gained control of all her property. That did not change until parliament intervened and the Married Women’s Property Acts of 1870 and 1882 gradually gave married women the right to own property, wages and investments separately from their husbands, and eventually to enter into contracts and lawsuits in their own names.

    Another ecclesiastical court action was for the restitution of conjugal rights. It was transferred to the court for Divorce and Matrimonial Causes when that was created at the end of the 19th century.  By such an action, founded on Paul’s argument set out in 1 Cor 7, a spouse whose partner had left them and was living away from them could obtain an order that they be required to resume cohabitation. This was not abolished until the Matrimonial Proceedings and Property Act 1970 came into force.

    The 1991 case of R v R [1991] UKHL 12 is a landmark UK House of Lords ruling that made marital rape a crime by overturning the centuries-old legal exemption for husbands raping their wives. The court’s decision established that a husband can be convicted of rape, thus dismantling the legal principle that a wife’s consent to sexual intercourse became irrevocable upon marriage.

    More recent changes – (i) Civil Partnerships

    A more recent and significant change has been the introduction of Civil Partnerships in 2004. This did not change marriage but introduced a new state-recognised relationship alongside marriage. If two people (who initially had to be of the same sex, but since 2019 can be of the opposite sex) register such a partnership in front of a registrar and two witnesses, they are accorded almost all the same rights and responsibilities as if they were married. The few that do not carry over have no particular significance from a religious perspective, being chiefly around survivor benefits in occupational health schemes. Many people regarded this as introducing same-sex marriage in all but name.

    Civil partnerships proved very successful. By 2014 there had been 60,000 partnerships registered, three times as many as the government had anticipated when introducing them. For some they were preferable to marriage as they carried none of the stains of patriarchal marriage traditions. But for others they continued the stigma associated with gay relationships. Such Civil unions, as contrasted with marriage, are also available in many other European and former Commonwealth countries.

    All that can be said about what a civil partnership is that it is the registration of a legal relationship between two people that produces a number of rights and responsibilities for them. There is no reference anywhere to what the relationship of the partners involves or does not involve behaviourally, particularly in the realm of sexual intimacy. Because it is silent in this area, the Bishops found it difficult to say that couples, including a couple where one was a cleric, should not enter such a partnership as there was nothing about it that was inconsistent with an exemplary way of life as per the Canons.

    But it has been the practice that if someone who presented for ordination was in such a partnership they were asked (by some, but not all, bishops) to confirm that they accepted the church’s teaching in relation to matters sexual. It used to be the case that the document “Issues in Human Sexuality” was referred to in that context, but that has now been withdrawn and potential ordinands as an interim measure are to be asked to confirm that they will live consistently with the Guidelines for the Professional Conduct of the Clergy. That document at para 10.2 states “The House of Bishops’ Marriage: A Teaching Document (1999) clearly affirms, ‘Sexual intercourse, as an expression of faithful intimacy, properly belongs within marriage exclusively.’” Further pastoral guidance on this issue has been promised and is awaited.

    More recent changes – (ii) Same-sex marriage

    It was the pressure for real equality rather than a civil partnership (which could potentially be seen as a second-class relationship) that led to the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013. This introduced same-sex marriage. Nearly 40 other countries make same-sex marriage available. Between March 2014 and the end of 2022, 55,613 same-sex marriages were registered in the UK. In 2022, 7,800 same-sex marriages were registered, 4,896 being female couples and 2,904 male couples.

    It might be asked why a same-sex couple, perhaps already in a civil partnership, would want to convert it, as they can, to a same-sex marriage (note that you cannot convert a heterosexual civil partnership into a heterosexual marriage). The answer is perhaps because it has more of a sense of commitment, perhaps associated with the traditional attitude to and words around marriage ceremonies. The socialisation of marriage, which we learn about from the cradle onwards, would seem to carry a lot of weight.

    In a civil partnership, you apply to register it and do so before the registrar, but no words are spoken, no promises are made or exchanged. If you have a same-sex marriage then the same words are used as in a heterosexual marriage, where each person says that there is no impediment / reason in law why they should not marry and that they (call upon those present to witness that they) take the other to be their lawful wedded husband / wife. So there is a level of contracted commitment (about which more later) that is not present in a civil partnership. But it is obvious that those words fall far short of the exchange of vows made in a church service.

    The government recognised that some religious organisations hold a different view of marriage. The fact sheet published by the government in April 2014 said: “Many religious organisations believe that marriage should only be between a man and a woman, and the Act explicitly recognises this. The civil understanding of marriage has always been broader than that of many religious organisations. Marriage has evolved over the years, for example to enable Catholics, atheists, Baptists and many others to marry outside the Anglican Church, and to recognise married women as equal to married men before the law.”

    There are however some interesting features of the legislation in relation to matters of sexual intimacy. Unlike in opposite-sex marriages, non-consummation is not a ground for voiding a same-sex marriage. Furthermore, you can only bring a divorce relying on adultery if the offending partner has had sex with a person of the opposite sex. I am uncertain what to make of these matters, but it does seem to me to raise the question as to whether there is any underlying assumption, in either a same-sex civil marriage or in a same-sex civil partnership, that there must be sexual intimacy. Clearly, although it is possible for a same-sex couple to adopt a child or for one of a female couple to bear a child, the underlying assumption about procreation (the first of the Augustinian “goods”, as spelled out in the BCP introduction to the service) is simply not there as it would be in an opposite-sex marriage.

    The modern contract of marriage – as seen by the state

    A well-known legal definition of marriage was provided by Lord Penzance in the case of Hyde v Hyde  [L.R.] 1 P. & D. 130, decided in 1866. He defines marriage as understood in Christendom and in English law as: “the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others”.

    The case itself is very instructive. Hyde was an Englishman who had converted to Mormonism. He met a young woman, also a Mormon, and in due course they went to Utah where they were married by Brigham Young in Salt Lake City. The male petitioner later renounced the Mormon faith but she did not. They separated and he returned to the UK. She then married again. Again her marriage was according to the Mormon form. The man then sued in England for divorce on the grounds of her adultery. The court refused his petition on the basis that it did not recognise his Mormon “marriage” as a marriage. The reason was that the marriage in Utah was potentially polygamous and English courts cannot recognise polygamous marriages. Lord Penzance, the judge, also said in that case, “Different incidents of minor importance attach to the contract of marriage in different countries in Christendom, but in all countries in Christendom the parties to that contract agree to cohabit with each other alone. It is inconsistent with marriage as understood in Christendom, that the husband should have more than one wife.”

    Lord Penzance’s definition of “the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others” has come under some criticism in recent years. Rebecca Probert in Child and Family Law Quarterly, Vol 19, No 2, 2007 said that a new definition was needed.

    The President of the Family Division had in fact provided such a definition in the case of Bellinger v Bellinger [2001] EWCA Civ 1140 [2002] Fam 150; [2002] 2 WLR 411.2005.

    In that case the issue was the validity of a marriage contracted between the appellant (born a man but who had undergone transgender surgery) and the respondent (a man). There were a number of arguments to be addressed, one of which was that “The relationship called marriage is and always has been recognised as the union of a man and woman.” (para 124).

    Thorpe P quoted the above passage from Hyde v Hyde and said at para 128:

    “But the world that engendered those classic definitions has long since gone. We live in a multi-racial, multi-faith society. The intervening 130 years have seen huge social and scientific changes. Adults live longer, infant mortality has been largely conquered, effective contraception is available to men and women as is sterilisation for men and women within marriage. Illegitimacy with its stigma has been legislated away: gone is any social condemnation of cohabitation in advance of or in place of marriage. Then marriage was terminated by death: for the vast majority of the population divorce was not an option. For those within whose reach it lay, it carried a considerable social stigma that did not evaporate until relatively recent times. Now more marriages are terminated by divorce than death. Divorce could be said without undue cynicism to be available on demand. These last changes are all reflected in the statistics establishing the relative decline in marriage and consequentially in the number of children born within marriage. Marriage has become a state into which and from which people choose to enter and exit. Thus I would now redefine marriage as a contract for which the parties elect but which is regulated by the state, both in its formation and in its termination by divorce, because it affects status upon which depend a variety of entitlements, benefits and obligations.”

    That judgment was given before the introduction of civil partnerships and same-sex marriage. It now needs to be updated to refer to and include those in its modern definition of what is meant by marriage in the law of England and Wales.

    The advice from FAOC seems to me to be provided almost as if we were still in a position where they believe that the Church is shaping the law of marriage for England and Wales, as it did in the 18th century. It does not grapple with any of the issues created by the evolutionary development of marriage law by the state which I have been describing, nor with how the church responds to the external realities with which it is confronted. It is very much speaking within its own bubble.

    As we have seen in relation to marriages in other denominations, before 1836 not everything that purported to be marriage was recognised by the church as such. And, whilst the church ran the show, the state went along with its views. Little by little the state asserted itself and the two views diverged. The 2013 Act recognised that the Church has a different view about marriage from that which is now the official state position.

    The current contract of marriage is very far removed from the contract underlying the BCP service with its threefold Augustinian goods of procreation, faithfulness and permanence.

    It also seems to be the case that entering into a contract of marriage adds hardly anything to the registration of a civil partnership, other than at an emotional level.

    In those circumstances, and having regard to the absence of any reference to, let alone requirement for, sexual intimacy in a same-sex marriage, and having said that entering a civil partnership is not of itself inconsistent with leading an exemplary life, it seems to me that there is no good reason why the Bishops should not say that entering into such a “marriage” is also not in and of itself an ecclesiastical offence.

    Legal advice to the House

    I turn now to the legal advice tendered to the bishops on this topic. The Advice tells us that the Chief Legal Adviser to the Archbishops’ Council and the General Synod was asked “to consider two specific possibilities for legislative change to accommodate clergy who enter into same-sex (civil) marriages.”  Those two possibilities were (i) changing Canon B 30 and (ii) the creation of a power to grant a canonical dispensation to individual clergy that would permit them to be civilly married to a person of the same sex.

    Changing Canon B 30 (Of Holy Matrimony)

    It is noted that General Synod has previously resolved that current doctrine should not be departed from and so this route is not considered in any detail. It is however said that it would require more than a change in the Canons, because the doctrine is set out in other places also. This means that it would require a Measure to carry out further changes. Although it would be Article 7 business, it would only require a simple majority vote (presumably in each House) to carry that change into law.

    Canonical Dispensation

    The other option considered is granting a canonical dispensation. The similarity is drawn with the Canon C 4.5 process whereby faculties are granted to allow the ordination of those who have remarried whilst their former spouse is still alive. The Chief Legal Adviser considers whether there could be a similar faculty to allow an ordinand or cleric to be civilly married to a person of the same sex.

    He draws a distinction between that option and Canon C 4.5 on the basis that, when that was permitted, it was on the basis that when B 30 speaks about marriage being “in its nature a union permanent and lifelong” those words encompassed a marriage that was “entered into with the intention that it be permanent and lifelong (my italics)”. Thus, the legal advice at the time said that matters could proceed along the proposed route without compromising the church’s doctrine of marriage. I have always found that to be a rather specious piece of “special pleading” and a convenient way round the difficulty created by the doctrine as traditionally espoused. When the Measure was before Parliament assurances were given that this approach would be exceptional and only granted in exceptional circumstances. But it is certainly no longer the case that these situations can be seen as “exceptional circumstances”. Between 1993 and 2023, 2449 such faculties were granted; and it is estimated that one in six ordinations now follows the grant of such a faculty. And it is also the case that a number of clergy still refuse to remarry those who are divorced as they regard the vow as absolute and not conditional on best intention.

    As is well known, the Roman Catholic church does not recognise divorce, viewing marriage as a lifelong and indissoluble covenant. A civil divorce does not end the marriage in the church’s eyes and a divorced Catholic who remarries without an annulment is not permitted to receive communion. Their way round this is for the church’s marriage tribunal to grant annulments, i.e. saying that the marriage never really existed as a real marriage in the first place.

    But the advice to the Bishops goes further and says that powers of canonical dispensation “do not permit the doing of things which are contrary to the Church’s doctrine; they permit doing things which are not normally permitted as being contrary to good order or that otherwise require regulation. To provide for a power of dispensation to permit the doing of something that was contrary to doctrine would be a novel departure in the canon law of the Church of England.”

    Some historical canonical dispensations

    That last statement seems to me to pass over what happened in the nineteenth century amid all the controversies over ritualistic practices. The church was as divided then over ritualistic issues as it is now over sexuality issues. Again the law was clear and many of the matters in dispute were doctrinal. There were prosecutions of those who breached the law, some priests going to prison for the sake of their consciences. In 1881, the bishops in the Upper House of the Convocation for Canterbury reached a decision together that they would no longer prosecute people for breaching various rules of liturgical practice. This followed a decision of the House of Lords in a case against the Bishop of Oxford seeking to compel him to issue proceedings when a complaint was laid about unlawful practices, when it was held that his approach could not be criticised. Such dispensations granted by the bishops permitted the continued breaking of the ecclesiastical law.

    And that was not the only occasion when the bishops, for the sake of the good of the church as a whole, decided to act outside the law. The efforts to overcome the ritualism controversies led to the production of revised Prayer Books in 1927 and 1928. These were twice rejected by Parliament. Notwithstanding that, Convocation resolved to press on with its use. Bishop Hensley Henson said that bishops “found themselves compelled to act outside the law because the aid of the law, which was indispensable to the healthy progress of the church, had been refused to them.”

    A possible way forward

    This would seem to be a more accurate reflection of the law of dispensation (or “economy” as it is known in the Eastern church). Of course it is always easier to allow an episcopal dispensation if there is authority for doing so. And so the introduction of some form of canonical authority would undoubtedly be of assistance to bishops generally in this regard. This would be achieved by amending the Canons, which requires a simple majority (although I would expect there to be a vote by Houses and so a majority in each House would be required).

