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Tag: unity

  • Alternative Ordinations and the Fracturing of the Church

    by the Revd Robert Thompson, Vicar St Mary’s, Kilburn & St James’, West Hampstead; host of Open Table, London; member of General Synod

    I was brought up in rural north of Ireland, in the Church of Ireland. The Anglicanism that formed me was shaped much more by conservative evangelicalism than by Liberalism or Catholicism. My faith was nurtured not only by Anglicans but by Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians and other Christians whose commitment to Christ was sincere and transformative. I have known the gifts of charismatic renewal, evangelical preaching and faithful discipleship across denominational boundaries.

    Yet my own spiritual home ultimately became the inclusive Catholic tradition of the Church of England. In making that journey, I have been deeply influenced not only by Anglican Catholicism but also by the wider Catholic tradition and by Orthodoxy. I have been drawn to their profound sense of stillness before the mystery of the God in Jesus Christ, their sacramental vision of creation, and their conviction that the material world, the human body and human relationships are places where God’s presence is revealed. At their best, these traditions hold before us a deeply positive vision of human dignity, grounded in the mystery of the Incarnation itself.

    That theological vision has shaped my ministry. It has taught me to seek Christ in other people, to work for reconciliation between divided Christians, and to recognise the dignity of those of other faiths and of none. In the diverse communities of Kilburn and West Hampstead, where people of many cultures, faiths and backgrounds live alongside one another, this is not simply a theological conviction but a practical necessity. Seeing the image of God in one another, and seeking the common good together, lies at the heart of how I understand Jesus in his portrayal in the Gospels and how I am called to follow.

    I found within the inclusive Catholic tradition of the Church of England a vision that was sacramental, rooted in tradition, intellectually serious, socially engaged and capacious enough to hold profound difference. That breadth has always seemed to me one of Anglicanism’s greatest gifts.

    Perhaps that is why a recent article by Andrew Atherstone, examining a further seven Church of England candidates ordained by bishops of the Reformed Evangelical Anglican Church of South Africa, troubles me deeply [1]. Whatever one’s views on Living in Love and Faith, this is now very clearly no longer simply a debate about sexuality. It is a debate about the nature of the Church itself. The Church of England has always contained disagreement. Catholics, evangelicals and liberals have often disagreed vigorously, sometimes painfully. Yet we remained committed to a common life. We worshipped together, discerned together and ordained together because we recognised that the Church belonged not to any one party or tradition, but to Christ. What Atherstone describes is not an isolated event. Alternative discernment processes, alternative training pathways and alternative ordinations are gradually creating parallel structures of authority. A Church that ceases to trust its own common life inevitably begins to fragment into competing constituencies, each accountable primarily to itself.

    As someone who has spent much of the last few years campaigning for greater independence and accountability in safeguarding, I understand why institutions can lose trust. Institutions sometimes fail. But the answer to institutional failure cannot simply be the creation of alternative institutions whenever we dislike the direction in which the wider body is moving. That path leads not to renewal but to separation.

    My ministry today is exercised in Kilburn, one of the most diverse communities in the country. Here questions of poverty, housing, mental health, migration, loneliness and community cohesion are not abstract policy concerns but daily realities. Our neighbours are Christian, Muslim, Jewish, people of other faiths and people of none. They come from every continent and speak dozens of languages. In such a place, Jesus’ commandment takes on a particular urgency: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and you shall love your neighbour as yourself” [2]. The neighbour is not the person who agrees with us. The neighbour is the person God has placed beside us. That is true within the Church as much as it is beyond it.

    When I look at the challenges facing our communities, I find it difficult to believe that the pursuit of theological purity is the primary calling of the Church. The Gospel repeatedly directs our attention towards reconciliation, justice, mercy and the building of communities in which people can flourish together. The New Testament consistently presents unity not as an optional extra but as a gift and calling. Writing to a divided Church in Corinth, St Paul insists that “the body does not consist of one member but of many” and that “the eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you.” [3]. Diversity is not a problem to be solved but a reality to be embraced within the life of Christ. That biblical image poses a challenge to every party in the Church. If the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”, neither can evangelicals say it to Catholics, nor Catholics to liberals, nor liberals to evangelicals.

