Andrew Goddard writes: As the College of Bishops gathers in Oxford next week for its regular September residential, the Bishops of Penrith and Huntingdon remain Acting Bishops of Carlisle and Ely respectively and will probably be so into the second half of next year. It is also probable that there will be perhaps 5 or 6 bishops present who were interviewed to become Bishop of Carlisle or Ely but all of whom discovered that, in the words of the Archbishops—last December (York for Carlisle) and repeated exactly in July (Canterbury for Ely)—in both cases the Crown Nominations Commission (CNC), proved unable to “reach the level of consensus required to nominate a new Diocesan Bishop”.
That phrase signals that among the 14 voting members of the CNC (comprising three groups: the two Archbishops, 6 of the Central Members elected by General Synod, 6 Local Members elected by and from the diocese’s Vacancy in See Committee) no candidate had been able to secure the support of 10 of the members (at least two-thirds of voting members are required) and so be nominated to the Crown to fill the see. A fuller account of the processes of CNC discernment is offered in a section of my longer PDF article.
This situation is not unprecedented—there were similarly two failures back at the start of Justin Welby’s primacy with Hereford (March 2014) and Oxford (May 2015) and it seems that, as I discussed at the time, his own appointment to Canterbury was one where achieving the necessary level of consensus was also challenging. It is, however, highly unusual and concerning to have two failures in such quick succession. This means that the current CNC (including 6 pairs of new Central Members elected in July 2022—see details about the election and result) has in the first two of its five years failed to nominate in 25% of its 8 Commissions. In contrast, its predecessor did not fail in any of the 16 Commissions over its full five-year term.
One can imagine that at least informally there will be much discussion among the bishops about what is going on with CNC. It is particularly concerning since between 2016 and 2022 there have been several extensive formal reviews and Synod discussions and decisions concerning the functioning of CNC. For more details on these see again my longer PDF article.
The Archbishop of Canterbury’s statement after the Ely CNC made clear that
Together with the Archbishop of York and others, there will also need to be a period of reflection on the implications of this decision on the Church of England more generally.
It is noteworthy that, in contrast to the statements after the two previous failures, neither Archbishop offered reassurances, honoured the intentions of those involved, or expressed confidence in the CNC processes such as that the Commission
felt that we needed more time to discern the next stages for mission and ministry in the Diocese. Taking time over appointments is important and the Commission is utterly committed to finding the right person to be your Bishop (Hereford)
or that the outcome should be taken
as a sign of the CNC’s commitment to finding the right person to be your next bishop (Oxford).
Some people are quite clear, despite the strict confidentiality of the processes, that they know exactly what is going on. Anthony Archer, who served on CNC as a Central Member in 2005-07 and again in 2017-21 wrote in a Letter to Church Times, 19th July 2024 that
The failure of the Crown Nominations Commission (CNC) to nominate a candidate for the see of Ely (news story here) needs to be called out for what it is: a grotesque failure of a process taken over by a group of conservatives wanting to gerrymander the composition of the House of Bishops. It is misleading of the Archbishop of Canterbury to refer to a “lengthy process of discernment”. The members of the CNC who thwarted the process played no part in any discernment process. They simply came to the commission with little yellow notes in their back pockets reminding them of “LLF’ and “no women”. That is not discernment.
As Ian Paul wrote in response (Letter to Church Times, 26th July 2024)
unless someone in CNC has leaked information, he can have no idea of the dynamics. Should, for example, the appointment of someone eminently suitable have been blocked by liberal members who refused to compromise, Mr Archer would not know. Because of confidentiality, the members of the CNC can neither correct him nor defend themselves.
So, what evidence is there for these claims?
Possible reasons for no nomination (link to fuller PDF)
Because of the highly confidential nature of the process, even family and close friends of CNC members are kept in the dark about the discernment for any particular vacancy and members are unable to explain what has happened, how they acted, and why. It is therefore impossible for anyone other than the 14 present (whose perceptions will likely vary) to reach an informed judgment why any particular CNC did not reach the level of consensus required. This makes the current concern to understand and rectify the situation very difficult to address.
As with any failure to achieve the sought outcome from a process there are many possible contributory factors that might result in no candidate gaining 10 votes. Some might be judgments specific to the particular diocesan process – poor candidate performances at interviews, a belief that no candidate has clearly satisfied the needs of the diocese, insufficient consensus among Local Members, a lack of confidence in the management of the process.
As Archer’s letter makes clear, however, some believe that the problems arise because of more deep-seated fundamental questions relating to the publicly known, settled conscientious theological convictions of CNC members and their presumed consequent voting pattern across different nomination processes. Two have been highlighted in public commentary: attitudes to women bishops and attitudes to PLF/marriage/sexuality.
An “anti-women bishops” bloc on CNC? (link to fuller PDF)
In relation to opposition to women candidates another former CNC member, April Alexander, has highlighted this concern claiming that
if, as now, there are four members of the central CNC who do not support the notion of women as bishops…any successful candidate has to achieve 100 per cent of the remaining ten members. If a single member of the diocesan six is also opposed to women as bishops, then the die is cast against a woman bishop from the first day of the CNC deliberations (Letter to Church Times 17th May 2024).
The Bishop of Dover has gone further and spoken of the CNC as “diametrically opposed to women in leadership”. While it is true that 3 members out of the now 10 serving Central Members (Benfield, Dailey and Scowen) voted against women bishops it is not true that on any CNC there are always 4 central members opposed to women bishops. Under the new system the norm is that one member of each of the elected 6 central CNC pairs serves on each Commission. These 4 members are found in 3 different pairs and the other 3 pairs all comprise supporters. All Central Members were, of course, elected by General Synod whose members could check candidates’ voting records or ask them questions.
It is also the case that a person having voted against a development does not necessarily mean that, once the development has been duly accepted as the mind of the church, they would refuse to work with it. It is quite possible—we simply do not know—that some or all of the 3 who voted against women bishops have nevertheless voted for women candidates on CNC.
What we do know is that this CNC has nominated two women as bishops (Peterborough and Sodor and Man). This represents 33.3% of the 6 nominations (though only 25% of the CNC outcomes if one includes the two failures to nominate). The previous CNC (2017-22) nominated 5 women over 16 nominations, a very slightly lower proportion. While caution is needed due to various complexities and there are clearly issues that do need addressing here (again see the fuller discussion and figures in the PDF) it is not immediately obvious given these figures that, set in this wider historical context, the current CNC is more biased against women candidates in the ways being claimed or that these beliefs of its members explain the failure to nominate in Carlisle or Ely.
Whatever the views and voting of current members there is a clear and paradoxical but largely unrecognised bias embedded in the CNC process that may make it more difficult to appoint women. Women and men are, in reality, being considered for slightly different jobs because under the Lords Spiritual (Women) Act 2015 a new woman diocesan goes to the front of the queue for a seat in the House of the Lords. This means both
- that a woman has to be more obviously immediately capable for this role than a man (who would normally wait several years), and
- that a diocese appointing a woman will therefore have less of their bishop’s focussed time and attention from early in their position due to their responsibilities in the Lords, likely a concern for Local Members on CNC.
The current plan to extend this process of ensuring women bishops are in Parliament means that this situation is set to continue.
A more likely theological conviction shaping CNC discernment is the live political debate where (unlike women bishops) the mind of the Church of England has not clearly been settled and so views of new diocesans could prove decisive. This is more credibly a significant, even if insufficient, explanatory factor in the recent failures to nominate.
CNC, PLF, Clergy in Same-Sex Marriage and Marriage Doctrine (link to fuller PDF)
Both Carlisle and Ely final CNCs occurred in close proximity to key decisions in relation to PLF and the Synod voting records show both had 5 or more members opposed to those decisions. However, as in relation to claims about women candidates, the wider CNC reality is more complex. Of the six nominations by this CNC, two have not supported the House of Bishops’ direction of travel and two clearly supported it and also called for clergy in same-sex civil marriage as signalled by their support for the November 2023 open letter from 44 bishops.
Interestingly, the two less clearly committed on this question are the two women nominated and this may also be significant. Analysis of the signatories to that letter shows a much higher degree of support among female compared to male bishops especially among non-diocesans (see figures in fuller PDF). It therefore may well be that perceived bias against women candidates is masking or failing to consider the interaction of that debate with the current sexuality debate.
It might also be significant that where the views of nominated candidates are clearly known they represented continuity with the views of their predecessors. We have, in other words, yet to see a clear shift in the balance within the House as a result of CNC decisions. It could be that the failures in Carlisle (previously conservative) and Ely (previously revisionist) are a signal of the difficulty in securing the necessary 2/3 majority for an appointment that represents such a shift.
What is really going on? (link to fuller PDF)
If—and again so much here is speculation—PLF disagreements are a major factor, then the CNC problems are more like the symptoms pointing to an underlying disease. Previously workable processes no longer working may point to CNC acting like the canary in the coalmine. Perhaps when CNCs repeatedly find that they Could Not Choose a candidate we need to recognise that we are being warned that we are a Church Nearing Collapse.
The problem here, in other words, is wider problems in relation to how the church is handling its disagreements over possible liturgical and doctrinal developments. For example, many believe that the proper Synodical processes in relation to liturgical changes (Canon B2, also requiring two-thirds) are being bypassed. As I commented in a Facebook discussion of the Carlisle failure to nominate:
Unlike with Canon B2 and liturgy there is no equivalent to commendation to bypass the 2/3 requirement here.
We are, it seems, possibly entering a period led by the Archbishops and a majority (but only a small simple majority) of the current bishops in which there may be (1) a degree of “development of doctrine” and/or (2) permission to allow bishops to reach new and different judgments as to what episcopal actions are at variance with the teaching of the Church of England. In such a situation it would appear justifiable for someone on CNC to see it as their responsibility to refuse to vote in support of the nomination of a candidate for diocesan bishop who was known to be committed to changing that teaching and practice.
It is also at least paradoxical to argue that the church’s recent developments in relation to women bishops must be adhered to by all CNC members in their discernment process and voting but its historic doctrine of marriage need not, even must not, be determinative in making judgements about episcopal appointments. On this important question the 2017 Guidelines from the Archbishops raise significant questions (see fuller PDF discussion) in relation to CNC treatment of candidates opposed to church teaching. Perhaps the most stark and relevant concerns the extent to which “it would be for each individual member of the CNC to decide how much weight to attach to” such known views (para 19) or whether, and on what theological basis given the bishop’s calling and promises, it might be true that
the mere fact that a candidate had publicly questioned the Church of England’s teaching on human sexuality, or indeed that of the Anglican Communion as articulated in Lambeth 1:10, or any other significant part of Church teaching, would not be sufficient to raise any issue from this point of view…provided the views they express remain within the Chicago-Lambeth quadrilateral and demonstrate a serious and thoughtful attempt to engage with Scripture (para 21).
What now? (link to fuller PDF)
It seems likely there will now be pressure—perhaps from the Archbishops—to review CNC voting processes. Recently considered but rejected proposals, such as open not secret voting within the Commission, and the option to opt out by abstaining (and so reducing the total number of votes), might be put back on the table. There might even be those arguing that the bar needs to be formally lowered to less than two-thirds. These would, however, be widely seen in the context of already deep distrust in relation to LLF as, to reapply Archer’s critique of alleged conservative behaviour, “a grotesque failure of a process taken over by a group…wanting to gerrymander the composition of the House of Bishops”.
Such proposals, like the various CNC questions explored here, bring to the fore for all parts of the church the question of what it means to apply the pastoral principle of “pay attention to power”. It may be that, rather than simply focussing on CNC and its voting, the issues raised by CNC are pointing out to us the need to reflect on relational and power dynamics within LLF/PLF and within CNC processes and what recent events reveal about where we now are as a church.
Rather than rushing to find a procedural fix for CNC—where we are unlikely to find an easy new consensus—we perhaps need instead to step back and ask what God is saying to us at present through the messy life of the Church of England and wider Anglican Communion. We need to consider what CNC’s problems, and different perceptions of them and responses to them, are signalling about our theological disagreements, how we relate to each other, and our wider structures and procedures. What patterns of episcopal selection and ministry do we now need to develop as a church if we are to live well with our deep disagreements? If we do not explore these questions well then we may find ourselves constantly fighting one another and/or creating gridlock within our common life and soon vividly embodying the truth of Jesus’ words in Matthew 12.25:
Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and no city or house divided against itself will stand.
Revd Dr Andrew Goddard is Assistant Minister, St James the Less, Pimlico, Tutor in Christian Ethics, Westminster Theological Centre (WTC) and Tutor in Ethics at Ridley Hall, Cambridge. He is a member of the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC) and was a member of the Co-Ordinating Group of LLF and the 2023 subgroup looking at Pastoral Guidance.
Buy me a Coffee
1) ‘Bishop’ in the CofE sense is not a biblical position – in the NT ‘episcopos/bishop’ is simply another word for the office of ‘presbyter/elder’ and not a kind of ‘regional CEO’.
2) More importantly, the ruler of the Church is one Jesus, anointed by God as King of His people. Why does the appointment of a Church office require a ‘Crown Nomination Commission’ connected to the secular state in the first place?
Actually Anglicans, like Lutherans and Orthodox believe that their Bishops descend from the first Pope St Peter by apostolic succession, even if they have since broken away from the Roman Catholic church. The C of E is also established church whose supreme governor is the King so a CNC for Bishops is appropriate, not least as some of them, including as the article says new women diocesan Bishops immediately, will enter the House of Lords and become revisionist legislators in the UK upper house
Anglicans don’t believe any such thing. I am not sure where you get this stuff from…?
‘The Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Old Catholic, Swedish Lutheran, and Anglican churches accept the doctrine of apostolic succession and believe that the only valid ministry is based on bishops whose office has descended from the Apostles.’
https://www.britannica.com/topic/apostolic-succession
Amazingly, this is not where Anglican doctrine is found.
I will take the Encyclopædia Britannica definition thanks
The ordinal is pretty clear that only Bishops can ordain Bishops (not to mention Priests and Deacons).
Clearly the editors of Britannica ought to appoint Bishops to ensure ‘apostolic succession’.
What is an “apostle”?
What do they do?
Does Britannica have any authority here?
T1 – I’m about to lead a bible study series on I Peter, which after the gospels is probably the favourite bit of the NT for Anabaptists. So here’s a question – which is true apostolic succession; people who actually follow Peter’s teaching on things like state/church relations, or people who have a ‘line of succession’ from Peter but disregard Peter’s actual teaching???
And it’s all very well for you to keep going on about the CofE being the established church of England, but where is the scriptural back-up for that doctrine? Peter in that epistle and Jesus especially in his confrontation with Pilate teach a rather different arrangement; where do you get the idea that the English monarch or government have any authority to contradict Jesus and Peter???
Nothing at all in 1 Peter against established churches. Jesus himself anointed Peter as the founder of the church and first Pope. So apostolic succession is important to Anglicans like us even if not to evangelical Baptists like you!
You have an ideological agenda that is anti established churches and militantly evangelical and just interpret scripture accordingly
T1
Well just for starters references to Christians as a ‘diaspora’ and as ‘resident aliens’ even in the country of their birth due to their new allegiance to Jesus. And then the description of the Church as ‘God’s holy nation’, in contrast to the idea of superficially Christianised earthly nations.
I repeat, “which is true apostolic succession; people who actually follow Peter’s teaching on things like state/church relations, or people who have a ‘line of succession’ from Peter but disregard Peter’s actual teaching???” Remember those of Jesus’ Jewish opponents who were so proud of their descent from Abraham and were told “God can raise up from these stones children of Abraham.” All we ‘Gentile’ Christians are evidence of the truth of that…..
As far as I’m concerned I got my ‘ideological agenda’ precisely from scripture – those recommending the various established or similar positions seem to have little but an idea from outside scripture that “Surely God must want this….”
It is true that OT Israel was in effect an ‘established church’ – it is also very much the case that the ‘new covenant’ changes that, with Jesus seeking a ‘kingdom not of/from this world’, a kingdom of the born again by faith rather than of any earthly descent.
‘God’s holy nation’ could certainly be interpreted as having a church established in holiness for the whole nation. Jesus himself gave Peter the task of spreading his newly created Christian church as first Pope
T1
You say “‘God’s holy nation’ could certainly be interpreted as having a church established in holiness for the whole nation”.
How? Peter is writing to a Christian community living in a pagan territory; it is the Christian community which he describes as “God’s holy nation”, not the nation as a whole in which they lived. And he is actually quoting an OT text about Israel, comparing the Church to Israel. And throughout the epistle he addresses how this ‘holy nation’ is to live among the pagans, and bring people into the Church from among them, and advises the readers not to be ‘allotriepiskopoi’ – bossy-boots in other’s business. The holy nation are not to be established but rather to be ‘parepidemoi/resident aliens’ and a ‘diaspora’ scattered through not just a nation but the world. Almost the whole epistle is about ‘church in the surrounding world, not a church co-extensive with its state.
Simon/T1 ‘Jesus himself gave Peter the task of spreading his newly created Christian church as first Pope’
He did no such thing! That is a fantastical Roman reading, and has no basis in Scripture—as the Articles make quite clear.
Yes and England was historically a Christian nation when the C of E became the established Christian church. So nothing against established churches once a nation had become a Christian majority. There was no Christian majority nation when the Bible was written
Of course he did and if you reject the notion of apostolic succession then you are not Anglican and shouldn’t be in an Anglican Church! Indeed the Articles themselves make clear ordination must be by Bishops
T1
You write “Yes and England was historically a Christian nation when the C of E became the established Christian church. So nothing against established churches once a nation had become a Christian majority. There was no Christian majority nation when the Bible was written”.
Historically the reason England was a so-called ‘Christian nation’ in Tudor times goes back to the late 300s CE when the Roman Empire hijacked the faith for its own purposes – at a time when it wasn’t a majority – and coercively imposed it very much against the actual Christian ethos. Plus the very big thing against ANY ‘Christian nation’ is the simple proposition that the Church is international. Associating the church with any earthly nation compromises its position with non-Christian nations, and leads to wars and persecutions (which please note the CofE would probably still be doing but for the opposition and persuasion of the various ‘Dissenters’ such as the Baptists…..
Stephen
Because the CofE doesn’t have a Pope, but nor is it independent of government.
Peter – and the question here is precisely whether the Church should be independent of government, rather than closely entangled with it…
No it isn’t, the C of E was created precisely to be the established church. If you don’t believe it should be established church you shouldn’t be in it! As you are not as you are Baptist
T1
“…the C of E was created precisely to be the established church…”
True – but the issue which you seem simply unable to grasp is whether it was created so by God (and if so in contradiction of God’s word which teaches a considerably different way for state and church to be related) or was it created so by an earthly ruler who had no authority to create such an unscriptural body?