    One approach might be to add to Canon C 26 (On the manner of life of clerks in Holy Orders) a further paragraph at C 26.3 which might read as follows:

    The fact that a deacon or priest has entered into a same-sex civil marriage by virtue of the Marriage (Same-Sex Couples) Act 2013, shall not in and of itself be regarded as indicating a life other than one that is a wholesome example and pattern to the flock of Christ.

    A similar provision could also be added to Canon C 4 (Of the quality of such as are to be ordained deacons or priests):

    No person shall be refused ordination as a deacon or priest solely on the ground that they have entered into a same-sex civil partnership of same-sex marriage by virtue of the Marriage (Same-Sex Couples) Act 2013.

    It may be that there will be other and better ways of phrasing such dispensatory provision in the Canons, but I offer this as a starting point for moving forwards.

    Those who would wish to argue against this, as I know some will, have really got to grasp two things. First, the absence of any assumptions about sexual intimacy in same-sex marriages. Second, given that the society in which we live has redefined what it means by marriage, how do we as a church relate to those who have entered into civil marriages, whether same-sex or opposite-sex, which are now both very different forms of social contract from that of Holy Matrimony as set out in the BCP? These are two quite different contracts, and it will not do to rely on the fact that the section 1(3) of the 2013 Act preserved the church’s different understanding of what a marriage is, without working out what the consequences of that different understanding mean in practical terms.

     

  • A Response to “The Exercise of Discipline and Clergy Exemplarity in the Church of England: The Case of Same-Sex Civil Marriages: A Report of the Faith and Order Commission” (GS Misc 1431)

    Fr Thomas Sharp is a priest theologian based in the South East of England and is also Provincial Secretary of the Society of Catholic Priests

    This was the third report which briefed the House of Bishops before they made their decisions in October about Living in Love and Faith (LLF). It purports to explore theological issues relating to three possible ways by which clergy in a marriage to a person of the same sex might be licensed in the Church of England. It also purports to explore what it means that clergy are called to an exemplary life, and what implications there might be for licensing married people who currently would need a civil partnership in order to be licensed.

    The Report claims to do all this whilst ‘not endeavour[ing] to resolve those differences, either finding for one side or making clear a previously unknown path to consensus’ (§214). It does this by almost entirely sidelining the views and voices of LGBTQIA+ people, presenting a viewpoint significantly informed by North American Evangelicalism as if it were a balanced presentation of Anglican variety. Of the 24 modern theologians engaged with in this report (Gregory Nazianzen and George Herbert are the other two theologians included):

    • 100% are white
    • 96% are white men
    • 83% are straight or in opposite sex marriages
    • 46% are North American
    • 12% are ex-gay / same-sex-attracted identifying evangelicals
    • Only one person, at 4% of the whole, is an affirming gay Anglican with a partner.

    The one affirming gay Anglican contribution cited is from Jeffrey John, in a book which was published in 1993 when I was two years old.

    This report does not meaningfully engage with the theology produced by or read by LGBTQIA+ Anglicans, or people who hold an inclusive theology. Simply directing us to the LLF Resources does not constitute theological engagement (§100). This report is not balanced or representative. It should not have represented itself as being such.

    However, it is lengthy and technical, and gives a very good sense of being comprehensive, even whilst it utterly fails to present or even really take into account the voices of those most affected by its subject matter. This is a shamefully inadequate Report whose omissions (wilful or otherwise) have potential to mislead its readers.

    In order to make this meandering and confusing report more intelligible, my response to it comes under six headings:

    1. Make doctrine a moving target
    2. “Communal regulation”, discipline and toxic theologies of power
    3. Are the clergy a special case?
    4. Leading us to think we are talking about sex whenever marriage is mentioned
    5. Despite divorce, we really do still hold to the traditional doctrine of marriage
    6. Disempower the Bishops

    This is a report which overwhelms by the sheer variety of arguments it includes. Here, I cannot deal with them all, particularly the biblical section and its lack of meaningful engagement with LGBTQIA+ readings of important texts.

     

    1 – Make doctrine a moving target

    The FAOC Report on Doctrine defined doctrine as: ‘true knowledge about God that is communally authorised by warrant in the Holy Scriptures and is, therefore, communally regulative’ (GS Misc 1429, §146). However, in this report, that simple definition varies. Early on, ‘authorised by warrant in the Holy scriptures’ is watered down and communal regulation does not appear: ‘Doctrine… is true knowledge about the living God, grounded in or agreeable to the Holy Scriptures, that the Church of England determines by a process of communal authorisation’ (§8).

    Later, elements of both are mixed as doctrine is ‘true knowledge about the living God that is communally authorised and communally regulative’ (§84 & §212). But the scriptures seem to have vanished. On one level this might be a symptom of speedy or sloppy drafting. However, on another, it could be understood as an attempt to give an impression of a clear definition of what doctrine is and how it operates in these arguments, without being willing to be pinned down to any actually clear definition. This sort of slipperiness and unclarity of meaning runs throughout the report.

     

     2 – “Communal regulation”, discipline and toxic theologies of power

    A theological high point comes in §§12-17, when the heresy of Donatism is dealt with and it is concluded that individuals and the wider church can have confidence in the sacramental ministry of a minister, even if they err in doctrine. However, as the report proceeds to outline a theology of discipline, it is unnervingly one-way, authoritarian and entirely lacking in awareness of the operative theologies of power which have led to both the abuse crisis in the worldwide Church and the failure of the Church of England itself to respond meaningfully to abuse.

    The report links discipline with discipleship, and it is established with reference to The Homilies that ‘it is imperative to think of discipline in both its proactive, formative sense and also its reformative and punitive senses in order to understand it fully’ (§17). This is good, but the formative is not really considered. It is the reformative and punitive senses of discipline with which this report is interested, i.e. what sledge-hammers the bishops can hit us with, whether it be for our benefit or to teach us a lesson.

    A survey then follows of reformative discipline as described in the liturgies of ordination of deacons, priests and bishops in Common Worship and the BCP. It entirely lacks any meaningful awareness of the fact that the power to discipline can be incredibly dangerous, despite the liturgy enjoining the bishop to use their authority: ‘not to destruction, but to salvation; not to hurt, but to help’ (§24). The vocation of a bishop ‘to minister discipline, but with compassion’ leads to a reminder that even a compassionate bishop may also need to punish: ‘it may be that such a response is the compassionate one’ (§27). But there is no awareness in the report that hurt and destruction, i.e. abuse, may result from such episcopal behaviour.

    The rather odd concept of “communal regulation”, which I explored (and we were all no doubt confused by) in the liturgical context with reference to the report on Doctrine, reappears. Apparently, the vow made by bishops to ‘accept the discipline of this Church, exercising authority with justice, courtesy and love’ (§29) is when a bishop puts themselves under “communal regulation”. What is entirely overlooked is the significance of justice, courtesy and love in the exercise of that ministry by any individual bishop, or the College or House of Bishops as a whole.

    The same blinkered focus is apparent in the report’s reading of the latter part of the consecration prayer:

    Further on the Archbishop prays, ‘Give him humility, that he may use his authority to heal, not to hurt; to build up, not to destroy’, a reference to 2 Cor 10:8 and 13:10. The emphasis, like in the rephrased declaration, is on the corrective and reformative aspects of discipline.

    It takes deliberate one-track thinking to fail to spot the critique of punitive authoritarian power in this prayer. Punitive authority is the focus of this report. That seems to be what “communal regulation” actually means.

    This disturbing theology of power in the report comes out strongly when clergy families are considered. Canon C26’s injunction to the minister to order their life and their family’s lives in a manner ‘that provides a wholesome example and pattern to the community’ (§36) is presented uncritically. Though the duty to order our family members’ lives is ameliorated since the phrase ‘as much as in him lies’ is interpreted to remind us of ‘the limitations of any individual to determine the behaviour of other family members in all times and places’ (§37). But it is crystal clear that “communal regulation” should be exercised in the home as well, mostly I imagine over wives and children, but over clergy husbands and extended family as well. This is not a theology of power which a responsible theologian simply states uncritically.

    There is a hint that this dangerous and toxic theology of power might be applicable in wider discipleship (“heavy discipling” is one euphemism for spiritual abuse and grooming, after all). The report notes, again uncritically, the linguistic or etymological links between spiritual discipline, church discipline and discipleship: ‘The complementary relationship between spiritual discipline and church discipline would indicate the broad range between the proactive, formative and the condemnatory, punitive ideas that inhere in the single word discipline’ (§43). Tellingly, throughout this passage, the role of the ‘authority figure’ as the exerciser of discipline in its various forms is emphasised.

    Finally, the image of a doctor prescribing medicine from Gregory Nazianzen’s second Oration is used to support this broader deployment of discipline (§46). This is particularly unfortunate and ironic. Gregory wrote his second Oration shortly after his ordination, having fled his post because he did not think he was able to bear the weight of the pastoral duty imposed upon him. He writes in a manner which emphasises the importance and weightiness of pastoral care, almost to an absurd extent. This is an apologia for his belief that he should not be entrusted with such authority to discipline. It is not a suggestion that every bishop and priest should start prescribing punitive medicine.

    This isn’t a funny theological blooper. Rather, it reveals just how far the compilers of the report were not aware of the issues of power underlying the texts with which they engage. Bishops might well read Selina Stone’s A Heavy Yoke: Theology, Power and Abuse in the Church (London: SCM Press, 2025) before they decide that this is the sort of power in relation to God’s people which they want to define themselves as having. If they do, they need to deploy it in all areas of their episcopal ministry and equally on all people in the church, not just LGBTQIA+ people. Gregory, given the choice, ran away from it.

     

    3 – Are the Clergy a Special Case?

    In order to answer this question, the report presents a bewildering array of arguments, many of which are specious or based in unreality. I shall try here to present this torrent of uncompleted ideas in a way which is moderately digestible.

    First, the report argues that ‘The broadest possible jurisdiction one can conceive for church discipline includes baptised Christians on an electoral roll in the Church of England’ (§48). You might think we were about to get a sense of how “communal regulation” applies in the community of the baptised. But this is passed over, moving on to a discussion of Lay Ministers (§49). It seems simply to be accepted that discipline is not something which touches the baptised who are not licensed. This is unsatisfactory and inconsistent with the theology of discipline presented thus far.

    This gap in the argument means that the next argument, that clergy are held to a ‘higher moral bar’ than the laity (§50), seems to arise solely by virtue of ordination. No argument is offered to justify the statement that due to the ‘exceptional nature of holy orders’ the church ‘expects a public transparency about many aspects of life, including areas in which lay Christians are afforded the ease of privacy’ (§50). This is an unreasoned distinction from the privacy afforded to the laity which is presented as self-evident. And should then the bishop, as even more exceptional than the priest, be required for example to publish their bank statements on the diocesan website? There is no theological substance here.

    A strange argument is presented about the call for clergy ‘to witness by example against the norms of the culture in which they sojourn’ (§53). It is not stated directly, but we are used to this sort of homophobic gaslighting, which argues that we are not to be in ‘normative alignment with the shifting sands of cultural values’ (§52), those shifting values being a fictional secular society which is a nirvana of inclusion for LGBTQIA+ people. That secular inclusive society against which the church is called to witness is fiction and a foil. Society is deeply homophobic, even as it is deeply misogynistic and racist still. Homophobia in the Church is in lockstep with the homophobic abuse and discrimination we experience in the secular world every day. It’s not countercultural, it isn’t cool, and it isn’t a witness.

    The distinctive witness of clergy to procure the good conduct of children and their spouses is considered again in the context of this cultural witness. This is passed off masterfully with the sentence: ‘Modern assumptions about the alignment of private, domestic space with public order differ significantly from the assumptions in [the pastoral epistles]’ (§59). It is odd that the report should accept women’s lib and contemporary appreciation of children’s dignity and autonomy so easily after all the handwringing about being counter-cultural. If applied to LGBTQIA+ people, it is simply not clear why the same counter-cultural discipline would not be applicable to women, children and those in clergy households, and no arguments are made.

    The report advances an argument that the vocation to ordained ministry is a ‘whole-life dedication’ which makes it ‘difficult, if not impossible, to separate the moral from the exemplary imperative in a life conceived as a form of witness’ (§64). This is an extraordinary argument for an Anglican to advance, especially as it is essentially the root of the argument for clerical celibacy in the Roman Catholic Church. If ordination is ‘whole-life dedication’ to God, then heterosexual marriage and dedication to another person also should be inappropriate for the clergy.

    Then the report argues that we must take particular account of the perceptions of outsiders.

    The pastoral epistles… even specify that the exemplar ‘must be well thought of by outsiders’ (1 Timothy 3:7). It behoves us to consider the same in the 21st century just as it was commended in the 1st century. In practice, it is inescapable.

    This is blunt application. And it is hard to see why this argument for not ordaining or licensing those in same-sex marriages would not also hold for women, immigrants, disabled people and people who are racialised. Their ordination, as they will tell you, also prompts push-back and elicits ableist, racist and misogynistic abuse and even scandal. And yet again there is no considered argument in the report about why this problem of perception should only apply to LGBTQIA+ people.

    There then is yet another strange argument: that allowing clergy to marry their same-sex partner would ‘alter the context in which Christian exemplary witness is offered and point to the fragmentation within wider society of a consensus on the nature of marriage and sexual intimacy.’ This is simply delusional. There is no fragmentation in secular society on the issue of sexual intimacy. Rather, there is general agreement in secular society that the place of sexual intimacy is no longer anything to do with marriage. Indeed, for even the majority of conservatives in the Church (at the level of operative theology rather than theory) the question is really about what sexual intimacies you enjoy before marriage and which ones you save for your spouse. Again, cultural witness is set up as a straw man, in which resistance to LGBTQIA+ people is supposedly the keystone holding up the Church’s moral witness.

