Attending General Synod is always an intense experience, and I always need a couple of days to recover, despite trying to be wise in the use of my time and energy whilst there. And it is dangerous making early judgements about the significance of a particular meeting, since this often only comes to light with the passing of time. But my initial reflection is that this session of Synod was just about the best I have experienced in my fifteen years involved (from 2000 to 2005, from Salisbury Diocese, and then since 2015 from Southwell and Nottingham).
I am not here planning to give an account of all the debates; for that I recommend you go to Michael Hayden’s substack, where he offers really good coverage of the debates and the key speakers. But I am picking out what I think were four issues where there has been a significant change which will have important implications for the future.
1. Hereford Motion and Spending Plans
A lot of time was spent on looking at finance, driven by some radical proposals from Carl Hughes (the Director of the Finance Committee of Archbishops’ Council) to simplify the way finance works (eliminating movements of money back and forward from dioceses to the centre and back again), and significantly increasing the funds released by the Commissioners going to the dioceses. This is by means of around a 50% increase in the Lowest Income Communities (LInC) funding, and the inclusion of time-limited transitional funding to give dioceses breathing space to bring themselves back into balance again over the next five years.
So we had presentations on Friday afternoon, a debate on the Hereford diocesan motion (more on that in a minute) on Saturday morning, a long debate on the spending plans on Saturday afternoon, followed by the Private Members’ Motion on Pensions. All of these could have potentially been contentious and divisive.
The distribution of the Commissioners surplus from their assets is agreed by a group called the Triennium Funding Working Group (I think one of the positive legacies of Justin Welby), composed of commissioners, bishops, and members of Archbishops’ Council. They work over a three-year horizon, in order to give stability and enable planning, and in fact have included projections for the next three triennia, that is, nine years. To be anticipating what is happening over nearly the next decade is a good thing—though much could change over that time. The money being distributed totals around £1.6bn over those three years—which, coincidentally, is almost exactly the amount that I called for when looking at the financial imbalance three years ago (and again a year later). There remain some key questions about why the Commissioners are still planning to see their assets grow—though I have been promised further answers from Alan Smith, the First Church Estates Commissioner.
All this is going to be transformative for dioceses; almost all will experience a significant relief of pressure on their finances—but of course they must use that in order to restructure so they are sustainable in the longer term.
But not all are happy! Richard Jackson, bishop of Hereford, brought a motion requesting that part of the Commissioners’ assets were redistributed to dioceses—which was not a good idea, since they would never get the same returns as the Commissioners have had, and the money would simply dwindle over time. Michael Beasley brought an amendment, that instead there be a statutory requirement that 1% of the Commissioners assets be set aside, in perpetuity, for direct funding of clergy stipends in dioceses, without any control or qualification—so the Commissioners still invested the assets, but part was ring-fenced for stipends. This all sits under the Save the Parish movement idea that we need less control from the centre, and more assets returned to the successor of glebe funds, the diocesan boards of finance. There was a substantial amendment from Pete Wilcox (Sheffield) calling for a proper process of reflection on this.
I made this speech:
I would love to support the Bishop of Hereford’s motion. Of course we want to believe that those on the ground know the best way to use financial resources to see people come to faith. But, unamended, I think that this is putting the financial cart before the spiritual horse.
We know from experience at every level that what happens with finance reflects what is going on spiritually. As someone said, you are only really converted when your wallet is converted. Or, as someone else said, where your treasure is, that is where your heart will be.
We could indeed simply release money in the way that Richard requests—assuming that, across the dioceses, we had reached the point where we all equally shared a passionate and disciplined commitment to mission and growth. The hard truth is that we don’t—yet.
And it is not hard to see that from the data. Look at the presence of children and young people now compared with 2019. In one or two dioceses, disciplined investment in youth ministry, with the support of SMMIB money, has meant that the numbers have recovered to 2019 levels. In other dioceses, the numbers now are half what they were in 2019. That is a massive disparity. And it is a sure sign that we are not yet in the place where the call in the main motion would work. It is putting the financial cart before the spiritual—and relational horse. I believe that the Bishop of Sheffield’s amendment would bring these back in the right order.
(By the way, I love the irony of debating a motion where a bishop wants to talk about finance, and the Director of Finance wants to talk about mission!)
The movement of money must go hand in hand with proper reflection together on where that is best used.
I like Marcus Walker, and we have many concerns in common. But he made a speech suggesting that resistance to the Hereford motion was driven by those ‘at the centre’ wanting to grab and hold onto power—which I am afraid is unsubstantiated paranoia, and fortunately it did not win the day. And ‘returning’ money to the dioceses raises further questions about power and accountability, since this is not the same as returning money to parishes. One of the substantial questions we yet need to explore is why so much power (and finance) is now sitting at diocesan level when historically it belonged in the parishes. (And, theologically, do ‘dioceses’ actually exist at all?)
The truth is that dioceses vary enormously in the focus they have on mission, and the discipline with which they handle their finances, so we do still need the conversations that happen in the process of releasing money for effective investment in mission and growth. With the passing of Pete Wilcox’s amendment, effectively neutering the Hereford motion, I think we have seen broad agreement on that emerge.
2. Stipends and Pensions
I have long objected to both the slow running down of the clergy stipend and the step-change reduction in clergy pensions that happened in 2011, in response to the financial crisis of 2008. My Private Member’s Motion (PMM) in February 2024 called for the pension’s restoration, and was in itself a watershed moment in Synod. But progress appeared to be slow, and as a result a Clergy Pension Action Facebook group and action group formed, with a website, and we submitted a follow-on PMM proposed by James Blandford-Baker, reiterating the demands of the previous PMM, and adding the call for a further, independent, review of the pension.
With the significant change to the pension announced in May (which you can read about here), the PMM was not needed in its original form, so Adrian Youings (a member of the action group, and former archdeacon in Bath and Wells) proposed a friendly amendment, removing reference to the things that had already been agreed, and emphasising the need for a further review. I made this speech:
A Church leader said to me recently: ‘I know this is important, but I have done nothing about it. Thank you for your persistence.’ It has taken persistence—over many years—to see this welcome change—and it is very welcome indeed. It has not been done alone, though. This year a fantastic team has been gathered around this issue, and they have injected renewed energy, focus, and campaigning.
But something I have learnt about bringing change to the Church of England: you cannot push water uphill, and that is what you are doing until you have the right people in place. I would like to pay tribute to the engagement and support of Clive Mather, chair of the Pension Board, John Ball, who has been exceptional in his sympathetic and professional work, and Carl Hughes, who has provided essential financial perspectives. One of the things that was so impressive is that we set up a Clergy Pension Action website, and on that gathered some of the deeply painful stories of retired clergy, and the disturbing stories of hardship that so many are experiencing. John Ball took the time and trouble to read every one of them—and if you have not, Synod, please do so.
I have had many people contact me; one person said ‘Thank you—I no longer fear retirement.’ Synod, I am afraid that, over the last ten years, we have failed—each house here—we have failed to care for the shepherds of the Church. It is essential that we vote for this review—so that we do not fail again. We must not be able to say, in another ten years ‘We have done nothing’.
I commend this revised motion to you.
In his speech, proposing the PMM and accepting the amendment, James Blandford-Baker listed the things that a future review needs to cover. This includes disconnecting the clergy pension from the state provision, accounting for the years spent in training, dealing fairly with those who have worked part-time or done house for duty, the situation for those who have retired post-2011, and the crucial matter of housing—how it is accounted for in the package, future provision, and the scandal of those who were instructed to sell properties when entering training.
Again, there was a sense in Synod of recognition that we need to take a completely new approach to thinking about clergy stipend and pensions—and that clergy should never again be the ones who bear the consequences of financial problems.
3. Archbishops’ Council
This might seem like a small one, but I think it is very significant. In the previous quinquennium, I had twice presented the AC annual report to Synod—so it came as a shock to find that, for this session, the report was ‘deemed business’ (that is, the report did not need to be discussed, but could be assumed to be accepted) unless members of Synod registered their desire to debate it. I was one of several who did so.
The report was presented by Alison Coulter, our new chair, and debated on Sunday evening, and there were some important comments made about the need to take full account of the risks the Council faces, not least in the light of the divisive impact of the LLF process. Martin Sewell, a longtime critic of the AC, had tabled a following motion criticising the report and the Council, but it included numerous errors of fact and false assertions, and Synod saw sense and voted to ‘move to next business’, so that Martin’s motion would not be discussed.
Two years ago, there were chaotic scenes in Synod with all sorts of accusations being made about the Council and its actions in disbanding the Interim ISB. Thankfully, we appear to have moved a long way from that. This will only continue if AC takes seriously the need to be transparent and accountable, and always to ‘show its working’ to Synod in order to continue to build trust.
4. Sexuality
I have left the best till last—since it was almost the last item on our agenda. In general, it is notable that sessions of Synod are always less fractious when there is no item on sexuality or the Living in Love and Faith process, which demonstrates how damaging, divisive, and demoralising this process is whenever it comes up.
The item on the agenda was a PMM from Mae Christie, asking:
That this Synod request that the House of Bishops remove any requirements relating to Issues in Human Sexuality from the Vocations (Shared Discernment) Process.
Note that what was to be removed was not the (generally disliked) document Issues, but ‘any requirements’ related to it. This looked very much like a ‘revisionist’ ruse for bypassing all due process, and opening up a free-for-all when it came to the question of morality and lifestyle of clergy and candidates exploring ordination. As such it effectively would have set aside all the work of the last eight years in one fell swoop, and nullified the current work going on, which is due to be presented in February 2026.
I therefore wrote to Robert Hammond, chair of the business committee (BC), offering five substantial reasons why this should not be on the agenda, not least because the BC themselves had decided not to table it previously. (Bizarrely, we learned through Questions that a PMM which asks the impossible, for example ‘That the House of Bishops paint the sky green’, is not itself out of order, and so could in theory be debated.)
Two important comments formed the background to this debate on Tuesday morning. The first was an answer to a Question put before Synod by the usual process:
Q81 Miss Jane Patterson (Sheffield) to ask the Chair of the House of Bishops:
Regardless of the status of Issues in Human Sexuality and any successor document, has the House of Bishops considered the status of Canons B30 and C26, and whether the requirement that at all times each clergy person shall be diligent to frame and fashion his or her life and that of his or her family according to the doctrine of Christ continues to apply to all those who are ordained, and if so to what conclusion did it come?
The Archbishop of York to reply as Vice-Chair of the House of Bishops:
A The House of Bishops has received legal advice on this matter which said that Canons B30 and C26 remain applicable. The House has not considered the matter further at this stage. Further work on this matter is expected from the Faith and Order Commission in the autumn which will inform future discussion at the House of Bishops.
It is not hard to see that the Christie PMM would thus be a futile attempt to create a vacuum of understanding, requirement, and practice.
Secondly, in his Presidential Address on Friday afternoon, Stephen Cottrell noted in passing that ‘on LLF…we seem no nearer a settlement that can hold us together.’ Stephen tried to make this a positive point (‘how many other organisations would go this far with such disagreement? It is precisely and exactly because we belong to one another…’) but I am not sure many people would accept this spin. We have been embarked on this process since February 2017, launched by Justin’s incoherent call for a ‘radical new Christian inclusion…’ and after eight years we are ‘no nearer a settlement.’ That is a massive indictment of this foolish project, driven by hidden agendas, changing facts on the ground, and a lack of honesty and transparency.
But Paul Waddell, a member of the ‘Together’ coalition campaigning for change, set a rather different tone in his introduction of the PMM:
Conservative friends, unlike you, I want to change the canon so we get equal marriage, but that’s not part of this motion. Progressive friends, I want people in same sex marriages to be able to stand for ordination, but it’s not on the table. And conservative friends, exactly the same. It’s just not on the table today. So try not to worry about it. Let’s take Mae’s Private Member’s motion, and rather than leaving an empty space where there’s uncertainty over what replaces Issues, we come together to add a friendly amendment that makes us a much wider coalition of the happy.
Thank you so much to all the Conservatives for whom I’ve had constructive conversations with over the past few days, Sean Doherty, Adrian Youings, Andrew Atherstone and Christian Selvaratnam. In particular, I’ve really appreciated your candor and willingness to work together. Also, big thanks to Nick Shepherd for helping us find common ground and Jenny Bridgman for bringing the amendment. So here’s my elevator pitch on a way forward on Issues. Okay, it’s an elevator pitch where you’re all stuck in one with me for 10 minutes. Whilst we’re waiting for however long it takes for a new package of guidance, we replace Issues with a requirement for ordinands to consistently uphold the Guidelines for the Professional Conduct of Clergy. Progressive sorts are happy because we get rid of a fairly minging document, and conservatives can also rest easy because we keep the church’s doctrine of marriage and fidelity.
The clergy guidelines are getting an update soon, but that is okay as well, because no Canons were harmed in the making of this motion. This part of the guidelines won’t be changing in nature. The GPCC is deliberately structured on the ordinal, which is what ordinands are working towards. Anyway, the ordinal was, of course, formally agreed by Synod in the past, and the GPCC is similarly mandated as an act of convocation by the clergy of synod. All that stands in stark contrast to the slightly shady and uncertain process for introducing Issues into vocational use. Another advantage GPCC is that in Section 10.2 it name checks the bishop’s 1999 work Marriage: a teaching document which contains within it a traditional view of marriage.
Here we have someone who is clear he is campaigning for change in the Church’s doctrine of marriage, but recognises that this cannot be brought about by sleight of hand, and has worked actively with those upholding the Church’s historic teaching to come to a workable and reasonable agreement. The report of this on Together’s website is even more striking, written by campaigner Nic Tall:
A conservative concern was that removing Issues might hasten moves towards clergy same sex marriage without any due process being observed. To counter these it was explained, including several times from leading progressive voices, that deciding to remove Issues made no changes to the wider framework of rules governing conduct. The 1999 House of Bishops Statement on Marriage, Canon B30 on Marriage, and the 2014 Declaration on Clergy Same Sex Marriage were not up for discussion on this occasion. In removing Issues from the vocations process Synod did that and only that. There are not at this point any further consequences, any changes to allow clergy same sex marriage will need to happen through due process at a later date. That this was made clear does not mean that Together is not working towards delivering clergy same-sex marriage, just that the removal of Issues from the vocations process is a limited step forward on that longer road to full inclusion. Rumours that progressives on Synod have “given up” on clergy same-sex marriage or equal marriage should not be believed.
Notice that phrase (my emphasis added): ‘through due process’. Due process is the key thing that orthodox Anglicans have been calling for all along. And it is striking that Nic is worried that this conciliatory approach to the PMM is interpreted as revisionists giving up on their campaign!
Despite Charlie Bączyk-Bell and others claiming that passing this amended motion removed an obstacle to clergy entering same-sex marriage, and that this was a major change, that could not be further from the truth. (The Church of England press release is misleading and unhelpful here; I have asked in vain for it to be rewritten.) Here we have ‘revisionists’ agreeing that it is the canons, doctrine, and clear past statements of the House of Bishops that are the real issue, and that the only path to change must come through due process of engagement with all of these. That is precisely what many of us said in 2017, and the LLF process has failed because it did not address these questions.
Conclusion
I hope you can see, dear reader (assuming you have reached the end of this longer-than-usual article) the reasons why I think this Synod was so significant. We appear to have turned a corner on our approach to finance, our view of clergy pensions and well-being, the question of trust in relation to central committees, and even our approach to sexuality. If these are built on rather than torn down in future Synods, then not only does it set a hopeful direction for Synod and the Church, it might even play a fair hand to whoever will be the next Archbishop of Canterbury.
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Point of Order: LInC stands for Lowest INcome Communities (not ‘Lower Incoming Communities’)
Thanks! Changed.
All my other proof-readers missed that one!!
“We know from experience at every level that what happens with finance reflects what is going on spiritually.” I think your experience must be very different from mine here. Churches that are financially stable may be doing a lot and have large numbers but they can become smug (perhaps that is a bit too harsh!)? spiritually complacent? give the impression that they have arrived and know all the answers? Whereas the small struggling churches on the edges may have a kind of humility that shows spiritual depth. I’ve certainly experienced this myself.
Well, I think the data says that these large churches are usually the highest givers per capita.
In the C of E, many churches are small because people do not believe that they need to share their faith or invite others.
There are others reasons for some, but research shows that this is a big issue.