Despite that flawed creation, the CofE has thankfully had many true Christian members over the years – but I think that right now, with the supposed ‘national church’ actually attended by barely 2% of the nation, and a major internal dispute which looks to be about trying to remain ‘established’ at the expense of rather important beliefs, might it be possible that God is finally calling time on a well-intentioned but ultimately bad because unscriptural idea….?
God literally anointed the King, certainly if you believe the Divine Right of Kings as Henry VIII certainly did, so indirectly created the C of E too.
The C of E is used by far more Christians than those who just attend it every Sunday, those who get married, baptised and buried in it only do so as of right as it is the established church and they as Parishioners are entitled to such services in their local Parish church which they wouldn’t be as of right in a Pentecostal, Baptist, Methodist, RC church etc. In terms of same sex couples, the C of E has a middle ground position of blessings not marriage now for them in its churches. If you want no recognition at all become Baptist or Pentecostal or Orthodox or RC, for now, if you want same sex marriage in churches become Methodist, nothing regarding the C of E being established church or not changes that
*searches for the Divine Right of Kings in the doctrine of the C of E…*
T1
You write
“God literally anointed the King, certainly if you believe the Divine Right of Kings as Henry VIII certainly did, so indirectly created the C of E too”.
https://stevesfreechurchblog.wordpress.com/2013/04/30/but-seriously-5-the-divine-right-or-wrong-of-kings/
You linked to a load of nonconformist radical evangelicalism, nothing C of E in it as the King remains our Supreme Governor exactly as he was when Henry VIII set up our Church of England and as he was anointed in the coronation by God last year (with the brief interlude of Oliver Cromwell for whom you evangelicals clearly think was wonderful!)
‘Being by God’s Ordinance, according to Our just Title, Defender of the Faith, and Supreme Governor of the Church, within these Our Dominions, We hold it most agreeable to this Our Kingly Office…This Book of Articles before rehearsed, is again approved, and allowed to be holden and executed within the Realm, by the assent and consent of our Sovereign Lady ELIZABETH, by the grace of God, of England, France, and Ireland, Queen, Defender of the Faith, &c.’
https://www.churchofengland.org/prayer-and-worship/worship-texts-and-resources/book-common-prayer/articles-religion
That is not an articulation of the divine right of kings.
SL
There are lots of denominations that are independent of Pope and government.
And some surprising ones who aren’t. Even if you’re not established, Parliament can interfere with you at will. The Salvation Army for example, is governed by specific UK statute (the latest being the Salvation Army Act 1980).
I am afraid all this shows how desperately we need to abandon the entire Crown Nominations Commission system and instead have a diocesan election, where candidates are put forward within a special session of the vacant see’s diocesan conference. This is a procedure followed in most other parts of the Anglican Communion and a return to the ways of the Early Church.
If you want the early church then Stephen Langton is correct above, that instead of one episkopos over many congregations we must return to many episkopoi running each congregation; must disestablish the Church of England (silver and gold have I none?); and cease denying the priesthood of all believers by making ordination mean no more than passing a theology exam and being granted a living.
Can anybody state a time when the Church of England’s episcopacy as constituted was a force for good? They burnt the Lollards, they denied the Puritans freedom of worship either side of the Commonwealth, they hated Wesley, and they are the driving force between the LLF apostasy.
So basically you want to follow Oliver Cromwell and remove the Bishops, the BCP, high altars etc. That would effectively mean the Anglican Church ceased to exist, Cromwell after all basically turned it into a Presbyterian church in his period of rule before at the Restoration Charles II restored the Bishops, the Lords and created the 1662 BCP we traditional Anglicans in England still use today
Nowadays, T1, I take Christianity congregation by congregation and ignore hierarchies. The best congregation near me happens to be Church of England, so I am in it. I really don’t mind what others think of my attitude.
T1 – And why was it the business of either Cromwell or Charles II how God’s Church organised itself in England? To quote the alleged first Pope, “We must obey God rather than Man” (Acts 5; 29), a point you T1 don’t seem to agree with….
Please be fair to Cromwell. He permitted freedom of protestant worship, which had been denied before the Civil War, and saw no reason why the State should subsidise the bishops.
He may have permitted freedom for nonconformists but he abolished the Bishops, executed the King and scrapped the Book of Common prayer and pulled down High Altars and had stained glass windows smashed. He effectively banned the High Church wing of the C of E when Lord Protector and BCP High Church communion services had to be held in secret from 1650-1660
They were free to reconstitute their church system at their own expense if they wished – which is more than Charles I and Archbishop Laud had granted them.
T1… Perhaps you could point me to where in the BCP an “altar”, high or otherwise, is referred to any of the liturgy.
Ian this question comes up several times here. The BCP does not refer to altars simply because at the time of the 1662 edition of the BCP there was a predominantly Protestant regime in place. (Put rather simply, it was a political decision). If you look at the earlier 1549 edition of the BCP, the word altar does feature.
Whilst the word has not featured in other authorised prayer books, it appears clearly in the Coronation service and was used at the most recent Coronation service of King Charles. Nobody could argue that was not an authorised service of the CofE. I can’t recall any objections to it being used there and the monarch is the Supreme Governor of the CofE and didn’t object.
Likewise probably the vast majority of CofE churches do not use the BCP but print their own booklets. I can’t recall any objections or legal challenges to individual churches printing the word Altar in those booklets and countless numbers of them do so. And the word is used by probably the vast majority of CofE members. It’s common usage.
It’s part of the furniture. What is the objection to it?
An altar is for sacrifice. I don’t recommend it at a coronation.
You will notice that evangelical churches use terms like ‘Morning Praise’ or ‘Family Worship’ or ‘Refreshed at 9am’ or ‘The Hybrid Service’ or, as Emmanuel Northwood once did ‘Come Together!’ as titles for their acts of worship. None of those appear in the BCP or any other authorised places either.
Andrew G: ‘The BCP does not refer to altars simply because at the time of the 1662 edition of the BCP there was a predominantly Protestant regime in place.’
Indeed. And the BCP continues to define the doctrine of the Church, as Canon A5 makes clear. And the other thing that the Coronation service made clear is that the Church of England is ‘Reformed and Protestant’.
So you surely could not disagree with that as a fair and authorised description of it?
The King himself was anointed in Holy Oil from the church of the Holy Sepulchre, itself also a church of apostolic succession
“So you surely could not disagree with that as a fair and authorised description of it?”
Oh it’s one description of it, for sure. But you can only understand such a description in the context of the political turmoil of the 16th and 17th Centuries. It is more of a political statement than a religious one and has little significance in a very different world of the 21st Century apart from religious super enthusiasts.
The Oxford Movement was a very real thing and had a very important influence on the CofE especially in things like the Parish Communion movement. The tiny pockets of anti Catholic feeling are limited to the extreme.
Andrew
I think ‘Come Together’ is something I shall suggest to Pastor Tim at Star of Bethel (it’s a Twitter thing!).
Do you think it’s an approach to be encouraged Penny? Or is The Hybrid Service more 21st Century?
Andrew
I think Coming Together is always to be encouraged.
T1 – if the Anglican Church set-up is un- or indeed positively anti- scriptural then frankly it needs to cease to exist and to be out of the way of churches which do ‘state-and-church’ scripturally. And Cromwell was nearly as bad, simply advocating a slightly different level of state-religion-Christianity, though at least nearer to scripture.
You are not even in the Anglican church now. Stick to your Baptist church and don’t dictate to the C of E what to do. We High Church Anglicans ain’t going anywhere!
T1
Not dictating to the CofE; simply suggesting that they should let the scriptures dictate to them rather than earthly legislation.
Will fall for the temptation to say that indeed “High Church Anglicans ain’t going anywhere!!!!” – well not anywhere scriptural anyway….!!
It is scriptural, just not always the same interpretation as conservative evangelicals have!
Simon, you seem to be using the word ‘interpretation’ to mean anything at all, including something with no connection to the text!
Simon, do you think there can ever be such a thing as an incorrect interpretation? I will be interested in your answer.
Rather than rushing to find a procedural fix for CNC… we perhaps need instead to step back and ask what God is saying to us at present through the messy life of the Church of England and wider Anglican Communion.
And through holy scripture, which states that an episkopos shall be a MAN of one woman (1 Timothy 3:2) and obviously implies that, no matter what the State does, God would not recognise gay marriage.
I am awaiting the arrival from Amazon of the book Shepherds For Sale: How [American] Evangelicals Traded the Truth for a Leftist [i.e. Secular] Agenda by Megan Basham. It claims to expose connections between influential secular globalists and denominational church leaders. Has the same thing been going on under the carpet in the UK too?
Ahh the old ‘reds under the bed’ theory. You’d do far better to read The False White Gospel by Jim Wallis. Excellent stuff as usual from him. Rejecting Christian Nationalism, Reclaiming True Faith, and Refounding Democracy. It explores the very weird connections between Trump, his cronies, and the evangelical right wing in the States.
Actually Andrew, I’ve already read – and think well of – a similar book, Greg Boyd’s “Myth of a Christian Nation: How the quest for political power is destroying the [American] church”. We actually agree about that, and the phrase “white gospel” makes me shudder. But to my knowledge those people are not trying to change doctrine away from scripture towards a liberal theology that is actively counter-scriptural.
I’ll have more to say when I’ve read Megan Basham’s book.
While I’m unaware of Boyd in that setting, I am aware of him and his adoption of Open Theism. For starters see here.
https://thinktheology.co.uk/blog/tags/#topic-tags
But this is well off topic.
Well, I wouldn’t call the prosperity gospel liberal, but it sure is counter-Scriptural.
You’re absolutely right to point out that Scripture here requires an episkopos to be male (aner/andros not anthropos here), which is a major and first order fault line within evangelicalism. There are very different anthropologies at work in these two evangelical traditions that give quite different understandings of how the image of God in humanity is understood and expressed in marriage and church life. It’s a part of God’s creation purpose for men and women to take different roles. Some therefore argue that no evangelical could agree to female ministers/clergy/preists/bishops because of that verse, and it is to the credit of those who do so that they have the courage to stick by Scripture and don’t (in their eyes) give in to liberal revisionism which has been influenced by western culture to depart from biblical truth. The plain truth of Scripture, they argue, is that church leadership is male, and to think otherwise is to disobey the Bible. This is not simply a matter of a difference of opinion or adiaphora. There can, presumably, therefore, be no fellowship with those who do not hold to Scripture?
As someone on the Carlisle diosecan synod, it is clear to us locals at least how crucial these decisions really are.
The role of locally elected members of the CNC and the discussion process prior to them meeting was extensive. And in reality was as divided as General synod, and in Carlisle probably tipped towards conservative/orthodox overall.
The whole LLF process has simply woken up many Evangelicals to the obvious risks and dangers of the general tendency of Evangelicals to get on with local mission and focus on church and community rather than Synods and deanery affairs, which lets face it, are, shall we say, somewhat removed from say doing an alpha, and evangelising. Previously politically minded progressives have been ahead of the game in packing out these bodies with their supporters – but this is changing gradually. The polarisation is beginning to reflect the opinions of the actual people on the ground.
As an aside, my personal preference as a complementarian would clearly be not to have a Female bishop, but this is clearly a red herring here. I am in a tiny minority in my diocese, and 30 years into female clergy most would see female bishops as the logical conclusion of female clergy; as the new normal. This is just an excuse for such as +Dover to, get again, put the boot in on her brother’s and sisters who demur, and seek to further exclude them. Also it is fair to say that even complementarians would rather have am orthodox diocesan bishop who was female than a male bishop who by their record has shown themselves to be progressive. So a cheap shot.
In reality there are many in Carlisle, including all the larger churches who would be extremely uncomfortable with a progressive bishop. Additionally we have learned through all the nonsense of LLF and PLF that the house of bishops holds all the power on what actually happens, and we don’t trust them to do the right thing at all, but rather think they are in a campaign of change at any cost.
Thus the selection process for diocesan bishops has a huge importance in going forward. The days of the meek and mild evangelicals being trodden on are over.
The implications for having a progressive diocesan bishop are huge for many of us since being in impaired communion is the last thing any of us want. It would mean having to look into all that Ephesians fund stuff and massively exacerbate local divisions within PCCs, and further distract from the actual mission of the local church.
The general fear is that a progressive candidate who supports the direction of travel of ++York and ++Canterbury, will be forced on us by hook or by crook, and any change in the procedures is doing just that.
You need only look at the faces and hairstyles of most women bishops to see confirmation of what (Rev Prof) Leslie Francis found, that female Anglican ordinands typically have masculine personality traits, and male ones have female traits (in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, vol. 12, pp. 1133-40; 1991). And in view of 1 Timothy 3:2 which implies that episkopoi shall be male, they are bound to have a cavalier view of scripture.
I think you are mistaken on the reading of 1 Tim 3.2. See Margaret Mowzcko’s analysis.
But the Francis analysis is fascinating.
I think Mowzcko is mistaken. Women bishops are utterly incompatible with Paul’s preceding sentences (1 Timothy 2:11-14). Here is my analysis, set in the wider context of the (vital but different) role of women in churches:
https://church14-26.org/the-role-of-women/
Please see also the page at this website about Leadership.
Anton – if you havent read Andrew Bartlett’s book, then I would suggest it’s a must-read.
Look, I’ve read scores of books, including those with which I disagree. I made that effort and it took a long time and a lot of reading before I reached my present position. I am willing to read more, but you will need to summarise how and why Bartlett differs from the position which I set out in my website.
On this particular point, for those who have the stamina and time here is a link to ‘A Zinger from Winger’ with a necessary introduction by Andrew Wilson:
https://thinktheology.co.uk/blog/article/a_zinger_from_winger
Would this have prevented what our host has described somewhat oddly as a political error. Doubtful as the secular cultural and political pressure would prevail.
Although in a Diocese such as Carlisle in which the vast majority of parishes are small rural communities where many people feel an identification with the Church of England rather than town centre gathered congregations, we have to be careful not to allow the large urban ones to have the loudest voice. The very committed members of gathered churches can sometimes speak up loud and clear but the quieter people are ignored. The small rural parishes are often in much closer contact with the parish than the urban gathered churches, which draw congregations from a wide geographical area. There are relatively few strongly catholic or strongly evangelical churches in the Diocese which is very much ‘middle of the road’ without a strong affiliation.
I live, and used to work, in Exeter diocese. I would agree that most rural parishes have no strong evangelical nor Catholic affiliation. They have to be the church for the community and are therefore necessarily middle of the road or broad. It can vary a little. I knew some strongly eucharistic rural communities and some ardently morning prayer ones. Most don’t seem at all concerned with ecclesial tribes.
What did often surprise and delight me though was how often these communities were ethically liberal. More so often than tribal churches.
Penny, and what is happening to these middle of the road churches? As far as I can see, they are disappearing. Why do you think that is?
Mainly because of ageing populations, children leaving and never returning, often because they cannot afford to, and incomers who aren’t ‘churched’.
It’s very different from gathered congregations, whether that is an evangelical plant or a Cathedral. When people travel to a church their reasons are rather different from those who attend their parish church. Some rural communities are growing (often in market towns) but many are struggling and it is very sad to witness the sacrificial love and loyalty some have for their local church.
The other thing, of course, is that, proportionately, rural congratulations ate often larger than urban ones.
Many are at least 10% of the population. Many urban churches, with much larger congregations get nowhere near that figure.
Correct Penelope, far from ‘disappearing’ rural churches are often the backbone of a village or hamlet community with a well above average percentage of the local population attending. Indeed in some of the rural hamlets and small villages in our benefice there is no shop, post office, or even pub or school in some cases but still a church holding services. That is the real backbone of the C of E even if HTB and similar in big cities get most of the PR!
Generally conservatives, whether on the C of E Catholic or evangelical wing will be more likely to oppose or have opposed women priests and women bishops and also PLF. However as many Catholic conservatives went to Rome once Synod voted by 2/3 for women priests and then 20 years later women bishops too, conservative evangelicals tend to be the bigger block now. Conservative evangelicals also tend to be more focused on opposing PLF and same sex marriages within C of E churches than conservative Anglo Catholics of the Forward in Faith variety who are more focused on opt out from women in ministry (and the latter tend to be focused around a few areas like Chichester diocese where the Bishop is sympathetic and Walsingham).
Indeed some conservative evangelical churches now have women priests. In terms of Bishops there may be merit in recording Synod votes by Diocese as well as by hand count. That way if a majority of a Diocese’s clergy and laity representatives on Synod voted against PLF for example the CNC would be more likely to reflect that in the appointment of a Bishop sympathetic to that position, even though Synod as a whole has now voted by majority for PLF
Does the prevailing government play any part in the selection?
Chris – I’m not sure what the current position is; I seem to recall that on one past occasion Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher rejected both alternatives offered for a bishopric and effectively told them to think again.
George Carey was her revenge on the CoR.
CoE
Exactly so. The CofE had been the effective opposition party for the early part of her reign as Prime Minister and she was especially appalled by Bob Runcie’s sermon after the conclusion of the Falklands War.
George Carey was offered as the second name on the list as it was considered he was so unsuitable for the job that no one in their right mind would select him. And of course Maggie was not in her right mind ….and a non conformist.
The Cof E has declined in every way since his appointment.
Clearly the CoE at core has nothing to do with Christianity. It is only a secularly directed political party pressure group.
Have you watched or do you remember the episode of Yes Prime Minister about the appointment of a bishop?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m2dNCw0hPLs
George Carey stated in his autobiography “Know the Truth” that when he met with Sir Robin Catford, then the Prime Minister’s Appointments Secretary, and the latter handed him the letter from Margaret Thatcher offering him Canterbury, he asked Catford straight away “Am I the first name or am I the second name?”, to which Catford replied, without any equivocation, that Carey was the first name. Unless Catford was lying to Carey or Carey was lying to us, he was the first name and not the second. (I think I know where the myth that Carey was the second name came from, and I also – much more tentatively – think I know who the second name was, but I can’t prove either.)
Chris Bishop
Until Gordon Brown the procedure was that the PM would be given two names and they would choose between them (Im not sure, but they could possibly reject both and tell the CNC to do better?).
Gordon Brown thought it was wrong for a member of the church of Scotland to be deciding the leadership of the church of England and changed it to them only providing one name and he backed it.
I believe David Cameron switched it back to two names, but I’m not sure if that is still the case or not.
But certainly it’s still the case that the PM has a veto over bishops.
That’s only true in the sense that the King has a veto over all the business of Parliament.
And that sense is ‘none at all’.
Ian
I dont agree because the PM actually exercises power. I think it’s true that in modern times the government has no interest in running the CofE, but they could if they so wished.
Elections for Pope also use a two-thirds majority rule, and the Catholic system at least improves the probability that whoever is elected has broad support within the organisation. “Failure” of the CNC to reach a two-thirds majority might not be a failure at all – it could just be God saying “A delay is not the end of the world, think again, maybe get in some new candidates.”