     

    4 – Leading us to think we are talking about sex whenever marriage is mentioned

    In §68 the report acknowledges that clergy households where a couple are in a civil partnership can be exemplary, but it is not clear why those in a same-sex marriage would not be. And in §70 the report acknowledges that things are hard for Christian couples in civil partnerships, but there is no sense that the writers of the report are aware of how the Church’s approach following the 2005 pastoral statement also impacts the broader Christian family gathered around the couple.

    At the heart of the problem here is that the report refuses to say plainly that a same-sex marriage has no more presumption of sexual activity than a civil partnership. The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 inserts s.12(1-2) of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973, which disapplies the requirement that same-sex couples consummate their union in order to have a valid marriage. In law, there is no expectation that a gay couple who are married will be having sex, any more than there is for a civil partnership.

    The failure to acknowledge this amidst all the handwringing is one of the largest and most uncomfortable omissions of this discussion of “clergy exemplarity”. The readers of the report are left with the false impression that marriages mean gay sex while civil partnerships mean gay celibacy. This is a false impression. If clergy can be exemplary as civil partners, living a sexually sacrificial life for the Church, there is no reason why they could not also do the same as a married couple. There is no difference in terms of sexual activity between civil partnership and same-sex marriage.

    Indeed, the report stresses that ‘none of what follows intends to draw into question the current provision’ for clergy in civil partnerships. ‘It is nonetheless notable that if a pastoral accommodation is agreed [to enable the same clergy to get married] this may mean that provision [of episcopal guidance] for same-sex civil marriages and same-sex civil partnerships are different from one another’ (§93). However, given that neither involve sex, it is not at all obvious why this should be the case. Yet again, a spectre of something completely new and different is created without specifying any real difference, theological or otherwise.

     

    5 – Despite divorce, we really do still hold to the traditional doctrine of marriage

    The report twists logic to the point of breaking in order to advance two arguments: (i) that the bending of the doctrine of marriage which took place in order to enable the marriage of divorcees with a spouse still living is not analogous to any bending of doctrine required to enable same-sex couples in a civil marriage to be licensed; and (ii) that in any case, despite permitting the marriage of divorcees, we do actually still hold to the traditional doctrine of marriage, that it is between a man and a woman for life. Fair warning: your head will hurt trying to follow this meandering thread.

    We are told that same-sex marriage is in no way the same kind of thing as the marriage of divorcees. ‘While there are clearly similarities between the two, an argument that they are identical does not seem sustainable. Therefore, the logic used to support adding Canon C 4.5 [enabling the licensing of clergy in a second marriage] cannot be a precedent’ (§96). But no reason is given for this judgment that the two are not identical. Indeed, both marriages are a statement of the traditional doctrine, except for one thing: either the gender of the parties, or the “one man and one woman for life” bit.

    Perhaps an analogy could be constructed instead. We are told that ‘Theological reflection should always begin with scripture’ (§99), a statement which will come as a surprise to anyone versed in theological reflection as practiced in Church of England theological colleges. After this we are told that:

    It is true that Holy Scripture does not include explicit precedent for a faithful, stable, permanent same-sex relationship. Similarly, one might observe that ‘Scripture’s teaching on homosexuality is sparse and ambiguous and it is highly questionable to what extent we can derive from it any application to the ethical issue of gay relationships as it faces us today. (§99)

    This is not an argument routinely advanced by LGBTQIA+ people today, who find precedent for our relationships and identities throughout scripture. But the report entirely ignores our love for and valuing of scripture, referencing a group of mostly American straight Evangelicals talking about LGBTQIA+ people (and also referencing Jeffrey John). Unlike divorce, which does exist in scripture, LGBTQIA+ people’s lives and relationships are portrayed in the report as absent from scripture, so without precedent, so without theological existence.

    The report then charts the progress, from the Lichfield Report (1978) to the early 2000s, of the idea that a marriage can end such that a person can marry someone else. This includes: (i) the rejection of sacramental understandings of marriage and (ii) doctrinal clarifications (or developments) that marriage’s being for life was not an essential part of a marriage’s nature, only an ideal (§§111-118).

    We supposedly have arrived at a relatively straightforward conclusion: there cannot be ‘a complete analogy’ (§118) with the marriage of divorcees. However, the argument continues, now in the context of divorce and in what sense clerics’ lives are meant to be exemplary.

    The report notes (referring to St Paul and St Augustine) that marriage was itself a pastoral accommodation in the first place to the ideal of celibacy. It suggests that, when considering making pastoral provision for same-sex couples in marriages, ‘one might contend that such an approach has parallels – though inexact ones’ (§120) with the Pauline and Augustinian accommodation of marriage. However, again, it is not clear why these parallels would not be exact. A thing is not the ideal for sexual ethics, but we make accommodation for it. Why the distinction?

    The section §§122-128 duplicates the arguments of §§52-60, sometimes verbatim, about culture and exemplarity. Again, this feels like an attempt to create an illusion of a coherent argument by repeating material rather than referencing it. On the other hand, it could simply be a drafting oversight.

    The argument seems to be that the pastoral epistles are contextual and culturally referential. They represent an attempt to work out what conduct should be required of the clergy in their own day, in order to be an example of godly life (§124). And so, scripture requires us to consider what holy life looks like today.

    Insofar as the Church of England aims to support and assist those who enter holy orders with the long work of forming and fashion their lives for a visible, grounded holiness, it can only deal in the on-the-ground realities of living as an ordained person in the contemporary culture in which they sojourn. This approach follows the scriptural lead: Paul’s example in the Holy Scriptures indicates it is impossible to think about the exemplary call without considering the context in which Christian witness occurs. (§126)

    A rare, positive conclusion is reached: that it might be possible to think about exemplarity in a way which refers to shifts in understandings of what being exemplary might mean, and in a way which is also biblical.

    Therefore, the argument that clergy in a same-sex marriage may be exemplary invokes cultural context – not in any way omitting theological rigour in preference for an appeal to contemporary culture, but as a move necessitated by Holy Scripture. (§127)

    However, the argument quickly moves off again in another direction, this time truly mind-boggling. The authors of the report wish to underline that the ‘call to celibacy’ may lead ‘same-sex attracted persons’ to opt for a ‘covenanted friendship[] or celibate civil partnership’. By analogy, we are reminded that ‘similar options have always been available to anyone who is divorced with a living spouse’ (§133).  Some choose to remain celibate after a divorce ‘since their remarriage would be a stumbling block to those holding to indissolubility for marriage’ (§133). An argument is being made that because some divorced people decide to remain celibate, that is an option open to LGBTQIA+ people too.

    The report then asks why many opt instead for further marriage. ‘There are surely a number of reasons – but it is hard to escape the conclusion that one reason will be because the church teaches sexual intimacy belongs within marriage and they wish to respect that’ (§134). This is frankly bizarre. On one level it is hard to believe that anyone has ever seriously made this argument. People who are divorced remarry because they want to remarry. The serial monogamist is not making a prophetic declaration that the place for sexual intimacy (with each of their sexual partners) is within marriage. This is utterly bizarre. However, this is advanced as an example of an argument in which an analogy might be possible for extending marriage to same-sex couples who are having sex, in order to affirm the church’s teaching that the place for sex is within marriage.

    However, this argument is so preposterous that it is hard to believe that it would ever be made by anyone who actually wanted to convince the reader that same sex marriage might be a good thing. The analogy with divorce makes it absurd. If the report was seriously offering a positive argument for marriage equality, it would simply argue that the place for sex should be within lifelong marriage. And that would be an argument that many LGBTQIA+ people do actually make.

    That positive argument is finally made, almost in passing, along with an equally easily missed reference to the possibility that same-sex couples who are married might not necessarily actually be having sex:

    While it is true that a same-sex marriage – which one cannot be certain is sexually active, but for those who want to affirm same-sex relationships offers a faithful, stable, and permanent context for sexual intimacy – does present challenges to the church’s teaching on sexual intimacy, which restricts it to heterosexual marriage, there is a case that a same-sex marriage offers a model that is exemplary in our society. (§138)

    But you could have been forgiven for missing those significant points as they flew past.

     

    6 – Disempower the Bishops

    In my response to GS Misc 1430 on marriage, I noted the high emotional tone of some of the language, which seemed aimed at making the episcopal readers less inclined to exercise their episcopal prerogative. We have seen how this report might well have the same effect, but by mystifying the reader in a barrage of confusingly arrayed arguments.

    However, the sections considering the possibility that the bishops might permit clergy, who currently need to be in civil partnerships in order to receive a license, to simply get married, and that they might just decide not discipline them, do sow fear. They do this by foretelling legal uncertainty and legal challenge in a manner that suggests the bishops would be taking a course of action which could be described as courageous.

    The ideal, surely, for all of us, is that we might come to one mind, with sufficient majorities to pass legislation which pleases everyone. However, if this is not possible, the report acknowledges that it is possible ‘for the diocesan bishops to exercise their discretion in responding to a situation that raises such questions about doctrine and practice being in tension’ (§82). This is a very odd way to frame episcopal discretion which arises from the tortured logic of ‘communally regulative understanding of doctrine’ (§84) which is rehearsed again. Far more sensible would have been a simple statement of the long-established episcopal discretion which exists for a bishop to administer their diocese as they see fit. A survey of the legal and historical as well as ecclesiological grounding for this would have been particularly interesting. But I suspect it would have shattered the illusion of a church held together by its ‘communally regulative understanding of doctrine’.

    The report notes that the House of Bishops could decide to relax discipline across the Church of England. ‘This would constitute a form of communal regulation – but only of one constituent house of the General Synod’ (§190). The argument is framed to evaluate every option for episcopal action through the lens of the ‘communally regulative understanding of doctrine’. Since that concept presumes that only maximum agreement can be acceptably communally regulative, this essentially paralyses the bishop from acting in their diocese.

    It is a masterful, if strangled, conceptual power grab. So the House of Bishops as a whole cannot act because they are only one house of Synod (§190). The bishop in their diocese cannot act because this ‘would also put the approach in tension with the idea that discipline operates on a communally [sic] regulative manner’ (§192).

    Indeed, with the concept of ‘communally regulative understanding of doctrine’, the bishop is rendered powerless, and the bishops as a House are disempowered utterly. They are responsible for discipline. But they cannot exercise their prerogative when it comes to discipline. Which begs the question, what is the point of a bishop? It is a line of reasoning which only works if you remain committed to the ‘communally regulative understanding of doctrine’ and wilfully ignore 2000 years of ecclesiological theology on the role of the bishop in their diocese.

    But, lest the bishops assert their prerogative, we are told that individual bishops inhabiting their role ‘carries the greatest risk for discipline to depart from doctrine, potentially resulting in legal challenges and increased confusion over such matters’ (§197). This argument is repeated in §213 as the last paragraph of the report, just to make sure the bishops were left with a dose of panic. Peter Collier KC has taken the teeth out of this legal threat pretty convincingly. Like many of the arguments advanced in this report, it is not real.

    The bishops should not be afraid to lead, to minister and to administer. Conservative bishops have done so, interpreting doctrine more tightly in some areas and more loosely in others as fits their own beliefs about what it means to be a shepherd of Christ’s flock in their diocese. Inclusive bishops should be similarly empowered. And the House of Bishops as a whole should not let its freedom to act be utterly dissolved into communal regulation. The bishops are not merely an upper rubber-stamping chamber for the secretariat and the Synod as a whole. For this reason, above all the others, this report must not become enshrined in Church of England thinking. What it risks is a functional Presbyterianism, a synodality which is not Anglican, and a House of Bishops who are ordained and consecrated to be shepherds of Christ’s flock, but who find themselves powerless to do anything meaningful in fulfilment of that calling.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • A Response to “The Doctrine of Marriage and the Prayers of Love and Faith: Texts and Contexts: a Report of the Faith and Order Commission” (GS Misc 1430)

    Fr Thomas Sharp is a priest theologian based in the South East of England and is also Provincial Secretary of the Society of Catholic Priests

    This was the second report which briefed the House of Bishops before they made their decisions in October about Living in Love and Faith (LLF). This is another extraordinary document, with which I imagine many of the members of the Faith and Order Commission will not have been entirely content. At least, I hope they would not be.

    Its purpose is to determine ‘whether and how the Church’s public use of these prayers coheres with, realises new boundaries for, or departs from its established teaching on marriage’ (§1). It does not do this, as we shall see. But it does present a case, or perhaps more accurately talk around the assumption, that the Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF) (let alone equal marriage) would constitute a departure from the traditional doctrine of marriage. It does this around four general themes:

    1. public perception and theological significance of the PLF;
    2. ecclesial condoning of “life choices”;
    3. disagreement and liturgical diversity;
    4. the Church’s traditional teaching on marriage.

    1) Public Perception and Theological Significance

    The primary concern is not theological. It is about what we are seen to do. In §5 a distinction is established, between private prayers and public prayers, which is ‘not merely practical but theologically significant’. What is meant by this is that private prayers are less likely to be misinterpreted as condoning or blessing something which we actually think is bad and do not think should be blessed or condoned. Whereas, ‘In the setting of public worship, it is impossible to escape the reality that the use of the PLF is liable to be received, however unintentionally, as ecclesial endorsement of the relationship being blessed’ (§14, cf.§24). The primary problem is public perception, that people should misunderstand us and think we are blessing and approve of queer people, when in fact we are not and do not. This is not in fact a theological consideration, but a practical one of public perception.

    The argument gets stranger. A distinction is drawn between regular services and occasional ones. ‘Regular services,’ we are told, ‘carry a high presumption of normativity and significance.’ Yet ‘Bespoke services,… by their out-of-the-ordinary nature will also suggest a high level of normativity’ (§15). So it is hard to see what distinction is being drawn here.