Not necessarily, there are rural churches in the home counties with smaller congregations than evangelical churches in inner cities in the north and Midlands and East London say who give more as the congregation is much wealthier
I don’t dispute that large churches are probably the wealthiest with high giving. What I dispute is equating either large size or wealth with what is going on spiritually. How are you measuring what is going on spiritually? A large church may be large because of the activities of the leaders and a few other key people. Being a member of a large church doesn’t necessarily mean that you share your faith with other people. A member of a small church may be regularly sharing their faith in other contexts (e.g. schools, workplace) that doesn’t necessarily result in bums on seats in their own church.
Good points, most rural churches do schools ministry for example
Indeed. I think quite a few churches are large due to their particular rector or leaders or because of the nature of the services they hold, plus of course if social activities are provided. Not because many members are evangelizing. And you can share your faith all you want, doesnt mean people will start attending your church, or any church. Most people are simply not interested.
Plus of course as the Church of England we should welcome those who only attend our churches at Easter and Christmas or for weddings and funerals and baptisms. As well as those who attend every week
Thank you Ian for this, and thank you very much in particular for your persistent input on the whole clergy pensions area. It is very good that at last we are seeing significant progress here.
However, a glaring disparity remains between clergy pensions and that of other ‘professionals’, largely because clergy pensions are calculated as a proportion of bare average stipend, not as a proportion of the stipend ‘package’, which (for most) includes, significantly, free housing including council tax, water rates, HLC scheme, etc. I have spoken to a former trustee (9 years’ service) of the Church of England Pension Board who said he had tried on numerous occasions to get the Board to address this but without success. Any likelihood of this being brought into the conversation going forward?
Thanks Francis; I’ve noted your helpful reminder re council tax, water rates and HLC which we will take to the review group set up by the AC.
And housing. The stipend is lower than a comparable wage or salary *because* free housing is included as part of the package. Perhaps the logical outcome of 2/3rds *of the total remuneration package * would be to simply keep paying retired clergy their full stipend (but no house etc) ….
Yes, the housing part totally skews things. I’m not sure what a total full time stipendiary clergy package including housing is now, and of course it varies from area to area in the country. But if we said £50,000 (which is I think too low) then a pension needs to be around £33,000. Or £15,000 plus free housing. And are we going to be anywhere near that?
I have long argued that clergy should not live in tied housing, but should be paid properly, according to the area of the country they live in. They might choose to rent a Vicarage back of course. But the current arrangement whereby retired clergy are often forced to use the majority of their pension simply to house themselves is quite ridiculous.
Apologies, that last sentence should read ‘It is encouraging to learn that this looks like being brought into the conversation going forward'(!)
Paul Waddell made the following errors:
1. He assumed that there are ‘conservatives’ and ‘progressives’. (Those that there are are simply voicing their preferences and ideologies, so are the last people one would listen to. No half-honest debate is polarised, whereas debates between accuracy on the one hand and preference on the other hand always naturally are.). One of the worst things about this assumption is that it not only recognises those who jump straight to what they call a ‘conclusion’ but also normalises that procedure as though this was actually the right thing to do (rather than almost the worst possible).
[Chris this is a long an unhelpful rant which I have cut. Please make short and coherent points that contribute to and encourage debate. Ian.]
One could say that Debbie Buggs was the remnant of remnants and that mob mentality characterised most of the remainder. In reality that is not true, because of the lack of change in position that has eventuated, and also because she wanted to follow the agreed process for taking LLF forward (should it be capable of actually going forward coherently) whereas the large majority of Christians and denominations would agree that it is LLF that belongs in the said ‘receptacle’. As Ian said in his speech, all this internalism (process, law, points of order, inner ‘Anglican’ workings) contrasts with things like the fact that old people could be about to be killed off in large numbers.
My earlier comment was not what it seemed. What happened, as so often, was not what anyone could have deduced: The final part of the comment was typed in the middle by mistake, which I couldn’t rectify (so I reinvented it as a footnote); so it *looked at first to be less coherent than it would have been if it was in order. I am so senile that it is only now that ‘cut and paste’ has belatedly occurred to me.
It reminds me of the time when I used capital letters for headlines, and David Shepherd, from an initial cursory reading, thought I was shouting.
In brief (all split into short numbered points, as is my wont) some of his other errors, so far as I can see, were:
2. to see ‘progressive’ as a coherent concept – when it is simultaneously preemptive (mischievously fait accompli) – making it incoherent and dishonest – and insulting. But because it is so much part of the common currency, he himself did not realise that, I am sure. When faulty presuppositions become very common and unthinkingly accepted, it results in the truth very frequently lying outside the Overton window altogether.
3. He thought a nice *tone (which of course can always be tactical) – a secondary matter – compensated for the primary matter of a lack of attention to *substance (which last was so extensive that Issues has been treated by many as an amorphous mass without differentiation – though not by him). This is a highly normal outlook among liberals (such as the one Ian mentioned the other day who wanted to bypass theology).
4. Speaking of ‘progressive sorts’ means not only (a) that relativism -just about the weakest ‘philosophy’ – is held to trump everything but also (b) that people’s stances are treated as a matter of psychology, never mind evidence. Yet he was not picked up on this. This approach has actually been characteristic of much the LLF debate (a dodgy foundation on which to try to build).
5. What is the advantage of GPCC namechecking the document Marriage which contains a ‘traditional’ view? This is the chronological-snobbery fallacy, proceeding as though the word ‘traditional’ named a virtue. It is virtuous to be coherent and true – being traditional is neutral.
And that is the point about debate: identifying and surgically extracting logical fallacies as a first step always automatically brings us forward, narrows things down by a process of elimination, and brings the destination (truth) that bit more into focus. Sometimes a lot more. A standard, chief and inevitable modus of debate. Different people have learned different skills, to be pooled.
This is still a rant. And an unhelpful one.
In that case, I don’t think the point of understanding has been reached, probably the fault of my own opaqueness.
If there is fault in individual points of substance, debate begins when that fault is identified.
If there is fault in tone, the intent is that the tone convey the appropriate level of importance to the points at issue. To convey less would be to communicate that one cared less. Which could never be a good thing.
The point about debate sometimes being a matter of identifying philosophical fallacies is central. This is where what I do is most often and most fully misunderstood. Identifying fallacies is in the cause of truth, making it a very good pursuit. It is second nature to Lit Hum students. And to Peter Ould and many others.
That exhausts the main points about my intent; nowhere does ‘rant’ figure in that, though that will often in daily discourse be an *initial* subjective impression. The detailed points -and my emphasis on them to draw attention to their significance and the fact that this is something that people should be passionate about- are the thing.
Does Jesus Christ recognise same-sex marriage; and how would one go about answering that question?
Natural law. Coherence with the most foundational and impeccable principles. Internal coherence (e.g., what is the significance of 2 in nature other than for childbirth which is always one of each sex). The question is solved long before we get to Scripture which merely says what was already true long before it was written.
But ‘nature’ is fallen, so natural law is fallible; remember that attitudes to homosexuality were a massive difference between ancient Israel, with its Laws of Moses, and its pagan neighbours – to which we are now reverting.
Point taken Anton! Moreover, the above addendum to the concept (natural law requires a heap of unpacking. Indeed, the final sentence is presented in such a way as to undermine the importance and even primacy of Holy Scripture.
I dont think that’s true about Christopher’s last sentence. I think Scripture reflects the reality of nature, that men’s bodies are not designed for other male bodies. That seems pretty obvious to an objective mind. There is reasoning behind what God has said, He doesnt arbitrarily declare something sinful just for the sake of it.
Colin, are you saying that things like that were not true before they were written down in Scripture? No, they are obviously true, and the biblical writer assumed them for that reason. Things that are obvious, one takes for granted.
As the world has been here for aeons before any scripture was written, it is obvious that nothing magically becomes true at the point when it is written down. The options are that it either already was true beforehand or never was.
Those are not the only options, Christopher. The Fall occurred and altered nature and our view of nature, both for the worse.
Ah, ‘progressive’ – Stinky stuff ‘progressive’!! We found some of the ham slices in the fridge had got ‘progressive’ . . . so they made their way to the birdtable. Some of the milk also got ‘progressive’ so went down the sink.
Progress and development? ‘I have seen them both in an egg’, said Caspian. ‘We call it going bad in Narnia.’. Neither position is right, apart from in part. Progress in reality is a *curate’s* egg, and we need to differentiate between the good, the bad and the indifferent, and relative degrees of each.
C. S. Lewis on the ball as ever.
As ever. Lewis and Chesterton etc make even more progress in coherent holistic large-scale thought than any of us can imbibe in a lifetime. We too rarely take the opportunity of benefitting from it. I wasn’t agreeing with him on this occasion, though. The curate’s egg replaced the rotten egg as a more accurate picture of progress and development.
. . and Aslan is not a tame lion, you know! Is our idea of Jesus a little “tame” at times, I wonder?
Well, there is no ‘our’. For some it is, and for others it is not. Interesting that there is a counterpart to that saying in That Hideous Strength where it is emphasised, upon questioning, that Mr Bultitude the Bear (based on a Whipsnade original) IS tame.
PS I think it was also significant that the ‘Issues’ motion & amendment were debated swiftly with general agreement breaking out on all sides (Vaughn Roberts’ contribution helped a lot here I believe) enabling the amended motion to pass in time to allow the important additional debate on the parliamentary Assisted Dying bill. Shame that hasn’t (yet) made the press, though hopefully it will go on to form a significant part of the next stage in the legislative process (passage through the House of Lords).
Yes, Did you hear my speech on a point of order, asking that we ‘seize the moment’ of agreement and move on so we could look outward?
Yes, I suspect that helped seal it (apart from the 4 or 5 subsequent interventions agreeing with you and further delaying things for about 10 minutes!)
I thought that was a shame. Most of those added nothing, and it would have been good to end on a positive note. Ho hum.
The motion being carried without a count of votes, is a pretty positive note. And I think the speeches did matter: Sean Doherty making the point about ordinands being in a slightly different place to clergy, Luke Miller outlining what’s happening to GPCC, Mark Tanner adding the voice of the bishops (and possibly making a subtle pitch for Canterbury?), and Debbie Buggs reminding us that though this was carried overwhelmingly it wasn’t unanimous.
‘(and possibly making a subtle pitch for Canterbury?)’ I am not sure I agree with your inclusion of the words ‘possibly’ or ‘subtle’…! 😀
Revd Mae Christie’s original motion suggested – or blatantly seemed to – that all requirements for Christian sexual ethics be dropped.
You couldn’t make it up, but clearly it shows the ineffectiveness of formation even as it is, so how laxening of the standards (or what may be perceived as such) will help, it is hard to see. Her motions is an indication that the precise reverse is needed. Reminds me of the old chestnut ‘The women of the parish have cast off clothing of all kinds, and may be found in the basement every fourth Tuesday and….’.
Point of order. The 1% was in Michael Beasley’s amendment rather that the original motion, although I suppose as I was supportive. I also think you underplay the significant dissatisfaction with the current funding model and the very demoralising effect it’s having on churches not in receipt of SMMiB largesse. The large vote in favour of the amended motion indicates to me that this is far from settled. The grass is short rather than long and many will be watching it with a strimmer in hand if I may extend the metaphor.
Thanks Richard, for the correction.
Perhaps I do—but there was quite a lot to comment on, and I didn’t want to write an article on each one.
Yes, I am sure the metaphor will run and run (or grow and grow?). I have some sympathy with the complaint, as I said in the EGGS meeting when we were discussing it. But
a. When one diocese can lose HALF of its young people, whilst others do not, we have some serious problems in thinking about diocesan strategies.
b. Giving money to dioceses is NOT the same as giving money to parishes or for ministry. Someone said to me in York that only 40% of LInC money actual gets to deprived parishes.
So I think that any revision of the current funding model must go hand in hand with asking big questions about why dioceses have become centres of financial control (which they were not in the past) and why do many dioceses have so many central staff.
I have edited the description to reflect the action motions and amendments.
Richard, I am interested to read the account in Tim Wyatt’s substack, where he draws out the point you make about significant discontent with the current funding model:
‘Among the bishops Wilcox won by 22 votes to nine. So about a third of the bishops were at least interested in the more radical ideas coming from Jackson and Beasley. In the clergy it was even tighter: Wilcox prevailed by 89-75, and among the laity it was closer again, with Wilcox winning 87-83.
There is a substantial chunk of the church (if the synod is at all representative, maybe amounting to 30-40%) who are ready to tear up the current funding settlement. A faction which includes many bishops and plenty of clergy. A faction which wants to wrest control away from the national hierarchy and devolve power and money back to those at the grassroots.’
The paradox, of course, is that this challenge is coming at a time where (rightly) this funding model is delivering nearly twice as much as previously.
Pleased to see extra funds for the dioceses, even if I would have backed the Bishop of Hereford’s motion if the funds had been transferred to the parishes. Pleased to see the improvements in clergy pensions as well.
On clergy same sex marriage, legally as far as I see it there is nothing to stop clergy having a same sex marriage in English civil law in a registry office or hotel. They just can’t still get married in a C of E church, only prayers of love and faith for them and their partner within a service
The funds would not have gone to parishes, but to dioceses. That is not the same.
If you don’t see a problem with clergy entering same-sex marriage, then you appear to understand nothing of C of E doctrine, canon law, or liturgy. You need to do some homework.
They may have filtered down to Parishes. I have no problem with clergy of the established English church joining some of their parishioners in having same sex marriages which are legal now in the nation their church is established church of.
Even if C of E doctrine and Synod still denies them a same sex marriage in their church and limits them to a PLF
In view of the unanimity of Church of England doctrine, canon law and liturgy on the subject, T1, the CoE is not for you; you are free to move to the Methodists or another denomination that recognises SSM.
PLF has been approved by all three houses of Synod, tough. Disagree with that then the C of E is clearly not for you. I am on the high church Catholic wing of Chrisianity more than the evangelical wing, so a low church denomination like the Methodists can never be for me
I am in a CoE congregation whose vicar disagrees with PLF and I take a congregation-by-congregation view of church which I am willing to argue with you from scripture. There is no need for me to dispute with you as you do not have the authority to which you pretend over me, but I am happy to do so. Shall we?
‘I have no problem’…because you appear neither to have read or understood the doctrine and canon law of the Church.
I think this is the biggest issue around LLF: ignorance.
Where does the doctrine and canon law of the church forbid its clergy from entering into civil same sex marriages which are the law of the land now in the nation it is established church of? Such same sex unions are also now recognised in services via PLF, even if holy matrimony and marriage services within C of E churches remains reserved to heterosexual couples
‘Where does the doctrine and canon law of the church forbid its clergy from entering into civil same sex marriages?’
In Canon B30 (marriage is, according to the teaching of our Lord) between one man and own woman), in Canon C26 where clergy’s lives must reflect this teaching, and its working out in Marriage (1999) and the 2014 statement. All these are listed and linked above.
If you don’t understand that, I am baffled that you are able to comment. This is basic knowledge of the C of E.
I used to worship at an Anglican church. After an interregnum, it appointed a single female vicar who after few months announced that she was marrying her American girlfriend. Although not that happy about it, the church congratulated her (via its weekly newsletter), and there was no action from higher up. Unfortunately the congregation did not have the spiritual and theological knowledge to know whether it was right or wrong.
The doctrine and canon law of the Church may forbid its clergy from entering into civil same sex marriages, but they do nonetheless. Discipline is not enforced, and both the law and the doctrine are a dead letter.
None of those canons forbid clergy getting married in English law. Even if holy matrimony in church is still reserved to one man and woman for life and only PLF within services is allowed.
Conservative evangelicals need to realise same sex marriage is legal in England now and the King as head of the C of E and parliament will expect them to respect the same sex marriages of some of their parishioners in civil law even if not in terms of C of E doctrine still
Simon, what is it about ‘marriage is between one man and one woman’ that you are finding hard to understand? This explicitly excludes same-sex marriage for clergy. Your comments here are verging on the bizarre.
It is true that the biggest LLF issue is ignorance.
In English law marriage is not just between one man and woman now. Same sex couples, including clergy can get married in registry offices and hotels in England, just not C of E churches.
However the C of E is also established church. Now Parliament does not directly decide C of E doctrine now as it did until the last century but leaves Synod to decide it.
However, if Synod had not even approved PLF or any recognition of same sex married couples do you think Parliament would just have allowed the nation’s established church to get away with that? Of course not. Especially given the current Labour majority in the Commons, Parliament would have voted to impose same sex marriage on the C of E whether it liked it or not. At most with an option out for Parishes that disagree but who still would most likely have been required to perform some form of PLF for them
A congregation that calls itself Christian but doesn’t know if same-sex civil marriage is acceptable before God is so ignorant that I wonder if it is anything more than a local social club, and I am concerned for its members on the day of judgement. How did it get like that?