    There is a further irony here. The alternative ordinations described by Atherstone are themselves a response to Living in Love and Faith and, more specifically, to the Church’s willingness to commend prayers for same-sex couples who have entered civil marriages. Yet at precisely the moment when some conservatives are constructing alternative systems of discernment, training, ordination and oversight, the Convocations of Canterbury and York, the historic assemblies representing the clergy of the Church of England, are being asked to approve revised Professional Guidelines that remain heavily focused on the conduct of individual clergy, including questions of relationships, marriage and sexual behaviour.?

    Mine is not an argument about discipline. It is an argument about consistency. One side of the present debate is concerned with the regulation of personal conduct. The other concerns the creation of parallel ecclesial structures. One addresses the lives of individual clergy. The other concerns the visible ordering of the Church itself. The development of alternative structures is neither private nor unseen. It is deliberate, organised and public. It is announced in conferences, websites, public statements and ordination services. Whatever one’s views on Living in Love and Faith, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that these developments raise profound questions about the Church’s common life and common order.

    The question becomes even more pressing in the light of the revised Professional Guidelines currently before Convocation. The Guidelines remind clergy that they serve under the authority of the bishop and commit themselves through the Oath of Canonical Obedience. They state that clergy should “respect and abide by the regulations or requests of the bishop of the diocese in which they serve” and insist that “unless and until a law is changed, the existing law must be kept.” The Guidelines are also intended to assist in determining whether conduct meets the standards required of a clerk in holy orders [4]. As a gay priest, it is difficult not to notice the contrast. Considerable energy is devoted to regulating the intimate lives and relationships of clergy, while far less attention appears to be given to the public construction of alternative structures of discernment, ordination and oversight.

    Historically, Anglicanism has sought to hold together right belief, right conduct and right order. Yet contemporary debates often seem to focus overwhelmingly on the first two while paying remarkably little attention to the third. As a result, many clergy will inevitably ask whether the Church’s concerns are being applied consistently. If we devote enormous energy to questions of personal conduct, should we not also devote equal attention to developments that reshape the structures through which we discern vocation, exercise ministry and express communion? The revised Guidelines remind clergy that they are called to promote peace and reconciliation in the Church and in the world and to strive for the visible unity of Christ’s Church [5]. That aspiration seems difficult to reconcile with the emergence of structures whose purpose is increasingly to create a church within a church.

    Of course there are moments when conscience demands resistance. There are times when the Church must reform. Yet Anglicanism at its best has always sought to hold together what others would separate. It has understood that living faithfully with disagreement is often harder, and more Christian, than walking away.

    The question before us, then, is larger than Living in Love and Faith. Can the Church of England remain a Church broad enough to contain genuine theological difference, or are we becoming a federation of tribes, each constructing its own structures whenever disagreement becomes uncomfortable? I still believe the Anglican instinct is the right one. We need one another because none of us alone possesses the whole truth. The tragedy of our present moment is not that we disagree. Anglicans have always disagreed. The tragedy is that we increasingly seem to doubt that disagreement can be held within a common life.

    In the seventeenth chapter of St John’s Gospel, on the night before his death, Jesus prays for his disciples “that they may all be one” [6] It is a prayer not for uniformity but for communion; not for agreement in every matter but for a unity rooted in the love of God. That prayer remains unfinished. It is a calling entrusted to every generation of Christians. Once we cease to believe that Christ can hold together people with whom we profoundly disagree, far more than a debate about sexuality is at stake. We risk losing confidence in the very prayer of Jesus himself. More profoundly still, we risk losing confidence in the God whose creative love is capable of holding together difference itself, the God who creates, sustains and reconciles all things.