    The essential point of the first section of the Report is that, whatever liturgical provision is offered for same-sex couples, it will be interpreted as a marriage by people at those services and by the Anglican Communion and wider society (§§26,28). Although ‘Many would maintain that audience perception does not in itself determine doctrine’ (§32), ‘The weight of audience reception, then, may tip the balance from pastoral care into apparent [doctrinal] contradiction’ (§30). And we are reminded twice that ‘lex orandi, lex credendi’ (§§29,34). In other words, liturgy should mean what we say it does, but it doesn’t, and in fact it does mean what people attending the liturgy or talking about it on ‘social media responses or press headlines’ think it does (§32). This argument is repeated in §§66-68 in the context of a discussion of the importance of published liturgy.

    There is much concern also in §27 about the clergy and lay leaders who will be affected by the ‘symbolic resonance and precedent of a prominent public LLF service’. It is not made clear what that means. It is a strangely evasive paragraph. Presumably a gay bishop and their partner using the prayers. But, of course, that would never happen, would it.

    2) Ecclesial Condoning of “Life Choices”

    After concerns about whether we might be seen to be blessing same-sex relationships, next is the question of whether the Church is condoning same-sex couples and their ‘life choice/s’. This overtly homophobic phrase of long standing is used at both §11 and §14.  We are told that there is agreement ‘that God’s blessing may be prayed for over persons and intentions without necessarily affirming all aspects of a relationship or life choice’ (§11). It is apparently entirely possible to bless a same-sex couple without blessing in any way any part of their life together. If this seems strange, we are reassured that, ‘The Church has long provided public prayers in circumstances of moral or pastoral ambiguity’ (§19). Here, you might be forgiven for thinking that a door was maybe being opened to permitting a liturgy which also allowed for moral ambiguity (however much it feels unreal to suggest that this aspect of my life and identity might be any more morally ambiguous than a straight person’s). But that door is rapidly slammed shut.

    The Report gives short paragraphs to deal with the supposed arguments of unidentified and unreferenced ‘supporters of the PLF’ in a way which suggests that they/we may not have been in the room at the time. These supporters ‘point to analogous liturgical acts which mark without enacting and bless without endorsing every moral dimension of the context’, like civic services and memorials (§33). If we bless at civic services and memorials without being seen to condone every aspect of what we are blessing, can we do the same here? Computer says no. ‘In these contexts, there are some fairly set cultural expectations within which the Church can navigate at such commemorative events’ (§33). Apparently, we are meant to understand that that could not possibly also be true for using the PLF, although that is not worked out for us. Indeed, so prone to confusion with marriage must the PLF be that clear differentiation from marriage would require ‘clarity of liturgical differentiation’ and ‘the willingness of Church leaders to undertake sustained theological communication’ (§35). Now, I enjoy a public lecture as much as the next theologian, but even I think that would be overkill before a church service.

    Apparently, just telling people that it isn’t a legal wedding, as clergy I know have done who have used PLF so far, would still leave everyone confused. I am unconvinced. LGBTQIA+ people know that the Church is ambivalent towards us, and if we don’t know anything we assume that the Church is actively hostile. But these arguments are rehearsed again in §§81-83 and §86, just to make sure you heard them if you happened to be reading quickly before a meeting. The “theological question” is then summed up in terms which appear entirely out of the blue, unconnected as they are to the argument in the rest of the Report:

    Theologically, the question posed by the public use of the PLF is not primarily about whether God’s grace is available to all. It is about how the Church responds lovingly to the hope of those who come before God and desire to show forth their praise in thanksgiving for what God has given them. (§88)

    Is it? It hasn’t felt like that’s the theological question in this theological briefing. There’s nothing about the hope of those who come before God to give thanks to God. Perhaps they left that bit out. And if we are morally ambiguous and not-to-be-condoned then it is hard in any case to see what there is to give thanks for to God in Church. Our evil ways? What a strange thing to say.

    3) Disagreement and Liturgical Diversity

    The Report deals in some depth with how liturgical diversity has been handled in the Church of England in the past. The liturgical text is not a ‘narrow prescription’ but rather ‘a framework capable of bearing diverse theological interpretations’ (§42). This is presented as maybe a good thing, though in that section on how the public received liturgy it seemed to be a bad thing. There is a delightfully idealistic statement that Canons A5 and B5 ‘protect the liturgy from becoming an instrument of theological partisanship and ensure its function as a shared act of worship grounded in common faith’ (§43). Perhaps the authors are wilfully unaware of the many parishes and network churches in the Church of England which never or almost never use authorised liturgy, even if technically they perhaps do something which could be defended as a Service of the Word. The Catholicisation of the liturgy in Common Worship has not been accepted throughout the Church of England, and A5 and B5 have not ensured liturgical unity. Why would we expect them to now? Comments commending the ‘structured plurality’ of ‘theological sensibilities and liturgical styles’ in the deployment of different Eucharistic prayers (§45) and reminding us that prayers are not ‘neutral containers into which new meanings may simply be poured’ (§47) do not accord with the reality of the breadth of theological positions on the eucharist which are now accommodated by Common Worship’s diversity of prayers (if Common Worship or the Book of Common Prayer are used at all in a parish or network church).

    There is then a rather confusing but impressive argument about the Ritual Controversy and the tension between ‘prescription, rubric, and enactment’ (§§50-57). It seems to be strongly implied that, unlike other times when there have been debates and movements for change, we are somehow walking into this without proper discernment. But if the gruelling process of LLF which has lasted for the entirety of my training and ordained ministry was not discernment, I don’t know what discernment would look like.

    Suddenly the Report raises the tone, almost comically, warning us:

    Episcopal guidance becomes critical: without clear episcopal teaching and supervision, the national coherence of liturgical practice – and the doctrinal witness it sustains – may be compromised. (§60)

    It is precisely in the act of translating these prayers into public worship that the theological and doctrinal stakes become most acute. (§85)

    I think that we are intended to hear the warning that the national coherence of liturgical practice may be compromised with the same concern as a warning that the hull of our submarine might be compromised. However, this is not how it lands. It is hard to get upset about the stable door needing shutting when the horse is galloping gaily away over the horizon.

    And the Report is quite direct that this is in fact the reality:

    The Church’s embrace of liturgical diversity has hitherto been sustained by theological agreement on the central matters of faith. Where disagreement has existed – on baptism, the Eucharist, or the nature of ordination – it has generally been held within a framework of authorised texts and common structures. (§63)

    This is an extraordinary admission, given the picture presented that the PLF risked tearing up a unified doctrinal-liturgical fabric. In fact, on minor and unimportant issues, not at all central in any way, like baptism, the Eucharist or Holy Orders, we already disagree. And that is apparently fine. However, we are reminded, lest again a door towards living with disagreement be opened to us, that:

    If liturgical practice is allowed to diverge from doctrinal principle, then the Church’s claim to be a confessing body – one that worships according to what it believes may be placed in jeopardy. (§64)

    Jeopardy. Well, as much as I would like everyone to be of one mind, the Report has already said that disagreement and divergence has happened over central issues, and the Church is still one body with one head, however many times we have disagreed, done different things, or even gone our separate ways. This just reads strangely, along with the warning that suddenly liturgical difference is something about which we should now be terrified into inaction, now that LGBTQIA+ people are involved. This aspect of the report reads like an attempt to create panic where no panic is necessary. Or, if it was necessary, it was probably necessary over the past 40 years, when our present liturgical divergence was taking root.

    (4) The Church’s Traditional Teaching on Marriage

    Do you remember that the purpose of this Report was meant to be to work out whether the PLF departed from the Church of England’s doctrine of marriage? You could be forgiven for having forgotten, having worked through all of this. The so-called “traditional doctrine of marriage” is first stated at §38, though this is only to establish how much this conflicts with the PLF which ‘suggests at least a degree of ecclesial affirmation of the relationship’ (§37). That the authors believe that the PLF constitute a departure from the “traditional doctrine of marriage” is not explored, only the implications of this finding.

    The unchallenged assumption that the unchanging doctrine of marriage in the Church of England is and has always been that it be between one man and one woman for life runs throughout the Report. At §22 and in footnote 9, a reference is made to GS Misc 1407, which was the Episcopal Reference Group’s paper on marriage and its accompanying compendium of sources. The compendium is interesting in that it gives a useful overview of the ways in which the Church of England’s doctrine of marriage and human sexuality has changed a lot, even as the Church has professed not to change our teaching or doctrine, only our pastoral practice. This change is now normal.

    We do not actually believe (as a Church) that marriage is between one man and one woman, or if we do we certainly have not believed that unchangingly or traditionally. The Lambeth Conferences of 1888 and 1988 came to exactly opposing conclusions about polygamy. We also do not actually believe (as a Church) that marriage is for life, given that remarriage of divorcees is now routine in the Church of England, and not reserved to the ‘exceptional circumstances’ envisaged by Marriage in the Church After Divorce (2003). It now seems only in really exceptional circumstances that marriage of heterosexual couples after divorce is ever denied.

    I certainly have never heard of public penance being done by heterosexual divorcees to make clear that the Church does not condone their remarriage before their service of thanksgiving. But the Report uses divorce as an example of another ‘morally ambiguous’ situation which the church does not bless (§19). It is made clear in the liturgy, apparently, that what is offered to divorcees is not a blessing. But I have never known that service to be referred to in any terms other than as a ‘wedding blessing’.

    Conclusion

    This Report is frustrating, and disturbing. It presents the PLF as something of a worst-case scenario, with the potential to detonate the hitherto integral liturgical unity of the Church of England. However, it is not balanced. It is not theologically consistent. And its arguments are at times obfuscatory and self-referential. It does not evaluate whether the PLF are consistent with the Church of England’s doctrine of marriage(s). But it does make it appear as fait accompli that the PLF are inconsistent in a way that suggests that the House of Bishops has no freedom to exercise their episcopal prerogative to authorise them. As such, this was a confusing and at times needlessly offensive Report to read.

  • Where Does the House of Bishops Currently Stand on the Use of Prayers of Love and Faith? Some Reflections

    by Peter Collier KC, retired Senior Circuit Judge and former Vicar-General of the Province of York

     

    On 15 November 2023, General Synod passed a motion on Living in Love and Faith which acknowledged that we are in a period of uncertainty but, among other requests, asked “the House to consider whether some standalone services for same-sex couples could be made available for use, possibly on a trial basis, on the timescale envisaged by the motion passed by the Synod in February 2023”.

    Such a trial period would result in an expectation that if, at the end of it, there was a wish to continue the use of the Prayers, then that would be put through a Canon B2 process.

    After much longer than people had hoped for, the House of Bishops has now reached a provisional decision, which they anticipate confirming in December. That decision is that, following advice from the Church of England’s Legal Office and from the Faith and Order Commission (FAOC), such services – now described as ‘bespoke services’ – “would require maximum communal authorisation through the Canon B2 process of approval”.

    The recent legal advice (dated September 2025) which has now been published does not differ materially from what previous documents told us was the essence of the legal advice received on earlier dates. Annex F to GS 2328 had said that authorisation through Canon B2 would provide an automatic defence to any legal case brought against clergy for using the prayers. The advice at that time was that, provided the House, exercising its legally and theologically informed judgement, formed the view that the proposed prayers and other material met the requirements as to doctrine that are set out in Canon B5, then they could properly be commended. That was and presumably still is the case, as the use of the prayers in regularly scheduled services remains commended for use under Canon B5.

    The role of context

    What is of course new is the advice from FAOC. In short, it addresses the issue of the extent to which context and symbolic action communicate what the church believes. FAOC says that when used publicly, and especially when used in bespoke or occasional services, the Prayers may be seen to communicate an ecclesial endorsement of a couple’s relationship as a whole, including its sexual dimension. It says, some would say argues(!), that in public rituals meaning is read as much from what is seen as from what is said. Also, that actions, gestures, and vesture generate strong signals for a variety of audiences looking on. It says that, while explanatory prefaces may help, people will remember the enactment more than the caveat. In conclusion, FAOC suggest that symbolic actions, such as an exchange of rings, will communicate more than the church’s doctrine of marriage will allow.

    Notwithstanding that all of that also applies to such symbolic activity in regularly scheduled services – which are to be allowed to continue – the House has provisionally concluded that performance of the same symbolic activity in a standalone service should not take place until authorised by Synod through a B2 process.

    The Church of England and civil weddings

    Of course this is not the first time that the Church of England has addressed questions around marriage services. In 1836, the Marriage Act challenged the practice of all weddings being conducted only through the Church of England, and introduced what we now call ‘civil weddings’. Weddings conducted in registered buildings other than churches, in the presence of a registrar and two witnesses, were lawful. This was the first time that Parliament provided for people to marry other than through the rites and ceremonies of the Church of England.

    The Church was not happy and, in the debate on the bill in the House of Lords, the then-Bishop of Exeter, Henry Phillpotts, said that it was “a disgrace to British legislation. [It] is pretended to be called for to prevent clandestine marriages, but I think it will greatly facilitate such proceedings. Not solemnized by the church of England, may be celebrated without entering into a consecrated building, may be contracted by anybody, and will be equally valid, whether it takes place in the house of God, or in the house of a registering clerk, one of the lowest functionaries of the state. The parties may take one another for better and for worse, without calling God to witness their plighted troth. No blessing sought; no solemn vows of mutual fidelity; no religious solemnity whatever …”. Clearly in his mind this fell far short of ‘Holy Matrimony’ as per the Book of Common Prayer.

    Various other developments culminated with the use of a religious service in a register office being prohibited by s.12 of the Marriage and Registration Act 1856. So, more by accident than design, we reached the place where there was a very clear distinction between religious and secular marriages.

    Divorce and marriage

    However, a much more fundamental issue arising from the different views about marriage held by state and church was that of remarriage after divorce. In 1857, control over divorce passed from the church courts – which had exercised complete control over marriage and divorce since the Middle Ages – to the newly-created Court for Divorce and Matrimonial Causes. Until then, divorce was rare and expensive, requiring in almost all cases an Act of Parliament to bring it about. The grant of divorces by the courts was slowly liberalised over the years, culminating in 1969 with the “irretrievable breakdown of a marriage” being the sole ground for divorce.