In the 1990s I was in a village church (of England) outside Cambridge which planned a fortune teller at its annual fete. I protested to the vicar and was rewarded with the only bollocking I ever saw this exceedingly wet man administer (or try to). I protested to the woman organising the fete (who held an MBE for services to the community) and eventually asked her what she thought the Bible might say about it, naively believing that she would either know or would look it up. “I don’t know, Anton” she limply replied – and had no curiosity either.
I declined to attend that year’s fete, but not surprisingly the congregation continued to age and decline. It wasn’t just Bible study shifted me to the Frees.
This is or was fairly typical. A fortune teller was part of a fair inside Westminster Abbey in 1980. That was at the time of the aforementioned Bahai wife-of-Dean, but of course it was a highly liberal set up in other ways too.
Exposes of the occult started issuing from Christian publishers in the 1980s. It shouldn’t have needed to be said, but it was not before time.
Debbie Buggs deserves acknowledgment for her speech.
She was a lone voice who spoke against the perfunctory sticking plaster which General Synod has used to replace IHS.
Paul Waddell’s claim that he was engaging in a form of surgery was facile and embarrassing.
General Synod did a botched job on a serious matter. You really have no grounds at all for the tone of self congratulation that was an odd feature of the debate
A slightly odd response. Have you read the relevant documents which I have linked? GPCC? 1999 document on marriage? 2014 statement?
Ian,
There is not the remotest possibility that a future General Synod will entertain any form of specificity in either clergy professional standards or any other document in regard to the private sexual conduct of clergy or ordinands.
Why would they ?
For all its out dated vocabulary, IHS did address a substantive set of concerns.
By discarding it General Synod has nullified both the vocabulary and the purpose of IHS.
That was Debbie Buggs’ point and she was right. Nothing in the documents you cite is a meaningful remedy to this political reality.
ANd of course, people tend to get carried away by transient moods. You get an upbeat speaker, genial, and all of a sudden the thought is that we’re all getting along well, and we forget whether we agree on any substancec. A sort of fin de Synod mood. The liberals not only go with the flow – hatever that flow may be, good or ill – but make an art for of it. Others generally know better. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the women-priests debate 30+ years ago, I believe it was then that, as it came to the crunch, it became a question of vibe and of who was shouting loudest. Precisely when sober judgement and seriousness were most the thing required.
Agreement is propositional, not a matter of some vibe. Indeed, people can deliberately create a vibe – and when they do, Bob’s their uncle.
Yet more unevidenced, unscholarly assertions about ‘liberals’. For someone who goes on about precision you do come out with some libellous crap. But you are not alone in that.
In the space given, it is sometimes possible only to record that one has seen patterns of who is more likely to do what.
Newspaper letter pages, TV interviews, and blog pages often say they prefer concision.
But one cannot achieve concision without compromising on precision.
Have you read 1999 Marriage, or 2014 statement, or section 10.1 of the GPCC?
I think what’s important to understand about the letting go of ‘Issues’ is that it means that some potential ordinands are released from the choice of perjuring themselves or withdrawing from the discernment process so early on.
As a DDO and Director of Ministry I was never happy about the relevant question. It has been clear for a very long time that the CofE respects the consciences of those lay people who wish to enter a same sex partnership. And that it is not pastorally the right thing to do to ask people questions about their intimate lives.
Potential Ordinands will now explore at a later stage whether it is right for them to submit to a discipline which they, in good conscience, could not agree with as a lay person. And by the time they get to explore that, we may eventually have further pastoral guidance from the bishops.
Perjuring themselves? How so when you have on numerous occasions denied that ordination vows are not vows, publically akin to perjury swearing a false oath, or a false affirmation.
Geoff I think you are a troll in everything you write and I don’t bother to respond to those who are hide behind a pseudonym. But if you can provide any evidence for your claim here, please do so. Otherwise withdraw your accusation.
You have on a number of occasions on this blog site in the comments made that point and I have responded likening it perjury in court. Can’t remember that since your retirement? You quoted some change in the vow or affirmation which allowed ordinand not to personally subscribed to CoE doctrine. Ian Paul has also said that some Bishops do not adhere to their ordination vows.
Geoff. You are incorrect and I have made that point many times. Everything you need to read on the matter is here and you therefore need to withdraw your inaccurate slur.
https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2022-06/PROCLAIMtextWEB.pdf
As a former lawyer you ought to know that you may not publish in writing things about a person that are not true.
Potential Ordinands will now explore at a later stage whether it is right for them to submit to a discipline which they, in good conscience, could not agree with as a lay person.
Why at a later stage? Is it not hypocritical of them to enter a process to enter a process which they do not agree with?
Andrew, you exclude the third possibility of people actually choosing to fashion their lives according to the teaching of Christ.
And Ian you seem to exclude the possibility that some Christians conscientiously order their lives in accordance with a different understanding of their relationship with Jesus Christ than your own. And that pastoral advice from the bishops that has been around for so many years for those lay people. And that the only group of people who are candidates for ordination are lay people who have a variety of understanding based on their exploration of scripture, a variety of traditions, their use of reason, and their human experience.
I know why you exclude it. But I am not convinced you are right to do so, and I know I am by no means alone. And that’s why we need to find a way to settle the matter in ways that provide a broad space, which has been a characteristic of the Church of England and Anglicans for centuries.
‘… some Christians conscientiously order their lives in accordance with a different understanding of their relationship with Jesus Christ than your own. And that pastoral advice from the bishops that has been around for so many years for those lay people. And that the only group of people who are candidates for ordination are lay people who have a variety of understanding based on their exploration of scripture, a variety of traditions, their use of reason, and their human experience.’
Yes, as a description of the (problematic) facts on the ground. But in offering themselves for ordination lay people propose to enter a process culminating in embracing the professional standards required of ministers, including moral conduct consonant with the teaching of Jesus as the C of E (not any given individual) has received it. And culminating in an oath to uphold the doctrine of the C of E.
Vital to have all this articulated, understood, accepted and agreed at the earliest stage, I would have thought. Lest either time and money are wasted before an ordinand pulls out of the training process when they recognise the dissonance between their conscientious position and what they need to declare. Or worse, proceeds to ordination in compromised bad faith.
Andrew Godsall thinks that inserting the word ‘Conscientiously’ into a description of a person’s self-understanding given him or her a free pass to disregard what words actually mean and effectively commit perjury in making a promise or oath in bad faith.
Andrew shows a serious misunderstanding of the meaning of ‘conscience’. ‘Conscience’ does NOT mean ‘I have my private understanding which contradicts the historic sense of words’.
It means ‘I have a serious personal conviction which compels me to a different conclusion’. I may, for example, have a serious and conscientious conviction that Jesus was not divine or was not born of a virgin or that his crucified body was not raised immortal.
In which case, it would be perjury to state ‘I believe the doctrine as the Church has received it.’
But Andrew Godsall has happily supported in the past the ordination of people who doubt or even deny these doctrines, because he misunderstands the meaning of ‘conscientious dissent’. His sexual revisionism on same-sex acts and marriage is of a piece with his own doctrinal latitudinarianism.
Thanks Derwyn. And I realise that’s how a lot of people understand the situation. But not everybody does. And that’s why we got into this process. General Synod have taken some decisions already that already recognise and celebrate the pastoral realities of what you call the facts on the ground and more will be taken in due course.
Kelvin Holdsworth is, as ever, perceptive and incisive about this and worth a read
https://thurible.net/2025/07/15/issues-is-no-more/
Worth reading this document as well Derwyn (and anyone else) to have a better understanding of the oaths that clergy subscribe
https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2022-06/PROCLAIMtextWEB.pdf
You speak of a broad space but the way is narrow, as Jesus Christ warned. The reest of the broad space may be occupied by the enemy.
If you knowingly choose to behave according to a different definition of right and wrong than that given by Jesus’ Father, you will be kidding himself that you have any relationship with Him. This is dangerously easy to do, using distractions such as vestments, incense, dramatic liturgy etc.
‘And Ian you seem to exclude the possibility that some Christians conscientiously order their lives in accordance with a different understanding of their relationship with Jesus Christ than your own.’
It is not ‘my own’ that is the issue. It is the clear statements of canon law. Those who ignore this are not being ‘conscientious’, they are being defiant, and in their vows and through the selection process they will have to lie.
Odd that you should commend this.
Odd that you don’t seem to be aware of pastoral statements from the CofE made over several decades.
Either way, Issues has gone. And thanks for your part in making that happen.
Surely to say they are ignoring their conscience and lying is going to far.
They are wrong on a fundamental issue, and that is immensely serious for them and those they influence.
Only they and their Maker know the secrets of their hearts.
Don’t you think, Peter, that (individual cases aside) there will always be a threshold where it becomes impossible to believe that interpretations are indeed held in good faith?
And anyway why would it matter? We are concerned only with how accredited scholars interpret – there are very many of them. It is the phone-in culture and the voting culture that assumes that everyone [!] is informed and even that everyone’s position is of equal [!] value and integrity. E.g., mine on astrophysics.
‘Will you then give your faithful diligence always so to minister the doctrine and sacraments, and the discipline of Christ, as the Lord hath commanded, and as this Church and Realm hath received the same, according to the commandments of God; so you may teach the people committed to your cure and charge with all diligence to keep and observe the same?
…
‘Will you be diligent to frame and fashion your own selves, and your families, according to the doctrine of Christ; and to make both yourselves and them, as much as in you lieth, wholesome examples and patterns to the flock of Christ?’ (Emphasis added).
Is there some kind of CofE gloss that I don’t know about, perhaps appealing to the thinking of ‘linguistic philosophers’, which relativises and evacuates the heft of these profound statements?
Like someone else, I am more than a bit thick, but their meaning has always seemed clear to me!
I wanted to emphasise
‘as this Church and Realm hath received the same,’
but it didn’t communicate.
Did you read the booklet in the link I sent Derwyn?
Yes: quote from:
http://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2022-06/PROCLAIMtextWEB.pdf
‘The Oaths are distinct from the wide-ranging ordination
promises which concern fundamental questions of Christian doctrine and
Christian character.’
Is there an official C of E hermeneutic for interpreting (-away?) the gravity of our ordination promises? Or do they still ought to mean what they straightforwardly express?
Oh I think the official CofE hermeneutic is clearly laid out in that document.
My iPad won’t let me copy and paste that but the final paragraph on page 32 is very helpful.
And the section about proclaiming afresh beginning at the bottom of page 7 is also helpful.
I have not had a problem making the oaths etc etc.
I don’t expect we will agree Derwyn. But I note that there are many more areas where there will likely be disagreement, and not just the area of human sexuality.
You must not recall the series of comments, where I was appalled at your arguments. I was the one who likened it to perjury, and that anyone who could not adhere to the vows should resign.
I also commented that I knew a former minister who said that he couldn’t agree to the doctrines (as a former Methodist) but was told it was was of no concern. And you said they were no longer vows. Ian Paul has frequently said they are vows in his critique of some Bishops. And if they are and some Bishops are not subscribing to them, why aren’t they facing allegations of perjury?
You must not recall the series of comments, where I was appalled at your arguments. I was the one who likened it to perjury, and that anyone who could not adhere to the vows should resign.
I also commented that I knew a former minister who said that he couldn’t agree to the doctrines (as a former Methodist) but was told it was was of no concern. And you said they were no longer vows. Ian Paul has frequently said they are vows in his critique of some Bishops. And if they are and some Bishops are not subscribing to them, why aren’t they facing allegations of perjury?
Did you vow to subscribe to all contained here:
http://www.theologian.org.uk/church/39articles.html
I assume that includes affirmation of article 17 ‘The Baptism of young Children is in any wise to be retained in the Church, as most agreeable with the institution of Christ.’
Plus article 37 ‘The Queen’s Majesty (now by succession to the current King) hath the chief power in this Realm of England, and other her Dominions, unto whom the chief Government of all Estates of this Realm, whether they be Ecclesiastical or Civil, in all causes doth appertain, and is not, nor ought to be, subject to any foreign Jurisdiction.’
I have never said they were not vows. If you claim that you must produce your evidence.
Your link is not a Church of England link. The only valid link about the Declarations and Oaths is the one I have provided, which clearly you have not bothered to read. Those are the Oaths and Declarations I have taken many times. And I have made this point many times.
Here is the link again. Now, produce your evidence or withdraw your comment.
https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2022-06/PROCLAIMtextWEB.pdf
Andrew Godsall believes that inserting the word ‘conscientiously’ into a description of a person’s self-understanding gives that person a free pass to disregard what words actually mean and, as Geoff points out, effectively to commit perjury in making a promise or oath that the person doesn’t mean.
Andrew seriously misunderstands the meaning of ‘conscience’.
‘Conscience’ does NOT mean ‘I have my private understanding which contradicts the historic sense of words’.
It means ‘I have a serious personal conviction which compels me to a different conclusion’. I may, for example, have a serious and conscientious conviction that Jesus was not divine or was not born of a virgin or that his crucified body was not raised immortal.
In which case, it would be perjury to state ‘I believe the doctrine as the Church has received it.’
But Andrew has in the past happily supported the ordination of people who doubt or even deny these doctrines.
This is because he misunderstands the meaning of ‘conscientious dissent’.
Andrew’s sexual revisionism on same-sex acts and marriage is of a piece with his own doctrinal latitudinarianism.
Thanks James,
Nor does in mean as in a court of law, to misrepresent, bear a false witness, to the Court, tribunal, a question of truth of beliefs held. And if they are not held, there is no reason to believe the veracity either of the doctrines themselves or the person making this public confession. It is a point I’ve made in different ways a number of times, here, over the years.
Off to listen/watch some excellent seminar teaching on the Holy Spirit, the last of this week’s series at 9:30 am at Keswick Convention.
Yesterday’s was the Spirit of Pentecost, from OT to New, to today for nations for church for now.
If anyone thinks nothing more is to be said on Pentecost, have a look. 50 mins or so of unbroken solid teaching. All seminar on catch up. Today’s, The Spirit of Adoption. All by Sinclair b Ferguson.
I see that you can’t produce any evidence for your lies Geoff. And clearly can’t be bothered to read the official teaching about the oaths and declarations.
Andrew, this is from Common Worship Ordination Services:
“Do you believe the doctrine of the Christian faith as the Church of England has received it, and in your ministry will you expound and teach it?
Ordinands I believe it and will so do.”
You cannot honestly disagree with this and be ordained. That would be perjury.
The Ad Hominem attacks on Andrew Godsall are deplorable.
I fundamentally disagree with Andrew’s theology. I remain clear he should not be subject to personalised smears.
Please stop the insults and smears
Please specify a comment to which you take exception.
Peter writes: “The Ad Hominem attacks on Andrew Godsall are deplorable.”
The criticisms are not ‘ad hominem’. They are ‘ad rem’, to do with his actual sayings.
He affirms people who swear that they accept the doctrine of the C of E ‘as the Church has received it’, knowing that they don’t. That is not honest.
Andrew Godsall claims that people who disagree do so ‘conscientiously’.
This shows he does not understand the meaning of ‘conscientious’.
I conscientiously disagree with the teachings of Islam as the mosques have received them.
But that does not mean I can then call myself a Muslim. That would be absurd and illogical.
Andrew needs to look up the meaning of ‘conscientious’ and then use it correctly.
I agree. Attacks on Andrew’s probity and integrity are cheap and nasty. They say much more about those making them than they do about Andrew. However, I am heartily sick of ignorant slurs on the hermeneutics and theology of ‘liberals’. We all negotiate with text and tradition, but to maintain that some commentators here do not engage with scholarship is simply a lie. As well as demonstrating the prior ideological commitments of those making the slurs. I’m afraid that attacking others because they have different ecclesiologies and hermeneutics just looks weak and spiteful.
I am relieved that Issues has gone. It was a discussion document and should never have been used as a shibboleth. It was homophobic, but it was also lamentably ignorant about sexuality in a much broader sense. Paragraph 3.19 on pp. 26-7 is one of the most egregious instances of Issues’ shameful ignorance.
Penelope writes:
“We all negotiate with text and tradition, but to maintain that some commentators here do not engage with scholarship is simply a lie.”
“Negotiating with” is not the same as “BELIEVING and faithfully expounding and OBEYING” the Bible and the deposit of Christian doctrine.