    Notes

    1. Andrew Atherstone, “More Alternative Anglican Ordinations”, Law & Religion UK, 15 June 2026.
    2. Mark 12.30–31.
    3. 1 Corinthians 12.14, 21.
    4. Draft Professional Guidelines for the Clergy, Convocation of Canterbury FS(26)4, June 2026, especially sections 1–3 on clergy discipline, canonical obedience, episcopal authority and the obligation to observe existing law. Convocation is the historic representative assembly of the clergy of the provinces of Canterbury and York and is responsible for agreeing the Professional Guidelines for Clergy.
    5. Draft Professional Guidelines for the Clergy, paragraph 3.5: clergy are called to “promote peace and reconciliation in the church and in the world” and to strive for “the visible unity of Christ’s Church”.
    6. John 17.21.

  • Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word

    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:

    1. 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.
    2. 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.
    3. 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)

     

     

     

  • Marriage, Sabbath, Creation and Jesus’s Embodiment of Justice

    by the Revd Robert Thompson, Vicar St Mary’s, Kilburn & St James’, West Hampstead; host of Open Table, London; member of General Synod

    Like many, my deep disappointment at yesterday’s statement from the House of Bishops on the ending of the Living in Love and Faith process is charged with much anger too. The bishops have confirmed that no proposals will come to February’s General Synod on standalone services of blessing for same-sex couples, nor on permitting clergy or ordinands to enter same-sex civil marriages without canonical penalty. Once again, this position is presented as embodying the need for prudence, pastoral care, and church unity. But delay is never neutral. It is a decision, and this decision has a human cost.

    In the Church of England, we have already acknowledged the hurt caused to LGBTQIA + people by our teaching and practice. We have recognised that faithful same-sex relationships can bear the fruits of love, fidelity, patience, and self-giving. We have commended Prayers of Love and Faith as a sign that something has shifted. And yet, when it comes to equality that is visible, embodied, and trusted, equality that can stand on its own, we hesitate.

    Prayers may be offered, but only when embedded discreetly within other services. Love may be recognised, but not sufficiently to shape worship in its own right. Relationships may be affirmed, but not enough to allow those who live them to represent the Church publicly as priests. This is not full inclusion. It is calculated containment.

    Marriage and Creation

    Defenders of the status quo in our debates have often appealed to “creation” to justify this restraint. Marriage, we are told, is a gift of God given in creation and therefore cannot be changed. Doctrine, it is claimed, does not develop but is merely preserved. To alter the Church’s practice in relation to marriage or ministry would therefore be to abandon biblical faithfulness. But this appeal to creation is far less secure, biblically and theologically, than is often assumed.

    In the Genesis narratives, humanity is indeed created for relationship. It is “not good that the human should be alone” (Genesis 2.18), and human beings are created for mutuality and companionship (Genesis 1.26–28). Yet Adam and Eve are never described as being married. There is no ritual, no vow, no covenantal form, and no divine command instituting marriage as a fixed social or sacramental institution within the act of creation itself. Marriage, as a recognisable human institution, emerges later, shaped by kinship systems, law, property, and culture.

    The oft-quoted line that “a man shall leave his father and mother and cling to his wife” (Genesis 2.24) is not spoken by God but offered by the narrator, already presupposing settled social arrangements beyond Eden. Genesis gives us anthropology, an account of human relationality, not canon law.

    Sabbath and Creation

    By contrast, there is something in the creation narrative that is explicitly named, blessed, and sanctified by God: the Sabbath. Genesis tells us that God rests on the seventh day, blesses it, and makes it holy (Genesis 2.2–3). If anything can be said to be unambiguously “given in creation”, it is the Sabbath.