    Throughout this period, the Church of England remained adamant that marriage was for life and that any remarriage during the former partner’s lifetime amounted to adultery. In 1957, the church not only banned the use of the “solemnisation of holy matrimony” for the remarriage of divorcees but also barred the provision of any public service to mark a couple’s civil marriage when one of them was divorced.

    Some clergy, notwithstanding that official position, did hold private services of prayer and dedication for such couples either in their home or, sometimes, in a church. The Lichfield Report (1978) reviewed the position, along with the pros and cons of holding a service of prayer and dedication for those who had gone through such further marriages. However, it concluded that there was a risk of confusion between such a service and a marriage service. It argued that, whatever explanations were given, it was likely that some taking part would be unaware of the distinction, particularly if the traditional ceremonial elements such as a bride wearing white, the ringing of bells and the like “would convey a powerful misleading message which the words of the service would be unable to correct”. That argument will sound very familiar to anyone who has read the recent FAOC advice.

    However, within three years of the Lichfield Report being issued, in July 1981, Synod voted overwhelmingly for a motion that “there are circumstances in which a divorced person may be married in church during the lifetime of a former spouse”. But what were those circumstances? Such was the division on this issue across the country, that it was very difficult to find a way forward. At the root of the disagreement was the question as to whether this was a matter touching on the doctrine of marriage. That question remained unresolved when, in 1985, the then House of Bishops commended under Canon B4 a ‘Service of Prayer and Dedication After A Civil Marriage’.  This remains a commended service and is still in use today, particularly by some clergy who feel in all conscience that they are unable to agree to a remarriage in church according to the rites and ceremonies of the Church of England.

    The Church of England and the Civil Partnership Act

    The next occasion when changes in the civil law led to the Church having to address matters that touched on its understanding of marriage was when the Civil Partnership Act 2004 came into force. How should the Church respond when those who had entered into a Civil Partnership asked for prayers or for a blessing on their new status?

    On the 25 July 2005 the House of Bishops provided a Pastoral Statement on Civil Partnerships that said that clergy should not provide a service of blessing for those who have entered into a civil partnership but, if approached by people, they should “respond pastorally and sensitively in the light of the circumstances of each case”.

    Nigel Seed KC, then the Chancellor of the Diocese of London, prepared an advice in 2008 for the clergy of that diocese about what to do if asked to conduct services of blessing for those in civil partnerships. Having considered parallels with the ‘Service of Prayer and Dedication After A Civil Marriage’, and noting that “interestingly for a service that is not ‘a service of blessing’, it does include a blessing of the two individuals, but not of their union”, he concludes by saying:

    Thus the position is clear. Unless and until one of the relevant authorities listed in Canon B5.2 provides a form of service, beneficed clergy (or other clergy authorised by them) may use a form of service they consider suitable in respect of a civil partnership providing that service does not amount to a ‘service of blessing’ and is reverent and seemly and is not contrary to, nor indicative of any departure from, the doctrine of the Church of England in any essential matter.

    It would seem to be commonplace that such services are now in regular use across the country.

    Pastoral responses to same- sex marriage

    So where does all that leave us now that we are facing another challenge presented to us by Parliamentary intervention into marriage? Once more it fell to the Bishop of Exeter, in this case Michael Langrish, to express the Church’s concern when the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013 was making its way through the House of Lords. He said that if the bill was passed:

    A basic understanding of marriage, in law, will have irrevocably changed, and with one reality now bearing two different labels; or we will have legislated into being two very different realities, but confusingly bearing the same name.

    One of the points about a civil partnership is that it is very much not a marriage. A same-sex marriage is also very much not a marriage in the eyes of the church. So, is there any good reason why a pastoral and sensitive response can be made to those who have entered a civil partnership, but not to those who have entered a same-sex marriage?

    The pattern would seem to be well established – we begin with the Service of Prayer and Dedication where the couple but not the union are blessed, we follow that with the pastoral and sensitive prayers for those who have entered a civil partnership which might equally bless them but not their union, and then we come to those who have entered a same-sex relationship where again we pray for and bless them but not their civil union. Although not spelled out in that way, it is my understanding that the many years of work that went into producing the resource section of the Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF) were intended to produce exactly that – a recognition and blessing of the positive goods seen in a relationship, without any acknowledgement of that relationship being anywhere close to what the church currently understands to be a marriage in the sight of God. Such a marriage, when entered into according to the rites and ceremonies of the Church of England, necessarily can only take place between a man and a woman.

    It was that understanding that was set out in GS 2289 when the House stated its intention of commending those resources for use by those who wished to use them, but reserving always the right of any cleric to decline to do so on grounds of doctrinal conscience, as was the case in 1985.

    On the basis of all the above, it is clearly in order for any cleric who wishes to do so, to use the commended PLF resources in any regularly scheduled service. Although the House has in its guidance so far said that they should not be used other than in regularly scheduled services, I find it difficult to understand why that should be the case. I take on board what FAOC has said about symbolism, but note that the same was said in the Lichfield report in 1978, and that all the symbolic matters that concern FAOC may be just as much present in a regularly scheduled service as in a standalone service. And it is to be noted that the Introduction to the Prayers at pages 3 and 4 is very clear about what is and what is not being offered through using these resources.

    It also seems to me that on the same basis that Chancellor Seed considered that, when no other provision had been made but some sort of service was required, then it is within the discretion of the minister to provide a service that is not contrary to or indicative of departure from the doctrine of the Church of England. It is very difficult to see how what is apparently not so indicative in a regular service should become so simply because the service is occasional.

    The threat of legal proceedings?

    Throughout the discussion of these matters, and obviously something that has weighed heavily with the House, is the possibility of legal proceedings being taken against a cleric who uses prayers that have not had full Canon B2 approval. But I question whether the House has really looked at the nature and detail of those potential proceedings and therefore at the reality of the threat they are thought to pose.

    Any complaint would clearly be about doctrine – the whole ground of any such disciplinary complaint would be that what had happened was contrary to the doctrine of the Church. As such it could not proceed under the Clergy Discipline Measure 2003, as section 7(2) of that Measure provides that “proceedings in relation to matters involving doctrine, ritual or ceremonial shall continue to be conducted in accordance with the 1963 Measure”. That is the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Measure 1963 (EJM). Its proceedings are complex to say the least. It was their complexity, cost and consequent rare use that led to the passing of the Clergy Discipline Measure 2003.

    First, under the EJM there are restrictions on those who can commence proceedings. Under section 19 proceedings can only be commenced (1) by a person authorised by the Diocesan Bishop to bring a complaint; (2) by six persons aged 18 or over whose names are on the electoral roll of the parish the incumbent or stipendiary curate who they seek to complain about; (3) in the case of the stipendiary curate by their incumbent. I would have thought it unlikely that a cleric whose parishioners were unsupportive is likely to offer such prayers. There is much in the guidance about discussing matters and getting the approval of the PCC for their use. Also, the complainants would have a lengthy and potentially expensive path ahead of them. As for the Bishop bringing a complaint, I think any Bishop would have to think long and hard before launching one, as may become clear as we consider the process.       

    Under section 39, once the complaint has been brought to the Bishop’s attention and they have considered it, they must give the accused and the complainant the opportunity of a private interview. Having held that interview or interviews the Bishop may decide to take no further steps in the matter in which case it comes to an end, or may decide to refer it for inquiry.

    If the bishop has referred the complaint for inquiry, the inquiry is carried out by a Committee of Convocation in accordance with section 42. The committee consists in the case of an accused priest or deacon of (i) one member of the Upper House of the Convocation of the relevant province appointed by the archbishop; (ii) two members of the Lower House of that Convocation appointed by the prolocutor of that House; and (iii) two chancellors of dioceses in that province, appointed by the Dean of the Arches and Auditor. That committee inquires into the complaint to decide whether there is a case to answer in respect of which the accused should be put on trial. Both sides may lay evidence before the committee in affidavits; the committee might also require any deponent to an affidavit to attend and answer questions on oath. The committee decides if there is a case to answer and, if so, they spell out what the offence is.

    But that is not an end of the matter because they go on to consider whether the offence is too trivial to warrant further proceedings; or that it was committed under extenuating circumstances; or that further proceedings would not be in the interests of the Church of England; and in any of those cases they would then dismiss the complaint. Also, they may decide there is no case to answer. Only if they decide there is a case to answer and that they are not dismissing it for any of the reasons set out above can they send it for trial before the Court of Ecclesiastical Causes Reserved.      

    This Court consists of five members: two Court of Appeal judges (currently Smales and Lindblom LJJ) and three Diocesan Bishops (currently Chelmsford, Chichester, and Gloucester) They are assisted by between three and five persons selected from of a panel of specialist theologians and liturgists. Proceedings follow the pattern of a criminal trial with the criminal rules of evidence. Any decision is decided by a majority.

    If at the conclusion of the proceedings the accused is found guilty of the offence charged, then they are liable to be censured in accordance with section 49. However, under section 49(3), unless the accused has been admonished on a previous occasion in respect of another offence of the same or substantially the same nature, then no censure more severe than a ‘monition’ can be imposed. A monition is “an order to do or refrain from doing a specified act”, which effectively would amount to an order not to do it again. There is therefore no risk of deprivation inhibition or suspension for a first offence.

    It is all that complexity coupled with the lack of teeth in any outcome for a first offence that causes me to think that it would be very unlikely that any bishop would (a) authorise proceedings in the first place, or (b) want to send to an inquiry any case that had been launched by anybody else. Equally, I think that any Committee of Convocation would be very tempted to use one of their three options to dismiss rather than send the case to a hearing. Given the limited penalty, for a first offence which this would inevitably be, what would be the benefit of going to a hearing? Even if any of the parties or the Bishop thought that this might resolve an important doctrinal issue, there would be no guarantee of the outcome, and so I would guess little appetite to take the risk.

    In all the circumstances, it does seem to me that the threat of litigation is vastly overstated in the papers that have been produced so far.

    So where do we go from here?

    The resource material in the PLF is available as commended material for use when praying with a same sex couple in regularly scheduled services and that position is likely to remain after the House reaches final decisions in December.

    Even if they were to withdraw that commendation, it would be open to any priest relying on Canon B 5.2 to use a form of service considered suitable by them to provide a service of thanksgiving and prayer for a couple who approached them asking for such. It seems to me that it would be very difficult to criticise what would surely be seen as a pastoral and sensitive approach. In the preliminary conversations with the couple, I cannot imagine that the priest would not explain that there were limits to what could be offered because the Church of England for the time being has a doctrine of marriage which does not permit it to do any more, given that they are a same sex couple. I cannot imagine that would be any surprise to the couple, who in agreeing to the service offered, would be acknowledging that they understood that that was the Church’s doctrine.

    I can also see no reason why in any announcements about the service, either in advance or at the time, something could not be said that effectively apologised that no more could be offered whilst the current doctrinal position about same sex marriage remains in place. This would overcome the anxiety of FAOC that simply saying what positively is on offer may lead people to conclude that the Church has a doctrinal position other than it has. I can of course understand that people may not want to say anything that detracts from positive statements in the service itself but it would, so far as I can see, provide a complete answer to that significant concern of FAOC.

    And we can look back to those same concerns being expressed about the remarriage issues in the 1980s and note that there has been no lessening of an understanding of what the Church’s doctrine of marriage says. People still believe that the couple are committing to a life together till death does them part, and not committing to have a go at it for as long as they can, which has always seemed to me to be what lawyers refer to as ‘special pleading’.

    But, assuming that the December position of the House follows on from what was said in October, what of those who are not able to accommodate the prayers into their regular pattern of services? It seems to me that the arguments I have just advanced in relation to relying on Canon B 5.2 apply equally in those circumstances.

    What if a diocesan bishop issues an ad clerum purporting to forbid clergy using those prayers in their diocese? The oath of canonical obedience is to “pay true and canonical obedience to the Lord Bishop … and his successors in all things lawful and honest”. On the face of it there is a strong argument for saying that the priest is properly applying canon law and cannot be forbidden from so doing. Canonical obedience is generally understood as obeying such instructions as are given within the law of the church, and the law expressed in Canon B5 allows a priest to use such forms of service as are considered suitable by them for the occasion.

    But it should be noted that Canon B 5.4 provides that “If any question is raised concerning the observance of the provisions of this Canon it may be referred to the Bishop in order that he may give such pastoral guidance, advice or directions as he may think fit,  but such reference shall be without prejudice to the matter in question being made the subject matter of proceedings under the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Measure 1963.” The question here is whether an individual diocesan Bishop, in all the circumstances outlined above, is really able to say that the use of such prayers is either contrary to or indicative of a departure from the doctrine of the Church of England in an essential matter. Ultimately of course if such a direction were given and not followed it could be the subject of a complaint under the 1963 Measure, which would proceed as set out above to an outcome which, at the moment, may seem very uncertain for the Bishop.

    Finally, it must follow from all that I have said above that the House needs to give further thought to the matters that I have set out before coming to any final decisions. Careful consideration needs to be given to the long history of the relationship between church and state in relation to the state’s development of marriage and how the church has responded at different times. It needs to be acknowledged that the church has always been concerned that any adaptation of its practices to accommodate what is happening in the outside world may be seen as a threat to its understanding and doctrine of marriage.

    However, accommodations have always been made, and the doctrine has survived. There may be a lot of pressure both inside and outside the church to change the doctrine, but there is no doubt what that doctrine is. They should also not forget that some provinces have already changed their doctrine of marriage, and many other provinces are currently struggling over these issues, even as we are. Historically, the House has led the way in providing sensitive and pastoral accommodation in such changing times.  My question to them is whether they have the courage to do so again?

  • There’s Another Church Abuse Crisis That’s in Every Congregation, and Very Much Closer to Home

    by Sally Hope, a writer with a specialism in faith, feminism and domestic abuse. Sally is the creator of the Always Hopeful Programme, and her latest book No Visible Scars is a recovery journal for Christian women who have experienced domestic abuse

    “I don’t believe in God anymore” I angrily declared, two weeks after I’d left my husband.