We already know how Protestant liberalism (without scare quotes) understands the Bible and Christian doctrine: not as the inspired and true Word of God and its faithful, Holy Spirit-guided exposition (which is the official teaching of the Church of England) but as a repository of writings from the past, much of it true and useful, and other parts of it false and harmful, reflecting mistaken human opinion and not the guidance of Christ through the Holy Spirit. As such, these errors in Scripture and Tradition need to be corrected or rejected, according to some regulative principle (about which liberals are not fully in agreement).
This latter view is in fact how Penelope looks on the Bible and Christian doctrine and seems to what Andrew Godsall believes, although he speaks much less openly and directly about his own beliefs than Penelope does.
So when Penelope ‘engages’ with the Bible and tradition, it is to say that she disagrees with a lot of it, and sometimes she says why (usually because she thinks modern psychology of sex has disproved the Bible).
It has been explained and demonstrated here many, many times that modern liberal NT scholars (L T Johnson, Bill Loader, Ed Sanders etc etc) are very much in agreement about the meaning of the NT texts on same-sex behaviour. They don’t doubt what they mean (which is what Christian tradition has always affirmed). But they do DENY that the NT texts are morally or theologically true. IOW, they are erroneous and need to be rejected.
And this is Penelope’s position too. It is very similar to the way that Marcus Borg in the US rejected the bodily resurrection, causing his confused friend Tom Wright some embarrassment and incoherence.
“As well as demonstrating the prior ideological commitments of those making the slurs. I’m afraid that attacking others because they have different ecclesiologies and hermeneutics just looks weak and spiteful.”
– An ad hominem comment that fails to recognise that “prior ideological commitments” are mental idolatries that need to be submitted to the Lordship of Christ. I will not call Penelope ‘weak and spiteful’, just inconsistent and confused because she doesn’t follow through logically and coherently. Her modern secular liberalism and her childhood Roman Catholicism are at war with each other, but she may not realise this yet.
James is once again showing his ideological commitments. We all negotiate with text and tradition, the apostles, the writers of the NT, Church Fathers, Reformers, James, Ian, Andrew and me. What becomes dogma is often the beliefs which uphold the power and authority of those to whom power and authority matters. The Holy Spirit has an undoubted role in these negotiations, otherwise might all be Arians – as the gospel writers and Paul probably were.
Submitting to the Lordship of Christ for James simply means submitting to the ideological commitments which he believes such submission required. There is no such thing as belief untainted by prior commitments to particular ideologies and particular interpretations of what the Bible is saying on certain topics.
James also seems to forget that, although some scholars think certain texts are wrong, others conclude that they simply don’t discuss or have knowledge of the topics we are discussing. This is an unexceptionable stance, until it comes to sex, it seems …
Like most people in the global north I am thoroughly imbued with a secular mindset. Those who believe they are not have little apprehension of history and psychology. My secularism isn’t at all at odds with my former Catholicism nor my present Anglicanism. I am as ideological as the next woman, but, perhaps, more aware of it than are some of the men here
Penelope:
I don’t make any secret of my ideological commitments, so I certainly hope I am showing them – I do this in every sermon I preach from the Word of God.
My ideological commitment is that the Bible is the Word of God in the words of men (and some women, like Hannah, Elizabeth and the Blessed Virgin Mary) and our primary, God-given source of knowledge about God, the gospel and how we should live to please God.
Of course, I recognise other sources of truth, especially natural theology and natural law (I am a stronger proponent of these than many Protestants). But my basic ideological commitment is simply the historic orthodox pan-Christian view of the Scriptures which I believe is faithful to the way Jesus understood his Scriptures and promised his Church (see John Wenham’s ‘Christ and the Bible’ for a quick sketch of this historic belief).
And no, Paul and the Gospel writers were certainly not Arians – you are quite wrong there.
From your response I think I have correctly discerned what you think is the nature of the Bible and Christian Doctrine (the Creeds etc): a set of writings, parts of which are correct and good, while other parts are morally and theologically wrong. Nothing surprising here – this is simply Protestant liberalism, familiar to Sozzini, then radicalised by D.F. Strauss. I am not sure what your normative principle for discerning the truth is, but I suspect it is modern secular psychology. As you say, you are ‘thoroughly imbued with a secular mindset’ – but maybe not as thoroughly as you think, because ‘the secular mindset’ is actually anti-religious, anti-revelational and anti-miraculous, and seeks a naturalistic, immanentist, this-worldly understanding of what human beings are and what their destiny is (i.e. extinction), and I’m not sure you go that far. Perhaps you believe in life after death still? That is why I think there is a conflict in your thinking.
This is where we differ and why we come to different conclusions about theological and ethical truth. You think the Bible is a human document with good stuff admixed with dangerous errors which must be corrected by modern beliefs – even though modern beliefs and especially modern psychology are constantly changing and contradicting themselves. Do you remember when Freudianism was The Truth About Human Beings? Who believes it now? The same thing may be happening to the ‘Transgender Moment’ (I certainly hope so).
Secularism is such a fickle lover!
James
Your ideological commitment is to the univocality and inerrancy of the Bible, a case which scripture never makes for itself, and hardly could since it is a multi layered, contradictory set of documents which may be inspired by the Spirit. That doesn’t force univocality on their disparate concerns and beliefs. To claim that tye writers of the NT believed Jesus was the second person of the Trinity as outlined by later Councils is anachronistic, as well as a really poor reading of scripture; and one which depends on retrojecting developing theology into texts which had a very different understanding of God’s agency.
Likewise, secularism isn’t univocal. Freud is no more mistaken in some of his views than the writers of the Covenant code. Those in the gender movement who will feel the weight of history are the so-called gender criticals, to whom science, psychology, politics and theology will not be kind.
Penny, you are quite right of course to point out that there is a debate to be had about unity and diversity in Scripture. The vast majority of reflective Christians, and all respectable Christian scholars recognise that.
But the idea that scripture is a ‘contradictory’ collection of documents is only one possible conclusion from the data, and in fact not the most persuasive one. And it is a view which should lead to the rejection of orthodox Christian belief about Scripture; the Article and doctrine of the C of E specifically rejects that, not dogmatically, but out of conviction from the evidence.
Likewise, your view about how the NT writers viewed Jesus is highly contested, and scholars like the late Larry Hurtado, Tom Wright, Dick France, and many other respectable voices would think you are quite wrong. The language of the Councils is later, but many would argue on the basis of the textual evidence that this is a reasonable systematic expression of what the NT says, not least the book of Revelation.
But, again, your view here sits well outside historic, orthodox Christian belief in general, and the stated belief of the Church of England.
Penelope
If you haven’t learnt to see the deeper single Voice in scripture then you are missing the all-important point.
Anton
That is correct. The evangelical (and actually historic catholic) doctrine of Scripture is a good deal more sophisticated than Penelope may appreciate, and everything is seen through the prophetic, salvation-historical and messianic lens of Jesus Christ. The sophistication and complexity of this understanding is authorised by our Lord, who affirmed the OT as the Word of God and treated some of the Psalms at least (e.g. Psalm 110) as having a messianic sensus plenior, referring to himself.
Which is to say, 1. there is indeed progressive revelation in the salvation-historical unfolding of events and prophecy; 2. Underneath the many human voices in Scripture, there is, as you say, the one voice of the Holy Spirit directing us to Christ. Liberals can only see a diversity (and usually a dissonance) in Scripture, but catholics and evangelicals see a a symphony unfolding in history.
This is why Penelope will always be at war with orthodoxy: she prefers contemporary western culture (as the ‘Deutsche Christen’ did) to God’s final revelation in Christ. Penelope needs to read and absorb the Barmen Declaration. Unlike Penelope, we are not worried about “history’s verdict”, only God’s.
Oh, and by the way, that Algerian boxer really is a male, as (neatly) everyone now admits.
Much the same happened with Homer scholarship. For centuries it was assumed that Homer was one man, but then the German philologist Friedrich August Wolf published his Introduction to Homer in 1795, sugesting that there was no such person as Homer and that the Iliad and Odyssey had been compiled from multiple short poems (rhapsodes) by various editors in Pisistratus’ time. Goethe bought this theory for a while, for it helped him approach the two great epics; but as he read and reread them, he came to believe that behind them stood at least one poet of superlative genius, and he finally published a repudiation of Wolf in a short poem of his own, Homer wieder Homer.
Keep rereading in faith, and one voice emerges.
On the Trinity, there is a tremendous amount of deep structural material in the NT which necessitates a Trinity as part of much NT thought. The preponderance is in John’s writings, and there is an imbalance between his and others’.
Ian
Yes, I think some of my conclusions are, now, outside what you would call orthodox. For example, I would once have translated the anarthrous Theos in John’s Prologue as ‘God’; I would now more likely translate it as ‘deity’ or ‘divine’ in light of much Hebrew Bible conceptions of God’s agency (and some NT understandings). I may be wrong of course. But I don’t believe that wrestling with scripture will condemn me to Hell, or annihilation!
James – Khelif is, of course, a woman whatever you might believe about her.
Anton I think you have just made my point about commitment to a prior ideology.
Penny, it is not my label that is the issue; it is the consensus view of the church catholic. And it is certainly outside the doctrine of the Church of England.
I think your position flies in the face of the evidence of the text, particularly texts like Rom 10.13, 1 Cor 8.5–6, and Phil 2.10–11, where Paul, the monotheistic Jew, applies without remainder key OT texts which are clearly about Yahweh (and his sole sovereignty) to Jesus.
I don’t know what the consequences might be, but your position certainly puts you outside the faith as it has been passed to us.
Penelope,
My point which you don’t want to take is that Goethe kept reading and changed his mind, as he came to understand Homer more deeply, to the view that there was one great mind behind it all. If you try it with scripture, you will find the same – one Great Mind – unless you have let yourself be blinded by the god of this age. Scripture is capable and competent to challenge every human preconception. That is the testimony of all committed Christians across all cultures.
James – you have said that in every sermon you ‘show your ideological commitments’, which is positive, but you have not indicated that in every sermon you do what you are supposed to be doing in a sermon.
A sermon is supposed to show forth man’s predicament, namely, our separation from God, as a result of our sin, which is our responsibility – bringing people to an understanding of themselves that is expressed in Luke 18:13, and showing forth Christ Jesus as the answer. So the same message that convicts a person of his sins also gives joy and comfort to those who are ‘in Him’.
Do you try to do *this* in every sermon? If not, then showing the ideological commitments, no matter how good they are, is a bit of a waste of time.
I mean – Christianity is a zero-one law; reaching an understanding of self equivalent to Luke 18:13 is necessary. Based on the promise ‘seek and you will find, ask and you will receive, knock and the door will be opened to you’, we see that it is also sufficient.
A whole article about the synod – and I didn’t see the basic mission of the church mentioned once (nor in any of the discussion below the line).
It is interesting to see that Penelope is working towards agreeing with the Jehovah’s Witnesses on the (created) deity of Christ. Not that this neo-Arian idea started with the JWs, I think the Socinians were promoting it in the 16th century. It is difficult to come up with a new heresy. Penelope may believe her translation is correct, but her conclusions certainly place her right outside historic Christian orthodoxy. Which she may not think a bad thing, but at least she should stop claiming to be orthodox and catholic. Of course, she would not the first in the expansive borderless Anglican ‘fold’ to deny central tenets of the Doctrine of God; Katherine Jefferts-Schori was the Presiding Bishop of the American Episcopal Church, and nobody knew what she believed. But there have been false teachers in the Church since the days of Simon Magus.
As for Khelif, the chromosomal evidence is out there now and world boxing has been forced to change its rules. Khelif may have been born with a DSD and raised as a female in Algeria, but the XY chromosomes have produced a male skeleton and male musculature.
Ah, yes, ‘I will not call Penelope…’, but you did!!
My observation was to James July 18, 2025 1:55 pm.
Changing the subject, this is something I have just read:
‘The quarrels we undertake are not only vicious; they are also convenient because they detract us from the main claims of the text, and so undermine the force of the text. Of course it matters what the church decides about sexuality, but in the long run that skirmish or a dozen like it are as nothing before the truth that the therapeutic, technological, military consumerism cannot deliver or keep its promises. All of us–conservatives who are attentive to what the Bible says about sexuality and indifferent to what it says about economics, and liberals who mumble about what the Bible says on sex but emphasize economics–all of us stand under the awareness that the primary commitments of our society amount to a choice of a path of death.’
James
No wonder your hermeneutics are all over the place if you can’t follow a comment thread.
I wrote that the writer(s) of the fourth gospel probably wrote that the Word is deity/divine.
I wrote that interpretation is negotiation with texts AND tradition(s).
So my reading of John doesn’t make me an Arian, or even a neo Arian. It may make its author(s) proto Arians. But that would be anachronistic.
So, sorry to disappoint your heresy hunting!
And chromosomes alone don’t determine a person’s sex.
Andrew Godsall has reached a particular set of conclusions about the meaning of Scripture.
I believe the conclusions he has reached are wrong. I do not believe the issues concerned are of secondary importance.
I reject the insistence that Andrew – and others who share his convictions – are acting in bad faith. There is no justification for such an assertion.
It grieves me that I could not receive communion from him, but I would share a meal with him gladly.
We must honour the humanity of one another .
Andrew Godsall has not statted here how he reached his conclusions, but most people who call themselves Christian and hold those views simply ignore scripture.
There is always a threshold where it becomes impossible to believe that anyone could actually in good faith interpret the given words they way that they say.
Peter writes: “Andrew Godsall has reached a particular set of conclusions about the meaning of Scripture.”
Which contradict the received teaching of the Church of England.
Andrew is free to reach any conclusions he likes.
He is not free to say you can believe what you like about the Bible and still be an authorised teacher and cleric in the Church of England if your ‘conscience’ tells you this.
The Ordination promises forbid this.
“We must honour the humanity of one another.” I quote from Matthew 23: 16 ff : “Woe to you blind guides” — [17] “You blind fools!” —[27] “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You are like whitewashed tombs.”
Dear Peter, I suspect that those on this post who are not honouring the humanity of Andrew Godsall could be guilty of following a perverse deity? Or perpaps they are thinking, whenever this topic is broached, we are hearing the same spurious arguments churned out ad infinitum?
I think it’s more about the CoE having specific beliefs which are written down. Ordinands, as I understand it, declare they agree with such beliefs, or words to that effect. If a potential ordinand doesnt actually agree with those beliefs, then they should not pretend they do and not enter ministry. Similarly for those already in ministry – they should leave that church if they no longer agree with its beliefs. Jesus gave clear instructions as to how churches should deal with sinful behaviour. That applies to leaders too.
It’s about integrity.
I’d just like to thank you, Ian for all your hard work grappling with these issues in such a godly way, courageously and with integrity.
Thank you.
Persons being ordained in the Church of England are asked:
‘Do you believe the doctrine of the Christian faith *as the Church of England has received it*, and in your ministry will you expound and teach it?’
To be ordained, they have to answer honestly
“Ordinands I believe it and will so do.”
Andrew Godsall seems to have missed this point. Nobody can ‘conscientiously’ tell a lie.
Andrew Godsall writes: ‘The only valid link about the Declarations and Oaths is the one I have provided.’ The document does seem very relevant and I have gone through it. Here are excerpts:
[p. 2] The Canons declare The Thirty-nine Articles are agreeable to the Word of God and may be assented unto with a good conscience (Canon A2). The doctrine of the Church of England is grounded in the Holy Scriptures, and in such teachings of the ancient Fathers and Councils of the Church as are agreeable to the said Scriptures. In particular such doctrine is to be found in the Thirty-nine Articles, The Book of Common Prayer, and the Ordinal. (Canon A 5).
[p. 3] The place of the [39] Articles in modern Anglicanism was a major debate at the Lambeth Conference in 1968. There was increasingly diverse practice around the Anglican Communion – some provinces retained the Articles in their constitutions, while others revised them, replaced them or abandoned them altogether. Some have never adopted them in the first place.
[p 4] In the 1960s, this Declaration was still in force but increasingly under pressure from clergy who found it problematic or a burden to their conscience. Some protested publicly at being required to subscribe in this form, which brought the doctrinal discipline of the Church of England into disrepute.
The Church of England’s Doctrine Commission considered these questions in Subscription and Assent to the Thirty-nine Articles (1968). … The Doctrine Commission proposed a new approach to subscription. … [Subscribing to the Articles] must not tie down the person using it to acceptance of every one of the Articles of 1571. … The possibility of fresh understandings of Christian truth must be explicitly left open [as must the question of which of the Articles are no longer subscribable].