    This comparison and distinction matters profoundly. Because when Jesus encounters the Sabbath, not as a vague symbol but as a divinely instituted, creation-grounded command, he does not freeze it in place. Nor does he treat its creational status as a reason to resist reinterpretation. Instead, he makes a striking claim: “The Sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the Sabbath” (Mark 2.27).

    Jesus does not deny the holiness of the Sabbath. He fulfils it by re-articulating its purpose. A creation-given institution is revealed to exist for life, mercy, and human flourishing. When it is used to wound, exclude, or constrain, it has been misunderstood and is not honoured. This instinct lay at the heart of the teaching of the Hebrew prophets: the preservation of life takes precedence over rigid application of law.

    This pattern runs consistently through the Gospels. Jesus heals on the Sabbath (Matthew 12.1–14; Luke 13.10–17; Luke 14.1–6), restoring dignity where religious anxiety would have preferred restraint. He insists that mercy, not sacrifice, reveals the heart of God (Hosea 6.6; Matthew 9.13). Law is not abolished, but fulfilled, and fulfilment in biblical terms does not mean repetition, but faithful interpretation ordered towards life.

    Jesus’s and the Apostles’ hermeneutic of Justice

    Jesus’s way of reading Scripture is not an innovation imposed from outside Israel’s faith, but stands squarely within the prophetic tradition of Judaism, in which God’s commands are continually re-heard in the light of suffering, historical change, and the demands of justice. His teaching does not replace the law; it discloses its purpose.

    The same authority is evident when Jesus contrasts inherited teaching with his own words: “You have heard that it was said… but I say to you” (Matthew 5.21–48). This is not a rejection of Scripture, but a claim about how Scripture is to be read faithfully. Doctrine, in the deepest sense, is already dynamic here, not because truth is unstable, but because truth is encountered afresh as God’s purposes come into clearer view.

    The early Church understood this instinctively. Faced with the inclusion of Gentiles, the apostles did not cling rigidly to scriptural commands about circumcision. They observed the Spirit’s work among those once excluded, and concluded, “It has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us” (Acts 15.28). Scripture was not abandoned, but re-read in the light of lived faith.

    To deny the possibility of doctrinal development, then, is not conservative in any serious theological sense. The Scriptures of Israel themselves witness to a living tradition of interpretation, argument, and moral discernment, shaped by the conviction that God’s will is known most truly where life and dignity are upheld. Jesus stands within this tradition, intensifying its demands rather than abandoning its methods.

    If doctrine could not develop, the Incarnation would not deepen Israel’s story, the Resurrection would not widen the horizon of hope, and Pentecost would not mark an expansion of God’s life among God’s people. Christ would be reduced to a guardian of settled meanings, rather than the one in whom God’s purposes are brought into sharper focus and fuller light. In short, Christianity would not have come into being.

    Processing our Anger

    This brings us back to the present moment. The Church is being asked to believe that a same-sex relationship may be holy enough to be prayed for, but not holy enough to shape worship on its own terms. That a same-sex marriage may be lived faithfully by lay people, but becomes incompatible with holiness the moment a vocation to priesthood is discerned. That baptism incorporates all equally into Christ, yet ministry must still be rationed according to categories of suspicion. This is not theological coherence. It is a hierarchy of dignity.

    Appeals to unity and process cannot disguise this reality. Unity that depends on inequality is not Christian unity; it is institutional calm purchased at the expense of a minority’s flourishing. Acknowledging hurt while leaving intact the structures that cause it is not repentance; it is recognition without conversion.

    It is here that I locate the anger that charges my sadness. Like many colleagues I am now left in a place where I need to assess how best to respond to episcopal decision-making. Anger because I feel as if I been nothing but a faithful, committed and deeply-engaged Anglican for the entirety of my life and this feels like a resounding slap in the face. Like many I am now asking: at which point does active dissent to this decision-making become both morally and theologically essential and what forms should dissent take?