    It was a lie. I’ve known God as a real, tangible presence since I was a small child. I remember feeling comforted by God at night when I was five years old and scared of the dark, and when I was a lonely young teenager away from my family for the first time. I had stories of answered prayer, of God’s intervention in my life. I could no more stop believing in God than I could stop believing that the sky is blue. The problem was, I hadn’t been aware of God’s presence lately, and while I believed God existed, I felt abandoned and angry. I didn’t want to believe in God.

    What I really meant was, “I believe in God, but I have lost faith in God.”

    Hanging on the wall of my lounge was a collage of family photographs, made for me by my sister. Nestled among the pictures of my husband and my children were words from Psalm 37, “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.” It was ironic that these words were woven through my nearest and dearest, because the only desire of my heart was quite simple: a happy, peaceful family. I had “delighted myself in the Lord”, but I did not have the happy family I desired. I was bitter. Looking around church, I saw happy normal family after happy normal family. I didn’t feel like I was asking for the earth. Why then, had God given my friends at church the only thing I really desired, but not me? Why had I been given a husband who would spend our 13-year marriage abusing me and my children?

    God, I had decided, was a God who makes promises, but does not keep them.

    My experience is not unique. Christians experience domestic abuse at the same, if not higher levels than the rest of society.[1] One in four of us will be abused by an intimate partner at some point in our adult lives. How many women are in your church? Try to picture those women. For every 20 women quietly sitting in your pews, five of them will be experiencing domestic abuse, mostly secretly, silently, feeling stigma and shame. Hiding it, like I did for thirteen years. Many of them will eventually walk away from their faith altogether as a result.

    I didn’t lose my faith. I don’t know why but I know it was certainly not because of anything I did. Over the next three or four years I experienced the God who shows up, and won’t go away no matter how much you rail and spew your anger. The God who leaves behind the ninety-nine to pursue the one. The God who loves relentlessly, outrageously, who heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. In that time I questioned everything I had ever believed, my religion fell apart, but my God clung onto me as I rebuilt both my life, and my faith.

    Christian domestic abuse victims face unique challenges. In the majority of cases their faith and the abuse they experience are inextricably linked. Abusers will use spiritual abuse as a means of controlling their victims, making the victim feel as though a challenge to the abuser is a challenge to God. Abusers shoehorn themselves into God’s place in the lives of their victims, and often use biblical texts and Christian doctrines to justify their abuse. All victims of abuse find it difficult to leave an abuser but the added element of spiritual abuse, along with negative attitudes to divorce and the importance placed on two-parent families within Christian culture, can create another barrier for Christians. When we do leave, the way our faith has been weaponised against us invariably leads to a full-blown deconstruction of our beliefs, and if our abusers have managed to drive a wedge between us and God we can be resistant to God’s voice and tender care.

    As a Christian woman I found the strenuous journey of recovery lonely. I received excellent support from secular support agencies, found some levels of connection with other survivors in peer support groups, but always felt that none of them had the answers to the burning questions I was left with in relation to my faith: “Why did God allow it to happen to me?” “Is it okay for me to get divorced?” “Do I have to forgive my ex-husband? And if so, what if I can’t?” Worse, they saw my faith as part of the problem, not as part of the solution.

    Whilst secular support workers didn’t “get” my faith, my Christian peers didn’t “get” my experience of domestic abuse. I was told to repent of my own part in the abuse, urged to drop the charges against my husband, and made to feel less like an equal and valuable member of my church, and more like a project, a failure, and someone to be pitied, or worse: judged. I walked the path to recovery with Jesus by my side, but I longed to walk it with other Christian women who understood and connected with my pain.

    It’s now 12 years since I left my husband. My faith is stronger than it’s ever been, my relationship with God more loving and beautiful than I ever could have imagined. As I grew in strength I began to support other survivors of abuse; I volunteered at my local women’s refuge, and after a while I got a job there, running peer support groups for survivors both in the refuge and in the community. In the course of my professional life, I met other Christian survivors, listened to them ask the same questions I asked, saw them experience the damaging disconnect from God that I once felt, saw some of them leave their faith behind altogether and others struggle to rebuild, all the time deeply hurt and often broken all over again by the poor response from their churches.

    I do not know why God broke through my anger, hurt and broken-ness to help me rebuild my faith, when other victims don’t seem to experience that same divine healing. But I know that when I ask God, God’s reply is, “what are you doing now to bring my outrageous love to those women? Where are you in their journey of recovery?” I am grateful that God walked that journey with me but, more than anything, I wish other Christians had.

    So, I took the lessons I learned during my own recovery, along with my professional knowledge and experience of running support groups to create a peer support programme for Christian women. Never again should a Christian woman have to recover from domestic abuse on her own. My Always Hopeful Programme is now run online, via Zoom by Restored, a charity dedicated to supporting survivors of abuse and equipping churches to do the same. It’s also being run as a face-to-face peer support programme in a slowly growing number of churches in the U.K. Participants tell me it’s been a key part in their journey to wholeness. There is no substitute for face-to-face peer support and I would love it if every survivor was able to find an Always Hopeful Programme running in a church near them.

    I also realised, from my own experience working with survivors, that not everyone will find the courage to join a support group. There can be lots of reasons why women won’t join an Always Hopeful Programme, from fear or social anxiety to simple logistics of childcare or not being able to find a programme near to them. So, for those women who cannot attend an Always Hopeful Programme, I wrote No Visible Scars, which will be published on 17 July 2025. ‘No Visible Scars’ is an individual recovery guide for Christian women that seeks to help the reader work through those questions in order to “work out their own salvation” (Philippians 2:12) in the light of their experience of abuse.

    The Church has so much to offer to victims of abuse. It is often part of the problem but it could, and should, be part of the solution. We are called to care for the hurting, to defend the oppressed and to seek justice. Always Hopeful [2] and No Visible Scars are there to help the church accompany the women in every congregation who are victims of domestic abuse.

     

    Notes:

    [1] A 2018 study by Restored in partnership with the University of Leicester and Coventry University found that 25% of Churchgoers (across all denominations)  reported experiencing domestic abuse in their CURRENT relationship, and 42.2% reported experiencing at least one abusive behaviour in any intimate relationship (past of present) during their adult life. There have previously been studies by both the Evangelical Alliance and the Methodist Church that have found that rates of domestic abuse in churches is similar to that of the national average. Nationally 1 in 4 women will experience Domestic Abuse.

    [2] To run an Always Hopeful Programme at your church:
    online information here and     with free webinars at 12 noon, Monday 14 July [https://www.eventbrite.com/e/finding-hope-when-everything-seems-hopeless-tickets-1306878471689] or 7 pm Thursday 21 August [https://www.eventbrite.com/e/finding-hope-when-everything-seems-hopeless-tickets-1306883225909]

  • Marriage and the Bible: It’s Complicated

    A Response to the Part Report of the Episcopal Reference Group on the Doctrine of Marriage

    by Johanna Stiebert, Professor of Hebrew Bible (University of Leeds) and co-director of The Shiloh Project

    I have been married for twenty years and have co-authored a book on marriage – but I am still awestruck at the sheer amount of preoccupation and nitty-gritty theological advice on marriage that is to be found in “A Part Report of the Episcopal Reference Group of the Faith and Order Commission: Living in Love and Faith and the Doctrine of Marriage, February 2025.”

    This interim report condenses a great deal of information into nine theses. Still, it is 16 pages long and refers and links to yet another 316-page (!) document, which is also in a state of ongoing development, namely “The Church of England’s Doctrine of Marriage: A Compendium of Sources.” Say what you like: there is no shortage of effort, consultation, discussion, or verbosity on display here.[1]

    The upshot of this word-mass, however, is, ultimately, rather underwhelming: it can be summarised as “regarding marriage, there has been continuity over a long period of time and there has been change, too. Some change has been accepted, other change has been considered, resisted and rejected.” This is not especially enlightening as far as upshots go.

    While it is admirable and important to listen and to talk about human relationships and marriage, has this exercise really been productive? Is there appetite for getting serious about inclusion? And, for all the extensive and ongoing consultation and discussion, is there still “stuff” that has not been discussed, or discussed openly, frankly, and fully enough?

    Let me, an ongoing studier of the Hebrew Bible, give my own responses in the form of nine theses – adding yet more verbiage on the matter!

    1. First, the sheer amount of ink spilled might imply that the Bible (the main source of authoritative reference for Christians) refers to “marriage” in ways copious and clear. Not so. In the Hebrew Bible (the by far larger part of the biblical canon), there is not even a word that captures English “marriage.” Instead, there is – usually rather fleeting – reference to men “taking” or “lying with” or “going in to” women. There is little about, let alone clarity concerning, marriage ritual or ceremony (i.e. weddings), or anything much either descriptive or prescriptive – that is, about what “being married” is or should be. There is nothing about marriageable age, very little that suggests consent, and consequently, very little evidence for what might pass as a “stable core to the doctrine of marriage” (p.5). It is important to be frank about what is not there in the Bible.
    1. Second, what is there, or what can be puzzled together about unions between men and women (Thesis 1), is often acutely violent. Men take women[2] following wars (e.g. Deuteronomy 21:10-14 and Judges 21:10-12, 20-23). If this is marriage, it is also rape, rather than “sexual intimacy” or “friendship” (Theses 6-7). In the Hebrew Bible husbands also get a pass for accusing their wives[3] of infidelity, in the absence of proof, and for submitting them to what looks like a gruelling public humiliation (Numbers 5:11-31). Surely, this kind of conduct in marriage would not pass as “honourable” (Thesis 3); this kind of conduct, while prescribed in the Bible, should be resisted and should fall into the category of “a need for change that has been accepted.”[4] There is blatant association in the Bible between violence and marriage. This needs to be acknowledged and resisted. 
    1. Third, marriage is idealised as “a sign of the relationship between Christ and the Church” (Thesis 4), and as “God’s explicit sanction and endorsement as a holy vocation and whole-life calling in which to serve God and neighbour, not only in creation but in the Christian dispensation also” (p.8). It is good to be aspirational and to go into a relationship, especially one aimed at joining families and raising children (Thesis 5), with resolve to be friends and loyal (Theses 7 and 9). A text like Ephesians 5:21-33, as much as it clearly suggests hierarchy in marriage (vv.23-24), and as much as this text more than any other is cited by Christian abusers in cases of spousal violence, could be made right: a Christ-like husband is not abusive but loves his wife; obedience to a Christ-like husband does not involve submission to domestic violence; marriage constitutes mutual reverence.

    Most folk, however, as much as we might aspire to high ideals, such as “permanent and lifelong” (Thesis 9) union reflecting Christ’s relationship with the Church (Thesis 4), fall short. Any one person is complicated, and two people together long-term, against the backdrop of life, with its invariable serpentines and complexities, are yet more complicated still. Many of the ideals expressed by Jesus – parting with all our wealth (Matthew 19:21), loving our enemies (Matthew 5:43-48) – are noble and wonderful but nigh to impossible to live out. This pertains to ideals of marriage, too. How many among us who are married have never committed adultery, if we include there adultery in thought or in fantasy (Matthew 5:27-29)? Indeed, existing research strongly suggests that Christian marriages are as likely to end in divorce or to feature domestic violence and abuse as marriages in the general, non-Christian population: high ideals or norms do not transpire reliably in high (or even higher) conduct. Frank acknowledgement that the report idealises Christian marriage would be welcome.

    1. Fourth: several of the theses allude to the early chapters of Genesis – most notably, Thesis 1, with its reference to one man, one woman, and one flesh, but also Thesis 2, with its reference to marriage being a “gift in creation,” and (to a lesser extent) Theses 5 and 6, which refer to children (cf. Genesis 1:28) and sexual intimacy (cf. Genesis 2:24). The report asserts that what is prescribed is “specifically exclusive, monogamous marriage that was given in creation, such that other forms of marriage – several of which are contained in the Old Testament – are a falling short of or twisting of God’s original design and good gift” (p.6).[5]

    I, for one, find it rather extraordinary and bizarre that the early Genesis chapters are used so adamantly to justify heterosexual, monogamous, sexually exclusive marriage to the exclusion of all other kinds of marriage.[6] In the end, this – albeit wonderful – text is clearly a myth, complete with a talking snake and magical trees, where a human is made from dust and a woman, after all the animals, from a rib. It is a story, moreover, that departs rather sharply from the creation story that immediately precedes it (where humans are created together, after the animals). The story of Adam and Eve is the one that, more than any other biblical text, is used to drive home what marriage is and should be.

    The report, furthermore, firmly lays claim to this story. On the one hand, there is mention that the Church of England “has always recognised the marriages not only of Christian believers but of everyone,” yet on the other, it states that “Christians, however, by virtue of divine revelation, see in the same institution of marriage more than non-Christians see: most especially the ‘one flesh’ union and the sacramental signification of Christ’s relationship with his Church” (p.7). The Jewish text from the Hebrew Bible is firmly folded into a doctrine that makes Christian marriage superior (“more than”). This teeters on the brink of supersessionism. Above all, however, the mythological text is over-invested with profundity.

    Meanwhile, other texts of the Hebrew Bible – including legal texts prescribing that raped women marry their rapists (Deuteronomy 22:28-29), or the aforementioned texts linking violence and marriage, are not mentioned much. Maybe they are simply part of the change that has been accepted? Still, more honesty about how ideology drives the selection of biblical texts that construct the marriage ideal would be desirable.