[p. 25] Many aspects of church life and mission are not governed by canon law, and here clergy have liberty to act as they and their congregations think best, even against the friendly advice of the bishop. But when a subject is covered explicitly by canon law, then the bishop’s formal instructions are to be obeyed, although in some circumstances there may be a variety of ways of obeying among which clergy are free to choose.
[p. 26] The Oath of Canonical Obedience takes for granted that those in authority are themselves obedient to the Christian message as proclaimed in the Word of God. The apostles expected loyalty, not to church leaders or canons, but first and foremost to the gospel of Jesus Christ. There is no place for obeying what is manifestly not according to the teaching of Christ.
[p. 29] In pragmatic terms, an individual (or the representatives of a benefice to which they are to be licensed) might wish to treat the Declaration simply as something one must say in order to be licensed (or, indeed, ordained) in the Church of England. That is, the Declaration is sometimes wrongly treated as a kind of curiosity, of no great interest beyond being ‘what one does’ and (for those who take on new ministries) has to be done repeatedly. Rather than adding to its value, repetition is assumed to diminish the Declaration’s significance. It is sometimes treated with a kind of sigh or shrug – a needful and necessary ritual, but a hoop one must jump through before getting on with the proper work of ministry.
This would be a misunderstanding of the power and dignity of the Declaration of Assent and its place in the life of the whole worshipping community. Just as worship is more than a formula of words, but is also a work of action or liturgical gesture, the Declaration is also a form of words which performs an action and is itself enacted. … [p. 30] When the minister makes the Declaration they enact something: their living commitment to the historic faith in Jesus Christ as it has been revealed in the life of the Church of England.
Indeed, the oaths at an ordination have real force. Those ordained commit themselves to a complex set of documents, liturgies, statements and canons. For example, clergy must only use forms of public worship authorised or allowed by canon, which includes forms authorised by a bishop in her/his diocese. But that does not allow total freedom. E.g. forms worship without a greeting, penitence, collect, creed, the Lord’s Prayer or a blessing. Yet many do in fact lead such worship. Or how many clergy today are convinced of election as the Articles express it?
These requirements are as important as the commitment to marriage between a man and a woman and all clergy have publicly committed themselves to them..
More generally, the complexity of our heritage has been well analysed by Anthony Milton in, ‘England’s Second Reformation 1625 – 1662’, where he shows that the various reformations in C16 and C17 left us with ‘a confusing legacy of sometimes mutually incompatible elements.’ p507. He says that ‘the most misleading view . . . is the essentialist one that insists that the Church of England already had a fixed identity which only became further clarified by the experience of ‘persecution’ in the 1650s.’ p513. So we need to be a bit more cautious when we claim that a specific document from C16 give unambiguous, uncontested and simple guidance for what we are to believe and do today or that the C of E has a consistent view of doctrine. It’s more messy and complex than that. The Church of England is not for those who like their theology always in straight lines or defined with mathematical precision or consistency!
He says that ‘the most misleading view . . . is the essentialist one that insists that the Church of England already had a fixed identity which only became further clarified by the experience of ‘persecution’ in the 1650s.’ p513
So are you saying that there was no coherent understanding of doctrine in the Church of England in 1662? If so, why were there all the Ejections in 1662?
Tim writes: “The Church of England is not for those who like their theology always in straight lines or defined with mathematical precision or consistency!”
Hyperbole doesn’t help a cause. Who has ever said statements in words can ever be equated with arithmetical formulae? Substantial objects and predicates are not the same as non-material numbers and ideal topologies (the stuff of mathematics). But words can be true or false.
And where are CofE doctrinal statements ever actually inconsistent or mutually contradictory? Can you give any examples?
Otherwise, this remark just seems like throwaway rhetoric, not a serious argument.
The first two of the thirty-nine articles would be examples of doctrinal statements that are inconsistent and mutually contradictory:
‘There is but one living and true God … and there be three Persons, of one substance, power, and eternity.’
Given that personhood is an attribute of deity, whether of the one God or of any god within the polytheistic system, it is difficult to make any logical sense of this statement.
‘The Son [of God], which is the Word of the Father, begotten from everlasting of the Father, the very and eternal God.’
As you say, words have meanings and can be true or false. In all languages, ‘son’ designates a male who is parentally begotten, and ‘begotten’ designates an act in time which gives rise to the son. ‘Eternally begotten’ is a contradiction in terms, and as with the eternal trinity dogma comes not from Scripture but (apparently) from Athanasius. Obviously, it denies that Jesus, in the ordinary sense of the Greek and English words, is the only-begotten Son of God and denies that God sensu proprio is and was his Father (except for the 33 years that Jesus was a human being – but even then, it turns out, it was the Holy Ghost rather than ‘the Father’ who begot him).
In my opinion, that is a serious matter, and these examples illustrate how it is unwise for any church to define itself by adherence to formularies and creeds that do not directly quote Scripture itself.
You can agree or disagree that these are examples. I am well aware that my understanding of logic and what words mean is different from that of many others who hold themselves out to be thinking Christians. But so long as you have scriptural grounds for not assenting, I don’t think you, the deacon or presbyter or bishop, should be required to pretend that you don’t. And in suitably ambiguous fashion, that seems to be what the ‘To Proclaim Afresh’ document is saying.
‘Son’ is here being used metaphorically, which is why there is no contradiction.
If you do your theology with wooden literalism, I can see why that would be difficult.
IP
Well, I’ve notice that when you disagree with someone’s taking Scripture literally, you dismiss it as ‘wooden literalism’ – ‘wooden proof texting’ was a recent instance. That is just being disparaging, and begs the question how you distinguish between what is wooden and what is not.
It astonishes me that a NT scholar should regard the term ‘son of God’ as metaphorical. What is the evidence for its not being meant in its plain sense? Even the Devil used the term. So did the demons who were cast into the Gadarene pigs and the unclean spirits in Mark 3:11 – both of them recognising that Jesus was theSon of God before any human did.
Why would ‘son of God’ be a metaphor and ‘son of David’ not?
If ‘Son of God’ is a metaphor, then so is ‘only begotten’, in which case that term needs to be scrubbed as well. If the terms are only metaphors, then we should also stop addressing God as ‘Father’ and rethink what we mean by the new birth and being born/begotten again, because by extension we too are ‘only metaphorically’ sons of God, not truly new creations. According to Scripture, we are sons of God only because we are in Jesus Christ the Son of God (Gal 3:26). If he is not God’s son, then neither, by adoption and the gift of the Holy Spirit, are we.
The high priest who said “tell us if you are the Christ, the Son of God” by your interpretation also didn’t realise that the term was only metaphorical. Jesus was not the Christ either, seeing that the terms are interchangeable (also Luke 4:41, John 1:49, 11:27, 20:31).
John says: ‘Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.’ It is news to me that such confession is just woodenly subscribing to a metaphor.
John says: ‘Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father.’ Again, is John just dealing in metaphors when he makes these distinctions?
Surely the rejection of Jesus’s sonship is an even graver error than holding that the idea of marriage, being merely metaphorical, can be extended to people of the same sex.
It’s not a case of there being two options, acceptance and rejection. You are wrong in thinking that the third, fourth etc options do not exist. How would you justify that? Clearly this is not sonship in the normal sense which would involve mother and father.
CS
It is a case of there being two options, acceptance and rejection. You either believe that Jesus is the son of God or you don’t. What, scripturally, are the third, fourth etc options? You need to articulate at least three to validate your intervention.
‘Clearly this is not sonship in the normal sense which would involve mother and father.’ Clearly, because (pre-incarnation) there was no mother (though the incarnation involved a human mother and a divine father).
But the mistake that you and Ian, among others, make is to suppose that the primary reality is human reproduction, in relation to which the sonship of Jesus is merely an approximation, a metaphor based on human sonship. I suppose that kind of thinking is understandable when you don’t believe that in the beginning God created all things, including human relationships.
The truth is the reverse – Eph 3:14f. Man, in the physical realm, is given that same ability to procreate, to be the head of a family, as his Maker, God the Father, in the spiritual realm had already manifested.
Gen 5. ‘When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them … When Adam had lived 130 years, he begot a son in his own likeness’ i.e. just as God had created him in his own likeness.
Gen 6. ‘When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God … ‘
The sons of God were in existence before man (Job 38:7). God already had a family.
So now, ‘The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him. … For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. … groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. … we groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.’
Those who have the Spirit are sons of God, spiritually, not naturally. But this is most certainly no mere metaphor. They are sons because they are in Jesus the Son and therefore partake in his sonship. Human reproduction is a mere physical shadow. In the perfect reality of the world to come, human reproduction will have come to an end.
If you either believe Jesus is the Son of God or you don’t, then all the three of us are on the same side of the divide. Proof that your presentation of the issues, which to too great an extent ignores the fact that *definition of a phrase such as ‘Son of God’ is not always self-evident, can be improved on.
Chris, you are posting an awful lot of comments here.
That’s a cavil and, once again, an unjustified one. My remarks have been in the context of challenging Articles 1-2, examples of declarations that are inconsistent and mutually contradictory.
A god is a person, and if one believes that God is one, as the NT clearly states, then he is one person, and cannot be three.
Likewise, it makes no sense to declare that ‘the Son of God is begotten from everlasting of the Father, the very and eternal God’.
‘Only-begotten’ is sufficient definition of what it means for Jesus to be the Son of God. I say that because Scripture considers it sufficient, and in the absence of any further definition may be taken to indicate that ‘son’ should be understood in its plain sense. For good measure, I gave the meaning of ‘son’ as a male who is parentally begotten, with ‘begotten’ designating an act in time that gives rise to the son.
The point is fundamental to a proper understanding of the gospel. Regrettably, the suggestion that ‘son’ is a metaphorical term, licensing the dogma that ‘the Son of God is begotten from everlasting of the Father’ and therefore not the Son of God, indicates to me that we are not all on the same side.
The dogma makes nonsense of everything pertaining to the role and identity of Jesus, from Genesis to Revelation, and one has to ask how it is that it could have persisted for so long.
Somehow people read Ps 110 – Yahweh says to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool” – or Matt 26 “From henceforth you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power” – or Mark 16 “So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God” and umpteen other statements of this nature – quite oblivious of its implications for the dogma that Jesus was co-eternal & coequal with the third of the Deity they are pleased to call ‘God the Father’.
Thanks, James. That’s Milton’s argument, which he develops in great detail over a lengthy and very serious piece of work. He uses the phrase ‘already had a fixed identity’ and doesn’t claim there was no coherence at all. What he’s arguing against is the view that there was a point at which the ‘true’ identity of the C of E was apparent and clear (e.g. through the 1552 Prayer Book) and against which all other developments/ changes could be measured as either in conformity with it or as a falling away from it, and that the meanings of words can always be known unambiguously or don’t change with time. It’s not either total incoherence or none at all but a more messy picture. I don’t see why that’s a problem. Steven Robinson’s quote from the Doctrine Comm report in 1968 above is helpful: ‘The possibility of fresh understandings of Christian truth must be explicitly left open.’
I said, ‘a bit more cautious’, not ‘we can’t make any assessment at all.’
And the point abut mathematical precision was followed by a ! Again, it’s not total incomprehension / fuzziness or total and exact clarity but wise judgement and knowing when to accept we may not know or be clear. In the end I suspect it may be a point abut temperament and how far we want to be certain about meanings.
So you haven’t actually identified a contradiction in doctrine in the 17th century Church of England and in the BCP? That was all I was asking. We know the 16th century was very turbulent for the C of E, as was the 17th century.
But as for the chimera of ‘exact clarity’, has any Anglican ever said there are no mysteries in the Christian faith?
I don’t know of anyone who has claimed so. Surely this is the point of the oft-repeated adjective in the ‘Athanasian Creed’ which Anglicans are supposed to repeat several times a year.
Have you ever heard it said in church?
The only occasion I have heard it was from St Andrew’s Cathedral, Sydney, this past Trinity Sunday.
This is why I say, don’t set up Aunt Sallies, attacking a position that nobody actually holds. In the same way the orthodox catholic doctrine of Scripture is regularly mocked by saying, ‘The Bible didn’t fall out of heaven, y’know!’
Nobody ever claimed the Bible answers ALL our questions, just the religious ones we need to know the answer to. This is what the Reformers meant by the clarity and sufficiency of Scripture.
The Athanasian adjective is of course ‘incomprehensible’.
Tim – thanks for this – you have put my mind at ease. I have decided that I’m going to solve all my financial problems by robbing a bank. I don’t really see the moral problem with this – since all these rich kids don’t actually need the money they have stashed away in the bank and they’ve probably all obtained it by suspect means anyway. I think I could probably do a lot of good (certainly for myself) if I had a bundle of money. I could selflessly stimulate the economy by buying a nice expensive car and going on lots of luxury cruises around the world.
The moral law really is very difficult to understand on this point and it is self contradictory anyway – the only issue of importance is not getting caught.
And then, after I have a nice stash of cash, I’ll try to become an ordinand for the C. of E.. I don’t think anybody will object, since the job description is so difficult to understand, so self-contradictory and nobody actually bothers with it.
So one can (selfishly) not *want* to be certain about meanings, and bingo, those meanings will become uncertain just because we *want* them to be.
This you recommend?
?
I have noticed that the Church of England has a catechism (The Pilgrim Way) that answers questions about christian faith and doctrine but does not appear to be as detailed as that produced by the Roman Catholic Church.
Is this by accident or design? Should it be more detailed?
It’s had a catechism for a few hundred years….
Yes, but it doesn’t seem as detailed as the RC one.
South Bank religion, highly cosmopolitan and metrosexual, started by the Anglicans under Mervyn Stockwood (and his subordinate bishop the even more famed John Robinson) in the 1960s. Such as the indefatigable Revd Nick Stacey and his Woolwich Project caught the spirit of the age (never a good idea); Bp Gavin Reid’s contemporary writings suggest he opposed contemporary evangelistic initiatives, and the early 1970s (also the Death of God period) do seem full of contradictions, and culturally-conditioned contradictions at that. In the 1980s came the Southwark ordination course under the auspices of such as Revd Alan Race, which bore little relation to Christian doctrine as otherwise understood. Now we have St John’s Waterloo and the Oasis Project – whose worse aspects seem to be a race to see who can secularise the most.
This is not an exaggeration. Revd Mae Christie’s motion is couched in such a way as to suggest no restrictions on sexual lifestyle even among Christian leaders. Within a generation the western anglicans have become a laughing stock. Dean Lucy Davis spoke of the women in tears when they read Issues. But there is real suffering out there beyond these cloistered circles, and those set on Christian leadership would not give space to wanting to extend their sexual repertoire beyond the Christian anyway, let alone see the prevention of this as suffering.
So how did Revd Mae Christie get ordained?
Paul Waddell, despite the fact that all this decades-long discussion on homosexuality (and ‘homophile’, supposedly a highly offensive term, is no different from the other!) was meant to educate and resource, says – as though in conclusion – right, so here we are, some are progressives and some are conservatives, and the end of the process is in sight. No – saying ‘some are progressives and some are conservatives’ is the sort of thing that could be said without any reflection at all at the very beginning of the process (and not accurately even then), since when nothing seems to have been learnt by some – including some who now present themselves as spokespeople. But he knew that if he came across as genial and assumed a direction of travel, the power of suggestion would do its work. And it did. To Synod’s shame, for so much more should have been said about holiness (Debbie Buggs’s mention of it was as though it came from a foreign planet), and about the diminution of holiness not being anything to be other than ashamed at and opposed to. A snapshot of Synod, and where it has ended up (to date) at this point, would be of interest to history just as much as would be the complete emptiness of the Commons when Danny Kruger addressed it in the week just gone.
I have said before that if I gave three talks containing precisely the same substance – the first genially, winningly and winsomely, the second obnoxiously and the third drily, factually and coldly, the first audience would end up having the most believers in the actual substance. It is a tactic, and knowingly, which is why I would never do such a thing.
Yes, Danny’s speech was very fine.
https://youtu.be/6JlYf_VGv64?si=2I2Cl9jnXmF5yV1M
“ Richard Jackson, bishop of Hereford, brought a motion requesting that part of the Commissioners’ assets were redistributed to dioceses—which was not a good idea, since they would never get the same returns as the Commissioners have had…”
So odd that Ian is normally great at producing evidence for what he writes, but here he casually says ‘they would never get the same returns’ without an iota of logic or evidence to support. If you have (or the commissioners have) the secret to financial returns Ian, please let us all in on your secret!
I would love to let you in on the secret. I have asked them for it! I would love to hand my savings to them. 30 years of getting returns of 10% above inflation is almost without parallel; I certainly know of no diocese which has produced these returns—do you?