    There is a clear distinction between dissent born of impatience and resistance demanded by conscience. Ecclesial disobedience is not justified simply because progress is slow, a vote has been lost, or a desired outcome deferred. But there does comes a point when continued compliance itself also ceases to be morally neutral. It seems to me that this threshold is now met because of the convergence of four conditions:

    First, the harm must be real, ongoing, and acknowledged. In this case, the bishops themselves have named the hurt experienced by queer Christians. This is not speculative damage, nor the complaint of a disgruntled minority.

    Second, authority must know the harm and nevertheless maintain the policy that causes it. That border has also now been crossed. Delay is no longer inadvertent or provisional; it is conscious and defended.

    Third, the harm must fall disproportionately on a vulnerable group. Here it is borne most acutely by LGBTQIA+ Christians, particularly clergy and ordinands, whose vocations, livelihoods, and integrity are placed under sustained pressure.

    Fourth, appeals to unity or process must have become mechanisms of avoidance rather than means of discernment. That is now clearly the case here. Many of us have experienced this process as one that has led nowhere. When Procedure ceases to serve justice and instead becomes a way of deferring it the process itself loses any moral authority.

    When these four conditions are present, as they are now, obedience itself becomes ethically charged. Continued compliance is no longer a neutral act of loyalty; it is a decision that participates, however reluctantly, in the maintenance of actual structural harm.

    At this point, then, faithfulness may require something more demanding than patience. It may require acting as though the Church we proclaim already exists and accepting the cost of doing so. As Marika Rose, very much echoing Jesus on the Sabbath, writes in Theology for the End of the World: “Christian faithfulness is not about managing the world as it is, but about refusing to give ultimate authority to arrangements that deny life.” When ecclesial structures become arrangements that deny dignity, the call of the Gospel is not quiet endurance but truthful disruption.

    Jesus’s call to embody Justice

    The issue before the Church today is clear: it is whether we are willing to allow mercy, dignity, and life to be the criteria by which our doctrine and practice are shaped or whether we will continue to defend inherited forms even when they wound the very people in whom the fruits of the Spirit are already evident.

    That is not a question about sexuality alone. It is a question about what kind of Church we are becoming and whether we truly believe that Christ is alive enough to lead us somewhere we have not yet fully understood.

    Will we follow Jesus on the Sabbath? Will we with Christ embody God’s justice?

     

     

     

     

  • Cooking with Love and Faith

    by Nic Tall, member of General Synod and National Coordinator of Together for the Church of England

    The General Synod has met again. Once again, it has debated the current stage of Living in Love and Faith (LLF), once again the plans to move forward have been approved in all three Houses of the Synod, and once again this permission to proceed still has a significant minority of Synod in opposition to the proposals.

    One aspect of the debate was the selection of metaphors used in speeches – Fortnum and Mason port and Stilton hampers, Argos flat pack furniture, LLF being like a bus with some on board and others feeling run over. One metaphor which came up in several speeches, all opposed to the proposals, was that it wasn’t “oven ready”. That the phrase was used several times implies co-ordinated comms work from conservatives literally speaking from the same centrally pre-prepared text. “Not oven-ready” expresses a concern that there hasn’t been enough work done, that proposed pastoral guidance needs more time and more consultation before it is fit for purpose, and we should stick with Issues in Human Sexuality until its replacement.

    Since coming home from the debate, I have been thinking through the questions of process and this culinary metaphor, and I have been comparing the LLF process to baking bread. We have been following a recipe, collecting and mixing ingredients, kneading the dough, stepping back and leaving it to rise for a while, before returning to knock it back, squeezing the air out, more pushing, pulling and stretching before leaving it to rise again. A good baker knows that a time of proving before further kneading helps the structure and flavour of the bread, but repeat that process too often and you ruin it.