…. If only Manchester United had followed the procedure laid out by the Vatican when Sir Alex Ferguson retired, they might have been in much better shape today.
Elections to the Papacy also involve the Conclave being locked in until they have reached a decision. Perhaps we should do the same to the CNC.
Jamie
But the current pope is facing open rebellion on a daily basis!
A thousand rebels will always get more publicity than a million loyal supporters.
And by the same principle it is the noisy objectors to LLF and same sex marriage in the CofE who are getting publicity. The millions of parishioners up and down the land who have no objection at all have no voice.
The only way to settle the stalemate would be a vote of all parish electoral role members up and down the country. Pretty easy to organise. But the conservatives will never agree because they know they would lose.
Andrew, I am looking for the Canon or Article which says ‘The doctrine of the Church of England is determined by a poll of those who associate themselves with it’.
If we did doctrine like that, we would abandon the belief in the Trinity, Jesus as the incarnation of the Second Person, and any orthodox understanding of the atonement. No thanks!
The doctrine of the CofE can be changed by votes in Synod. No difference then to have a vote by ER members.
Definitely no! I have attended meetings. Most people want to be “nice” and Jesus is of course all about “love” – no mention of throwing out the money lenders etc from the temple or “get thee behind me Satan”. Those who have family who are living in same sex relationships make others feel guilty for supporting biblical truth. The church must uphold biblical truth and not be coerced by the gospel of ‘nice”.
What do you think the biblical truth is for gay people?
‘What do you think the biblical truth is for gay people?’ You have asked this before, and I have answered it before, and I am not sure why you have ignored my answer.
It is the same as the answer for all people: God made humanity male and female, to be fruitful and subdue the earth. Our ‘sexuality’ does not define us. In the new creation, which breaks into the present in the resurrection of Jesus, marriage is not the only way to be fruitful. God calls all of us to turn from the ‘works of the flesh’ to be holy temple presences of his as we are filled with his Spirit.
Of course discussion needs to recognise that ‘gay people’ is not just a simple category – it is currently being inaccurately treated as such. There are people who are *now SSA, but that is not to say they are so essentially or innately, and they certainly were not to be so classified pre-puberty, whereas adolescence itself is a quintessentially confused time anyway. So…?
AJB, I made that central point many times, and it does need acknowledging IMHO.
Ian,
I was really asking Tricia (who may have a substantially different answer to you). But given you’ve provided your answer, and complained I ignore it, let’s open up the discussion.
What you’ve written is abstract and academic but not applied. You’ve given yourself lots of scope for deniability, and very little clarity for anyone seeking actual answers or pastoral support in ordering their lives. We’re made male and female, and our sexuality doesn’t define us? What do you mean by that? I could interpret that as meaning our sexual orientations are very minor things we can largely ignore, and therefore gay people (i.e. those who are exclusively SSA) should have no more hesitation about entering straight (i.e. male-female) marriages than anyone else. Or I could interpret that as meaning that celibacy is no big deal really – we’re not supposed to be defined by our sexuality. Or I could interpret that as meaning Christians should expect their sexual orientation to change – it doesn’t define you, and we’re called to turn from ‘works of the flesh’. And so on and so forth. What you’ve written is not really an answer.
“The Bishop of Dover has gone further and spoken of the CNC as “diametrically opposed to women in leadership”.”
There may be a bit more to it than that. People down in that diocese tell me that Rose Hudson Wilson has in fact tried to become a diocesan bishop in at least four dioceses and has been turned down each time. While she sees that as sexism, others in the diocese say it is because she has a reputation as a bulldozing bully who tries to exclude orthodox catholic and evangelical clergy from diocesan posts – including evangelicals who are perfectly happy with WO. She has tried to kick evangelicals out of cathedral canonries in order to make everything uniformly liberal catholic. And Justin Welby knows this, and you can be sure the vacant sees also know this.
And this in a diocese where church decline has been even steeper than the national average (stats show Canterbury diocese had has the poorest recovery of attendance nationally since the enforced closures). Children’s and youth work largely collapsed there during the lockdowns and has not returned to most parishes. Rose grabs the headlines because of her race and sex, and her outspoken political views; what she can’t do is evangelise and make new disciples. Rose thinks male sexism is to blame; it doesn’t occur to her that it is her own leadership that causes others to think twice.
Meanwhile, Canterbury Cathedral carries on with its silent “raves in the nave” – it did an 80’s disco recently which no doubt helps the coffers, as aging rockers paid £30 each to dance on the tombs of saints. I am told the Cathedral lost £3 million in tourist revenue because of the lockdowns, so it has to find some way to fund its ‘mission’ (whatever that is).
To AJ Bell
I do not recognise the term “gay”. It is a modern construct. All people are human beings and have free will. Whether you accept Jesus as your Lord is a choice. If you accept a Christian life you live it one day at a time asking God to strengthen you to follow Him.
So what does living a Christian life mean for someone who is exclusively attracted to people of the same sex (given you get triggered by the word ‘gay’ let’s describe them like that)?
I’m not sure what you mean by saying that the term “gay” is a modern construct and therefore to be rejected? There are lots of modern constructs we’re happy to accept – national identity being an obvious one. But are you suggesting that no one really is gay, and can just stop (i.e. like the radical feminists who say gender is a construct we can choose to discard)?
As I have mentioned before, my gay friends offer several possibilities. Some have said that the issue is not about living out one’s overall pattern of attractions, but living out one’s sex. So two of my friends who would have described themselves as ‘exclusively attracted to people of the same sex’, having accepted Jesus teaching about marriage, have met and fallen in love with women and married them.
Others say that the only realistic possibility is for them to be celibate and single. And in that they are no different than the large number of Christian women who would have liked to have been married, but have not met someone whom they fell in love with.
This second option is made much harder in a sexualised and lonely culture, which does not value friendship. So others of my same-sex attracted friends particularly invest in patterns of friendship as key to this.
To AJ Bell
The modern world seems to think that it is impossible not to have sex with someone. People over the centuries seem to have managed this, many using all their energies in the service of God.
There are times in our lives when we cannot have a sex life – should a partner then leave the relationship?
This is right. We should add that the large number of unmarried Christian women is not a norm but has absolutely shot up quite recently, as women quite sensibly will not marry beneath themselves (in terms of character) but men’s character formation has been stunted by being allowed sex on tap before marriage, and the women too should be calling this lie out. Within a feminist context/culture that will not happen, but so much of feminism is sand, and the only way this can be overlooked is by a culture having made it ubiquitous so that no-one can imagine an alternative. I always pleaded with Christian women of high quality of whom we know many – get to a very large Christian church or more than one, get there from a relatively young age, because only thus will you maximise your chances. many have been less statistically minded than I and than my somewhat unromantic but highly practical suggestion. What could be more absurd than the very best characters the culture has to offer, who would make totally wonderful mothers, being so often denied the marriage for which they wish?
This less savoury aspect to feminism is like so much of the way darkness operates – it sucks people in with enticing promises, leaves them high and dry, and (as it were) spits them out, because they were never valued as individuals in the first place, only as means to an end.
I’m not sure why you think this is a question all about sex Tricia.
Ian,
Maybe this is the root of why we keep hitting an impasse. I don’t think you’re encouraging the Church to provide an answer on this. For you, it’s enough to say to gay people (i.e. those who are exclusively SSA) – gay marriage is out, but after that it’s up to you to work it out on your own.
National identity dates back to the incident at Babel.
Really? Babel just had linguistic differences. The idea that linguistic difference was grounds for a separate national identity is a pretty modern idea (19th century?)
Just because *some modern constructs are accurate, you are saying that modern constructs are guaranteed to be accurate, AJB? That would be sleight of hand if so. It is certainly true that this presupposition that some people are what is called ‘gay’ is a minority/recent one.
No. I’m saying that if your argument is that something must be rejected simply because you believe it is a “modern construct” then logically that ought to apply to all modern constructs. If it doesn’t then your grounds for rejecting (or not) have to be something different.
You are wondering why my reply was that this is all about sex! Well, there is no law against love – love comes in many forms:
Friendship
Maternal and paternal
Brothers and sisters
The issue we are discussing is sexual. Marriage is a sexual relationship whereby we gain a share in creation. A marriage used to be annulled if it was not consummated.
Sex between brothers and sisters is taboo, sex between children and parents is taboo. Friendship sex is part of the anything goes culture. Christianity teaches that sex is reserved for a commitment of marriage between a man and a woman.
That’s not what this discussion in the Church is really about though. It’s really about how gay people (i.e. those who are exclusively same-sex attracted) should order their lives. What is the Church teaching, practical and pastoral, for them?
Sex comes into that. But it isn’t wholly about that. The ferocious reaction to PLF ought to signify that. Even prayers for celibate partnership/friendship are getting short shrift from the conservatives.
Twenty years ago Andrew Goddard wrote:
“Will we really seek to understand gay people? Will we create Christian communities in which our vision becomes reality and so is not a harsh law but embodied as the gospel of grace? Will we establish a Church where recognition and support to single people and chaste loving friendships and it is demonstrably no longer the case that gay Christians can legitimately say ‘you have offered me in my life no viable strategy for ordering my life’?”
I don’t think it’s good enough to say we don’t really care what gay people do as long as they’re not getting married to each other. It’s not good enough, and it’s patently not true.
Are we encouraging them to enter straight marriages? That has some profound implications, and a terrible track record. Are we telling them that their sexual orientation can be changed? That looks like it would be a lie. Are we looking them in the eye at 16 and telling them to embrace lifelong celibacy? Well, we can’t kid ourselves that that’s no different to the situation of single women, and perhaps ought to consider why we’re so reticent to spread that message to our kids who aren’t gay. Are we perhaps going to say lifelong committed companionship might be important and beneficial, but you have to rule out sex? I’d suggest we need to consider why so many in the Church assume that would be a lie. Or might we say that those who are not called to celibacy are right to marry, and living authentically means acknowledging your sexuality?
I think Welby has steered the whole CofE leadership into an impossible situation – one where it’s unacceptable to oppose same sex marriage, but simultaneously unacceptable to tolerate it. Presumably the only candidates who can become bishops in this scenario are those particular skilled in weasel-tongue, which is exactly the opposite of the sort of person I think is suitable to lead the church.
I think you are spot on there. That is what needs to be admitted.
Fortunately Exeter CNC delivered a bishop who has been quite clear in his own approach to the question of same sex marriage. Let us hope he isn’t got at before his installation at the beginning of November
It is highly unlikely to happen again.
Because the central CNC is rigged that way. Anthony Archer was quite right to point that out. And I applaud him for doing so.
Why?
Do you think the CNC will block any future Mike Harrisons on principle?
Yes, we could do with an update for our times of The Vicar of Bray.
The other major issue that no one seems to be admitting is that money is running out. I know of even previously wealthy dioceses who are reckoning that reserves will be depleted in the next 3-4 years and it will not be possible to run as they are currently running. That will cause a threat to training ordinands for one thing – and numbers of ordinands are well below what was hoped.
There are many crises facing the CofE and it is simply unsustainable on many levels. The only task left to the current Archbishops is to prepare the CofE for a future that is very different from anything known in our lifetime. The message of Justin Welby has been that growth is possible. It clearly hasn’t been possible and will not be possible. The head in the sand approach has got to stop.
‘no-one seems to be admitting’??
You mean, apart from my previous articles on this blog, apart from the readers of it, apart from Carl Hughes’ presentation to Synod, and apart from the data presented to the bishops and the Archbishops’ Council?
Apart from them?
But Justin was right to say growth is possible. Many parts of the C of E are growing, and many other denominations are growing too. What almost all of them have in common is a belief in the historic understanding of marriage in line with the teaching of Jesus.
The thing that has caused this fracturing, failure, and loss of confidence has been LLF. It has not caused it all, but, as this article shows, it has taken fragile structures already under pressure for various reasons—and broken them.
Admitting it means doing something about it. What is actually being done?
[Andrew I’ve deleted this because I don’t accept silly ad hominem insults on the blog. I’ve asked you numerous times before.]
He won’t get it anyway, hence Synod voted by majority for LLF with an opt out for churches that disagree
Still a lot of Nigerians and other Africans coning to Britain. Most of these are of Christian background and the Cof E is trying to win them over – or to retain them for Anglicanism. Some theological colleges, e.g. Trinity Bristol, are trying to appoint black staff so as to attract black ordinands. As you know, at present there are very few black members of the C of E.
Southwark has a lively African church scene and the Church of England wants a piece of that action. Liberalism doesn’t cut it with African Christians or with other Christian immigrants or with Iranian converts from Islam.
So this is one of the hoped for growth areas, just as Roman Catholicism grew from Polish immigration.
Not at all true. You are trying to claim that all black Christians believe and worship in the same ways. Like white Christians, they don’t.
Here in Coventry there are several new churches with large numbers of Nigerian members who are you young, committed and give sacrifically. Culturally and socially they are very conservative, and I suspect many Anglicans would be uncomfortable with their tone. I suspect that they in turn might think the C of E to be apostate. They are growing in a way that the C of E can only dream of.
Penelope, I claimed nothing of the sort. I know that most African-origin churches in the UK are Pentecostal or prosperity-gospel minded, and a few are on the cultish spectrum (an unhealthy interest in demonology). But there are also a lot of Anglicans and Catholics from Nigeria and east Africa in Britain, and we have a number of these medical and legal professionals in our church. I would hazard a guess tbat the better educated immigrants from Africa are from Catholic or Anglican backgrounds.
Andrew
1) You effectively admit there what has been clear all my life – that the ‘liberal’ wing of the CofE ISN’T growing. Among reasons for this are that liberal beliefs are not different enough to the beliefs of the world, and are rather woolly/soggy and unattractive anyway; and that for people of integrity it can look all too much as if the liberals are saying “To get you into our churches we’re happy to compromise and consider unimportant things which are clearly original Christian belief”.
2) “Homophobic” is an evasion of proper discussion – as in, it is easier to label people as ‘phobic’ and not worth listening to than it is to seriously consider the serious case that God made sex for males with females and the ‘gay’ alternative is rather pointless and absurd.
It might seem pointless and absurd if you are straight, which I am assuming you are.
It’s neither pointless nor absurd for gay people. Who, like straight people, enjoy sex in order to express and feel joy and intimacy.
I hope that you (and others here) have no idea how offensive (and absurd) your attitudes are to gay Christians. If you are aware, then shame on you.
Yes, the gospel is indeed an offence to worldly attitudes.
PCD
I assume that you and others like you here have no idea how offensive it is to God to suggest that He “makes people gay”. Have you thought through what that really implies??
I am a very strong advocate of love between men, not to mention appropriate intimacy, and have great joy in my relationships with men. I just happen to agree with the God who made sexuality that ‘gay sex’ is inappropriate intimacy.
Offensive to whom?
Those who do not wish to repent.
PCD
I asked if you had thought through what it really means to say that “God makes people gay”? Seemingly you haven’t…..
What it logically means is that having created seriously wonderful sexuality for males with females, God will then for some reason positively deprive some men of the desires to do that, and give them instead the wonderful desire
[Stephen, you need to find a less provocative way to express this. Ian]. Absurd is an understatement about that claim, bluster to the contrary as you may.
There is by the way a smilar question about transgenderism – the keenest advocates in that area are unable to disguise that people seek the ‘gender reassignment’ because without it they are in distress; distress so great as to require really drastic alleviation (which still doesn’t actually produce anywhere near a full person of the other gender). That such a distressing situation would be part of God’s good creation is a stupid idea and implies a cruel or even insane god.
These situations are not from God’s good creation but are part of the disorder resulting from sin.
Stephen: your disgust at what human beings do – not just gay males but women and men, steaight and heterosexual – seems to be the only thing that guides your theology.
You think God is disgusted because you find things disgusting. You are projecting on to God what you hate in yourself. It’s classic and it’s obvious. And has nothong to do with the Kingdom.
God apparently finds it toevah too, according to Leviticus.
God apparently finds all kinds of things toevah according to Leviticus. And we find ourselves free to ignore quite a number of those strictures.
Yes, because they are not rooted in creation and not affirmed by Jesus. Unqualified rejection of same-sex sex is both.
This observation is really hermeneutics 101. If we are revisiting these kinds of basic questions, it shows the poverty of our debate.
Yes, it’s such a basic question that no thinking Anglican would really think that Leviticus is our guide, or that Jesus said anything about same sex relationships. He doesn’t. We have been over it so many times before.
Andrew,
Can you name anything else in the area of interpersonal relations (‘morality’) that the Pentateuch describes as toevah which attracted the death penalty in the Mosaic legal code?
When I asked you a similar question last time you gave no reply. You say that no thinking Anglican takes this argument seriously. People resort to insult when they run out of argument.
Anton I must have missed that question then.
All kinds of things are described that attracted death penalty. We don’t apply the death penalty to women who have sex outside of marriage any longer do we? Or any of the other things. Do you think we should?
Toevah or abomination is linked to women wearing men’s clothing or eating various things like shell fish etc.
Do you think doing those things are still toevah? No, you don’t. Because we aren’t bound by such laws.
You are correct that the word toevah or abomination and a link to death penalty is reserved for same sex activity – in the case of men only. Why not for women?
I take the view that the prohibition you are referring is linked specifically to pagan sexual worship practices that were known in surrounding nations. And that the word toevah linked as a prohibition has no special significance for us today, but is linked to idolatrous worship practices.
Do you think the death penalty should apply to men who have same sex relationships? If not, what other penalty should be applied?
Andrew,
You assert that the prohibition in Leviticus on man lying with man as with woman, (i.e. for sexual gratification) “is linked specifically to pagan sexual worship practices that were known in surrounding nations”. If, however, you read the whole passage in Leviticus, you find it prohibits a wide range of sexual activities, including incest and bestiality, without any mention of ritual idolatry. Is your assertion not just an unsustainable excuses used by the gay Christian lobby to deny that they must repent before God?
There is no mention of lesbian practice in extant documents from the Ancient Near East, at least at the time of Moses. God does not prohibit what has not entered the mind of humans, not least because he does not wish to give them ideas.
As to what the law should be, like God I support a referendum on such matters (He asked the Israelites whether they wished to accept the Mosaic code, which was accepted by acclamation), and it is obvious that there is no appetite for capital punishment in relation to sexual matters in the West today. If I could, I would restore the death penalty for murder alone, becaue of Genesis 9:6 commanded to all mankind.
“Is your assertion not just an unsustainable excuses used by the gay Christian lobby to deny that they must repent before God?”
I’m sure you think that. I disagree. The question is, how do we disagree well?
Likewise, you believe that Leviticus, like all scripture, is somehow God’s direct speech, and therefore unquestionable. Whereas I disagree with that approach to scripture. That’s a discussion that also needs us to disagree well.
I’ve asked you before, but can’t recollect you answering. If not the death penalty for same sex activity, what should the punishment be?
