by Revd Ruth Harley (Vicar, Cowgate and Priest in Charge, Newbiggin Hall)
When General Synod meets in the coming week, the Archbishop of York will move a motion beginning “that this Synod recognise and lament the distress and pain many have suffered during the LLF process, especially LGBTQI+ people.” This is the start of the motion (coming from GS 2426) which effectively brings the long Living in Love and Faith process to an end, with no progress made towards greater equality for LGBTQI+ people within the Church of England.
This is not the first time we have seen an LLF motion before Synod which starts like this. Compare and contrast the motion brought to Synod in February 2023 (from GS 2289): “That this Synod… lament and repent of the failure of the Church to be welcoming to LGBTQI+ people and the harm that LGBTQI+ people have experienced and continue to experience in the life of the Church.”
Recognise, lament, repent… none of these are quite an apology for harm done, though they may be spun that way. And indeed apologies have been given, in statements from the House of Bishops and on the floor of Synod. In the ‘letter to the church’ issued by the House of Bishops in January, they acknowledge that “many, holding a variety of convictions, have felt, and still feel, bruised, hurt or unsafe by the conversations and the discussions we have had, particularly LGBTQI+ people. We are very sorry that the process has become so protracted and painful.” They are sorry, we are assured. But evidently not sorry enough to make any real changes.
The House of Bishops apparently wishes to “recognise and lament the distress and pain” which this process and the church’s stance on same-sex relationships causes to LGBTQI+ people. But it does not wish that lament to lead to any material changes which might reduce that distress and pain by making a meaningful move towards the much-vaunted “radical new Christian inclusion” which Justin Welby called for (but, again, made no actual moves towards) back at the start of the long, drawn-out and ultimately fruitless LLF process.
For those of us who have been following the sorry saga of the Church of England’s conversations about sexuality for some time, there may be a bit of a sense of déjà vu about all this. Back in 2017 the report from the House of Bishops on the Shared Conversations (GS 2055), the rejection of which kickstarted the LLF process, proposed “establishing across the Church of England a fresh tone and culture of welcome and support for lesbian and gay people, for those who experience same sex attraction, and for their families, and continuing to work toward mutual love and understanding on these issues across the Church”. This is even further from an actual apology, but it serves the same function as the apology, lament and repentance we have already considered: it sounds like we are doing something, without actually making any real changes. I wrote about this at the time, and every word of that blog post, written almost a decade ago, could apply equally to the present situation. As I say, we have not made progress.
The problem with all these apologies and non-apologies, laments and calls for repentance is three-fold:
- They are deceptive. They imply something which is not true. They imply that there is a real care and concern for LGBTQI+ people in this process, which has never been there. They also imply a hope for change – because surely if you can see and hear and lament that your siblings in Christ are suffering because of your actions, you will change your actions? – which again is not substantiated by the (lack of) actions of those making these statements.
- They devalue the very concepts they claim to espouse: lament, repentance, apology. These are things which should mean something. And when the action undermines the words, that meaning is eroded. Repentance, in particular, is a concept which carries weight in the life of the church. It is about turning away from past sin, from past perpetuation of harm. To claim repentance, and indeed lament, while continuing to perpetuate the same harm is at best disingenuous, and at worst deeply damaging to the body of Christ.
- They undermine the integrity and unity of the church. Our integrity is undermined when we do not speak honestly to one another about our present position or our future intentions. To claim, as the House of Bishops did in their ‘letter to the church’ that “we dare to hope that the LLF process will leave a legacy of greater inclusion of LGBTQI+ people in the life of the Church of England” while refusing to act in any way that might give substance to that hope, is deeply lacking in integrity. The unity of the church (repeatedly emphasised as a priority in the LLF process) is undermined when it is build on a fundamental unwillingness to acknowledge the true nature of our diversity and our divisions.
These are not small issues. A non-apology (or even an apology) which lacks substance, or indeed is undermined by the substance of the motion which follows it, is not just one more slap in the face to those of us faithful LGBTQI+ members of the Church of England who have engaged at such great cost in an ultimately fruitless exercise which has done nothing to move us towards greater justice and equality within the body of Christ, and indeed has (arguably) taken us backwards in some respects. It is also a statement which undermines the integrity of the body of Christ.
If we are going to move forward together, then we have to start by being honest with one another. An honest apology, lament or repentance will be backed up by real action which leads to real change. Without that, it is worse than meaningless, it is harmful.
Until that comes, perhaps the best we can do is to pray with the psalmist: “Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us, for we have had more than enough of contempt.” (Psalm 123.4)