    Before I talk about how we have been cooking the bread of LLF, I want to think about how the House of Bishops prepared the meal that is Issues in Human Sexuality.  I recently spoke with someone who was in the room when Issues was written.  It was a document purely created by the House of Bishops, who we should remember at that point included no women and no openly LGBT+ people. There was no Programme Board, no working groups, no consultation with stakeholder groups or involvement with the wider church at all. The entire process came from the House of Bishops discussing among itself and then putting out its thoughts as a teaching document, not intended as the policy statement that Issues later became. The preface stated “We cannot expect all to agree with our conclusion and, indeed, in our discussions we encountered a wide variety of opinions… It is our hope that this Statement – which we do not pretend to be the last word on the subject – will do something ‘to help forward a general process, marked by greater trust and openness, of Christian reflection on the subject of human sexuality’”. Issues was cooked by a small group of episcopal chefs, and was not intended to be the final meal. More than thirty years since it was first served up it now become stale and few find it appetising.

    Given the lack of process leading to the half-baked Issues, what has been happening in the kitchen to cook up its replacement? LLF began with panels of experts gathering to compile material around theology, biblical studies, history and more which formed the LLF book, videos, podcasts and course. These were then made available to the whole church to study, discuss and pray about. From late 2020 through to mid 2022, all policy work was paused while the resources were used at the grassroots in parishes, benefices and deaneries. In the baking metaphor, this was a period of the LLF dough being left to rise. Then there was a consultation, the largest in the C of E’s history, capturing the feedback of over 6000 who took part in the course and following up with focus groups to drill down deeper into grassroots opinion. The results were a majority wanting liturgical affirmation of same-sex relationships, a quick decision so everyone knew where they stood and a strong desire for the church to remain together.

    Through the autumn of 2022, the House of Bishops developed their proposals, which were modest but deliverable and brought to General Synod in February 2023. Synod welcomed the proposals through a vote passed in all three Houses. There has since been further work considering refinement and implementation, including consultation with stakeholder groups, small working groups and facilitated conversations bringing together people with very different theological convictions, in-person talks with representatives from different constituencies, theological input from the Faith and Order Commission, legal support from the Church of England’s Legal Office and a further substantial debate in General Synod in November 2023 affirming the ongoing direction of travel. There have been a ‘Next Steps Group’ and a ‘Moving Forward’ video.

    In preparation for the July 2024 Synod, there were different working groups, more stakeholder consultations, a Programme Board, further meetings of the College and House of Bishops and more input from FAOC. And then at the most recent Synod a third major vote has yet again passed in all three Houses to affirm the ongoing direction of travel. We can safely say that the LLF dough has been thoroughly kneaded, shaped and proved. When we compare the many years and wide consultation of the LLF process to the short bishops-only cooking up of Issues, we can be sure that we are in a much better place that will be more widely owned by the whole church once this dish comes out of the oven.

    We also have to remember who the chefs are in preparing this meal. The commending of liturgy and the issuing of pastoral guidance is the responsibility of the House of Bishops.  When Issues was published, it did not require Synodical approval; it was a document from the Bishops. Its replacement will also not need the approval of Synod. The House of Bishops have been much more sensitive this time around in ensuring wide consultation and involving people outside their number. The new pastoral guidance will not be something created in a closed room by a small group of outwardly straight men and then passed down from on high. It has been a collaborative process, with the bishops supported by Synod, FAOC, stakeholders, the Legal Office and all our parishes and deaneries who invested time with engaging.

    But now it is down to the House of Bishops to complete the process by putting it in the oven to bake. That is their job, and it is not for the rest of us to interfere. Neither will it help if we insist on continually opening the oven door to check how it’s getting on. Too many cooks will only spoil the meal.

    So, once the well-prepared dough of LLF that we currently have has been properly baked, brought out and left to cool, I hope we will be able to gather together to enjoy the breaking, sharing and eating. And I hope that will be around one table, where all are called, including our LGBTQIA+ family members who are usually only offered crumbs under the table. I hope also that our more conservative family members will also be at the feast around the one table, and not feel that they have to sit in another room apart from the rest of us.