And Anton please remind yourself that Sandi Toksvig, during her long and happy civil marriage to her partner, Debbie, noted that she’d “had several credible death threats, sometimes requiring the very kind assistance of the police hate crime squad. Each and every one of those threats has come from an evangelical Christian. Inevitably they have wanted to kill me on God’s behalf”
See what evangelical Christians do?
‘See what evangelical Christians do?’
That is like talking to your non-believing neighbour and saying ‘Stalin killed millions of people. See what atheists do?’.
It is the lowest level of argument, completely ad hominem. What is the point of this kind of verbal assault?
Please re-read the comment guidelines.
Excuse me? You are either saying Sandi Toksvig is a liar or else saying it is fine for evangelical Christians to write to her in that way. A clear condemnation would have been more helpful.
Plus the comment came on the back of Anton asking about the death penalty. Context is everything.
No, I am pointing out that the argument ‘Person X with this label did this ghastly thing implies all people with this label are ghastly’ is not an argument.
I really don’t want this petty pot-shooting in the comments. I would love actual constructive debate. If you cannot contribute to that, please don’t comment.
In that case please read the comments between Anton and myself earlier today. Don’t just take a pot shot at one line
I have. He sets out a reasoned case (which you think is wrong) and doesn’t seem to me to lob insults. You wave these away airily with phrases like ‘No Anglican would even consider that’.
Your comments are dismissive and patronising. Please desist.
Andrew,
I see that you don’t defend the claim that Leviticus 18:22 is a prohibition in the context of pagan worship when I point out that it is simply one of a list of prohibited sexual practices.
The passage ends with “I am Jehovah your God” (18:30). No believing Israelite would dare to put words in God’s mouth, and no nonbelieving Israelite would bother. So I take the Pentateuch to be the word of God – just as Jesus Christ did, unless you want to suppose that the gospels recording his words are also a pious pack of lies. In which case why believe in the virgin birth and the Resurrection? In which case your faith is in vain.
Were the death threats to Sandi Toksvig signed or their authors otherwise identified, and were they indeed wholehearted regular attendees at an evangelical church? Unless the answers are Yes then the allegation is worthless. That is not to call her a liar, but perhaps the letter-writers were.
If you share Christ’s view of the written Laws of Moses then, since human nature hasn’t changed, are the laws that govern interpersonal relations a precedent for gentile nations?
Anton you avoid answering at least one direct question there. Let me put it to you again before I respond to yet more questions from you:
I’ve asked you before, but can’t recollect you answering. If not the death penalty for same sex activity, what should the punishment be?
The penalty should be whatever the people decide, as I have explained.
Do you, in fact, believe in the virgin birth and the resurrection from the dead of Jesus Christ?
I have answered your question here several times before in these comments. Yes, I do in fact believe in the virgin birth and the resurrection.
But you are avoiding answering a question put to you directly. Not to whoever decides. But to you, personally. Anton, what do you believe the punishment for same sex activity? And if you won’t answer, please say why…
Of the possible answers, one would be actionable under the falsely so-called hate speech legislation which you support. In that circumstance you do not deserve my answer, whatever it be.
So, you accept the New Testament as authentic but not the Old, despite Jesus Christ doing so. Hardly consistent, is it?
All answered before. You can easily find answers to your questions on this blog.
I’m not sure of that, but let readers inspect the exchanges for themselves and decide how convincing your arguments are.
Oh well some readers will agree and others will disagree. That’s the nature of disagreement about biblical inerrancy. The trend of neo fundamentalism is an interesting development but I don’t find that approach edifying or convincing.
The bible is a unique library of material with such different genres that defy a one line approach. And this is not a thread about the bible, but there have been others here over the years and I have always made my own position clear.
You are always welcome to write to me more personally if you would like to develop a more considered and nuanced discussion than is available here.
I’m aware that the Bible is a library containing works of many different genres. These combine to tell one story and the autograph texts at least are preserved by the Holy Spirit from error – that is what makes these writings different from other writings. Do you think they are different, and if so then how?
I would wish to learn more about holy scripture from people who believe that when “I am Jehovah” appears in it, the passage comprises words that Jehovah meant believers to read or hear verbatim. Jesus was one such. You are not.
Anton – do answer my question about the punishments you personally believe are necessary for active same sex couples and I will reply further.
Of the possible answers, I said that one would be actionable under the falsely so-called hate speech legislation which you support. In that circumstance you do not deserve my answer, whatever it be. Did you miss this response of mine?
My aim is simply to make your position more explicit. If I wish to learn, it would be from people who believe that where “I am Jehovah” appears in scripture, the passage comprises words that Jehovah meant believers to read or hear verbatim. That was Jesus’s view and it is good enough for me.
Anton – did you miss the part where I invited you to write to me so that we could have a detailed and nuanced discussion? Making my position explicit involves more than a few lines.
The LLF book which you can find here
https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2020-11/llf-web-version-full-final.pdf
Is published by The Archbishops Council, of which Ian is a member. It has a very key chapter on the bible. And that chapter makes my position quite explicit. Do have a read of it – all of that chapter – and it will help you understand exactly what my position is on the bible – a classically Anglican position I should add.
Yes I did see your answer about punishments. And that’s why I suggested a personal correspondence so that you can explain it to me without posting it here. Though in fact any action about hate speech would be directed at the publisher of the blog, and not you.
Andrew,
LLF is not a formal doctrinal statement by the Church of England, although I read in detail several parts of it – including that on the Bible – before I took the associated course with a group from nearby parishes on Zoom 2 or 3 years ago. And I skim-read the rest. Why a church thinks it should play the honest broker between persons of incompatible views, rather than work out and present with confidence the biblical view, was a mystery to me then, but it was another tactic by Welby to get the ball over the line to have gay wedding ceremonies in the Church of England. The ‘honest broker’ position has – predictably – caused all parties to be dissatisfied.
I do not seek a private dialogue with you about these matters or biblical interpretation.
Anton if you had read that chapter you will know that it contains the tiny doctrinal statement the CofE actually has about the bible.
You wanted to make my position more explicit but aren’t actually interested in engaging with it. No problem. You should have said from the outset.
The Church of England’s current doctrine in in line with scripture that marriage is between man and woman. As here:
https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2017-11/men-and-women-in-marriage.pdf
More broadly, I consider that I have knocked your position down. I understand that you will not agree but, as we do not get an infallible referee in this life, I don’t have more to say.
Anton, that link has nothing to do with doctrine about the bible.
You haven’t even bothered to engage with my position, let alone knocked it down. But that isn’t a big surprise.
You said that “if [I] had read that chapter [of LLF] you will know that it contains the tiny doctrinal statement the CofE actually has about the bible.” I took this to mean what the CofE had to say about taking its doctrine of marriage from the Bible. An understandable error, as the idea that any church has little to say about its doctrinal position relative to scripture is absurd (although Article VI was commendably concise). I regret your assumption that I was not telling the truth when I said I had read that chapter of LLF.
As I said, your view of the Old Testament is not that which Jesus took. I consider that that is decxisive. I don’t mind if you disagree but it means I’ve no further interest in dialogue except to wind this exchange down. As for gay wedding ceremonies in the CofE, we have contended that in repeated threads here.
But you haven’t bothered to engage with my ‘view’ of the Old Testament.
You asked about one very particular verse.
Do you think there was really a talking snake? What language did it use…
I did engage with your view of the Old Testament – I said why you were wrong to assert that “I am Jehovah” is man putting words in God’s mouth, not vice-versa. No God-fearer would do that; no God-denier would do it either. *You* did not engage with that response.
As for the encounter in the Garden of Eden, I go with the view espoused by Ben Stanhope in “Misinterpreting Genesis”; the author is an expert on ancient Near/Middle Eastern Creation myths and a (fairly) evangelical Christian.
Putting words in Gods mouth is never a phrase I would use in relation to the bible.
You haven’t begun to understand.
Were you in receipt of a salary from the church while you peddled doubt?
Sorry to disappoint Anton.
Better luck next time
By the way that means I never would ‘peddle doubt’ – whatever that’s supposed to mean. My approach is like Ben Stanhope in “Misinterpreting Genesis”. We have to understand the text in the context of literary genres of the time – the genres of the people who actually wrote the texts. Who were human beings trying to eff the ineffable. By definition you can’t eff the ineffable, but our only choice is to use words, but be aware of their limitations and their meanings at the time they were used – just as Stanhope says.
Of course we need to work out what the Bible passages meant to their hearers, which necessitates an understanding of the culture of their time and place. But we also need to see if there is a wider meaning; Daniel was told that his prophecy (or at least the later part of it) wouldn’t make sense until nearer its fulfilment. (I do not, by the way, accept the Augustinian view that wider meanings are allegorical.) Merely because I did not find you a fruitful person to discuss such matters with, you assumed that I was naively unaware of them. And I deplore your desire to overturn the church’s 2000-year understanding of marriage for something that is condemned in the first person by God in Leviticus. Consider James 3:1.
I rather deplore your focussing on one issue and writing off anybody who takes a different approach to you as the enemy on the basis of that one issue alone. Recall the parable of the Good Samaritan – it’s actually your worst enemy who can help to save you.
Oh and yes, I agree with you about the passage from James. It’s why the CofE has a rigorous and long selection procedure for those who are in such roles. I was very privileged to be involved in that process in several ways.
The selection process works so well for bishops and archbishops – who are even more important than you were – nowadays, doesn’t it?
SSM in the church being a good litmus test, I have “written you off” only as somebody I am interested in learning more about the Christian faith from. I know nothing of your pastoral ministry and abilities.
The real litmus test, as the parable of the Good Samaritan shows so clearly, is how you treat other people, especially those who are your enemies. The lawyer Jesus was speaking to couldn’t even bring himself to use the word Samaritan. It disgusted him so much.
It seems that you are so ashamed of how you would like those in same sex relationships to be punished that you can’t even say here what it is.
You are misapplying the parable of the good samaritan. It was told to a clever-aleck who wanted to know who ‘his neighbour’ was, to whom he should show love. Jesus’ answer is: anybody – regardless of race or any other factor – whom you encounter personally who has a need which you can meet and he cannot.
The letters betwen Acts and Revelation make clear that false teachers should be shunned.
I have told you twice above why you do not deserve my answer to that last question. Apparently you do not believe my reason. That isn’t my problem.
Anton you are dumbing down one of the most powerful parables in the whole of the NT. Jews and Samaritans weren’t just different races – they were enemies. And that’s the reason the young lawyer won’t even say the word Samaritan when Jesus asks him at the end of the parable.
What you do is often more important that you believe.
If you think the CofE is full of false teachers, as you clearly do, then I have no reason why you and others here else to be associated with it, or even dialogue with people like me. Clearly you do wish to dialogue here else you would not keep commenting.
And yes, I know you have told me something twice. Each time it shows your own shame at what you think should happen. You are just using the hate speech thing as a get out. At least Christopher Shell has been honest enough to say here that he thinks homosexual acts ought to be criminalised once again.
Being told what your real motives are invariably says more about the speaker. Jesus called it judging (as distinct from discerning or rightly dividing).
I was a loyal enough Anglican following my adult conversion in 1990, but various experiences (and exegeses) a decade later moved me to the Frees. I have since moved region more than once, and today I take church congregation by congregation; the best congregation near me happens to be Anglican, so I am in it. I am uninterested in the hierarchy; the vicar knows my views about that (and SSM) and is happy to have me. I don’t mind what you think of this arrangement. I contend against church SSM here because (1) it is unbiblical (unless you care to torture scripture), and (2) I do not wish to see any church or church system deviate so wantonly from what scripture says is right and wrong.
The takeaway from Luke 10 is who one should see as one’s neighbour. My answer is anybody whatsoever whom I encounter personally in need and whom I can help. In an exegesis I would of course enter into the antagonism between Jew and Samaritan, but I was not offering exegesis, only conclusion.
But so often what you actually do here is act like the young lawyer. You don’t want the answer from me because you are actually interested in engaging in any kind of mutual conversation. You are simply wanting to put me to the test. To see if I live up to your mark.
And you have already decided I don’t before you even ask the questions.
The reason I have offered – and would value – a more direct correspondence with you is that we could get to know each other better. We could understand the other better – of course we shall never agree. But we would feel less like enemies. And that is a crucial and especially Christian way forward.
If you don’t like my questions, you needn’t answer them. A blog is not a court of law; we both understand that.
I would be delighted for us to become friends. You need to repent of your present views.
Anton it’s not that I don’t like your questions. I neither like nor dislike them. As I say, in most cases they aren’t really questions. They are posturing and put to test – just as that young lawyer did to Jesus.
I didn’t say I wanted to become friends. I said I’d like the opportunity to become better acquainted so as to aid understanding. That requires open hearts and minds.
Growth, in whatever area, whether it’s your HTB plant or your local Cathedral is just a tiny, tiny proportion of an increasingly indifferent (or hostile) population.
Nothing the Christian Church is doing in the global North is ‘putting bums on seats’. Some forms of worship are either superficially attractive or appeal to the converted, otherwise people aren’t afraid of Hell and are angered by a church which abuses children and excludes women and queer people. And, as more generations are ‘unchurched’, any kind of worship whether it’s dry ice or incense, will seem alien and unnecessary. The narrative has been lost. I have no idea what, if anything, will replace it. It’s in God’s hands. Meanwhile, we could try building the Kingdom by not being abusive, toxic, phobic, exclusionary and cruel.
Penelope, you are forgetting (or omitting to mention) that Islam is growing rapidly in Britain, through large families and immigration, currently it’s about 6% and is projected to reach 20% by 2050. I hope not to be alive then, but our children and grandchildren will be, and one wonders what the country will be when the white indigenous population is largely “religionless”, the black population is notionally Christian and the brown/Asian population is Muslim or Hindu. The problems gays face (as they see it) from the church wil be pretty minor compared to the impact of Islam, at least in the cities. Can you imagine the Church of England setting out to convert Muslims in Britain?
I was concentrating on the decline of the church in the global North. Yes, Islam is flourishing and it seems to hang onto it’s young adherents. Which is interesting. No, I don’t find it scary because I’m not a racist. I think you’ll find that most British Muslims, like my family, have less interest in persecuting gay people than do many of the commentators here.
Penny, the evidence is that the Christian church in England is not in decline. In many parts it is growing, but you will not have seen that if you are in the parts that are shrinking.
Penelope,
Why is expressing concern about the rise of Islam racist when Islam is a religion that claims to be for all races? Have you forgotten that you can change your religion but not your race?
Ian
But the growth, which is anyway contested – is it growth or poaching? – is such a tiny proportion of the population. It isn’t going to ‘save’ the Church from what is, probably, terminal decline.
The church in England and Wales is not in terminal decline, and in fact is probably not in decline at all, as research shows. Your unfounded claim that it is is just doom-mongering.
The churches that are in decline are the ones that have changed their doctrine of marriage, but you appear to find that hard to accept—which suggests that you are in denial.
Anton
Because Muslims in this country are mainly black and brown people.
James
And ‘white indigenous’ is another racist dog whistle. As I’m sure you know.
But what if one does not have similar concerns about non-Muslim brown people (such as Hindus) or non-Muslim black people. Can someone then said to be racist?
Ian
Have you deleted Anton’s offensive comment about bishops from September 4th?
I’m sure you must have in order to be even handed.
No, because I have not had time to read all the comments. I get fed up with the insults, but particular the way that Andrew G and you dive in, lob an insult, and then walk off.
You are not following the guidelines, and not helping constructive dialogue. You might not be alone in this, but at least most other people take the trouble to make their case.
No Ian. You select the lobbed in comments of the two most liberal (possibly) commenters on here and protect the abuse and offensiveness which is all too often spouted by the likes of Anton and James.
Do you never wonder why people like David Runcorn now appear here only very occasionally and disappear as soon as someone like James lobs in an insult?
No, I don’t protect anyone’s abuse. I wish you would all grow up and learn to be respectful. But I happen to look in, and there was a string of ten single line put downs from you.
I don’t want it from anyone. I don’t want it from you. Change or go elsewhere.
The last time David appeared and made a comment, I engaged with him and asked him some questions. He refused to answer.
Ian
I can’t find 3, let alone 10. There is some serious engagement on Islam and decline in the CoE with which you disagree and a couple of comments about racism (i.e. I find James’ and Anton’s comments racist).
At least you have noticed Stephen’s unpleasant obsession with the mechanics of male same-sex sex. I shall avoid responding to him. But i do think his prurience should be curbed.
And others who are same-sex attracted disagree. There is a range of views.
Ian,
If you repeatedly threaten to ban someone for comments you find abusive yet never do so, the aspects of the threads you dislike are in part the result of your own decisions.
This is a point of information; I acknowledge your freedom to run your own blog as you wish.
Penelope,
Are you going to explain how my comments expressing concern about Islam are supposedly racist when I have said that I am at ease with brown and black non-Muslims?
Ian
If opposing same sex marriage led to growth, the CofE and the RCC would be both in a golden age.
Parts of the C of E are faithful to the teaching of Jesus on marriage, and those parts are by and large the ones that are growing. There have been signs of significant growth in the RC this year.
Not really. LLF was merely the only compromise the majority of Synod would vote for, given liberals would never accept no services at all for same sex couples and conservatives would never accept same sex marriage services in C of E churches
Call me old fashioned, but I continue to think we ought to be preaching the Gospel as the Gospel, and not the new Gospel of preferred late-20th century sexual ethics of making sure the gays can’t marry.
No, we will certainly not call you old-fashioned!
And people with SSA have always been able to marry. Just not each other. That’s ‘another gospel’ and woe is Paul or anyone who preaches that.
As a legal technicality gay people can enter straight marriages. But you wouldn’t want to imply that you’d encourage that would you?
Adam
Of course they encourage it. Have you not read the replies on these threads?
I know of two instances where this seems to have been successful. Ans numerous others where it has been an unmitigated disaster. Mostly because people don’t ‘have’ SSA. They are gay. I have a great deal of time for conservatives who see this, such as David Bennett, and none at all for straight men who weaponise scripture to tell gay people who they are and what they should do with their precious, holy lives
It’s funny though Penelope that no one will actually say it. We’re constantly told this is a gospel issue, a first order issue, something on which we should break communion, where biblical teaching is clear, and yet when we get down to the brass tacks of how faithful people are actually supposed to order their lives we get an outbreak of silence. That is then swiftly followed by obfuscation, abstraction, and beating around the bush.
Adam, simply not true. David Bennett talks about it. Wes Hill talks about it. Vaughn Roberts talks about it. All those who are part of Living Out talk about it. Every time you raise this question I answer it. But that is when the silence falls.
This is a first order issue because every decent biblical scholar is agreed that the teaching of Jesus, reflected in all of scripture, is that marriage is between one man and one woman. And it shows in that every denomination which changes its doctrine of marriage divides and rapidly declines.
Adam
The House of Bishops don’t think it’s a first order issue and nor do most theologians.