    1. Now, we all hold ideologies; moreover, interpreting the Bible in ways that speak to life and how to live it will almost invariably (consciously or unconsciously) involve ideologically-motivated selection of texts. It is entirely possible to select biblical texts that provide and emphasise quite different recommendations for marriage than those of the report’s nine theses. It is entirely possible to construct recommendations that designate the married state inferior to the single and celibate state, or that permit divorce, same-sex marriage, polyamory, or unions without children – be this by choice, or not.[7] The report mentions that the State’s definition of marriage (subsequent to marriage equality of 2014) is distinct from the definition of marriage of the Church of England. The first thesis emphasises that in the Church of England marriage is between one man and one woman. Again, their becoming “one flesh” is stressed. It is acknowledged that this one-flesh-ness can be understood “sexually, socially, and even in some sense spiritually or mystically” (p.5). Yet even if two people of the same sex join sexually, socially, spiritually and mystically, this cannot, apparently, be a marriage, or God’s gift (Thesis 2), or “an honourable estate” (Thesis 3), or a sign of Christ’s relationship with the Church (Thesis 4), or “proper” sexual intimacy (Thesis 6).

    Exactly why this might be remains unclear to me. Friendship, even intimate friendship, in the Bible can be between members of the same sex – indeed, the bond between David and Jonathan, or the devotion of Ruth to Naomi, where there are also words of promise (1 Samuel 20:42; Ruth 1:16-17; cf. Thesis 9), stand out, as does the love of Jesus for his disciple (possibly, John the son of Zebedee). Indeed, these descriptions are far more suggestive of friendship than the account of Adam and Eve (or any other man and woman of the Bible, for that matter). The report refers to friendship as “the bedrock” (p.9) of marriage. Why can’t a relationship between persons of the same sex that is one of friendship, loving, intimate, consenting, and bonded by words of promise, ever be a marriage, while Adam and Eve are paradigms of marriage even though notions of friendship or consent are not exactly explicit? There is some consideration of this in the report, some mention of narrowing the “conceptual distance” between different- and same-sex unions (p.13) but this is not reflected in the nine theses. It is, ultimately, nebulous why there is a requirement for marriage to consist of one man and one woman only.

    1. The report acknowledges both change with regard to marriage, and some degree of “ambiguity and flexibility” (p.11). It says that doctrine can “develop or change” (p.2); that (albeit modest) changes have been made to the report (p.4), and that (much more significantly) there has been “pastoral accommodation” to permit divorce and remarriage in some cases (p.10), including on account of “differing interpretations” of biblical texts (p.11). There is also mention of change towards “a more egalitarian understanding” (p.12), and to permit contraception so that a married couple can “in good conscience” delay conception by artificial means (p.13). Moreover, the report asserts a shift in emphasis towards regarding sex in marriage less in terms of preventing fornication and more in terms of mutual enjoyment (p.16). It strikes me as right and good that changes and accommodation are made as knowledge (e.g. about safe forms of contraception) is gained; it strikes me as right and good to promote egalitarian marriage and to resist unfair rigidity (e.g. concerning divorce in situations where a relationship has broken down or is damaging to one or both partners).

    Moreover, there is precedent for changing doctrine within the Bible – not only in terms of how Jesus interprets Hebrew Bible doctrine but also internal to the Hebrew Bible. Hence, in the Ten Commandments, God promises to visit the guilt of parents on their children and subsequent generations (Exodus 20:5) but in both the books of Jeremiah (31:29-30) and Ezekiel (18:2-20) there is a retraction of this, stating that people will be responsible for their own sin, not for another’s. This strikes me as a progressive change within the Bible.

    Now, just as there now exists safe contraception, and just as there is more understanding and accommodation regarding divorce (which is condemned in some biblical passages), so understanding of gender and sexuality has been transformed, particularly in recent decades. There is much fuller understanding of gender and sex as being a spectrum rather than a binary and of human sexuality as much more complex than straightforwardly heterosexual, either by “natural order” (p.7) or divine design.[8] Why, if there is understanding that some humans are emotionally, psychologically, sexually, and spiritually fulfilled loving someone of the same sex, can same-sex marriage not be among the changes?

    1. Let me develop this point further. The report states firmly that “The Church of England has always believed and taught that sex is for marriage, and marriage is for sex” (p.9). Denying same-sex loving Christians a same-sex marriage, would also then deny them sex.

    This, of course, is the crux, the point of greatest division, and it is around this that much of the report circles. Same-sex marriage and homosexuality have drawn what journalist Mark Gevisser evocatively calls a dividing “pink line” – in multiple religious traditions, in marriage and sexuality debates, right around the globe. Indeed, the Bible could legitimate both same-sex inclusion and non-binary gender – because it is a dextrous text. Hence, creation of “male and female” could refer not to either/or but to male, female and everything in between – just as “old and young” and “great and small” can refer to a spectrum of ages or statures. Queer interpretations indeed offer a myriad of inclusive readings, which celebrate eunuchs as genderqueer, and the same-sex love of David and Jonathan, the Centurion and his servant, Ruth and Naomi.

    And openness to change need not mean “anything goes.” Of course, there are bounds – one such bound must be an insistence on informed consent for sex and for marriage, for instance. For this reason, I have been among those who welcomed a recent change in UK marriage law, which raised the age for marriage to at least 18 years in every case – in recognition of the magnified scope for exploitation and compromised consent of someone even younger marrying or entering civil partnership, even with parental consent.[9] Of course, ongoing discussion, including in the light of fuller understanding and growing knowledge, is important. But the reasons for resisting change in the face of new knowledge and understanding (e.g. knowledge about the nuances of human gender and sexuality) should be strongly interrogated, lest they rely on discrimination or prejudice. After all, there are biblical texts that refer to the “holy seed” and which express strong objection to marriage between different people groups (Ezra 9:1-4; Nehemiah 13:23-27), yet prohibition of miscegenation is nowadays considered straight-out racist (and in the USA, unconstitutional). Is resistance to same-sex marriage not straight-out homophobic? And if not, why not?

    1. Ultimately, the report concludes very little. It speaks (at length) of whether the “envelope” of the Church can or should be enlarged, or whether more inclusion would tear up a “God-given institution” (p.16). This is how the report ends. The report expounds and proffers possibilities for change and inclusion – and then retracts and dashes them.
    2. This blog is called “Via Media,” “the middle road,” referring to a path between extremes. Perhaps my alternative theses seem too strident, too extreme, for a middle road. My reply would be that right now, when very many minoritized groups, including queer and same-sex loving members of the human family, are ever more vulnerable in a world where sinister political forces are emboldening the weaponization of biblical texts while efforts to advance equity, diversity and inclusion are under attack, those of us who can speak out and can (or could) marry in the Church of England, have to speak out for those who cannot.

     

    Professor Stiebert has now published a further piece on the response to this blog post, on https://shilohproject.blog/a-response-to-a-response-to-a-response-yep-its-marriage-again/ 

    [Many aspects alluded to in this piece are developed more fully in Saima Afzal and Johanna Stiebert, Marriage, Bible, Violence: Intersections and Impacts (Routledge, 2024)]

    [1] All my references to theses and pages pertain to the report.

    [2]  In Numbers 31 men take little girls (v.18) in a war depicted as divinely sanctioned (31:1-3). Surely such sexual enslavement marriage is not what Thesis 2 has in mind when referring to marriage as “God’s gift.”

    [3] In Hebrew, there is one word for woman/wife and for man/husband. Context and/or translators’ choices determine which English word is used.

    [4] Numbers 5, while one of the longest legal texts about a scenario in a marriage and how it ought to be resolved, rarely features in discussions of marriage in the Bible. I could not find reference to the passage in either the compendium or the report. To be fair, the sources cited favour Christian texts, which is fair enough. Genesis 1-3 features very prominently in the compendium in particular.

    [5] Why these other forms of marriage fall short, or why later Hebrew Bible narratives tend not to make any such deficiency explicit, is not clarified in the report.

    [6] The story of Adam and Eve is also used to condemn homosexuality, non-binary gender, transgender, polygamy, polyamory, and divorce. Preoccupation with the story and with its reference to “one flesh” is already in evidence in the New Testament (e.g. Mark 10:8; Ephesians 5:31).

    [7] The report makes clear that children are not required for marriage to be valid or meaningful. It explains that marriage is the proper context for raising children, not that raising children is the purpose of marriage (p.13).

    [8] The report refers to “men and women being ‘diverse in their emotional, mental and spiritual lives, their way of experiencing and responding to reality’” – which difference it believes is instantiated in marriage to the benefit of society. It is the core argument made in the submission to the government consultation on equal marriage in 2014: “The uniqueness of marriage – and a further aspect of its virtuous nature – is that it embodies the underlying, objective, distinctiveness of men and women” (p.14). This emphasises a binary distinction that can be and has been plausibly questioned – as is acknowledged in the report, too (p.15).

    [9] This is in reference to the UK Marriage and Civil Partnership (Minimum Age) Act 2022.

  • Can the Church of England be Mature about Love?

    by Revd Canon Neil Patterson, Vice-Dean of Bristol Cathedral and Chair of Together for the Church of England

    As readers are probably aware, a set of liturgical resources known as the Prayers of Love & Faith (PLF) were commended by the House of Bishops for use in the Church of England in December last year and are available here. Whatever the shortcomings of the texts felt by some, these are important as the first official encouragement to pray with same-sex couples for the flourishing of our relationships. Inasmuch as the Church of England’s doctrine is defined by liturgical texts rather than dogmatic statements, they constitute the decisive point on the Living in Love & Faith journey where the Church has acknowledged that same-sex couples exist and are a good thing, even if we are still corporately a bit unsure what sort of thing that is.

    So it was a delight to recently attend a service where the Prayers were used for two friends of ours at a regular service at a cathedral. It was not quite ‘regular’ to the extent that the congregation was swelled by a substantial number of family and friends, close relatives read the lessons, and the music was provided by a superb choir assembled from friends for the occasion. But liturgically, it conformed entirely to the rubrics for the Prayers – it was a joyful service of Evensong, with the couple sitting in ordinary seats with everyone else, and the short prayers for and by them taking place alongside the intercessions towards the end.

    I do still hope for a Church of England in which same-sex marriage in church happens and, in the short term, for  ‘standalone’ services, i.e. for the use of the PLF to be accepted for a free-standing service devised for a particular couple (though it is already unclear how adding hymns, Scripture readings and other prayers – all of them already permitted in other services – to the commended PLF would render them unauthorised). This is especially important if we are to welcome those for whom a regular liturgy like Evensong would be inaccessible, as well as for the practicalities of time and date. But I reflected that the service I attended felt like a more mature Christian celebration of what was happening than many church weddings I took in my parish ministry.

    What I mean is that my friends were not at the beginning of their relationship – they remembered that, as a very new couple, they had attended my own civil partnership in 2017 – and have shared a house for some time. Their own legal partnership was in fact a little while ago, but this was the occasion when they felt ready to celebrate publicly, with family and friends, and to seek God’s blessing for the years ahead, as devout and serious Christians.  And for that the modest prayers, within a service which was chiefly an act of praise to God, seemed thoroughly appropriate.

    But is this not usually the situation for those marrying in church? I can only recall a single wedding I have taken where the couple were not already cohabiting, and that was because the groom was in the RAF and so (as I understood) not provided with married accommodation. And after marriage there is limited change in legal identity – as far as I can tell there is no pressure from  conservative Anglicans to revert to the situation before the Married Women’s Property Acts of 1870 and 1882, when all property was held in common (but controlled by the husband) or before the case of R v. R in 1991 when a wife’s body was held to belong to her husband (following 1 Corinthians 7) and so he was immune from any charge of rape. Yet we still purport to undertake some sort of existential change in a church wedding, taking two ‘single’ people and making them into something else, but I am not sure that we know what.

    Living in Love & Faith has focussed the attention of the Church with painful rigour on those of us in same-sex relationships, scrutinised as never before and now held by some to be responsible for many ills including, apparently, the decline in vocations to ordained ministry.  But I wonder if in fact we may be pointing the way to a more mature, less fairytale, understanding of all committed relationships. There have been official CofE documents on marriage occasioned by accepting the reality of divorce in 1999, or resisting same-sex marriage in 2013, and both are skewed by their contexts.  The LLF book treats it more widely, but evades the messy reality of forming relationships that leads to marriage. Until we can talk about this more honestly, we will have little credibility on the subject at all.

     

  • Clergy Summer Quiz: the Answers!

    by Anon.

    Thanks to all who sent in answers to this year’s brainteasers. Our quiz received many interesting responses. But now to those all-important answers! If you haven’t yet had time to do the quiz, just go back to it now and see how you do.

    1.  What is the approximate population of your diocese? How many parishes does your diocese have? How many Churches? What percentage identify as Christian? What percentage of Christians are committed in terms of a fraction (i.e., a bit; quite a bit; sometimes; depends on what else is happening this weekend; a lot; “I’m retired”; etc)?

    ANSWER: These figures are all available in the Church of England Yearbook. We don’t give any points for copy-and-paste responses.

    To the nearest 100,000. how many tea lights were used in your diocese last year?

    ANSWER: Only Sodor and Man score under 1,500,000. Over 50% of dioceses score more than 3,000,000. An important indication of the likely number can be found in the most recent Annual Report of the Church Commissioners in their section on new derivatives ventures. Please note that candles do not count as fossil fuels under the policy adopted by General Synod, as nobody ever got warmed up by tealights.

    2.  How many stipendiary clergy are working in the diocese?

    ANSWER: (c) that’s a problem for the Archdeacon (obviously)

    3.  The solemn declaration made before your ordination or first licensing in the diocese that “In public prayer and administration of the sacraments I will use only the form prescribed in the Book of Common Prayer or a form authorised by lawful authority and none other” means

    ANSWER: it should be (e), ‘What it says’, but we affirm the Anglican Via Media principle in ultimately determining such matters, and recognise that clergy must find a way between the letter of the law and pastoral pragmatism.

    4. True or false, with extra points for naming these authorities: 

    (a) ‘The Church of England is a device for allowing agnostics to remain in the church’   

    ANSWER: True; the quote is from Yes, Prime Minister, with thanks to Sir Humphrey.