    I hope that shared meal comes very soon, as many in the church, especially LGBTQIA+ people, are hungry and are needing to be fed.

  • Holy Discomfort: Time to Restore the Unity of the Church?

    by Theo Hobson, who has written various books and articles about the  Church of England and theology and writes regularly for The Spectator. He blogs at theohobson.com

    1 Kings 3: 16-28

    One day two women came to King Solomon, and one of them said:

    “Your Majesty, this woman and I live in the same house. Not long ago my baby was born at home, and three days later her baby was born. Nobody else was there with us. One night while we were all asleep, she rolled over on her baby, and he died. Then while I was still asleep, she got up and took my son out of my bed. She put him in her bed, then she put her dead baby next to me. In the morning when I got up to feed my son, I saw that he was dead. But when I looked at him in the light, I knew he wasn’t my son.”

    “No!” the other woman shouted. “He was your son. My baby is alive!”

    “The dead baby is yours,” the first woman yelled. “Mine is alive!”

    They argued back and forth in front of Solomon, until finally he said, “Both of you say this live baby is yours. Someone bring me a sword.”

    A sword was brought, and Solomon ordered, “Cut the baby in half! That way each of you can have part of him.”

    “Please don’t kill my son,” the baby’s mother screamed. “Your Majesty, I love him very much, but give him to her. Just don’t kill him.”

    The other woman shouted, “Go ahead and cut him in half. Then neither of us will have the baby.”

    Solomon said, “Don’t kill the baby.” Then he pointed to the first woman, “She is his real mother. Give the baby to her.”

    Everyone in Israel was amazed when they heard how Solomon had made his decision. They realized that God had given him wisdom to judge fairly.

     

    This story came to mind recently as I pondered what’s happened in the C of E while preparing to speak to the trustees of WATCH, Women and the Church. Maybe it’s a bit self-righteous to put ourselves in the place of the true mother who eschews self-interest and just wants the safety of the baby, and to say that the traditionalists are happy for the church to be cut in two if they can’t have it all.

    But the story does perhaps sharpen our thinking about division and unity. In what sense is division acceptable, a pragmatic way forward? Solomon’s initial solution seemed to be fair on both women, to respect the rights of each – but it forgot, or pretended to forget, the even deeper truth, that the baby’s life mattered above all.

    You could say that the Church has forgotten this – that it has been an anti-Solomon, allowing itself to be divided so as to be fair to both sides. The importance of unity has been sidelined – to bring it up is to question the wisdom of the Church.

    This signals a change of approach that I think WATCH should take. That also applies to other campaigning groups in the Church of England. Their main message should be the unity of the Church. And they should be wary of the language of rights, of discrimination.

    First let me say something about my own engagement with this issue. In my youth I was never very focused on the issue of the ordination of women – it didn’t feel like my business. I vaguely disapproved of the traditionalists being given so much space but when I heard female clergy complaining about this I still had a sense that it wasn’t really my business, and also that their campaign resembled secular campaigns for equal rights.

    When the Church finally decided to ordain women as bishops I had a vague sense of – well, surely it’s all over now, so surely we don’t still need campaigning rhetoric from the women clergy. It felt like they were being sore winners, stuck in campaigning mode, echoing the rhetoric of identity politics.

    On one level I knew that the issue was about the division of the episcopate, and therefore of the Church. But I didn’t really focus on this. Maybe because the issue of episcopal unity felt rather Catholic, and I’m not very high church so maybe that’s not my concern. Also, most Anglo-Catholics seemed ok with alternative episcopal oversight, so maybe it wasn’t a problem.

    A few years ago my attitude changed a bit. I visited a local parish where the priest is Forward in Faith but the parishioners seemed mostly unaware of their allegiance. It felt like a hindrance to the C of E’s identity, that this dissenting body was tolerated.