A key aspect of this is the size of the fund. It is much easier to get bigger pro rata returns with a bigger fund. The moment you split into 42 separate ones, you are almost certain to get poorer returns.
I don’t know of anyone who disputes this; even Richard Jackson admitted in his speech that the original Hereford motion would be a bad idea.
If you prefer momentum investing to value investing then it is actually easier to make money if the total size of your investments is small, because the many small companies that are rising in value fastest at any instant are incapable of accepting investment of billions.
Some of those returns were due simply to variations in exchange rates.
If you are Lord King, you are President of my cricket club!
He could be the legendary darts player.
In response to some of the comments posted above I would respond:
Please read what I actually write.
No one has commented on the fact that some clergy do not keep their ordination vow to only use approved forms of service. Visit many parish churches to see this. Why is this not called out in public? This is a serious breach of trust and a lack of integrity.
If you read what I’ve written I am simply pointing out that the identity of the C of E has been profoundly shaped by historically contingent factors and has changed over the centuries. Even what we mean by subscribing to the 39 Articles has changed.
Doctrinally we seem to be committed to a form of predestination, but also to the view that God desires all to be saved. Hence the Whitefield/ Wesley debates of C18. Both could use Scripture and the church’s own texts to argue their case. We live with that profound difference. And do we still demand that clergy believe that without holding the whole catholic faith a person will ‘without doubt perish everlastingly’? Maybe some of us do, but others don’t and it’s a pretty big difference, and it isn’t a requirement for ordination.
On Scripture, that it contains all things necessary for salvation and is inspired. But some wish to go further and make more comprehensive statements such as the EA one.
Perhaps you can reconcile these and other differences or are certain which is the correct one but that doesn’t work for many people.
And please don’t use disrespectful phrases such as ‘Aunt Sallies’, ‘throw away rhetoric’ or suggest that I’m rubbishing the moral law.
I suggest this part of this thread now closes.
If this is moving towards an argument that because the Church of England is broad over some things then it should also be broad over same-sex marriage, then let us by all means discuss SSM using holy scripture.
Thanks for this summary, Paul.
I’m a little confused though on the last point. The original motion asks for the requirements to be removed, but it seems that the amendment negated that (keeping the requirements) which meant it was just the document that was removed. So the intent of the original motion wasn’t actually carried (in a sense). Am I understanding that correctly? How did Mae feel about that? I’d be a little miffed if my motion was ‘carried’ but not really carried… or was she happy with the end result? And if so, why?
You also argued that it wasn’t leading in the direction of allowing same-sex relationships among the clergy, however, Nic Tall writers that it is “a limited step forward on that longer road to full inclusion.” You say it’s a step forward in the issue of sexuality, but Tall feels it’s step forward towards ‘full inclusion’. I’m a little confused as to which it is… if it’s not really changing anything, then I’m not sure how that’s a step forward (for conservatives), but that’s contradicted by the progressive you quote as saying it’s a step forward (though small) for them…
Any illumination on this most welcome!
‘So the intent of the original motion wasn’t actually carried (in a sense)’ That is entirely corrected. Which is why those who claim ‘Everything has changed!’ are talking nonsense.
Nic Tall is spinning things. If you read the main part of his comment, it is no change whatsoever. Note also the answer confirming that the Canons remain in place and in force.
What is good about it is:
a. there is real clarity now that Issues was never the real problem for introducing same-sex marriage. It always was the canons and ordination vows.
b. A key admission by ‘liberals’ that any change must come through due process, and not by changing facts on the ground.
Does that help?
That’s what you’ve taken away as the most important things.
I would say it’s demonstrated that breaking the question down and discussing constituent parts yields a more fruitful and unifying discourse. Synod focussed in on whether Issues should be part of the discernment process, and people were able to engage respectfully, listened to each much more, and lo! a consensus emerged.
The contrast with the all or nothing approach we’ve been trying for the past couple of years couldn’t be more stark. When we attempt to bundle everything together, Synod doesn’t actually discuss all the issues and questions. Instead attention focuses hard on the most controversial and divisive elements, and all other considerations fade away (no matter how important they might be). Instead of a consensus we get close-run narrow victories. And instead of the clarity of broad agreement, we get the confusion of convoluted compromises designed to ‘get’ a handful of swing votes.
We’re told (or at least someone’s told Debbie Buggs) that the package of documents on pastoral guidance etc. are written. Personally I feel increasingly like St Thomas about this – I shan’t believe that until I can read them for myself, and put my hands metaphorically in the wounds. But they are blocked on the clergy marriage question apparently. Well, what a surprise! Maybe the lesson of the Issues and Ordinands debate is to take the elements step by step and see how far we can get in broad agreement. Maybe it will all break down very fast (if there’s a sizeable faction in Synod that simply doesn’t accept sexual orientation is real, or insists that it is chosen for example). But I strongly suspect not.
I have almost never come across either the ‘is real’ or ‘is chosen’ stance.
Many things that are real are not innate but have come into being at some later point.
Frequently, early family circumstances (which are not at all chosen) and other formative experiences (which often are not) make something be perceived as inevitable, as impossible to shake off, as part of one. We are, indeed, to quite a degree the sum of our formative experiences.
Nor do people often make the distinction between ‘action A was chosen’ – which it very often was, which is why people ‘insist’ on the ‘chosen’ element; and ‘after action A I now feel I have no choice’.
And of course that just happens to coincide with your own conclusion about this matter Christopher. And it is why you agree with conversion therapy and shock tactics to persuade men that they should ‘choose’ not to be same sex attracted when they innately are,
Does he?
What does ‘innate’ mean?
Sexual orientation is only perceived to be impossible to shake off, and people only feel like they have no choice about it? Suggesting you believe it can be shaken off and we can choose to change our orientation?
See, the ‘is real’ vs ‘is chosen’ stance wasn’t that hard to get your head around after all.
Yes, Christopher has said on here before that he believes gay men should be reprogrammed in their thinking by, for example, being shown horrific images of what *could* happen if they engaged in same sex activity. And he is engaged with Christian Concern – who are very much in favour of conversion therapy.
No they are not.
Christian Concern do argue that banning therapy for unwanted same-sex attraction would violate human rights, and amounts to a “must stay gay” law…
Adam, they argue that banning consensual and requested assistance to ameliorate unwanted sexual desires should remain lawful, and I think they are right in relation to human rights.
‘Conversion therapy’ is normally used to mean coercive and involuntary or uninformed processes. They do not support that.
“No they are not.”
Ian, even a cursory look at their website will tell you that they don’t think the term conversion therapy is helpful but they are clearly in favour of what amounts to conversion therapy. And believe that Christians should oppose its ban.
Andrew, that is because ‘conversion therapy’ is extremely ill-defined, and is used as a gotcha term. In law, it refers to coercive or unwanted practices, and that is not what Christian Concern support.
Ok, they are not in favour or using coercive means, but let’s say what they support.
They are clear in wanting to convert people who are same sex attracted to people who are not same sex attracted using therapeutic means.
And at the same time they are clear that Christians should oppose the ban on Conversion Therapy.
No, they are wanting to support those who would like help to resist unwanted sexual desires. There are groups of people for whom we would all agree that would be a very good thing.
Every proposal for a ‘Conversation Therapy’ ban has been ill-defined, contradictory, probably illegal because of the contravention of human rights—and ironically would probably make sex transition illegal. Anyone with any sense would oppose it.
But they believe, as Christopher does, that *all* same sex desires are inherently unwanted. And unnatural. And something from which we can be converted. They are sinful desires. And we need to be converted from those desires. And they support therapeutic means for that conversion.
https://christianconcern.com/resource/conversion-therapy-faq/
That looks like a very sensible document to me.
According to the doctrine of the Church of England, and the ‘teaching of our Lord’, marriage is between one man and one woman. The bishops have repeatedly explained that that is the only place for sexual intimacy, and sex outside that context is sinful.
So a desire for sex outside male-female marriage is a desire for something sinful. That is the doctrine of the Church of England. CC don’t appear to take a different view.
Ian you seem to be very unaware of the various things bishops have said. Their 2014 Pastorsl statement following the introduction of same sex marriage, for example:
“we said in our 2005 pastoral statement that lay people who had registered civil partnerships ought not to be asked to give assurances about the nature of their relationship before being admitted to baptism, confirmation and holy communion, or being welcomed into the life of the local worshipping community more generally.”
“Those same sex couples who choose to marry should be welcomed into the life of the worshipping community and not be subjected to questioning about their lifestyle. Neither they nor any children they care for should be denied access to the sacraments.”
“The Church of England will continue to place a high value on theological exploration and debate that is conducted with integrity. That is why Church of England clergy are able to argue for a change in its teaching on marriage and human sexuality, while at the same time being required to fashion their lives consistently with that teaching.”
“the Church of England should not exclude from its fellowship those lay peope of gay or lesbian orientation who, in conscience, were unable to accept that a life of sexual abstinence was required of them and who, instead, chose to enter into a faithful, committed sexually active relationship.”
You seem to consistently emphasise some of the things the house of bishops have said whilst ignoring others. It’s alarming that you seem to suggest that those in same sex relationships are not able to be full members of the church, playing in music groups, being on the PCC etc.
And you seem consistently disgusted by those clergy who wish to argue for a change in the church’s teaching when it has been made quite clear that we are freely able to do so.
‘Ian you seem to be very unaware of the various things bishops have said’. I am very aware of all of these. What these statements say is that we should not exclude those who cannot yet accept the clear doctrine of the Church ‘according to the teaching of our Lord’.
There is no sense in which any of these statements are saying that the doctrine has changed, or that they are not something into which mature disciples grow.
But it is strange that you project all these things on to me. I have never said that people in SSR cannot participate in particular activities. Nor have I ever mentioned ‘disgust’.
I wonder where your projections come from?
The claim that I agree with ‘shock’ therapy and whatnot are highly inaccurate, come from an inaccurate source, and can certainly not be documented, so I’d like documentation if anyone suggests otherwise. Will it emerge?
I agree with Christian Concern’s mainstream Christian position, and reiterate that people over and over again -which is clearly dishonest-ignore, or are unable to incorporate, so many oft-made points: that ‘conversion therapy’ is vaguely defined; handpicked as a baby/bathwater (Trojan Horse) term; has faced endless problems for the above reasons when people are seeking to write laws round ‘it’ (not that it is a thing); that conversion is a neutral matter – obviously conversion from something bad to something good would be a good thing, for example; and that the idea is that counselling can never be had at all, even when requested and desired – an odd sort of ‘improvement’, and one that leaves on their own ‘even’ those wishing to morph in a woke direction (unless of course a double standard is proposed).
Christopher I recall asking you on here if you favoured chemical castration as a corrective for those same sex attracted men who did not choose a celibate lifestyle. You said no, of course not. But would advocate talking with them and, for example, showing photos of what might happen if they persisted. Search is not producing the reference and if that is not what you think then I withdraw my comment.
It is also important to note that General Synod overwhelmingly voted for a ban on conversion therapy when it debated the matter in 2017. Here is the motion that was passed
That this Synod:
endorse the Memorandum of Understanding on Conversion Therapy in the UK of November 2015, signed by The Royal College of Psychiatrists and others, that the practice of gay conversion therapy has no place in the modern world, is unethical, potentially harmful and not supported by evidence;
call upon the Church to be sensitive to, and to listen to, contemporary expressions of gender identity;
and call on the government to ban the practice of Conversion Therapy.
Could not be clearer
‘Could not be clearer’. Could not be more clearly hitched to a flawed, inadequate, and ideologically biased goal.
Ian
I think your position needs some rethinking. When in replying to AG you write ‘I have never said that people in SSR cannot participate in particular activities’, you are, in the context, including baptism. Andrew reminds us that, according to the Pastoral Statements, ‘lay people who had registered civil partnerships ought not to be asked to give assurances about the nature of their relationship before being admitted to baptism, confirmation and holy communion’, and you seem content with that, apparently on the grounds that conviction that SS physical relations are wrong and sinful is ‘something into which mature disciples [may later] grow’.
Baptism is, or should be, conditional upon repentance, and the person baptising should satisfy himself that there is genuine repentance of sin. That entails, on the part of both parties, knowing what sin is. You have said yourself that sexual relations outside marriage are sin.
Crucially, the candidate for baptism is asked, “Do you turn away from sin?” “Do you reject evil?” “Do you turn to Christ as Saviour [i.e. as one who forgives the penitent and cleanses them from sin]?”
The liturgy requires repentance from sin now, not at some later date, and for the C of E, like the US Army, to adopt a policy of “Don’t ask, don’t tell” is to make a nonsense of what baptism is.
Well, I might not disagree with that.
What I was pointing out to Andrew is that ‘I have never *said* that’.
There is an important debate to be had on the threshold of repentance for baptism, especially as cultural norms change. But I was just pointing out that he is project on to me things I have not said.
Ian you go on and on about clergy breaking their ordination vows when they vote in favour of PLF, etc . And you have quite clearly expressed your disgust at that. But as I have pointed out, it has been and remains perfectly acceptable for clergy to argue for a change in teaching on marriage and human sexuality. That is all I have ever done.
And as Steven Robinson notes, and indeed you say you might agree with with his analysis, you have certainly given the impression that the only way you might permit a same sex married or sexually active couple who were not married to take any part in church life is on the basis of their repentance. Whereas in fact the pastoral statement I have quoted from is clear that the Church of England should not exclude from its fellowship those lay people of gay or lesbian orientation who, in conscience, were unable to accept that a life of sexual abstinence was required of them and who, instead, chose to enter into a faithful, committed sexually active relationship.
‘Ian you go on and on about clergy breaking their ordination vows when they vote in favour of PLF, etc . And you have quite clearly expressed your disgust at that.’
I have never used the language of ‘disgust’. I think we are in real trouble when bishops say things which contradict the doctrine they swore to uphold. Most people in the big wide world call that ‘hypocrisy’.
“Could not be more clearly hitched to a flawed, inadequate, and ideologically biased goal”
But Ian the voting for the motion I have mentioned in General Synod was overwhelming. The votes in the House of Bishops were 36 for and one against, with no abstentions. In the House of Clergy 135 backed the motion with 25 against and 13 abstentions. In the House of Laity 127 supported the motion with 48 opposing and 13 abstentions.
Clearly more than 2/3 majority in all houses and only one bishop against. That bishop probably just pressed the wrong button!
Is the Church of England really a church you feel comfortable in?
Andrew, it is very strange the way that you treat motions in Synod as ex cathedra statements of Anglican doctrine. They are not. As the Articles say ‘Councils do err’.
Synod has, under campaigning pressure, made some serious errors, including this, and the bishops’ proposal to use elements of a baptism liturgy to mark ‘transition’ without doing the most basic thinking about the Church’s understanding of sex and marriage.
One thing that is clear and agreed, though, is that marriage is ‘according to the teaching of our Lord’ between one man and one woman, and that sexual intimacy outside of that context is sin which should pastorally be met with a call to repentance.
Is the Church of England really a church you feel comfortable in?
Clearly, Andrew, Ian thinks it is a church worth fighting for. No doubt the apostle Paul felt uncomfortable in some congregations, based on his letters.
Chemical castration? What room does that leave for repentance?
I do certainly agree (as who could not?) with people in all circumstances in life being shown the results of their action as they have been in the case of others and as they may well be in their own case if they continue down that road.
Though it is not impressive that they would need to be shown such things without ever realising that they were the end result. The media is partly to blame for that.
ANd if that puts homosexual behaviour in the category of addiction, then yes that is the category I have always put it in. That is, behaviour which becomes (has not always been) a comfort zone regardless of whether one wishes to do it (may or may not) and even regardless of whether one enjoys it (may or may not). Most such behaviours start at exactly the same time, teenage, which is another factor linking them. If something is a comfort zone, it is what comes to be gravitated towards, and orientation and gravitation are the same thing.
Thanks Christopher. I thought I had remembered our previous exchange on this matter and your corrective tactics correctly.
Good lord. On the one hand you say that councils err and then you say that “I think we are in real trouble when bishops say things which contradict the doctrine they swore to uphold.”
Councils are made up of bishops and in any case “The Church of England will continue to place a high value on theological exploration and debate that is conducted with integrity. That is why Church of England clergy are able to argue for a change in its teaching on marriage and human sexuality, while at the same time being required to fashion their lives consistently with that teaching.”
You may not use the language of disgust, but you certainly sound disgusted, both in writing and in speech.
Only to you.