    (b) ‘One good thing about being an Anglican is that it doesn’t interfere with your politics or religion’  

    ANSWER: True; Richard Holloway.

    5.  “I can hold my hand on my heart and honestly say that I have obtained a faculty when making changes in a church or in the vicinity of a church”:

    ANSWER: We deducted a point for anyone ticking option (d), ‘Obtained a what?’, but affirm the Via Media principle for answers (a) to (c).

    6.  An Anglican clergyperson requesting permission from the bishop to conduct a burial service for a Baptist should expect the following reply from the Archdeacon:

    ANSWER: (a) “I am currently out of the office…if your matter is urgent please…” (obviously)

    7.  When I see the number 1662, I know that this refers to…

    ANSWER: We are happy to confirm that all the options (a) to (o) are correct. However, we have been asked to make some important corrections and clarifications:

    (e) in inches, normal social distancing at a Cof E BCP 8 a.m.: while this is correct, as readers have pointed out, this is the minimum distance in such services. All eye contact should be avoided, and handshakes are prohibited before, during, or after the service. These were Cranmer’s original rubrics.

    (f) the predicted number of stipendiary clergy left remaining within the CofE by 2034, that being the 500th anniversary of the creation of the national church by Henry VIII (who started it all off with a change to the doctrine of marriage): correct, but as the doctrine of marriage was changed in 1534 by Henry VIII, this has some bearing on how LLF is debated by those claiming the CofE has only ever upheld the ‘traditional’ doctrines of marriage (whatever they are). Henry VIII was married six times. Two marriages were terminated by divorce, one wife died naturally, and one wife survived him. The remaining two were beheaded. The LLF Facilitation Group has yet to consider execution as a means of preserving the traditional teaching on marriage and, though drastic, it plainly avoids divorce so could be commended. However, a working party is looking into this. Henry was the Supreme Head of the CofE, as are his descendants. We did not consider James I’s intimate relationships with other men (e.g., Somerset, Villiers, Lennox and Buckingham, etc) as important, as the king still had eight children by his wife, Anne of Denmark. Clergy completing this quiz should not infer that just because James I shared a bed with many of his male favourites and kissed and caressed them in public, he was in any way bisexual or homosexual.

    The important thing to remember is that as Supreme Head of the CofE James I didn’t divorce his wife, Anne. So after Henry VIII had changed the doctrine of marriage there were no further changes – until Charles II, Mary II, William III, Queen Anne and probably others. But as they (mainly) produced legitimate heirs, LLF does not propose to take a view on what the Supreme Governor and Head of the CofE have got up to after office hours in their spare time.

    After all, Iwerne Camps were full of Real Men, some of whom were married, and some “single for the Lord” (and for the boys), so we don’t need to debate the finer points of marital fidelity in the CofE if the doctrine of marriage is still being upheld. It has always been clear in the CofE. Are we all clear?

    (i) the number of people likely to be employed at your Diocesan HQ, if current trends continue. (Please don’t worry, as this expense is fully covered. That is what the Diocesan Parish Quota Share is for): correct, though I have been asked to point out that as most Bishops consider the ‘fundamental unit’ of the CofE to be the diocese, it really doesn’t matter if there are no employees further afield outside Diocesan HQ. The House of Bishops have responded: “That’s your problem, not one that central staffing can resolve (although we could always employ another Diocesan Strategy Enabler or Resource Advisor for Growth to look into your issues and concerns, and report back in 2032?). The new mission statement for all dioceses is ‘keep growing staff numbers at central HQ, and let the peasants eat their brioche’. We are all striving for that. If you are not, chances are you will not be replaced when you leave/retire/are unlucky enough not to have your PTO renewed, etc….”.

    (k) the most difficult posture in the Anglican Kama Sutra, reserved only for male clergy who cannot in conscience accept women priests or bishops. Please note, this requires four participants, with each person required to assume the pose of the relevant number. Due to the potential hazards of this position, it should only be attempted after a risk assessment has been undertaken, and a PEV must be present at all times during the actual act: apologies to those who found this question difficult. We should have added that during this positional enactment, no mobile phones or recording devices are permitted. However, the PEV is equipped with a stopwatch, so each participant has the same amount of time in each position. We should also have reminded readers of the ‘safe word’ or phrase in the event of something going wrong, or someone feeling uncomfortable. For those ordained before 2012, the safe phrase is “motion to move to next business”. Those ordained more recently must audibly exclaim “Mutual Flourishing!”. Both phrases bring any action to an immediate halt, and result in complete disengagement.

    (m) the number of complaints made against the Secretary General of the Archbishops’ Council and NST last year. Correct, but I am also asked to point out that due to the high volume of complaints, and the necessity of all these being handled internally by hand-picked members of NCI’s or the Archbishops’ Council, the whole business of a complaints policy regarding senior personnel has been rendered unworkable. The Secretary General has asked me to say that because no complaints are ever upheld, and due to the time-consuming fuss of going through the motions of a policy and process, there will now be a moratorium on all future complaints. From hereon, all complaints will be treated as deliberate nuisance, and all complainants will be treated as vexatious litigants, liable for counter-litigation and costs if there are any complaints about the ineffectiveness of complaints. So, if you don’t want to be hit with a huge legal bill, don’t ever complain. Simple.

    (n) the number of Mission Enablers employed in the CofE: correct, though probably underestimated.

    (o) the coded number of the Beast in Revelation, according to my colleagues at our local HTB Plant. Apparently if you take the two 6s away, then join the remaining numbers of 1 and 2 together to make a 12, then divide the 12 by the numbers remaining (which is 2), that equals 6. So, the 1662 BCP is actually a code for 666 as set out in Revelation 13. A series of talks is now available on the God Channel and YouTube. And there are books. Correct: and you have been warned.

     

  • Marriage, but not LLF

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

    We are hearing much about marriage as the Living in Love and Faith process continues. But there is another aspect of marriage – this time, opposite-sex marriage – where I believe the Church of England should do much better.

    In a previous article on Via Media, published in 2022, Revd Sorrel Shamel-Wood told the story of her ordination as priest being deferred because she had recently got married. The ‘problem’ was that, even though her new husband was a priest, he had been divorced and his former wife was still alive. Sorrel had been ordained deacon already, with no impediment, and had she deferred her marriage she could have been ordained priest and been married later with no consequence. But, by marrying before ordination, she found herself caught up in the arcane and poorly known provisions of Canon C4. The directions given by the Archbishops under the Canon had not been significantly changed for many years, and specified that it would normally be necessary to wait at least three years after a relevant marriage before a candidate could be ordained.  By the time of Sorrel’s case it was generally understood that this three year period was a fixed requirement. In fact the Archbishops always retained a discretion, which they were eventually able to use, though Sorrel’s ordination was still delayed.

    But why should Canon C4 be there in the first place? Sorrel’s story is not the only example of this Canon failing the Church of England and making it look rather ridiculous. But, because the provisions touch on deeply personal matters, these stories are not well known. Many candidates have been advised to defer marriage until after ordination to avoid the complications of the Canon. An organisation which claims to value marriage encouraging ordination candidates to delay their marriages? Does that make any sense?

    And here is another fact that should be more widely known: over 30 years, one in six ordinations has – like Sorrel’s – required the intervention of the Archbishops under the Canon – one in six – and that is quite apart from those who have actually taken the advice offered to them to defer their marriage. That is some 2,500 faculties issued in 30 years – an average of over 80 each year. Yet when Amending Canon 9 was passed by General Synod in 1991 such exceptions were expected to be rare.

    Most members of the Church of England, even of the General Synod will likely be totally unaware of the practical ramifications. Here as in so much of church practice, processes have varied in different Dioceses – some candidates have been required to attend a panel interview on the subject of their marital history. Clergy who have remarried after divorcing abusive spouses have been told that the former spouse will have to be contacted, even if this might be a safeguarding issue for the candidate or their children. Many candidates find the process intrusive.

    My conclusion is simple: Canon C4 needs to be amended, and I have a private member’s motion listed for debate in General Synod in February which seeks to achieve that. Rather than deciding so many cases are ‘exceptional’, we need to get to the root cause of the problem: the Canon itself.

    The debates leading up to the passing of Amending Canon 9 were tense and highly charged – including allegations that the doctrine of marriage was being changed, and legal action to try to get the amendments declared ultra vires. What was at stake? Those affected were both those like Sorrel – marrying a person who had a former spouse still living – and those who were themselves divorced with their spouse still living, and who had remarried.

    In contrast to former marriages, however, other relationships are not subject to the same scrutiny. This means, for example, that a brief and unwise youthful marriage when the candidate was not yet even a Christian is regarded with more seriousness than a long-term relationship into which children may have been born and which has now come to an end. In former times such a relationship would likely have been solemnized as a marriage, but times have changed. Focusing on remarriage can distort the pastoral understanding of a candidate’s history.

    I would like to encourage General Synod members to find out about how the Canon has operated locally, and to support my motion – and if you are not a member of General Synod, please encourage your reps to understand the issues and to offer their support. I have heard many personal stories which, because they are personal, I am not at liberty to share, and I’ll also have limited time to speak and need to deal with technical matters too. It would be good if other Synod members could come prepared to tell stories they know and have permission to share (there are clearly lots of them).

    These technical provisions buried in the detail of the Canons are not the subject of wide knowledge or popular debate, but when they affect so many lives and vocations it is incumbent on us to get them right. it is the human cost which is the real failing of Canon C4.

    This is my motion, currently scheduled for debate on the afternoon of Tuesday 27th February:

    Revd Mark Bennet (Oxford) to move:

    ‘That this Synod request that the Archbishops’ Council introduce the necessary legislation to remove the canonical impediment to ordination in respect of a person who has remarried and, the other party to that marriage being alive, has a former spouse still living; or who is married to a person who has been previously married and whose former spouse is still living.’

     

     

     

     

  • An End to an Injustice: And the Start of a Campaign

    by Sorrel Shamel-Wood, Curate in the Diocese of Oxford

    This morning, Wednesday 6th July 2022, I presided at the altar for the first time. It was at the Church of St Mary and St Berin, Berinsfield – a 1962 daughter church of Dorchester Abbey – and, from my vantage point facing east*, it felt like heaven was breaking through. There were nineteen of us in attendance.

    In some ways, it felt very special and remarkable: after all, it was my first time in this privileged position, and of course women could not be ordained in the Church of England until I was seven years old, so it’s never something I’ve taken for granted. But in a different sense, it felt very normal: the midweek Wednesday eucharist is a staple part of the worshipping life of our team, and has been forever. Many priests have stood and celebrated behind that altar in the past sixty years and, down the road at Dorchester Abbey, they have done so for the past fourteen hundred. I pray they will continue to do so for many centuries after I have left.

    Readers of this blog will know that I almost didn’t get priested at all. In February, I wrote an article for Via Media detailing how my priesting was delayed because my husband had previously been married to someone else. Many ordinands are affected by the Canon C4 regulations (the rule that a faculty has to be granted in order for a person to be ordained who has remarried following a divorce, or whose spouse has remarried following a divorce). Our case was particularly nonsensical, though, because my husband is the one who was previously married to someone else, but he was already a priest when we married so could happily preside at the altar without any ramifications. The story was also reported by the Church Times. It gained attention from some significant people, and many people who read it were outraged and perplexed by the situation.

    Then, on February 16th this year, there was good news. I was in the early stages of labour when my bishop rang, but I didn’t mention this to him because I knew what the conversation was about and I didn’t want it to be delayed a moment longer. He was excited to tell me that the archbishops had agreed in principle to grant an exception to the three-year rule regarding Canon C4 faculties and, all being well and with the wind behind us, I should be able to be ordained at Petertide. I try not to over-interpret the coincidences that take place in the world around us, but it did feel to me that there was something meaningful in the fact that my baby and the good news about my priesting came at the same time.

    It’s difficult to express how thankful I am that I have now been ordained priest. But it has been a frustrating, bewildering and at times overwhelming experience. For a start, people who don’t even know my husband know that he was previously married to someone else, which is something deeply personal and difficult for him, despite the circumstances being relatively amicable and straightforward. We even had trolls who don’t believe in divorce attacking us on social media, being horrible about our wedding photos and my wedding dress.

    I’m not naturally a campaigner or change-maker in personality, and yet I found myself campaigning for changes to the faculty rules. (And if you are a member of General Synod who is reading this, do please support Revd Mark Bennet’s private members bill to revoke the Canon C4 regulation altogether). All this has caused me to realise that, if I’m capable of campaigning for a relatively small injustice that affects me personally, I can and must campaign on behalf of those who suffer infinitely worse injustices than we have experienced, and perhaps this is a new aspect of my calling that I hadn’t really anticipated.

    In a weird, microcosmic corner of social media we found ourselves in the spotlight for a moment and, if I’m entirely honest, I can see how that sort of thing could become quite addictive. It catered to the vainer, more superficial aspects of my personality which many priests have, and which women tend to be castigated for far more than their male colleagues, and which I’m not keen to encourage in myself because they distract from our real purpose of pointing people to Christ.

    So I am very happy to be at the end of this strange, frustrating journey. It has been painful at times, but also filled with encounters with good people and much grace. But of course, this is only the beginning of what I hope will be many decades of serving the Church, God’s world and God’s people. As I prepared for priesting, I was repeatedly struck by the words which the Lord once spoke to St Francis, “Francis, rebuild my church! It has fallen into ruin”. This morning, as we got the church ready for the service, the organist opened a window and the entire window frame fell out. We don’t really have the money to repair it. But spiritually, of course, as well as practically, the Church is facing huge challenges in our generation. There is a riding tide of secularisation to grapple with. A gospel that needs to be proclaimed afresh in a rapidly changing world. There are injustices to fight, within and without the church. There are broken people that yearn for God’s healing and lonely, hurting, lost people desperate to know God’s love. It is now that the real work begins.

     

     

    * The layout of the church was reversed at some point in its history during renovations, so the altar is next to the font where the entrance used to be.