It is, as ever, interesting that a suffragan bishop will (most likely) get away with an irregular ordination, but a perfectly licit service of prayers in a Cathedral causes controversy.
Ian
David Bennett does not agree that gay people should enter marriages with other sex partners.
So?
Ian,
So, it was part of my reply to James that David Bennett is wise enough yo see that gay people marrying partners of the other sex is theologically flawed. (Yes, I know there are exceptions)
As a gay man, he cannot afford to be trite.
‘The House of Bishops’ of the third largest denomination, and ‘most theologians’ (???) are higher authorities than Christ?
Who is it that they are following, then? One has to follow a higher authority than oneself.
It is not so much that Christ saw marriage as being between man and woman, it is that no alternative will have occurred to him nor to most of his contemporaries. It takes quite a shift to think outside the way that families are formed, and what would be the motivation for doing so anyway? Ian is right that he saw it as being between precisely one of each. There, there will have been the potential alternative of polygamy, which was known about.
It isn’t. As Save the Parish has showed the C of E has £866 million in annual income (including £300 million in annual income from investments and rental income from church owned property).
There is more than enough money to train ordinands and invest in Parishes if Bishops want to do so and not do grand schemes on net zero or reparations for slavery centuries ago.
Evangelical Pentecostal, Independent and Baptist churches need rapid congregation growth because that is their income, the C of E (and indeed the RC church) less so due to its vasts property portfolio and assets and investments built up over centuries
Silver and gold have I none?
Contrary to popular belief, the CofE has never relied on parishioner giving for its income. It would never have been able to build or operate the parish network on that basis. It’s always been endowed with assets that provide an income – hence, as far back as Queen Anne’s time there have debates and mechanisms to move the income from the assets around it order to even out the funding of parish ministry.
Where did those assets come from?
Originally, the Roman Catholic church at the Reformation after the Dissolution of the Monasteries etc
And where did the Roman Catholic church get the land from? A good deal of it from landed persons terrified that they’d get stuck in a place called Purgatory of Rome’s own making unless they coughed up in their wills for places of perpetual prayer for their souls. Brilliant racket! Tetzel hawking Rome’s begging bowl round Germany using that excuse triggered Luther’s protest.
Of course the RC church in England when it was our national church was even richer than the C of E is now as its replacement as national church. Henry VIII used much of the funds and riches he took from the dissolution of the Monasteries to fund his wars and gave main of the Abbeys and Monastery property to the aristocracy and landed gentry to keep them quiet. Not sure that was much better, especially given the Monasteries and monks did at least provide alms and bread and some money to the poor
No, T1, Henry VIII *sold* monastic lands to the aristocracy. He got far more money that way than from seizing and selling the monks’ other assets. That is why his Catholic daughter Queen Mary could not restore the monasteries: the aristocracy had paid for the land and refused to give it up.
Poor relief fell to the parishes and, after a few decades of turbulence, the system worked well. As for the other services the monks provided, such as places to stay while travelling, the free market soon provided those. And people now stayed in the community rather than go into monasteries, fostering a more vigorous middle class than on the continent.
Either way they were transferred to the aristocracy. As for poor relief continuing as you say that was largely down to the Parishes, emphasising the vital importance of C of E Parishes to their local communities not least in provision of charity and relief.
After the dissolution, relief of the poor – mainly those incapable of working the land who had no capital or support from others (they were typically widows and the infirm), fell to the parishes. Following a lifetime during which the laws fluctuated in their attitude to the poor, a system was settled in 1601 in which parishes were obliged to provide assistance for persons in and of the parish who were destitute. (Eligibility criteria were tightened up later in the 17th century, to stamp out various abuses.) The question of which applicants for poor relief should be granted how much help was left to local authorities, who knew personally the circumstances of those involved.
Quite a lot from the state.
Indeed
Geoff & Anton
You should read this and the other articles here: https://terranwilliams.com/a-first-response-to-mike-wingers-11%c2%bd-hrs-video-on-1-timothy-2/
Rather than a zinger, more a plop.
I am completely unconvinced by Winger and Wilson on this important issue. Strangely Wilson seems to hold a halfway house view – women can preach in a local church as long they are under the authority of male elders, as preaching is not teaching! Talk about jumping through hoops. How vey odd.
Am I the only one who finds it truly bizarre that most people, including men, are quite content for women to lead whole countries, judge murder trials, be the heads of royalty, teach in our schools to both males & females, and to heal our ills. But God-forbid they teach or lead in our churches!
I find it worrying too Peter but there is a frightening rise in a kind of cultural fascism – especially of course in the USA, supported by evangelical Christians there, but also now across Western Europe. I suspect many in that cultural phenomenon would welcome the return of women to the kitchen and definitely not want them in any kind of leadership.
Your fallacies keep on flowing.
Straw man for a start.
I think many of these “cultural fascists” (don’t you mean “far right bigots”?) would in fact welcome the return of conventional Christian marriage and childbearing, instead of a world in which fewer and fewer people are getting married, the birthrate is below replacement level (very many women today will not become mothers because mortality declines significantly after 35, and many women are deferring childbearing to ever later years), and close to half of births are now out of wedlock (while a quartr of births are aborted). Marriage is increasingly becoming the preserve of the middle classes. Meanwhile, the typical first house price is about 8 times the average annual income, compared to 3 or 4 times 50 yesrs ago. So for most people, there is little option but for both partners to work- which only drives the birthrate down.
At the same time, with serious demographic decline, there is great pressure to bring in immigrants to do semi-skilled work – and the mass immigration of semi-skilled men from eastern Europe and sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia leads to social tension and conflict, not just in Britain but throughout the western world. 20% of the population of the Republic of Ireland were foreign born, and such massive change in one generation is causing huge social dislocation, affecting housing costs and supply, schooling and conflict.
It is, to say the least, a shallow and unreflective response to call ordinary people of limited financial resources “cultural fascists”.
So calling people cultural Marxists is ok…
If the Lenin cap fits, comrade.
Which parts of my demographic-cultural summary of Britain (and Europe) do you find fallacious?
Or can I take it that you basically agree with me that demographic changes and the rise of identity politics (racial/ethnic/religious/erotic) have upended politics as we knew it in the 1960s and 70s (chiefly about class and welfarism)?
How do you feel about your children in a Britain of 2050, split between non-religious and Muslims?
Can you envisage the Church of England setting out to convert Muslims to Christ?
Ah I see it is ok to call people cultural Marxists but not ok to call them cultural fascists.
Oooh, I spy the Great Replacement Theory. Fascism without the culture.
Penelope, you have a very dewy-eyed view of Islam. A bit like Queers for Palestine, I imagine.
And you have this bizarre idea that Islam is a “race”.
That would be an astonishing idea to the Christians of Africa and Pakistan.
But in reality, I suspect that an intelligent leftist like you just doesn’t want to be seen agreeing in public with the Neanderthal ‘far right’.
“doesn’t want to be seen agreeing in public with the Neanderthal ‘far right’.”
Who on earth does want to be seen agreeing with them?
Andrew, you know I meant about the exponential growth of Islam in Britain. I suspect more than are 80% of the British public are privately unhappy about this (and I think you are probably one of them as well), but they won’t say openly for fear of prosecution, ostracism or worse.
It’s a very scary time to be a Jew in Britain – or even an RE teacher in Batley.
Mass immigration from Pakistan and Bangladesh was a terrible idea in the 1960s, but those who questioned it were roundly denounced and silenced.
Of course, if you welcome Britain’s inner cities and schools becoming more Muslim, please feel free to say so. You won’t be punished for that.
James you consistently assume all kinds of things about me, many of which are proved wrong. Forgive me for not bothering to reply. And don’t take non reply to mean I agree or disagree with anything you say in such a binary way. The very idea of nuance seems lost on you.
Andrew Godsall writes: “James you consistently assume all kinds of things about me, many of which are proved wrong. Forgive me for not bothering to reply. And don’t take non reply to mean I agree or disagree with anything you say in such a binary way. The very idea of nuance seems lost on you.”
But you did reply, Andrew, in that insouciant drive-by shooting way of yours, that doesn’t stay long enough to engage substantively with those who disagree with you – or takes offence when you are challenged.
I am quite certain that over 80% of the British population – you and Penny included -are worried about the growth of Islam – not just ‘cultural fascists’ as you term them* but most others, including the religiously indifferent majority. I am one of those who think it will spell more problems in the future, and not just for Jews and Christians, but for Britain generally, as the election of five Islamist MPs in July indicated: the balkanisation of our cities (a similar problem in Michigan and Malmo).
I am pretty certain that a man of liberal-leftist sympathies such as yourself is also worried about this – but conflicted because you cannot be seen in public to express negative ideas about third-world immigration into Britain.
Far from not understanding the idea of nuance, I see it all the time, and I know why you can’t speak up in defence of the RE teacher in Batley whose life was destroyed by that baying mob.
I know also why Katherine Birbalsingh fought back in the courts to prevent Islamists taking over the Michaela School, even though half the kids there are from Muslim homes.
Don’t shoot the messenger – even in a drive-by shooting – just because you don’t like the message (and you share the same worry about where Britain is headed but cannot say so publicly – wait till ‘Islamophobia’ is declared a crime!). Ask instead: are you bringing the Gospel to Muslims? Or is that streng verboten now?
(* ‘fascist’ is not the opposite of ‘Marxist’: although fascism is an imprecise ideology, it is much closer to communism than most people realise, like cousins who hate each other.)
Nope. I didn’t reply to your questions. Once more you fail to see nuance.
Once more – a decision not to reply indicates nothing but that decision.
It’s OK, Andrew, I share your anxieties about Britain in the coming decade as well. Fortunately for me, I am not a Jew or an RE teacher in Yorkshire.
Oh, that sounds a bit too Niemoellerish for comfort….
It’s ok James to have your anxieties. Try focussing on those instead of making assumptions either way about other people and their anxieties.
Andrew, I feel the same way you do about the growth of Islam in Britain, I just don’t conceal it (well, sometimes I do – I’m not as brave as I’d like to be).
Ahh James I see. So you have taken part in, been interested in, and hosted some interfaith dialogue sessions then? Or been involved in Scriptural Reasoning group?
James
I don’t have a dewy eyed vision of any religion – including Christianity. All have been and are instrumental in abusive and toxic theology. I am anxious about Salafism, just as I am anxious about Project 2025 and Patriarch Kirill. All corrupt the Springs from which they flow.
But, as Andrew observed, nuance is not your strong point. The history of Islam shows a religion often much more enlightened and tolerant than Christianity, and Muslims in Britain are, by and large, integrated and loyal. Look at Sayeeda Warsi and Sadiq Khan. Regarding all Muslims as extremists is bit like me believing that all white working class people are feral, racist thugs. I don’t.
Furthermore, we had a duty to those of the Indian sub continent as we had a duty to those in the Caribbean. Exploiting countries to satisfy our greed has consequences. As does arming militias to oppose the Soviets as the US has found. North America is largely to blame for the Taliban.
I don’t see that white people have a God given right to be the majority in any country (although they will continue to be so in Britain). I believe this not because I’m a Marxist but because I’m a Christian.
Penelope – for what it’s worth – I’m probably in agreement with you about the Muslim religion (probably about the only point where we do agree). As I indicated before, I consider Peter Oborne’s book ‘The Fate of Abraham: why the west is wrong about Islam’ to be a book that everybody should read. James is a self-confessed ‘Zionist’ and I consider this to be the worst heresy within Christendom right now.
Andrew drives by:
“Ahh James I see. So you have taken part in, been interested in, and hosted some interfaith dialogue sessions then? Or been involved in Scriptural Reasoning group?”
Scriptural Reasoning? Yes, I do Bible study with others regularly, Andrew. The Quran isn’t ‘Scripture’ for me.
Have you invited and Muslims or Hindus in your part of the world to consider the claims of Christ?
Or do you think we’re all on the same sacred mountain?
Ahh I see you haven’t quite grasped what a Scriptural Reasoning group is.
No worry. I thought it was interesting to see how much you did ‘feel’ the same way as I do. Obviously not very much
Andrew
Yep – here we have a presidential candidate convinced that God diverted a bullet meant for him into the body of a lesser mere mortal so that he could end asylum seeking in the US and a VP candidate who has been a Christian only slightly longer than hes been in politics and thinks hes an expert on both and thinks that only people with biological children should be allowed to vote and that school teachers without their own children must be “perverts”.
Peter I find it astonishing that a convicted felon, financial cheat, and a liar amongst several other things can even be considered, let alone nominated, to run for the most powerful position in the Western world! And that your Supreme Court seems to think it’s fine to allow him to do anything if it’s a presidential act.
You maybe have seen the amusing commentator Gavin Ashenden who is now, I think, Roman Catholic – but seems to change his religion on a weekly basis – saying that if DJT is elected we will need to give thanks to God for diverting that bullet. The whiff of religion really does odd things to people.
Andrew, why don’t you talk to Dr Ashenden if you really want to dialogue with him and understand his thinking?
He’s a highly educated but very approachable person and I’m sure he would welcome a dialogue.
But he’s not a pushover as he used to be a Jungian and a liberal before rejecting those outlooks, so you have to be secure in your thinking first.
On what basis do you say Gavin Ashenden “seems to change his religion on a weekly basis”? He was a lifelong Anglican until he became a Catholic in 2019, which he remains.
Anton,
I was going to post the same but you have saved me the bother; it’s just Andrew’s drive-by shooting style. You are quite right that Ashenden has only ever been an Anglican (since his conversion), until he became a Catholic in 2019. He was actually a member of General Synod for a time.
Of course, his Anglicanism ‘evolved’: from youthful evangelical to firm liberal Jungian, and then to a more classical Anglican, moving ever more Catholic in his thinking until he became a Roman Catholic in 2019.
Ashenden of course called out the incursion of Islam into ‘Anglican’ worship (the reading of the Quran in a Scottish Episcopal Church, IIRC), which got him turfed out of being a Queen’s Honorary Chaplain. He also disturbed the bureaucrats in Lambeth Palace when he spoke up for the wrongly disciplined Dean of Jersey over his mistreatment by the Bishop of Winchester. In both cases, Ashenden committed the cardinal sin of being correct.
Andrew should really talk with him to understand his thinking better.
Oh I think you will find he was a bishop in a sect that was not at all part of the Anglican Communion.
I very much admire his decision to become a Roman Catholic.
“Oh I think you will find he was a bishop in a sect that was not at all part of the Anglican Communion.”
‘sect’ is a pejorative word usually used to describe doctrinal deviations from orthodox Christianity like Mormonism, the Christadelphians or the Jehovah’s Witnesses. I would not call the Christian Episcopal Church, an Anglo-Catholic Continuing Anglican offshoot of The Episcopal Church a ‘sect’ as if its doctrines were any different from historic Anglicanism, any more than I would call the Free Church of England a “sect”. For those who care about such things, the Christian Episcopal Church is in “apostolic succession”. And its hardly a “different religion” unless you think Anglicanism and Catholicism are “different religions”, like Islam and Hinduism. Is that what you think, Andrew?
And “not being part of the Anglican Communion” excludes most Christians in the world. Being a little parochial here, Andrew?
“I very much admire his decision to become a Roman Catholic.”
You should have a word with him if you’re thinking of converting. I don’t think he has found it that easy, not least because I think he was hoping to be ordained as a Catholic priest and to take on a role in theological education, but the Catholic hierarchy are frightened on having such a disruptive, media-savvy force in their ranks who would expose the mediocrity of most Catholic clergy. Shakers and movers of some brilliance are not wanted in most churches. The same thing happened to Calvin Robinson when the C of E blocked him and he went to the FCE, only to fall foul of Bishop Fenwick. Upsetting Islam and the transfolk is a sure way of getting blocked and booted.
The Roman Catholic Church does tend to place a value on discipline and obedience amongst its clergy. You can see why they might not trust Ashenden.
AJB writes: “The Roman Catholic Church does tend to place a value on discipline and obedience amongst its clergy. You can see why they might not trust Ashenden.”
I think it’s more of what Australians call ‘the tall poppy syndrome’: although no longer young, Ashenden is too bright and media savvy for the grey men that are the RCC bishops in England. A (married) Father Ashenden with a large internet following would just show up their mediocrity. And just as that onetime Marxist Peter Hitchens is too hot to handle for the Tories, Ashenden is not afraid to articulate an authentic conservative Christian social and political vision, instead of Francis’s dated 60s socialism. The Catholic Church is still very vulnerable over its history of sexual abuse, and Ashenden always risks going off message.
Except of course Michael Nazir-Ali was ordained a Catholic priest when he moved over…
“Except of course Michael Nazir-Ali was ordained a Catholic priest when he moved over…”
So have lots of Anglican clergy who went over to Rome, including the unfortunate Fr Alan Griffin. I imagine the RC hierarchy figured Ashenden would be too difficult to control. Perhaps even the Vatican put the kibosh on ordaining him as a sop to Justin Welby, of whom Ashenden is a trenchant critic. Nazir-Ali kept a relatively low profile on attacking the directions of the C of E, focussing instead on the sufferings of Christians in the Islamic world – still a risky thing to do.
As fun as your conspiracy theories are, it doesn’t make much sense to argue that Ashenden was denied ordination because he’s just too bright, given that the very bright Nazir-Ali was ordained.
AJB – as I said, not just because Ashenden is bright but because he rocks the boat. You will know that he runs his own successful youtube channel with viewers all around the world, as well as being part of the ‘Catholic Unscripted’ channel. He is rigorously orthodox but not obsequious to the Vatican, which is politically quite to the left of him.
Nazir-Ali, on the other hand, doesn’t rock the boat or say much on the causes du jour. I was in fact a little surprised he swam the Tiber. I knew he was educated as a Roman Catholic in Pakistan (his father converting from Shia Islam) but he was closely associated with John Stott and evangelicalism, and I knew him a little when he was chair of Trinity College Council in Bristol. As a bishop he ordained women, and when he became a Catholic he made clear his dissent from the way Anglicanism was going, but I can’t recall him giving positive reasons for joining Rome. Maybe he did and I didn’t notice. If he had previously been an Anglo-Catholic it would have been more understandable.
Simply, but not reduction ad absudum it is a question of authority in house/ household of God.
And orthodox Jews also hold out the distinction and difference of work inside and outside their faith communities. (The so called Jewish enlightnment and egalitarian philsophy has pressured some movement here.)
(To avoid any back snd forth comment in this matter here is a link:
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/a-history-of-women-s-ordination-as-rabbis )
It would be interesting to see which churches are growing.
It has already been pointed out on this site the effect it has had on LLF ssm/b.
For what it’s worth, (and I don’t have to make that decision) like Mike Crees above, I’d rather come under the authority of an orthodox female than a liberal male.
BTW my conviction in this matter of female church leadership has done 180⁰ change in this matter.