I do find it odd that you have no problem with bishops making solemn promises one minute, then hypocritically disagreeing with these the next. The wider world certainly does.
The idea that you could say you believe one thing one minute, and argue against it the next, was introduced by Issues, which has now gone. Good riddance.
“Andrew, it is very strange the way that you treat motions in Synod as ex cathedra statements of Anglican doctrine. “
I don’t in the slightest treat them that way. Motions in synod are just a way of introducing debate, which can sometimes be illuminating. In this case it was very much that way, and produced a very clear consensus. The fact that you disagree with it says more about you than it does about either the particular motion or GS in general.
‘The fact that you disagree with it says more about you than it does about either the particular motion or GS in general.’ Yes. It makes me a good deal more consistent than Synod is!
And that is simply not what I think, as I have explained many times. What I think is that The Church of England will continue to place a high value on theological exploration and debate that is conducted with integrity. That is why Church of England clergy are able to argue for a change in its teaching on marriage and human sexuality, while at the same time being required to fashion their lives consistently with that teaching.
And that’s what the world values. Theological exploration. That isn’t hypocrisy, but honesty.
“sexual intimacy outside of that context is sin which should pastorally be met with a call to repentance.”
That of course is not what various pastoral statements say, as I have pointed out many times before. Maybe I need to do that one more time.
“the Church of England should not exclude from its fellowship those lay people of gay or lesbian orientation who, in conscience, were unable to accept that a life of sexual abstinence was required of them and who, instead, chose to enter into a faithful, committed sexually active relationship.”
“ought not to be asked to give assurances about the nature of their relationship before being admitted to baptism, confirmation and holy communion, or being welcomed into the life of the local worshipping community more generally.”
So it is by no means “clear that that sexual intimacy outside of that context [marriage] is sin which should pastorally be met with a call to repentance.”
And it is clear that if I were part of a gay or lesbian couple in an active sexual relationship and turned up at your church that I would not feel very welcome. And would be unlikely to stay unless you could abide by the pastoral advice of the bishops – which it seems that you can not.
Andrew, we don’t exclude from our fellowship people who sin, but we still call them to repentance.
And btw that statement was passed by Synod, so surely must be right! And it is expressed in the doctrine and canons of the Church, and reiterated in the statements by the Bishops.
Hmmm. A thread of slippery political half-answers and side-stepping. Archbishop Welby would be proud. My thanks to Andrew G for beavering away at it.
It is curious though that in other medical ethics questions, I doubt any of us would buy into an absolute autonomy argument: we don’t have much time for that when it’s presented (centrally) in the assisted dying debate. But for reasons I can’t put my finger on, when we get into the quack medicine behind attempting to turn gay men and women straight, some people discover a decidedly libertarian streak.
Adam, who is sidestepping anything? Not me!
“Andrew, we don’t exclude from our fellowship people who sin, but we still call them to repentance.”
Of course. Absolutely. And that’s why auricular confession can be a very important part of Christian life. All may. None must. Some should. Very Anglican.
Ian
“Exclude” can be a slippery term. I felt forced to leave my CofE church (and lost most of my friends with it) after I came out. At that point I hadn’t had sex with anyone at all (unlike most of the congregation!). Nobody ever formally said “you are not to come back”, but I still got the message.
I know of others who have faced similar treatment.
I do not think the CofE, even now, really knows what its own policies on gay people are. Synod says X, bishops say Y, opinion makers say “over my dead body” and the local churches just try not to upset anyone.
I Agree. That lack of consistency is really damaging. The major part of that is liberal bishops turning a blind eye.
Tim comments:
“No one has commented on the fact that some clergy do not keep their ordination vow to only use approved forms of service. Visit many parish churches to see this. Why is this not called out in public? This is a serious breach of trust and a lack of integrity.”
– It is up to bishops to enforce conformity to the use of approved services. If you know of clergy breaking this rule, you have a duty to inform their bishop to take disciplinary action. Have you done this?
“Doctrinally we seem to be committed to a form of predestination, but also to the view that God desires all to be saved. Hence the Whitefield/ Wesley debates of C18. Both could use Scripture and the church’s own texts to argue their case. We live with that profound difference.”
– Predestination to Life is taught by Article XVII. It seems obvious from Scripture. Do you deny this doctrine? The Articles say nothing about double predestination.
“And do we still demand that clergy believe that without holding the whole catholic faith a person will ‘without doubt perish everlastingly’? Maybe some of us do, but others don’t and it’s a pretty big difference, and it isn’t a requirement for ordination.”
– As C. S. Lewis once put it, holding the Catholic Faith is not the same as understanding it. Every doctrine is suffused with mystery that passes our understanding. But this does not prevent assent. And this is perfectly acceptable: in science, for example, no scientist *really knows what matter, energy or life is, or how classical mechanics and quantum mechanics relate to each other, but that doesn’t stop them affirming these things and using them usefully. Similarly when we talk about the intra-trinitarian relationships.
“On Scripture, that it contains all things necessary for salvation and is inspired. But some wish to go further and make more comprehensive statements such as the EA one.”
– And some want to introduce Thomistic ideas about transubstantiation. What is your point?
“Perhaps you can reconcile these and other differences or are certain which is the correct one but that doesn’t work for many people.”
– Or maybe we can’t. The four great Greek adverbs in the Chalcedonian Creed don’t explain *how Christ’s two natures are united, only how we may speak of this union in a way that is faithful to the New Testament. Ultimately, to expect a miracle to be “explained” is to understand things as God does (which is like having a mind that can grasp transcendental numbers).
“And please don’t use disrespectful phrases such as ‘Aunt Sallies’, ‘throw away rhetoric’ or suggest that I’m rubbishing the moral law.”
– Nothing disrespectful about these phrases, even if you have an Aunt Sally. It is good to see Protestants recognising the existence of the moral law, after too long a captivity to philosophical positivism. I encourage Protestants to recover their forgotten inheritance in the Natural Law, aka Creation Ordinances. The Baptist Al Mohler has a wonderful discussion with the Catholic Princeton Professor Robert George about this in his recent podcast.
“I suggest this part of this thread now closes.”
– Each of us may leave when we like, but the blog belongs to Ian.
James – while I’m probably more-or-less in complete agreement with you in your responses to Tim on the points you raised, I feel that the perspective is somewhat wrong. Tim brought up the subject of ‘predestination’ and you gave a response, where I probably agree with you. But for the main task in hand, I wonder what relevance it has. Consider the gentleman in Luke 18:13, who had fallen under conviction of sin and was asking God for mercy. Scripture informs us that he was saved, had passed from death to life, hence we can infer that the Holy Spirit was within him as a deposit guaranteeing what was to come, transforming his life. I’m not at all sure that the question of ‘predestination’ had entered his head. Those of us who have come to faith might start asking ourselves how we got there (and yes – I believe that God led me all the way; I can’t see any point where refusal might have been an option), but I see nothing in Luke 18 to suggest that having a correct view on predestination is in any way a requirement for belonging to the Saviour’s family.
The problem with Tim’s posts is that I see absolutely nothing in them to suggest that he understands what he (and indeed every single person ordained in the C. of E.) is supposed to be doing, which is that every single sermon show show forth why God’s redemptive plan is necessary – bringing people under conviction of sin – and holding up Christ Jesus as the answer (so that the same word that convicts people of sin, bringing them to the point we find in Luke 18:13) also brings joy and comfort to those who have come to faith. I don’t see the evidence that this is what Tim is trying to do, but I haven’t really seen the evidence that this is what you are trying to do either.
Jock,
Your comment about coming to faith meshes with Spurgons and with mine, and as an experience and explanation of predestination.
The example you give from Luke, has not reached the explanation stage, just as it (salvation-conversion) hadn’t with Spurgon, with you (I think) and with me. Predestination was not on my mind at the time, had not even heard about it.
The problem comes, just as James mentions, when predestination morphs into double predestination. And the whole aspect of free will opens up. A question I think you have answered personally. My will and mind were captured by Christ. I didn’t want anything to be otherwise.
As Sinclair Ferguson says we get the whole Christ, a union, and dwelling in and an indwelling.
Hello Geoff – yes – I think we’re basically in agreement. I confess that I don’t know what ‘double predestination’ means. As far as ‘free will’ goes – well, there are certain things that are logically possible, but morally impossible for someone who has come to faith – and hence has the Holy Spirit within him as a deposit guaranteeing what is to come. Logically, I *could* renounce my faith, but it isn’t going to happen – it’s a moral impossibility for me right now – and I take it from the Holy Writ (which speaks of a deposit *guaranteeing* what is to come) that it will remain a moral impossibility forever more – my heart and mind have been captured by Christ.
I don’t really know how to mesh Hebrews 6:4-6 into this; all I can say is that I can’t imagine myself falling away – Christ has a good hold of me and won’t let go.
The things we’re reading / listening to are pretty similar. I’m still stuck firmly ‘in the past’ – the sermon I listened to yesterday was one by James Philip on ‘personal evangelism’ from 1991 (Billy Graham would be coming in a few months to do a ‘Mission Scotland’ and the sermon was ostensibly aimed at preparing people who had signed up to go to Murrayfield when Billy Graham was speaking there and talk to people who were coming to faith). I know that Sinclair Ferguson carries exactly the same message in a similar way (e.g. the indicatives followed by imperatives which you mention from his approach to Romans and other Pauline epistles).
One last point on Tim’s mention of predestination and that is the reason he mentions it and the connection to ordination vows.
From all Tim has written in comments on this blog, and if it is the one and same Tim, it seems that he is from a Methodist background, or has a great knowledge of it and the Wesley, Whitefield split and dispute.
Is Tim, if he is ordained, unwilling to subscribe to and preach/teach predestination, as presented in scripture, for that reason? Are you Tim?
In the late 90’s, in the Methodist Circuit I was a member of, a meeting was held to seek views on what then seemed to be serious and substantial discussions nationally on merging with the CoE. There was only one minister (who had an MA) who was implacably opposed to merger due to substantial conflict in doctrine; he could not subscribe to CoE doctrine.
On the other hand, due to study, I was coming to the conviction that I could not progress to being a licenced local preacher as I could not make a vow, not to preach/teach in opposition to Methodist doctrine which did not accept the “Fall” and subscribed to Pelagianism, Arminianism and was somewhat at odds with the atonement.
It now seems to me that embrace of these doctrines of methodism and others such as universalism, syncretism, pluralism, atheism, some RC find a home in the CoE as being something of a theological free-for-all (ranging from deconstruction to deconversion) notwithstanding ordination vows. But a veritable “curates egg.”
Jock,
This is very tangential to the article, and may not be helpful without access to it, but there is a 7 page overview of this scripture and others, and historic protagonists on both sides, under the chapter entitled, Apostasy and Backsliding, in volume1 Understanding Theology, by RT Kendall.
Some get offended at the very idea of Blessed Assurance.
Geoff – OK – thanks. If they get offended by this, I’d say ‘more fool them’.
Yes – you’re right that it is tangential – I’ve noticed this – and I really wonder why things that are at the heart of the gospel – and hence what the church *should* be doing – are tangential in a thread all about the synod – where the Spiritual elite are supposed to be discussing what the church *should* be doing.
Geoff, did you notice that Tim asked above that we read what he actually wrote? Why, then, the inquisition on whether he teaches ‘predestination, as presented in scripture’? Doesn’t including ‘Arminianim'(!) in your list of Methodism’s ‘errors’ show your *own* misunderstanding?
Bruce – may I gently make several points to refute your comment:
1) Geoff wasn’t responding directly to Tim; he was responding to my response to James (who was responding to Tim).
2) It was therefore James who had picked out ‘predestination’ as one of the talking points (which really was mentioned by Tim) and I was responding to the comments that James made (in response to Tim) on ‘predestination’; Geoff was responding to me.
3) Geoff made it clear that he is looking at the larger picture, which comprises a series of comments made by Tim over several threads; Tim really has mentioned *double predestination* in the past (I still don’t know what any of them mean by this) – Geoff is putting 2 and 2 together as an ‘educated guess’. Furthermore, he is putting Tim’s comment in the context of what Tim was responding to (namely, all this business about ordinands in same-sex relationships).
4) Geoff himself has pointed to the fact that the discussion has become ‘tangential’.
As I have pointed out to you in the past, your objections (similar to those I am responding to on this thread) are unfounded, but seem to me to point to a deeper spiritual malaise; the transforming work of the Holy Spirit when someone comes to faith (and therefore has the Holy Spirit dwelling within him) is something you find incomprehensible and it all seems a bit silly to you. I think this is at the root cause of your comments in response to Geoff.
Jock, thank you for your concern for my ‘salvation’ but what makes you think ‘it all seems a bit silly to [me]?’
I am asking Geoff how he relates these statements from his 11.23am comment:
Does Tim ‘preach/teach predestination, as presented in scripture’ and ‘Methodist doctrine which … subscribed to … Arminianism’ (among other ‘bad’ things).
Is Geoff saying that Arminianism is at odds with predestination according to scripture? It seems to me that that would show misunderstanding of what Arminianism is and more or less affirms that the way Geoff (and you?) think Anglicans are to teach predestination is in its ‘double’ variety (which as James pointed out would be contra the 39 Articles).
Bruce – I think it seems a bit ‘silly’ to you, because in the past you have described (not only to me, but also to others) things that seem to me like a sensible description of life ‘in Him’ as ‘silly’.
Thank you for your clarity – I understand the point of issue better now. I looked up ‘double predestination’ and got an AI answer – which was at odds with a previous definition I had heard (the previous one I heard was some sort of universalism – Christ being predestined and the whole of humanity predestined in Him) – but now that I understand the point of conflict, I basically resign from having an input. I’m only prepared to say that Salvation follows the pattern of the gentleman in Luke 18:13, who was convicted of his sins – and from a position of conviction of sin asked God for mercy. As the good book says, seek and you *will* find, ask and you *will* receive, knock and the door *will* be opened to you. As I pointed out (to James) the question of whether he had been predestined or not was the *last* thing in the head of the protagonist in Luke 18:13 – and his salvation (being justified) was not contingent on him getting the right answer. God didn’t give him a multiple choice questionnaire (one of the questions being predestination) and his justification wasn’t contingent on filling in the answers properly. I also know (John 3:16) that a person who *has* come to faith *will* have everlasting life (i.e. assurance of going to heaven when they pass from this life to the next, communion with God is restored – and cannot be lost) – and I think I ought to leave it at that.
Certainly, Hebrews 6:4-6 indicates that God reaches out to people who ultimately reject him (indicating that any doctrine that he predestines some to damnation is not in accord with Scripture – why would he waste time reaching out to them if He has already decided their fate?). But I haven’t really understood Arminianism (wikipedia tells me that it comes in two varieties, ‘Classical Arminianism’ and ‘Wesleyan Arminianism’) and I’m not prepared to enter this discussion.
Thanks Jock. And thank you for looking up ‘double predestination’.
On silliness I think I have only ever talked here about ‘silly things said *about language*’. Things like this:
‘Nouns refer to concrete objects; but when we come to verbs, who is to say how “literally” accurate a given verb is?’
I think that passage in Hebrews refers specifically to Jews, hence the reference to crucifying Jesus all over again – it was at the specific instigation of the Jewish authorities and quite a few ordinary Jewish people that Jesus was executed. I strongly suspect these are the ‘false believers’ that Paul refers to in 2 Corinthians – Jewish people who were initially attracted to and became involved in the Messianic community, experiencing what was happening amongst them, but who then went back to their view that Jewish rituals and law is what saves you. Hence the author’s reference to crucifying the Son of God all over again, because they are saying he was rightly executed.
PC1 – well, umm Hebrews 6:4-6 doesn’t seem to me to be limited to Jews, since I don’t think that being enlightened, tasting the heavenly gift, particularly ‘becoming partakers of the Holy Spirit’ – and then rejecting it was something limited to Jews. What (I think) we can be sure of: conviction of sin (i.e. reaching understanding of self presented in Luke 18:13) has not happened in Hebrews 6:4-6 – or else we would have a contradiction.
He is talking about people who, even though they have seen all the good things and all the positives about the heavenly life, still hanker after the pleasures of the flesh (e.g. Lot’s wife) and haven’t fallen under conviction of sin (hating sin, wholeheartedly wishing to forsake it and conform to the image of God is all part of conviction of sin). Also, God isn’t interested in the ‘brood of vipers’ whose only interest in heaven is to ‘flee from the wrath to come’. Also, the rich man and Lazarus – the rich man clearly does not like the situation he is in, but no signs of repentance and desire to actively embrace the heavenly life.