    Also, I didn’t like the idea of a big theological issue – the unity of the Church – being off-limits, just because it was so contentious. I became suspicious of the idea that both sides had agreed not to re-open the wound, not to question the other side’s right to exist. The Church had decreed that it was virtuous to accept this form of disunity, and unhelpful to re-start the old painful debate by questioning the Act of Synod.

    I began to think – why don’t WATCH come out and say that alternative episcopal oversight should be ended? The reason, of course, is that the Church has de-legitimised that position – to speak of re-unifying the Church has become taboo, for it means wanting to exclude a portion of one’s fellow Anglicans. But what a strange situation – that a Church should strongly discourage the desire for unity, treat it as a subversive desire.

    So that’s my analysis of where we are – WATCH has a dilemma. Should it demand the repeal of the current arrangement, and sound aggressive and un-Anglican? Or should it accept the basic set-up, but call out instances of discrimination? If so it is forced to sound like a marginal campaigning group, complaining about the status quo, but not daring to try to change it.

    The current approach, it seems, is a half-way house: it says that the whole set-up is discriminatory, but doesn’t quite follow through with this and call for its repeal. And it stays within a rather secular framework of rights, when its approach could be more boldly theological.

    How can we get out of this rut? I suggest we need a new narrative.

    It comes from seeing that since 1993 we have not been living in normal times – and acknowledging this is only slowly growing on us. In normal times, the moderate centre of the Church defends its unity from factions on each side. But in recent decades the moderate centre of the Church has condoned disunity.

    So, the old idea is still ingrained in us, that bringing unity is what the moderate centre does. We are still not really used to the new era, in which the moderate centre gives its blessing to disunity. And of course so do the traditionalists. The conservatives and the moderate centre have agreed to define unity in a spurious way – to say that it means peace between separate factions – but no church has ever really survived with that idea of unity, with a divided body of bishops. And the Church is now being asked by some conservative evangelicals to do this again over the gay issue.

    It’s a weird state of affairs, that the ideal of unity must be reasserted, but now from the fringe. And I suggest that WATCH has not quite grasped this, in its campaigning – it still sounds like it is representing the interests of a minority, a faction.

    The real task is to launch a new sort of campaigning rhetoric. To say, let’s restore the unity of the Church. It’s the rhetoric that used to be owned by Anglo-Catholic traditionalists, but they have now lost ownership of it, by condoning a divided episcopate – so it’s for liberals to own it.

    This means moving away from the rhetoric of rights, and instead for liberals to present themselves as the champions of unity. The language of rights is unhelpful, because the traditionalists also have rights, according to the official policy of the Church. For liberals to assert the superiority of their rights, because they align with general human rights, sounds secular, and allows the traditionalists to sound more boldly Christian.

    Such a move will attract criticism – that this approach is aggressive, that it seeks to kick out the traditionalists. But this will wake people up to the reality: that the desire for unity has been de-legitimised.

    Is this what a movement such as WATCH is for? I think it could be said that if WATCH doesn’t make this move it is contributing to the status quo. It endorses the official view that unity has been redefined, that a united episcopacy is an illegitimate goal. To put it more provocatively, WATCH can be seen as obscuring the issue of the Church’s disunity. For the average liberal thinks, Oh that’s the job of WATCH, to challenge alternative episcopal oversight, it’s their issue. But of course the unity of the Church is the concern of all.

    If WATCH does move in this direction, its name might be a problem, for its name ties it to the rhetoric of minority-rights-campaigning. To go back to my engagement with the issue, I assumed it wasn’t really my business – because of the word ‘women’. But a campaign to re-unify the Church would have got my attention, drawn me in.

    In conclusion, I think that WATCH has a fascinating challenge. Today, it has a special role in re-unifying the Church. Why? Because the rest of the Church has drifted into accepting disunity as normal, inevitable. Only here is there a real discomfort at disunity – a holy discomfort that can lead to renewal.