The one person “authority” model of many or most churches isn’t the New Testament model of local church leadership. Further, in a Christian marriage, is it not the Christian husband’s spiritual responsibility to care for his wife? These are the implications of 1 Corinthians 7. Priscilla and Aquila give us the only NT model we have of a Christian couple in spiritual leadership.
At other levels, in other categories, than family, at the time of Jesus how many
1. Female rabbi’s
2. Female priests
were there?
Even today there aren’t many female rabbis except in the most liberal synagogues
Not quite, T1, Reform, Masorti and Conservative synagogues all ordain female rabbanits, quite a few modern orthodox do so too. It’s only the conservative orthodox, Haredi and Chassidim that do not.
Funnily enough there were female apostles so…
Beware of the ‘totality transfer fallacy’: ‘apostolos’ means basically ‘messenger’ or ‘missionary’; at other times it has a more specific reference (just as ‘disciples’ can mean the Twelve or a much greater number):
https: // http://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/ word-study-fallacies
Thanks for the link, James. I foreget how much good stuff is to be found there.
Carson’s book, which is mentioned, exegetal fallacies, has been on my radar for a number of years, but I doubt I’ll look to buy it now at my stage and place in life.
It’s a good book, which I read years ago, along with Moises Silva, ‘God, Language and Scripture’. Everyone needs a good grounding in basic synchronic linguistics (how language works here and now), and maybe some understanding of diachronic linguistics (how words and languages have changed over the years). For myself, I love etymologies and historical linguistics (especially Proto-Indo-European and its children) but it’s of limited value in biblical interpretation. I think it was James Barr in 1961 (‘The Semantics of Biblical Languages’?) who demolished the misleading hold that historical semantics on biblical studies (a false view that prevailed through massive works like Kittel’s Dictionary). A little learning is a dangerous thing, said the infallible Pope, and a little Greek can be the same.
Pl read https://terranwilliams.com/what-winger-presently-gets-wrong-woman-apostles/
The most relevant section is ‘Different kinds of apostles’ and onwards.
Anton asks this (unanswered) question above:
“Penelope,
Why is expressing concern about the rise of Islam racist when Islam is a religion that claims to be for all races? Have you forgotten that you can change your religion but not your race?”
Quite so. Muslims are delighted when a white Briton converts, and especially when a white Muslimah dons the hijab, as a sign she is not to be sexually propositioned in any way.
The idea that religious beliefs are somehow biological is bizarre, but I suppose some anthropologists in the 19th century did think that way.
I imagine it must be very difficult to lead or even plant a church in Birmingham or Bradford, given the level of violence that is likely to provoke in those balkanised communities. Even harder to be a Muslim who converts; moving way is sometimes the only safe option.
Penelope writes:
“The history of Islam shows a religion often much more enlightened and tolerant than Christianity, and Muslims in Britain are, by and large, integrated and loyal. Look at Sayeeda Warsi and Sadiq Khan. Regarding all Muslims as extremists is bit like me believing that all white working class people are feral, racist thugs. I don’t.”
An incredibly blinkered historical outlook. How do you think Christianity was reduced to servitude in Egypt and practically abolished from the rest of North Africa?
What do you think caused the continuing bitterness and conflict in the Balkans? The Ottoman Empire.
Who were the Janissaries? What was the centuries-long experience of the Greeks? What is the centuries-old source of the conflict between India and Pakistan? What is the source of the conflict tearing Nigeria apart? Or the bloodshed that ended in the birth of South Sudan?
Where was the only place that Islam was driven back? The Iberian Peninsula. Oh, and the Gates of Vienna.
Khan is a politician. Loyal? To whom? He has helped make London a very unsafe place for Jews and welcomed the conflicts of the Middle East to its streets. He knows how to run with the hounds and the hares, but one day he will have to choose between the gays and the mullahs. And the mullahs have more votes. Labour’s antisemitism is posited entirely on securing 70%+ of the Muslim vote without which it can’t be the government. The election of five jihadi MPs gave them a jolt, hence Lammy’s posturing toward Israel.
“Furthermore, we had a duty to those of the Indian sub continent as we had a duty to those in the Caribbean.”
And we fulfilled that at great cost to British life, limb and finances, protecting them from German and Japanese takeover.
Oh, I can do nuancy, Penny – because I don’t have a Year 8 RE cartoon view of the world. You probably don’t know what it’s like to be a Christian in inner Birmingham or Bradford. Or an RE teacher in Batley.
From your reply you clearly can’t do ‘nuancy’.
Read some history, Penny, and talk to Greeks, Armenians, South Sudanese, Nigerians, Copts, Pakistani Christians. They might give a bit of nuance to your anglocentric world.
You might be worth engaging with when you stop sounding like a slightly calmer version of Stephen Yaxley-Lennon.
Or perhaps Calvin Robinson would be a more apt analogy.
If I wanted apologias for colonialism and demonising of Mediaeval Islam, I’d read Nigel Biggar. And I’m far too bright and busy to do that.
Penny, I don’t think you’ll find much on Medieval Islam in Nigel Biggar’s work. I’ve read three of his books and don’t recall anything on that era, or much on Islam at all. You would need instead to read a modern history of Greece or Armenia. But for an account of the British Empire from a Christian ethical point of view, yes, you would learn a lot from Biggar. Niall Ferguson is also important for understanding the commercial and financial factors. He’s married to Ayaan Hirsi Ali, so has some insights into how Islam actually functions today.
PCD
Islam has one very simple problem – despite early leanings towards ‘no compulsion in religion’, in the end Muhammad fought wars for his religion, including the major one of conquering his former home city, and persecuted dissenters. Non-Muslims in Muslim lands are accepted only as second-class citizens. It is essentially a state religion though one that intends to take over the world.
And yes, Christianity by Muhammad’s time had been corrupted by its entanglement with the state and was also into wars and persecutions in defiance of the way that the NT teaches the Church should relate to the surrounding world – Christianity and Islam as state religions are about equally awful.
With, however, one big difference – Christianity was founded with a different and better agenda which can still be recovered and acted on by the Church today, an agenda to be a peaceable international state-independent counterculture. Sadly Christians who continue in the later heresy of ‘established churches’ have no such answer to Islam.
Yes, Biggar, Ferguson and Hirsi Ali are very much birds of a feather.
Ghastly, all of them.
Penny, I am just not interested in your throwing around petty insults towards respected scholars who have been well researched arguments.
Please take your comments elsewhere.
Ian
I’m just sad that you think Biggar is a respectable scholar.
Another petty put down. Take these silly comments elsewhere. I am not interested in them.
Ian
Not at all. You allow people on here to disdain Welby all the time. I show disdain for Biggar’s scholarship and you react as though he is in some way sacrosanct.
Can’t you see the double standard?
You, like James, may think he’s a fine scholar. I and many others don’t.
People criticise Justin for his very poor decisions based on evidence. That is different from the breezy sideswipe you made.
I cannot patrol all the comments. Others are poor; yours stand out as some of the worst.
I would like a space here for respectful dialogue and responsible engagement. You almost never do either.
Exactly so Penny. Conservatives on here spend most of the time with petty put downs of people who are ‘other’. No concept of who their neighbour really is. No willigness to dialogue. A complete emphasis on orthodoxy and no care for orthopraxy.
It builds a religon of purity and ulitmately one that passes by on the other side of the road bcease people like you and me have become ‘the enemy’.
Ian
You may wish to create a space for those things, but others clearly do not. That’s usually when I enter the discussion, usually to point out how rude or disrespectful someone is being. You do not seem to like that coming from my ‘side’ but are perfectly happy to allow abuse and offensiveness from yours.
You are, of course, quite right that Welby is not above reproach. I have never claimed he was and have, indeed, recently criticised him on Twitter for welcoming the Grenfell report when the Makin Report is so overdue. But Biggar is not beyond reproach either. As many critics have pointed his his research is partial and his conclusions biased and racist. You might not agree, but I hardly think you would argue that The Times and other papers shouldn’t publish such critiques.
My only conclusion is that you simply don’t like views with which you largely agree being called out because they are expressed poorly or offensively. I am not expecting you to read all the comments. That would be a full-time job on threads like this, but it is interesting that you always alight on Andrew and me and not on the commenters whom you must know make rather a habit of being cheap, rude, abusive, and unpleasant.
Forgive me if I’m wrong, but I have never seen you call out racism, homophobia, Islamophobia, transphobia, or pornographic detail from conservatives on here.
Yes, you are wrong. I did so this morning.
But even if I don’t, that is not a reason for you being insulting. I’m fed up with the constant bickering that you and Andrew G engage in with your opponents. I wish you would all take it somewhere else.
Your comments about me not liking things not from ‘my side’ are refuted by my welcome of challenge from Lorenzo, A J Bell (on good days) and others. You and Andrew G just seem to specialise in insults. Do it somewhere else.
Ian, you simply don’t engage when asked quite basic civil questions about some of your comments here. And when you do your are grumpy.
Why don’t you simply moderate comments and post those you want to and ditch the rest. Easiest way forward. It works very well on Thinking Anglicans which, despite recent claims from some here, has a very broad range of views expressed.
We weren’t talking about the ‘breadth’ on Thinking Anglicans, we were talking about
(1) the roll call of those banned,
(2) the way that no justification was provided for so doing
(3) the way that those banned were among the more qualified
(4) the way that this could seem to be because they were introducing unwelcome factual study-data and conclusions into the mix (just as newspapers have editorial policies, and media have their Overton Window and self-imposed middle ground, which may sometimes bear little or no relation to what the science says)
(5) the way that this was kept under cover, so that the unwary could think that this was indeed a meeting point for the more ‘thinking’, when all the while the more qualified were the more likely not to be allowed to speak.
This has now been going on for decades.
You obviously weren’t following the discussion here. There were complaints that it was entirely liberal in comments. It clearly is not.
Christopher it is a moderated forum and much better for being so I think. And you have complained here several times for being banned. And one time you did so, you were on there the next week commenting. It may just be that your comments were not suitable.
Penelope,
I have corresponded cordially with Nigel Biggar about his fine book “What’s wrong with Rights?” In that work he pointed out that human rights come at the end of a chain of reasoning, not the beginning; that the idea cannot be sustained in isolation without that chain; and that human rights tend to expand in scope. They are, in essence, based on the secular version of the notion of the image of God – a fact clearly recognised by an Iranian Muslim representative to the UN some years ago. Jonathan Sumption, a former Justice of the UK Supreme Court (and the leading expert on the 100 Years War) , wrote in the Foreword to his book Law in a Time of Crisis (2021) that “I doubt the value of multiplying rights, which often serve only to magnify and perpetuate grievances.” The barrister Michael Arnheim points out the exploitation of human rights law by interest groups in his book Fixing Human Rights Law (2023).
Some months ago you said you were quitting this blog because of the responses you and some others received. But you came back. What changed your mind?
Anton that’s a good summary of the conclusion of “What’s Wrong With Rights?”, the most sustained historical critique I have read on the ever expanding topos of human rights. Maybe Alasdair Macintyre has done something similar in his later books on rationality and justice (I haven’t read them yet). Sometimes I would ask a class “Who believes in the existence of human rights?” All hands would go up, then I would ask: where are they, then? Where did they cone from? Do they ever end? How do you know they are not just the invention of your minds? The bright atheists and agnostics in the class didn’t like these questions but had no real answers. Then I would explain to the class that the concept of human rights was really based on the imago Dei in Genesis 1.26 and if rights were meaningful and objectively true, it had to be based on divine transcendence – a fact thst gives both the content and limits of “rights”. If rights come from the state, then we are at the mercy of power politics. Natural rights are not the gift of the state but precede the state – and nature is another name for Creation and Natural Law. Time for me to begin reading Budzsizweski on Aquinas on law.
James,
I see you too have thought long and hard about the notion of human rights. I’d love to email you my 2600-word essay on the subject via Ian Paul if he and you are willing. Here is a taster…
Christians who believe in human rights say these are endowed by God. This was held to be “self-evident” in the US Declaration of Independence of 1776, at least of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” (words written by a slave-owner!) But how self-evident is it? God says we have responsibilities towards other humans; and to the man who asked who his neighbour was, Jesus gave the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). Is the rights-based view equivalent to the responsibilities-based view, with one focusing on the receiver of benefit and the other on the giver? Both views require relief to be given, but the responsibilities-based view specifies whose responsibility it is to take action: yours, if you see someone in distress. That is a moral obligation. The rights-based view leaves that question open. If the responsibility is the State’s, through its recognition of human rights, a bureaucratic machinery must be set up running into all parts of life. This may widen into totalitarianism – exactly what human rights are meant to combat – even as people become passive to the suffering of others and grumble “it’s not fair” about their own situation (as if Satan fights by Queensberry Rules!) The responsibilities-based view fosters selflessness; the rights-based view fosters selfishness. God wrote Israel’s law in terms of responsibilities.
Clearly we do not have human rights before God, because God (who is omnipotent and good) allows ‘natural’ disasters so bad that a man who was responsible for them would be seen as a gross human-rights violator. All of creation is under a divine curse (Genesis 3; Romans 8:20-22). God also instituted human death after the Fall by preventing access to the tree of life (Genesis 3:22-3), so he does not uphold any human right to life. (The death penalty is part of Mosaic Law; see also Romans 13:4.) If human rights exist then God grossly violated Job’s, when He let Satan torment him (Job 1&2). He has a Creator’s right over his creation, a right to be obeyed. We therefore have a responsibility – a duty – to obey God. But has God any responsibility towards us, which would then endow us with rights that He must respect? None! We have responsibilities toward each other, which we may provisionally reinterpret as rights in relations amongst ourselves. But, since such rights would be endowed by God yet are not upheld by him – for he is free to adopt the role of judge whenever he chooses (and who listens to prophets in the West today?) – this is not God’s view. To insist that we must respect each other’s human rights but God needn’t is to wreck the idea. Even if God is our judge and we have fewer rights in court than in the street, God is not a consistent judge in this life (Luke 13:4-5). Were churches to relabel ‘human rights’ as ‘sinners’ rights’, their theology might improve. Jesus never said, “Woe to him who denies the Son of Man his human rights”, and how strange it sounds written in his mouth! He never said “It’s not fair!” even about his improper trial and crucifixion.
The Bible nowhere mentions rights granted to us by God in any universal covenant with the human race. God gives us much freedom in how we live our lives, but that does not give us any right to believe or behave wrongly. The only universal covenant in force today, the covenant with Noah and his descendants, grants us merely the right not to suffer a catastrophic universal Flood (Genesis 9), and even this right did not apply to every human, for it was not in place before the Flood. God has also graciously given believers in Christ the right to be called sons of God (John 1:12), and the right of access to Him through Jesus Christ, but only since the Crucifixion. The idea of human rights is superficially attractive, because the alternative of invoking responsibilities (duties) and morality means telling others how to behave, which in our relativistic culture is offensive. But Jesus and the prophets of the Old Testament were forthright about human responsibilities and human wrongs (i.e., sins).
Where do secular people get the idea of human rights from? Every person has an understanding of right and wrong, and presumes that others do. (Christians say this is because humans are made in the ‘image of God’ according to Genesis 1:27.) This observation underlies the secular human rights drive. Common personhood is not enough for agreement over right and wrong, though. Murder and incest are universal taboos, but then come differences. Is the ‘golden rule’ – do as you would be done by – a universal principle from which human rights may be derived? Jesus endorsed it (Luke 6:31), and secular persons invoke it to avoid hypocrisy. But Muslims are told to treat non-Muslims (dhimmis) worse than Muslims in Islamic societies. An Iranian representative to the United Nations, Said Rajaie-Khorassani, called the UN’s 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights a “secular understanding of the Judaeo-Christian tradition” that was incompatible with Sharia (at the 65th meeting of the UN Third Committee, during the General Assembly’s 39th session, New York, 7th December 1984, A/C.3/39/SR.65, paragraphs 91-95). Sociobiological arguments based on the evolution of group behaviour are speculative. In short, secular persons say the existence of human rights is obvious but, when asked to explain it, cannot. Critical Theory denies the existence of human rights, and it is (for once) correct.
Clearly we do not have human rights before God, because God (who is omnipotent and good) allows ‘natural’ disasters so bad that a man who was responsible for them would be seen as a gross human-rights violator. All of creation is under a divine curse (Genesis 3; Romans 8:20-22). God also instituted human death after the Fall by preventing access to the tree of life (Genesis 3:22-3), so he does not uphold any human right to life. (The death penalty is part of Mosaic Law; see also Romans 13:4.) If human rights exist then God grossly violated Job’s, when He let Satan torment him (Job 1&2). He has a Creator’s right over his creation, a right to be obeyed. We therefore have a responsibility – a duty – to obey God. But has God any responsibility towards us, which would then endow us with rights that He must respect? None! Were churches to relabel ‘human rights’ as ‘sinners’ rights’, their theology might improve. Jesus never said, “Woe to him who denies the Son of Man his human rights”, and how strange it sounds written in his mouth!
Ian
You have been grumpy with both Adam and Lorenzo and you have certainly not protected them from others’ abuse. And yes I did concede that you had, at last, corrected Stephen’s gratuitous details, though not before time.
I really cannot see any occasion on which Andrew or I (or, indeed Adam) have been gratuitously offensive. I think the problem is that our barbs sll too often hit their intended targets exposing raw bigotry underneath the skin of erudition and education. (I know that James and Christopher, for example, are well educated and well read; I have no evidence about other commentators.)
But if they, or you, are offended by sharp criticism of pet scholars or observations that certain views are racist dog whistles, I might suggest a sabbatical from social media.
Penny, don’t patronise me. Your behaviour here is mostly awful, and I don’t see why I should spend time and effort hosting it.
I would like commenters here to engage positively with other views. You never do that.
Ian
I post a reply pointing out that I have been enagiging with you and answering Tim’s comments, and poof! it diappears.
Ian, I feel compelled to step in to say I disagree profoundly with the idea that Penny is “the worst” or “mostly awful”, or that she doesn’t engage positively with other commentators.
James, it’s obvious that you have very clear and very strongly views on a great range of subjects, which is fine and we’re all entitled to hold our views with conviction. (Though we must never mistake great confidence for being correct.) What I suggest, (not order, but suggest) is that it doesn’t do any of us any good when views are expressed with sarcasm or personal insults: e.g. ‘because I don’t have a Year 8 RE cartoon view of the world.’ or ‘it’s just Andrew’s drive-by shooting style.’ This is not about changing your views but about making your points without the edge they often seem to have. It would make it easier to take them on board and consider them seriously. I’m sure (I hope) that this is all unintentional on your part.
It’s OK, Tim, Penny can give as good as she gets, calling me ‘a slightly calmer version of Stephen Yaxley-Lennon’. 🙂 Only ‘slightly’?