The author clearly had a Jewish readership uppermost in his mind, but what he wrote (I think) is universal.
As you are discussing ‘Once Saved Always Saved’, a doctrine which has caused RT Kendall to write a book of that name asserting the claim, and David Pawson to write a sceptical book ‘Once Saved Always Saved?’, allow me to but in with a short essay on that subject.
To be clear, the question is: If a living person is in a state such that, if they were unexpectedly struck dead by lightning, their ultimate destination would be the New Jerusalem rather than the lake of fire (Revelation 21), might they nevertheless, as a result of their lives between now and bodily death, end up in the lake of fire? (Your ultimate fate is settled at your death: Hebrews 9:27.) I believe the answer, soberingly, is that this can happen – if someone falls away badly enough, which can indeed happen. Let us see what the scriptures say.
The New Testament is full of warnings about failure to reach your destination. The failure of most of the Israelites who left Egypt to reach the Promised Land is used as a warning in 1 Corinthians 10 and Hebrews 4. The apostle Paul, writing in the Greek world with its fervour for athletics, often compares life to a race, and what counts in a race is how you cross the line, meaning your faith at your death. That faith is what you carry over; how could people who have fallen away enter heaven as nonbelievers? Just after using the athlete analogy, Paul suggests that he himself might lose salvation: “I discipline my body and subdue it, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified” (1 Corinthians 9:27). Further warnings are found in parables of shoddy servants and unready bridesmaids (Matthew 25). Again, why bother if believers are ‘once saved, always saved’? Of the believer who overcomes in his trials, Jesus says in Revelation 3:5, that “I will never blot his name from the book of life,” suggesting that other names can be blotted out (or why not give a positive word of encouragement, rather than a divine promise not to do something negative?) The blotted-out would at one time be saved but later be unsaved, and to find out who such people are, the parable of the sower offers clues (Luke 8:4-15).
Paul exhorts gentile members of the congregation at Rome to “consider the goodness of God to you, provided that you continue in his goodness; otherwise you will be cut off” (Romans 11:22). In this passage Paul is making a point about relations between Jewish and gentile believers, but those words disprove the universality of “once saved, always saved”. Peter says of certain people that “If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and saviour Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and are overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning” (see 2 Peter 2:20-22). Hebrews 6:4-6 says that “It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age, if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance”. Only believers – the saved – share in the Holy Spirit. Hebrews 10:26-29 also warns that fire lies ahead “if we deliberately keep on sinning after receiving knowledge of the truth – then there is only expectation of judgement and raging fire…how much more severely does someone deserve to be punished who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that has sanctified them…?” Anybody who has experienced sanctification must have been a believer. The entire Letter to the Hebrews is a sermon against “once saved, always saved”, because it is warning ethnic Jewish believers who were coming under persecution for their faith in Christ that they must not revert to Judaism (which was not a persecuted religion in the Roman Empire at that time).
Claims that God does not let his faithful out of his grasp are based on a misunderstanding of Christian freedom; Christians have their freedom not to sin restored to them in Christ. (This freedom was lost at the Fall.) But freedom means freedom to choose whether to sin or not. Our helper against temptation is the Holy Spirit, who can bring victory every time but who does not force us to heed Him. There is no point in praying for people who wantonly abuse the freedom not to sin granted to them in Christ (1 John 5:16), so this abuse of Christian freedom does go on.
Any claim that the warnings in scripture against backsliding themselves ensure that no believer will backslide too badly is intellectually desperate. Why is fear of God commended among Christ’s faithful (Acts 9:31, 2 Corinthians 7:1, Ephesians 5:21, 1 Peter 1:17), given that “fear has to do with punishment” (1 John 4:18)? Without this fear, what will the church become?
James (5:19-20) states that saving a believer from serious error saves him from death. James means, clearly, the second death, which is hell (Revelation 21:8). The Greek verb tenses used in the New Testament denote more often a continuing action than conventional English translations indicate; for example, ‘we who are [being] saved’ and ‘we who [continue to] believe’. So the assurances made in scripture are to continuing believers. To settle whether they apply to persons who once believed but now do not, the verses studied above should be heeded.
Proponents of “Once saved, always saved” quote scriptures such as “I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5). But to whom does ‘you’ refer? The faithful; but what if somebody ceases to be faithful? There is also Paul’s rhetorical question, “What can separate us from the love of Christ?” (Romans 8:35-39), which is followed by a list of things that cannot separate us. But we can separate ourselves from God. Proponents also point to John 10:27-28: “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.” Jesus is affirming that no third party – even Satan – can cut them out of the flock; but we are capable of leaving the flock of our own accord. Paul says often that believers are slaves of Christ, but even a slave can disobey if he is prepared to take the consequences; a slave is not a robot. As for Jesus’ words to some Pharisees, “a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever” (John 8:35), Jesus next says that believers are set free from slavery to sin, but he does not speak of the sonship of believers in this passage, only of his own sonship. Believers are granted the right to become sons of God (John 1:12), but if they prefer to lapse into a life of sin then they are free not to exercise it.
Those who assert “once saved, always saved” say that someone who is manifestly unsaved right now, yet who had once lived a life indistinguishable from that of a committed Christian, never actually was saved. They are as dogmatic in this assertion as others who assert that somebody manifestly is saved at a given instant! You can have a good idea of your own salvation, but you cannot be sure whether anybody else is saved.
Matthew 7:21-23 warns that some people who exorcise demons in Jesus’ name will not be found in the New Jerusalem. To go there it is necessary to have the Holy Spirit; when the sons of Sceva attempted exorcism using Jesus’ name but without the Holy Spirit, they were taught a painful lesson (Acts 19). From Matthew’s passage it follows that some people who have been given the Holy Spirit – that is, believers – will end up in hell. They constitute further counter-examples to “once saved, always saved”. What we actually find in scripture is a different one-way door: ‘once backslid, always backslid’ (Hebrews 6:4-6). This is not a statement that Jesus has no power to save apostates, but a statement that those who backslide too far never wish to return to his fold.
But what about predestination? Those persons who are going to end up in heaven, end up in heaven, and those who are going to end up in hell, end up in hell. That is a tautology. The question is whether they can be identified in advance. If ‘once saved, always saved’ is true then the heaven-bound could be identified with high accuracy, but this is not true.
Anton – having perused your essay, I didn’t see anything about conviction of sin in it – and conviction of sin is really the whole point. Rejecting God is not a logical impossibility, but it certainly is a *moral* impossibility for a heart and mind that has been convicted of sin and abhors living in sin any longer.
So I do believe that if someone really is convicted of sin (c/f the gentleman described in Luke 18:13) then he is saved – and (by definition) his salvation cannot be lost. I also believe that there are many who receive the Word initially with great eagerness – but conviction of sin doesn’t seem to be part of this.
I also see very clearly how it can arise that the church attracts lots of people who are not (ultimately) saved when I look at the Alpha course materials (a course that is very popular). Sin gets a mention in Chapter 3, but you could quite easily go through the whole thing without understanding the centrality of conviction of sin (Luke 18:13 understanding of self).
As far as RT Kendall goes – I haven’t read any of his books so I don’t want to be negative about the gentleman, but I do remember from the 1980’s that he was spoken about in the negative context of ‘antinomian’ and if you understand the heart and mind of the protagonist of Luke 18:13, it’s clear that there is nothing at all ‘antinomian’ here – you’re talking about a heart and mind that is committed to God and His righteousness.
By the way – the whole discussion above (Ian Paul, Andrew Godsall, etc …) looks like an antinomian ‘cake and eat it’ approach – no conviction of sin, let’s redefine sin as not sin.
Jock,
You write: “I do believe that if someone really is convicted of sin (c/f the gentleman described in Luke 18:13) then he is saved – and (by definition) his salvation cannot be lost.”
I don’t understand ‘by definition’ and I am sceptical that his salvation cannot be lost. Where does the NT ever deny that one may be convicted of sin and turn to and believe in Christ but then fall into temptation and depart ever further from the narrow way? God is capable of preventing the devil from taking away your salvation if you will it – but we have our free will restored in Christ, and that means freedom to go wrong as well as to keep on the straight path.
I have given multiple scriptures which are explicit that the saved may lose salvation, and others which show that “once backslidden (too far), always backslidden” is actually the case. If you wish to persuade others like me, you will need to knock over every one of those former scriptures.
Hello Jock,
Once saved always saved, is indeed a book written by RT Kendall, which I had read, and loaned to a Methodist friend. Pawson was a prominent Methodist.
This whole topic is important, but it seems to be well beyond the scope of o6r host’s blog, it seems.
I could probably spend some time providing some notes from Kendall’s Understanding Theology, which would cover some of the ground, perhaps all, of the points in Anton’s essay.
As for antinomianism, Kendal isn’t in that category at all.
In an 8 page chapter, The Law of God, highly condensed covering a lot of ground, using a bullet point style.
We are not justified by faith to remain in sin.
Faith given by the Spirit leads to a life of holiness, that is the righteousness of the law.
It is a test of righteousness whether or not we are walking in the Spirit.
NB. The righteousness of the law is not a precondition of being justified by faith, not a condition of salvation, it shows you are saved, a question of holiness, of sanctification.
The Spirit who convicts believers of sin also leads believers to live Holy lives. He causes them to practice the ethics of Jesus. RT Kendall, Understanding Theology, vol 1.
Geoff – well, thanks for what you wrote about R.T. Kendall – it sounds good. Also, I think I’m pretty much completely in agreement with you on this one – after all, indicatives are indicatives and tell us where we are (the indicatives followed by imperatives is something very important – it looks as if you got it from Sinclair Ferguson – I got exactly the same thing from James Philip).
You’re right – it is way off topic – but I feel that it shouldn’t be; it should be at the heart of what a synod is discussing.
Anton – I find myself in agreement with Geoff and PC1 here.
“ And ‘returning’ money to the dioceses raises further questions about power and accountability, since this is not the same as returning money to parishes. One of the substantial questions we yet need to explore is why so much power (and finance) is now sitting at diocesan level when historically it belonged in the parishes. (And, theologically, do ‘dioceses’ actually exist at all?)”
Yes. This. Thanks.
Anton – ‘I have given multiple scriptures which are explicit that the saved may lose salvation’
Actually you havent, youve added in ‘the saved may lose salvation’. Those are your words, but are not found in Scripture. That might be your interpretation and understanding, but it is not ‘explicit’ by any means. Indeed if it was, there would be no argument!
I would just ask you one question, what does ‘guarantee’ mean to you?
Peter
Please don’t pretend you don’t understand what I am claiming, PC1. I defined exactly what I meant by “once saved always saved” at the start of my mini-essay:
the question is: If a living person is in a state such that, if they were unexpectedly struck dead by lightning, their ultimate destination would be the New Jerusalem rather than the lake of fire (Revelation 21), might they nevertheless, as a result of their lives between now and bodily death, end up in the lake of fire? (Your ultimate fate is settled at your death: Hebrews 9:27.)
That the answer is Yes is clearly implied by:
1 Corinthians 9:27
Revelation 3:5
Romans 11:22
2 Peter 2:20-22
Hebrews 6:4-6
Hebrews 10:26-29
James 5:19-20
Please explain your understanding of each.
The New Testament is full of warnings – often phrased as parables – about failure to reach your destination. Any claim that the warnings in scripture against backsliding themselves ensure that no believer will backslide too badly is intellectually desperate. Why is fear of God commended among Christ’s faithful (Acts 9:31, 2 Corinthians 7:1, Ephesians 5:21, 1 Peter 1:17), given that “fear has to do with punishment” (1 John 4:18)?
Anton – you are rejecting what Geoff further up called ‘Blessed Assurance’. I’m not going to argue with you on Scripture – I’ve read the whole of Scripture, read commentaries on it – and reached conclusions that are different from yours – and I’ve also concluded that discussion with you wouldn’t open up new perspectives, but would instead lead to an ‘oh yes it is’, ‘oh no it isn’t’ type of exchange that would be singularly dismal and unedifying.
You do come across to me as a ‘slave again to fear’ – unless, of course, you’re quietly confident that you have some sort of guarantee that you personally won’t be in the number of those who ‘fall away’ (Hebrews 6:4-6). If you do have such confidence, where does it come from?
I will say that if I were a gay person (which I’m not), I can’t see how your line of argument (presenting a ‘faith’ with no guarantees of my own personal redemption) would be remotely helpful in bringing me to faith. The C. of E. becomes a place that is only suitable for people who are quietly confident that they really will be able to keep to the ‘straight and narrow’.
Taking it personal when you can’t argue with scripture. I shan’t do the same.
Anton – no, nothing personal here; I’m responding to the arguments and topic proposed for discussion (i.e. it’s not personal). I *could* argue from Scripture, but you would be correct if you thought that I don’t see the value in it. You know the passages that people who hold to ‘Blessed Assurance’ base it on (e.g. Psalm 139 is one of them) and how they (including I) use them, you have already rejected these arguments, I know how those who wish to refute ‘Blessed Assurance’ understand these passages and what they use to counter it (and the list that you presented PC1 with is absolutely standard for refutation of ‘Blessed Assurance’). I know your arguments, I don’t agree with them, you know mine, you don’t agree with them. Discussion won’t change this or add anything – so what’s the point? By the way, I’m just going on the term ‘Blessed Assurance’ because Geoff used it above and I rather like it.
Discussion would probably end up going over old ground which is well established and would be in danger of becoming bad tempered as is depressingly typical of such discussions – it wouldn’t do anything to raise the tone of the blog.
I would say that, without a great deal of further clarification, a rejection of ‘Blessed Assurance’ does look like very much like ‘slave again to fear’
and makes the whole business a ‘counsel of despair’ for anybody (for example) with a besetting sin. For example – someone who was once an alcoholic, came to faith and succeeded in getting on the wagon – such people tend to know that if their ultimate salvation depends on staying on the wagon, then it is precarious. The same probably goes for the sins that arise from someone with same-sex attraction giving in to the temptations that arise from this.
I reject antinomianism, I also reject re-defining things that Scripture tells us are sin as not sin – I also think there is a great message of hope, which *does* require conviction of sin and an earnest desire to conform to the will of God and which, at the same time takes the view that for those of us who have come to believe, we were ransomed healed, restored, forgiven in the crucifixion – in a way that we do not fully see in this life (Scripture tells us that even after we come to faith we keep on sinning) – and are saved.
In a thread which can get somewhere only by discussing scripture you decline to discuss my set of verses or propose others, then you (1) accuse me of being a slave to fear while (2) denying that you have taken the discussion personal.
Are you not ducking the scripture discussion out of fear that the verses I cite disprove your position?
Anton – well, it wasn’t intended in a ‘personal’ way – I should have put it generally: ‘isn’t someone who has rejected ‘Blessed Assurance’ a ‘slave again to fear’?’ (according to the Apostle Paul) – you clearly think not. Apologies for putting it in the second person – it’s a legitimate question and doesn’t have to be taken personally.
The sermon I listened to this morning was the following:
https://jpaudio.s3.amazonaws.com/Edited%20Files/Midweek/JP91%20Personal%20Evangelism/91mw007PerEva_e.mp3
(second in a series on ‘personal evangelism’ given in the mid-week sermons in the run-up to Billy Graham’s ‘Mission Scotland’ back in 1991). Listen to the story from 8 minutes to 10 minutes in, illustrating 2 Timothy 2:24.
I think I’m worried about my own technique for debate here: ‘a servant of the Lord must not strive ….’ and – entirely my fault – a discussion could easily turn out to be unedifying.
Particularly when we both know the ground very well – you already know the standard refutation to the verses you list of those who hold to ‘Blessed Assurance’; I am already well aware of your arguments.
(Going back probably a decade) people going through discernment were told completely different things about Issues depending on their location. This seems a fundamental problem with this part of the process because “you have to say you agree with it, but don’t have to follow it” is very different to “you have to believe it and follow it and live it”.
Its the problem with the CofEs approach to gays in a nutshell – different expectations from different people and no clear rules or guidance, although most people think there are. In one parish a gay married couple are teaching Sunday School, in another a single semi secret lesbian isnt allowed on the flower rota because of “how it would look”
Yes, I agree entirely. But worth noting it was liberals who employed this primarily.
As Tim Wyatt pointed out a couple of weeks ago, what liberals don’t take into account and need to is that evangelicals have always (naively) assumed that people kept their word. They didn’t.
Ian
I thought everyone had to agree to it in some form, not just “liberals”?! I can point out at least one conservative priest who didn’t keep to it, though!