As for Year 8 RE cartoon views of the world, many years ago I did once teach Islam to year 8s and it was indeed a cartoon textbook that gave a highly sanitised, apologetic account of Islam and the life of Muhammad (omitting all his wars and marriages and his massacres of the Jews) – and understandably so when you’re dealing with kids (even though there were no Muslims in the class). Even at the time I was aware the kids knew a lot more than they were admitting and there was a kind of unwritten omerta about the syllabus. I understand now why Katherine Birbalsingh insists that her school, which is about half Muslim, is rigorously non-religious (although they all do RE for GCSE).
Later on I discovered that Catholic schools in their RE syllabus aim to say as little as possible about Islam, which is tactful. School education is not much about seeking the truth, much more about inculcating social harmony. Or the new approved social order of 57 genders.
James – well, Roman Catholicism is basically ‘salvation by works’, Islam is exactly the same – why should a Catholic RE syllabus talk badly about Islam when they are two cheeks of the same posterior?
Jock, your understanding of Catholicism is something of a caricature (even if it reflects popular piety about purgatory). If Happy Jack still reads this blog, maybe he’ll weigh in with one of his lengthy encyclicals.
James – I do understand what ‘Catholic RE’ is all about – since we do live in a Catholic country and I did have to opt my son out of RE classes (two 45 minute sessions each week). I did my homework on what it is all about before doing this.
Exactly so, James. School RE teaches Christianity as a religion of works, and teaches Islam as a religion of peace, making no mention of polygamy or the fact that a woman’s testimony is worth half a man’s in Sharia law. School RE is worse than useless, far worse.
We should not, of course, be surprised that secular humanism and Islam are coordinated in their attack on biblical Christianity.
James, I think you may have missed my point. I wasn’t commenting on or defending any other contributor to this blog simply pointing out that the tone and language you choose to express yourself in is detrimental to your argument. It gives the (no doubt false) impression that you like being or even intend to be belligerent and rude.
A blog is not a peer-reviewed journal of theology. I think James typically matches the tone in which he is addressed, which is a reasonable rhetorical stance. A blog is readable by third parties and comments are often intended implicitly for them at the same time as being an explicit response to another commenter. That is different from a private dialogue.
Thank you Tim. But James is, I think, just a controversialist. Like many conservatives he has hitched his wagon to the currently fashionable far right. Interesting that he sees being compared to Yaxley-Lennon and insult, yet is influenced by Biggar. A thin veneer of respectability won’t protect Christian Nationalists if their idols gain power.
It’s ironic that those who claim to follow a religion which is counter cultural are captured by blandishments of a very toxic, secular culture.
Penny, I grew up very poor living on welfare as “Old Labour” and have never really changed much from those convictions. It is passing strange that those old centre-left views can be stigmatised as “far right” by ignorant journalists, but that’s a reflection of their ignorance and political blindness. “Far right” in my youth meant angry Afrikaners and wealthy people who denounced the poor as lazy and immoral. As an opponent of apartheid, I was not in the slightest convinced by that outlook, all the less so when I became a committed Christian. Quite early on, though, I did become firmly anti-communist and saw it as an evil comparable to or even globally worse than Nazism. Reading Solzhenitsyn confirmed this belief.
Of course, the economy of the west is now quite different from my youth, with the decimation of heavy industry and the relocation of manufacturing to the sweated labour factories of China and India, so leftist academics in the west switched the focus of Marxism from labour to psychology and identity politics (a move presaged a long, long time ago by the Frankfurt School when it became clear that the workers of the west would never become communists). At the same time, the more I came to understand economics, how poverty arises and how it may be escaped, and the work of special interest groups (for good and ill), the more I came to believe in democratic capitalism and personal freedoms. Home ownership, strong marriages, education and personal responsibility and agency really are the foundation of a stable society, and the absence of these goods from the underclass today explains a lot of their confusion and anomie.
As for Tommy Robinson, I don’t know much about him but I think he’s a complex character, a mixture of working class hooliganism and financial dodginess (the latter a temptation not unknown to Deputy Prime Ministers and members of the Lords) but also that dogged working class concern for the despised underclass (white girls in care) and the restless mind of an autodidact who could hold his own in the Oxford Union or in a Jordan Peterson interview. I wonder how he might have been if he had grown up in a home with books or if he had been converted as a youth. It’s plain that the Home Office plays a cat and mouse game with him through the police and courts.
Nigel Biggar is a fine scholar with a great command of historical sources, as he showed in “Colonialism” and the attempt to cancel him by some Oxford staff. His book “What’s Wrong With Rights?” is a searching crtique of modern right-fundamentalism from the perspectives of virtue ethics and moral theology. Incidentally, Biggar was one of the very few scholars of Christ Church to support Martyn Percy when the rest wanted his hide.
James,
I thought little of either side in Christ Church’s epic Percy vs The Dons tussle. Percy was a leading importer of LGBT into Christ’s church (if not Christ Church). Not content with a salary higher than Cantuar’s – on the basis of which he accepted the job – he sought to be paid on the scale of Oxford College heads rather than that of cathedral deans, and dug in after a massive vote of No Confidence on Governing Body. The Dons, for their part, fought dirty to try to get rid of him. It all seems to have started when he rendered genuine pastoral assistance in a difficult situation to a troubled female undergraduate (who went on to notoriety), but he then seemed to think such tasks shouldn’t be decanal responsibility. After that there was Hairgate, the truth of which only two people in the world know (and I’m not one of them). It would all make a fine film.
Anton: yes, I was no fan of Martyn Percy: I thought he promoted false teaching and he was unconscionably avaricious for a man in Holy Orders (he lived rent free in a grand house on £90k pa but wanted more), but his treatment by the dons was dirty and underhand, and he was hung out to dry by the Bishop of Oxford and the Chapter of Christ Church Cathedral (for reasons that remain a mystery to this day) and Graham Ward encouraged the young sacristan from New Zealand to put in a CDM complaint against him – nobody emerged smelling like roses from this saga. But it was notable that those who spoke up for him were Nigel Biggar and Jonathan Aitken, not likely his theological allies. I think Percy left the Church of England after he took the money. Maybe one day the full story will be told.
Without knowing why +Oxford had it in for Percy we cannot comment. As for the female sacristan from NZ, either he stroked her hair nonconsensually (a grossly improper action for a Dean) or he didn’t; they disagree about that and only the two of them know. I refuse to speculate about it, even in private.
Penelope, thank you for your response. My point above was not objecting to strongly held views clearly expressed but to unnecessary rudeness/sarcasm and personal comments. How we express our views is equally important to what our views are – in fact communication theology would suggest that the two are inseparable or even, some would say, identical. The ‘style’of our communication is what we are saying, not merely the means to say it. So difference, debate, challenge, respect, attending – yes, that’s how doctrine develops. Rudeness, arrogance, sarcasm, dismissiveness, caricature – no, that’s how schisms are created. The former takes a lot of time and patience and keeps open the possibility that I may be mistaken and need to change, the latter is quick and has ready-made rebuttals to hand because I assume I’m right and just need to correct those I disagree with.
* “modern rights-fundamentalism”, the idea that “rights” exist as absolute and unexplained “fact of nature”, absent any religious or other historical foundation, and separate from virtue, reciprocal duties, responsibilities and the other entailments of social existence. Biggar analysises and evaluates such claims from the perspectives of moral theology.
As for the bogeyman of “Christian Nationalism”, I would love to see the Kingdom of God on earth but that will not come through political diktat. Communism and the Taliban are both satanic parodies of the divine promise. The State cannot make people Christian – but it can persecute Christians – which is what secular messianism always does. I favour limiting the direct scope of the State to the essentials of security and welfare and maximising the rights of citizens in forming their own culture (especially in education and free spech, both severely attacked today).
I’m a realist about human nature. I recognise the goodness of the Natural Law, the reality of the Fall and the transformative power of the Gospel. A wise State will see these things and avoid the horrors of utopianism.
James,
Thanks for a run through of what really ought to be basic apologetics in response to atheist unbelief and which doesn’t seem to be grasped by the political activists running Machevelian riot in the CoE, reading their Grauniad daily devotional.
(Which brings to mind all those years ago, as a working class pupil from a state grammar school, being asked at an interview for university, which newspapers I read! Of course it should have been the Times as it contained law reports, but I didn’t know that then.)
The Kingdom of God is so very far from Christian Nationalism, whereas Islam is rooted in theocracy.
And the secular democratic state is adrift in a whirlwind of confusion, of pressure groups.
But, I will make a distinction and draw out a difference based on a ( correctable) pre-assumption that both PCD is/was an authorised Bible teacher, as is James.
There are key drivers for both. One appears to be secular/ political, view of the world, of human life, synchronism and pluralism, the other Christian orthodoxy and the extrapolation therefrom of a view of the the world and human life and religions ( including secularism).
Geoff – I’d suggest that you show some care with James – I think that your theology is closely aligned with my own – and I think that this is fundamentally different from the view held by James; I’m not exactly sure that he is ‘on-side’. A few threads ago, you brought up ‘indicatives and imperatives’ which you had read (or heard) about from Sinclair Ferguson – and this was very good. I’m pretty sure where Sinclair Ferguson is taking this idea from, because I not only ‘read the book’ (i.e. the notes by James Philip on Romans), but I also ‘watched the movie’ (a substantial chunk of his series of sermons on Romans on Sunday evenings 1987 – 1989). That’s exactly what he hammered home – Paul starts with indicatives, telling us exactly where we are when we believe in Him (i.e. secure in the number of the Saviour’s family) and points out that, only having established the indicatives, Paul moves onto the imperatives – instructing us to conduct that is commensurate with our new life ‘in Him’. I think they were all (Willie Still, James Philip, Sinclair Ferguson) part of the same ‘Crieff group’.
Of course, logically I *could* make a decision to renounce my faith and *could* make a decision to adopt some hedonistic life style – and in this sense I suppose I have the commodity known as ‘free will’, this really is something that is morally impossible for a mind that has come to believe in Him (and for a person who has passed from death to life and is now in the number of the Saviour’s family) – and is therefore something that is not part of the game for a believer; it is a moral impossibility for a believer to exercise his ‘free will’ in such a way that he removes himself from (or gets kicked out of) the Saviour’s family.
My suspicions about James were aroused in one discussion where he nonchalantly dropped the phrase ‘free will’ into one of his comments – and the standard understanding of ‘free will’ is the doctrine whereby I am in danger of renouncing my position ‘in Him’ – this becomes a moral possibility. Furthermore, when he starts telling us just how wonderful a Catholic religious education is (and tries to tell us that it is infinitely superior to a Muslim religious education), one really has to wonder.
The Catholic theology (as I understand it) is not one that is based on indicatives (telling us what we are in Him) followed by imperatives.
Oh, Jock,
Please don’t go down the theological road of free will, here. Of course, you are free to do so, our host permitting.
Free will could be mentioned in a way that seeks to engage yet at the same time critique in such a way that shows the interlocutors comment is a contradiction of their stated adherence to free will, such as free will( or not) in sexual matters.
It recalled correctly that is the disputation in which James mentioned free will. That is free will adherents claiming they don’t have free will.
In a simliar vein, (that self-refuting contradiction) are those who contend that there are no absolte truths such as liberals, robustly contend that theirs is the absolute truth.(That is in evidence in this comments section).
RC Sproul on the Ligonier site was reluctant to engage in the questuons of free will and election.
The comments are captious and fractitious enough without delving into free will.
And I have missed any reference to James being linked to RC.
Apologies, James for talking about you without you.
As far as Union with Christ, it is a much neglected scriptural teaching, it seems to me and that although it is most prominent in presbyterian teaching, I first came across it through the lay orientated books by Dr Mike Reeves, an Anglican. First, ‘The Good God’ (on the Trinity) second, ‘Christ Our Life’.
Here is a short generalised review. From a baptist. It has been reviewd well across denominations.
https://banneroftruth.org/uk/resources/book-review-resources/2014/christ-life-review-andrew-roycroft/
I’ve always though Mike Reeves is a fine teacher with the knack of making difficult theological ideas accessible. More parishes could do with this style of teaching doctrine.
Jock, I don’t recall the comment I made but my assertion that we have (limited) free will is simply the correlative that we are considered – by God and the law – as morally responsible beings, with *some ability to choose our actions. I am sure that level of ability varies from person to person, depending on their life experience, genetic inheritance etc. That was all I was saying – a reflection on the philosophy of mind. The alternative, based on a materialist understanding of mind, is that we are entirely determined automata incapable of acting differently. I do not know how the soul and mind interact, but I’m not a materialist as far as human beings are concerned, so I affirm there is some element of freedom within us all. That was all I was saying.
I don’t think you have understood me at all with reference to RE. I was simply comparing two RE syllabi that I knew of, one in a C of E school, the other in a Catholic school and how they dealt with Islam. The Year 10 and 11 GCSE syllabus requires students to learn about Christianity and one other world religion. I said nothing at all about ‘Muslim religious education’.
AFAIK, the Catholic schools do a similar bland Y8 lesson course on Islam (focusing on cultural or folkloric things) but choose not to make it a subject of comparison with Christianity for GCSE.
Catholic schools make Judaism the other ‘world religion’ for comparison; many other state schools have chosen to study Buddhism for comparison. This is tactically wise because there are very few Buddhists in Britain and avoiding discussion of jihad, the caliphate, martyrdom, dhimmitude etc keeps the classroom and school calmer.
My thoughts always go back to that poor RE teacher in Batley who is still in hiding to this day because of the baying mob that besieged the school after he showed pictures of Muhammad to a class.
Or worse, the philosophy teacher in France beheaded for questioning Islam in class.
If I’m correct, you don’t live in Britain, so you probably don’t encounter these issues.
James – I’d say that, on the one hand we really do have complete free will in a logical sense; we can choose to reject God (and face the consequences). But what I learn from Scripture (together with my own life experience) is that certain choices (those which involve rejecting God) are morally impossible if we really have come to believe in Him (and hence have the Spirit within us as a deposit guaranteeing what is to come – as Holy Scripture puts it).
The term ‘free will’ is at best a red herring, but I have only ever seen it used in a malign context; previously I have only ever seen it in the context of ‘a slave again to fear’ (e,g, someone I knew – a Catholic – who was always worried that she might actually lose her faith – as if this was a real possibility). In other words, I’ve only ever seen ‘free will’ in the context of people who think that Salvation has something like a Schrodinger’s cat status – you can be in, then out, then in again – and you don’t really know if you’re alive or dead, if you really have done enough to remain ‘in Him’ until you actually get to heaven.
That isn’t Christianity.
“That isn’t Christianity.”
I’m afraid that neither is the kind of self righteous ‘I’m in, you lot are out’ judgement. Try reading the parable of the good Samaritan. It’s your very enemy who can actually save you and act in the right way to save you.
Andrew – agreed, because ‘self-righteousness’ clearly isn’t Christianity either (since it misses the whole business of the Cross – and why Jesus had to suffer – Romans 3:12). Christians don’t do ‘self righteousness’ and Christians also don’t do ‘self esteem’.
Jock I’m afraid your attitude towards Roman Catholicism in several comments on this thread is nothing but self righteous. And judgmental. And full of self esteem. Withdrawing your son from RE lessons because they are taught by a Roman Catholic is all of those things.
Roman Catholicism is the vast majority of Christians in the world. By a very very long way. I married a Roman Catholic. And in very many ways I’d happily be a Roman Catholic. The prejudice you seem to display reminds me of both the worst aspects of the English Reformation and the troubles in Northern Ireland.
I repeat – your enemy is the one through whom you can be saved.
Andrew – well, I did present some reasons why the teaching seemed either dangerously wrong or dangerously absent on key issues of salvation – which you didn’t interact with – the whole point being that it does seem to leave a huge swathe of self-righteousness – there is something left for the person to do in order to remain ‘in Him’ (so that when you eventually get to heaven, you can be proud of yourself for your part in achieving this).
Yes – from what you have written here, I suspect you may be right about yourself – Roman Catholicism may well have suited you – (except that, given your career choice, you may not have been permitted to marry and, from what you have indicated here, your life would have been greatly diminished as a result).
“so that when you eventually get to heaven, you can be proud of yourself for your part in achieving this”.
Oh I see. Not only are you judging Roman Catholicism to be wrong, you are also saying that we help achieve our own salvation….
I didn’t interact with all of your comments, no. I chose some parts and made further comment and you don’t want to interact with those
Andrew – in fact, I’m saying precisely the opposite of this – I’m saying that our Salvation is *all of God* ‘and not by works that any man can boast’ (Ephesians 2:9).
What else do you want me to respond to? Your take on the Good Samaritan? Well, I basically agree with it.
I was hoping you would reflect more on your caricature of Roman Catholics and your serious prejudice. But no worry…
Jock as far as chronology is concerned, Philip or Ferguson? I don’t know. I think Ferguson was ordained as a 23 year old at the Tron Glasgow. A friend who is probably a handful of years younger than Ferguson who was at university there, said the younger people had a preference for the preaching of Ferguson over the older well regarded minster George Duncan.
Willie Philip (a son of James?) is the current minister at the Tron,
I think.
Ferguson helps with preaching at Trinity Church , Aberdeen, led by David Gibson.
Can’t recall where I first came across gospel grammar, indicatives, before imperatives. Don’t think it was Ferguson, but it is prominent in his, ‘Lets Study Ephesians.’ a cracking book, by a Biblical scholar, yet not a typical scholars commentary.
But, enough. We are well away from the pickle jar that is the CoE.
BTW Jock,
I have just seen your earlier comment about linking Catholicism and Islam as two peas in the same pod of salvation by works. Islam is far far different, believing a different God entirely, not the Triune God of Christianity.
A key tenet of Islam is; God begets not; neither is he begotten.
Roman Catholics can say with integrity, the Creeds. They would be heresy of infidels, anathema to Islam.
I stick with my evaluation (above) of the contrasting comments by two Bible teachers, PCD and James.
Geoff – well, as I indicated, we live in a Catholic country – and I pulled my son out of RE, because it did not look promising. Furthermore, I have seen the ‘outcome’ of Catholic RE – where devout, good people, who are serious about their religion, are ‘slave again to fear’; they do not believe that the Spirit is a deposit which in and of itself guarantees what is to come (eternal communion with God), but a heavy input is still required from the person to remain in Him – there is still a worry on their part that they might lose their faith.
This isn’t Christianity. The starting point of Christianity is Romans 3:12; I have become worthless; the work of Christ on Calvary (crucifixion and resurrection) was necessary – and, from this starting point, believing that in Calvary, he did the whole job to transport me from death to eternal life. Of course, we are mindful of our obligations so that we can effectively do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do’ (Ephesians 2:10); the starting point for this is assurance of our salvation; we are no longer slaves to fear.
I don’t see this message coming out of Catholic, or indeed any other form of, RE.
Morning Jock,
I’m not defending R. Catholicism, and am a protestant believer, as is James, but to equate it with Islam is a false equivalent.
No one on this blog has looked into the effect on the CoE of the disaffected or quasi RC into the ranks of the CoE?
There are various stripes to compare such as our host, PCD, Andrew Godsall and others such as those who refer as Father.
53% of Christians globally are Roman Catholic and about half of the Church of England is on the more Catholic wing too, the other half evangelical. Now RCs may encourage good works and confession and taking holy communion to assure salvation. Yet conservative evangelicals hardly believe that everyone is assured of salvation via the holy spirit alone either, certainly not homosexuals in same sex relationships or those who have abortions or pre marital sex for example without repenting for that
Simon: you have described quite accurately Roman Catholic moral teaching on homosexual acts, abortion and extra-marital sex. I have sometimes observed that Catholics in Northern Ireland who wanted a party thst supported Catholic ethical teaching should vote DUP.
T1 – I can’t speak for ‘evangelicals’ in general, but I can indicate how I understand Scripture and what it says about salvation. Firstly (John 3:16) you are saved (i.e. have passed from death to eternal life – where eternal means eternal and not something that can be lost again) if you believe in Him. If you truly ‘believe’, then you have passed from death to life. Scripture also indicates that when this happens, you are endowed with the Holy Spirit as a deposit guaranteeing what is to come – and this should impact on your behaviour, attitude towards God, attitude towards the people around you.
At the same time, Scripture is very clear that there are people of faith who behave abominably – for example Samson is listed in Hebrews 11 as a man of faith (i.e. one who is in the number of the Saviour’s family, has passed from death to life and heading for eternal communion with God). It is quite instructive to look at the whole list in Hebrews 11 – and pointedly look at just how flawed these characters were.
Note that Scripture tells us absolutely nothing of whether or not Samson attended the synagogue regularly, what his rabbi had to say about his womanising – and the other things he got up to when he simply couldn’t control his temper – but we can probably infer that he wasn’t the sort of person who was hugely into church attendance – and if his rabbi did have words about his womanising he would have probably told the rabbi to go and boil his head (or worse).
The church is required to uphold God’s law, to make it clear that sin is ‘exceedingly sinful’ and give no quarter to anything that Scripture gives us to understand is sin. This therefore governs the response of the church if someone as depraved and dissolute as Samson comes along and asks for a church blessing on his union with the latest woman he has picked up.
Salvation, though, is a completely different matter – and Scripture (particularly Hebrews 11) gives us a long list of people of faith (who are therefore in the number of the Saviour’s family; they are saved) whose behaviour really doesn’t match up at all to what one should expect from a mind that has been gripped and mastered by the Holy Spirit.
I hesitate to comment on this thread, as it seems to have brought out the worst in some other commentators. However, I do think the headline question – “is the church in episcopal stalemate?” – might be worth considering from the perspective of the obvious collapse of any understanding of church order. The commissioning of everseers at All Souls Langham Place and the susequent commissionings at Bishopgate suggest that influential people either don’t know or don’t care about church order. And now we learn that the bishop-designate of Wolverhampton, Dr Tim Wambunya, has conducted a canonically irregular consecration in Germany.
Perhaps we need to remind ourselves what bishops are, what their relationship to the rest of the church is, and what they are for before we worry about appointing any more.
We certainly need to remind ourselves what bishops are. They are the ones who unite the people of God around the truths of the faith, and build the people up in that truth.
That is what a sizeable chunk of the current House have signally failed to do—including the two archbishops—and that is why we are in this mess.
And what happened at All Souls was no threat to order, as the service was commissioning people to stand in the pastoral gap created by this failure of episcopal leadership until proper episcopal ministry is restored. It was not a break of order.
You can’t seriously believe that the commissioning of overseers who stand outside the canonical structures of the C of E isn’t a breach of order. Nor can you serioulsy claim that the commissionings at Bishopgate weren’t a further development of that break. We are now in the bizarre situation in which those who claim that they are seeking to conserve what the C of E has inherited are the ones doing most to damage the structure, whilst some of the most ardent revisionists are demanding the upholding of canon law as if they are in some way credible advocates for the status quo. I’m not at all clear what the way out of this mess is, but people do need to be honest about their part in it.
The service (at which I was not present) was commissioning people to have an oversight of others to encourage and support them. These are neither bishops nor quasi-bishops. You can read the liturgy online because, unlike the House of Bishops, those involved believe in openness and transparency.
Do read the liturgy, written by a retired bishop, and explain where this is ‘outside the canonical structures of the C of E’.
I agree with you that it is bizarre for revisionists to complain about this, when they appear to think the doctrine of the Church—indeed, the very basis of its doctrine—is dispensable.
So what was going on at Bishopgate if not quasi-ordinations?
On their own terms, they would probably see these occasions (which have no legal force as per canon law) as semi-ordinations rather than quasi-ordnations, as they intend to be ordained when things are more propitious. I don’t think their service would count for church pensions.
Most evangelicals don’t have a particularly sacramental view of ministry- or least not an episcopally exclusive one – and would happily receive communion in a Baptist or Presbyterian church, whereas a rigourist catholic minded might not consider them as real churches with real sacraments. Or maybe not, I couldn’t generalise on this. Evangelicals have often remarked that a Roman Catholic priest could be received directly into the Anglican ministry but a Baptist minister would have to re-ordained. Is this theological or political?
“Is this theological or political?”
It’s about Church Order and the doctrine of the CofE, so theological. We believe that in order for people to be ordained as Deacons or Priests they must be validly ordained by a bishop. We recognise that Roman Catholic bishops actually are bishops. And we acknowledge that Baptists don’t have or even wish to have bishops – for theological reasons of course. So a Baptist has to episcopally ordained.
Both Roman Catholic Priests and Baptist ministers go through a process of selection and discernment and then formation before they are admitted to Orders in the CofE.
You are right. The trouble is that there is no procedure in the Church of England’s constitution for what to do when shepherds become wolves; while anything in scripture relates to a structure in which multiple episkopoi oversee one congregation, rather than vice-versa. Apostate bishops and archbishops – those who wish to import SSM into the church – are owed no spiritual allegiance. So faithful evangelicals have to make it up as they go along. The situation is best understood as spiritual civil war, to be fought by evangelicals using asymmetric tactics.
If there is to be any parity Tim Wambunya should now be asked to withdraw from Wolverhampton
I am not holding my breath…..
Part of the problem, I think, is that too many Anglicans work with a Cyprianic-princely model of what bishops are, as the fount of grace (the bestowers of sacraments, orders and true teaching), when in reslity they were meant to be translocal leaders and discipliners of errant clergy.
The result is that a privileged princely class is created in which individuals think that for 15 or 20 years they uniquely possess the Holy Spirit and have insight and guidance above hoi polloi. This special endowment of the Holy Spirit allows them to define doctrine directly (David Jenkins, Paul Bayes), to favour or disfavour clerics in trouble ( e.g. the chaplain of Trent College), to admit or refuse ordination (Calvin Robinson) and to exempt themselves from safeguarding scrutiny (John Sentamu). The problems of this clerisy is that diocesans bishops choose their own suffragans and from that class most diocesans are appointed – a bit like the ghastly problem Parliament has created, whereby so many MPs are chosen from the ranks of MPs’ dogsbodies.
Maybe I am naive about how institutions function and their capacity to reform themselves, but I think the only way out of this Cyprianic confusion is to recover a reformed understanding of the episcope as a senior presbyterate, not as a fount of graces and truth. Persons chosen to be bishops should be able parish ministers who are able to look after translocal properties and ministries for a fixed term (five years), then return to parish ministry, teaching or chaplaincy. We don’t need and can’t afford a princely class.
Most MPs now have at least been councillors before or MPs researchers or SPADs, so have experience of the rank and file political world. I would agree with you that most Bishops should be required to have been Parish priests or chaplains in a school, university or hospital for at least 5 years and ideally an Archdeacon or Cathedral dean following that too before being appointed
I hate the idea of a political class, especially a self-perpetuating one. If I had my way, no one under 35 could be an MP and only after they had had a real job in the real world. And I would have term limits as well – serve, then back to the world of work or retirement. Political classes are a recipe for corruption.
In Presbyterianism, the idea of oversight is expressed (if I understand correctly) through the Moderator, a minister who holds the post for a fixed term then returns to his parish. Anglican bishops should follow a similar model and never lose track of what the pastorate is really about. I felt the same in teaching and university work, that head teachers and professors should never lose touch with actual teaching, whatever else they had to do.
You could equally argue nobody should become stipendiary clergy until 35 either after they had had a real job in the real world so they could have more experience of what their parishioners go through as MPs would of their constituents lives. However ultimately it is up to their constituents who they elect and the PCC and wardens of the Parishes who they want as their clergy.
Bishops, head teachers and professors tend to get the role near the end of their careers so often retire afterwards having peaked rather than going back to the day job. Moderators may get the role younger so it might be different there
Not head teachers in a profession where people retire at 60. I knew two men who became head teachers in their 30s. The first, appointed at 32, did an outstanding job and worked himself to an earlier grave. The second closed his school.
People of brilliance can become professors in their 30s. Such people are better as productive scholars than heads of department.
Back in the 80s the Church of England discouraged a lot of young men from seeking ordination until they had had ‘life experience’. The result was that a lot of able and energetic men in their 20s disappeared, leaving older men with shorter ministry working lives to be chosen.
The average age of a head teacher is 48 to 51 and most of those who become headteachers do it until retirement.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5b475b0840f0b678e20d8e25/Leadership_Analysis_2018.pdf
Average age to become a Professor is 47.
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Age-appointed-as-professor-female-and-male_fig1_267790153
As you say you can’t have your cake and eat it. Either you have younger ordinands with less life experience or those who are older but have had a career outside the Church beforehand
“If I had my way, no one under 35 could be an MP and only after they had had a real job in the real world. And I would have term limits as well – serve, then back to the world of work or retirement. Political classes are a recipe for corruption.”
Disagree profoundly.
Beware the fetish for the real job in the real world. Serving in the armed forces is quite unlike any other job, and I wouldn’t argue that disqualified someone from standing for public office. As for term limits, I’d suggest that the rapid rise and swift departure to cushy consultancy and non-exec director posts is the big problem, not seeing people reach high office after years of experience in politics or staying on as backbenchers. It’s easy to forget but Margaret Thatcher already had 20 years under her belt in Parliament before she became PM (and for Clement Attlee it was 23 years, Harold Macmillan 30 years, and Harold Wilson 19 years). By contrast Liz Truss had 12 years as an MP before moving to No10, Boris Johnson 11 years, Keir Starmer 9 years, and Rishi Sunak had a mere 7 years as an MP prior to being PM.
Whoever said serving in the armed forces is not “a real job”? It’s very real, and pretty similar to serving in the police, in private security and the prison service. Many, many MPs after 1945 had been soldiers and understood the demands and dangers of that service. So I don’t know what point you’re trying to make there.
Working as a political agent for an MP or a political party as a young graduate aiming to be parachuted into a “safe seat” was the focus of my criticism. This current government has a vast swath of no marks who would struggle to survive in an unsubsidised job market that depends on profit margins and actual abilities. The enormous expansion of local and national government and quasi-governmental agencies and “charities” created this class of professional politicos.
What is the dividing line between real and unreal then? The political researchers and so on look pretty similar to the “real world” of management consultants and PR reps.
It’s fashionable amongst contrarians to bemoan that the government is full of people who went from University to an MPs office to being an MP. But the actual number of people who did that is vanishingly small. Look at the current Cabinet. Keir Starmer had a long legal career culminating in being DPP. Angela Rayner was a care worker. David Lammy was a lawyer in the US. Yvette Cooper was a journalist. Rachel Reeves worked at the Bank of England. John Healey was a journalist and tutor at the Open University. And when the public are given the opportunity to vote for or against “professional” politicians it turns out they have no particular problem with them: Andy Burnham, for example, is a pretty popular Mayor of Manchester.
Your critiques are lazy and at best a distraction from the real political and economic challenges the country faces.
AJB,
I agree with James’s reservations about a political class, but I think it’s more complex than either of you suggest. Too many MPs have been lawyers, or in large City firms, or in commissar-type jobs in public service. Too few have run wealth-creating businesses or worked with their hands.
There were both advantages and disadvantages in having MPs unpaid, as a century ago. It meant you were more likely to run the country as a calling, and it meant that Parliament was not pathologically overactive as it is today. On the other hand it meant you could not stand if you were not wealthy, which was an unfair skewing. These are not easy matters.
AJB, don’t complain about ‘this place taking a very ugly turn’ without a dose of ‘tu quoque?’ when you dismiss my comment as ‘lazy’ and ‘a distraction’ without bothering to read carefully the last sentence of my comment about the vast expansion of government and quasi-government (fulltime local councillors, leaders of government-funded ‘charities’ etc) in the last generation. This is where great numbers of budding MPs were generated. In 2017 (the last year I can find figures for), 19.3% of MPs had a background in ‘politics’, 11% said ‘lawyers’, 4.8% said ‘charities’. Of course it may well be that business people, farmers etc don’t want to abandon careers and businesses they have spent years building up. That’s why I favour term limits and citizen-legislators, not a professional class who may have experience but are also prone to the corruptions of office.
You showed a similar rush to type when you dismissed my comment on Gavin Ashenden’s failure to be ordained as a Catholic priest, contrasting him with Nazir-Ali, without noting what I said about him being difficult for the hierarchy to handle.
Anton,
The experience of unpaid MPs in reality meant MPs being in the pocket of their patrons. Labour leaders were the most enthusiastic about bringing in MPs salaries and expenses, for example, in order to break the hold of the union bosses on the PLP. We’ve had people try to bring in serious business leaders before, but the record has tended to be that they struggle to make the transition to frontline politics – see Archie Norman or David Young. By contrast lawyers have been prominent in Parliament for centuries, presumably because the barrister’s job of arguing the brief he or she is given, matches up with the cut and thrust required of party political debate.
James,
I read your last sentence, it just didn’t change my assessment. Bemoan a professional political class all you like, but I don’t see how you can cast it as a new phenomenon for our generation. Look at Winston Churchill – first elected when he was 26, scion of a family that had been in Parliament for 400 years, son of a former Chancellor, and himself sat in the House for 60 years (alongside fellow professionals and dynasts like Austen Chamberlain, Hugh Cecil, and David Lloyd George). I doubt the country would have been served by forcing him out via term limits, nor if we’d done it to Margaret Thatcher, or Harold Wilson, or Clement Attlee.
As for Ashenden discussion, it looks like you weren’t reading the comments yourself. My original point was that the Roman Catholic Church placed a value on discipline and obedience amongst its clergy. Plank in your eye?
AJB,
Also because lawyers can choose when to work and when to be elsewhere, and still get paid plenty if they work only part-time.
Far be it for me to suggest that lawyers like creating laws and then getting paid to minister them to their clients.
AJB – I dealt with thst question at the time. I went to a Catholic school for a good chunk of my education, and rather than having a plank in my eye, I can sometimes see things that many Anglicans don’t often understand: “discipline and obedience” in Roman Catholicism means abiding by the Magisterium and obeying the instructions of your bishop (canonical obedience). That is why Roman Catholic priests cannot openly challenge Catholic doctrine in the way that many Anglican clergy openly attack Anglican doctrine on marriage (even denying that exists), and why Catholic bishops have more direct power over their clergy than Anglicans do – because Catholic bishops are directly answerable to the Pope (and can be suspended by him), while each Anglican bishop thinks he or she is the Pope. (A Catholic David Jenkins could never have happened.) There isn’t the slightest indication that a Father Ashenden would teach counter to the Magisterium or disobey his bishop. No, a Father Ashenden would not be disobedient to the Magisterium but he would be an uncomfortable critic of the kind of accommodations that British Catholicism has made to life in a post-Christian country, and his ability to critique Jungianism, Islam and interfaith questions, LGBTQ+ ideology, transgenderism, DEI, abortion clinic prayer bans etc make him a challenging person. On the whole, British Catholic bishops don’t want to handle hot potatoes because of their political nature. They prefer encouraging Catholics to focus on Marian piety, food banks and foreign aid. But Ashenden – as he demonstrates in ‘Catholic Unscripted’ – ‘unafraid to engage these issues in a way that grabs headlines – and this is what the hierarchy finds unsettling. The first practical rule in Catholicism is trying to maintain tranquillity and order.
SPAD = Signal Passed At Danger?
Anton – just a very quick comment here on your piece above on rights (some of these threads are so long and involved, you can never know if a reply has been made). I agree that the idea that we have ‘rights before God’ doesn’t make sense since God is the Lord and the fons et origo of everything. But the idea of universal reciprocal human rights and duties as a template for how societies should live has a long history preceding the French Revolution, Thomas Paine and Euro-American Deism. Already in the 13th century (I believe) Catholic theologians were exploring the implications of biblical laws and what these laws were implicitly saying about the moral status of individuals and rulers in terms of rights and duties imposed by God, and the nature of justice.
Aquinas’s Treatise on Law in ST II analysed law in four related, hierarchical categories: Eternal Law (how God established his creation, physically and spiritually); Natural Law (‘the rational creature’s participation in the divine law’); Divine Law (biblical revelation of God’s will); and Human Law (the changeable, local and temporal laws that human beings make according to their perceptions of justice and local circumstances, e.g. driving regulations, tax codes). I suspect the ever expanding secular notion of rights today comes partly from a confusion of these categories.
This autumn I hope to tackle Budjizewski’s study of Aquinas on law and maybe Macintyre on rationality (and maybe revisit Biggar’s book).
The Iranian diplomat was right, I think, that the 1948 Declaration of Human Rights was Judeo-Christian in inspiration, coming as it did after WW2. Charles Malik of Lebanon would have said the same.
Yes indeed; the idea of natural law goes back at least as far as Cicero, who wrote (in De Re Publica bk.3) that “True law is right reason in agreement with nature. It is of universal application, unchanging and everlasting… No other law can be substituted for it, no part of it can be taken away, nor can it be abrogated altogether. Neither the people nor the senate can absolve from it. It is not one thing in Rome and another thing in Athens; one thing today and another thing tomorrow; but it is eternal and immutable for all nations and for all time.”
A related vanity is the notion of international law. ‘Law’ means a body of legislation binding on specified people (by birth or in a particular territory), enforced in a specified territory, publicly known, with penalties specified for violation and due process for deciding guilt. International law falls short of these criteria. There are only international treaties and conventions, and their signatory nations. The very use of the word ‘international’ implies recognition of the sovereignty of nation states; and, although the actions of a particular nation state may be deplored by other nations on ethical grounds, according to coherent legal concepts a state can be held only to its own signature (and even then – held how?). Anything more is a pretended claim to authority. The United Nations doubtless wishes to claim authority over all nations in the way that a ruler claims authority over his subjects, but that is vanity.
You go away for a weekend and this place takes a very ugly turn (or at least more ugly than usual).