Good disagreement? This isn’t it


Christopher Landau writes: It is a deep, sad irony. The Archbishop of Canterbury is an accomplished peacemaker, with reconciliation as a key priority in his ministry, and yet he is now presiding over some of the deepest disquiet and disunity seen in the church in two decades.

Across the theological spectrum, the bishops’ pastoral letter and accompanying ‘Prayers of Love and Faith’ are causing substantial unease, and I believe this stems from a profound corporate episcopal misreading of how Christians are to face their disagreements faithfully and fruitfully. 

Ecclesiastical fudge?

I understand why pictures of fudge have been clogging my social media. The church is apparently being encouraged to exchange the notion of being led into singular truth, along the narrow way, for an uncertain future including a pick-and-mix selection of “prayers that bear a nuanced variety of understandings” (to quote the official document).

During more than a decade when I have been researching and writing on theology and disagreement, alongside other ministry, it has become abundantly clear to me that, at best, the role of disagreement in ecclesial life is routinely misunderstood; at worst, it becomes weaponised. This is about how disagreements are faced (the affective question); how the church learns to assess the factors within a particular disagreement; and how disagreement is seen as a fruitful process of revelation, rather than a holding pattern or destination in itself. I will explore these in turn. 

Progress on how Christians treat each other in the midst of disagreement is arguably one of the gains made in the LLF process. Whatever the criticisms, and there have been many, churches have undoubtedly been challenged to admit the limitations of a ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy; potentially abusive theologies or practices have been brought into the light; and a deep sense of the intrinsic value of all members of the Body of Christ has been affirmed. 

Damaging Disagreement

Systemic problems remain, however. In ‘Loving Disagreement, published last November, I begin the book by suggesting that Christians are in fact addicted to damaging disagreement. Like alcoholics, we are often in denial about both the addiction itself and its impact on our lives. So I invite readers to consider the twelve steps designed by Alcoholics Anonymous: it is an instructive process to replace the word ‘alcohol’ with ‘disagreement’. The first challenge is to admit that there is a problem. Another crucial step involves believing in a higher power that can bring positive change. 

When it comes to disagreements concerning sexuality, I fear there has been little softening of hearts between opponents in these debates—and social media has continued to highlight toxic rather than loving approaches. We are yet to explore fully what it might mean to apply the fruit of the spirit in the context of our disagreements; and the challenge of John 13:35 that those beyond the church might discover something attractive when they see the mutual love within it, falls on deaf Anglican ears.

In my more optimistic moments, I can suggest that there has been at least some demonstrable progress in this first aspect of disagreement; at least in some contexts, including some local churches, deeper listening and learning has led to better mutual understanding. But improving this ‘affective’ approach to disagreement, which hopefully includes even a deepening love for the enemies for whom we pray, is not the whole story. 

Assessing the arguments

Effective disagreement must include a second crucial aspect: doing the painstaking work of assessing all the contributory factors in a disagreement. In the papers from the college of bishops issued in the last few days, one can only conclude that this deliberation seems to have been rushed. 

It is worth noting that the bishops did not end up reviewing and discussing these issues for the length of time that had originally been planned; the Queen’s death led to the cancellation of one residential retreat, removing more than a quarter of the time originally scheduled for this work. But even with that aside, a five-year LLF process in the whole church has been followed by a few short months of episcopal reflection. 

Indeed the bishops’ own document reveals many areas in which it is acknowledged that more work is necessary, and many of these are surely issues that need to be faced effectively before the proposed prayers could be used with pastoral or theological coherence. Instead, it feels as though mutually contradictory statements have been allowed to sit alongside one another, because the bishops “want to continue walking together, bearing with one another in love”. But does “a gracious interpretation of doctrine”, prompting many new questions, really equate to seeking the truth that Jesus promises will set us free? Whether disagreement is described as good, effective or loving, to disagree well must involve an effective facing of the issues in question.

In my home diocese (of Lichfield), the episcopal letter circulated by email perhaps inadvertently revealed an interesting dimension to the final document – the PDF file name is ‘final draft prayers of love and faith_8’. Oh to see the tracked changes! But the assumed to-and-fro of the drafting process rather speaks to the lack of unanimity behind the scenes. Clearly, the bishops have wrangled their way through a variety of options. I am not alone in regarding the resulting proposals as being so diffuse as to risk being theologically incoherent. 

So what would seeking to analyse this disagreement with a new depth, seeking a singular truth, actually look like in practice? 

Disagreement unresolved

The key issue is that rather than being faced in its totality, a disagreement is being left unresolved, and a potentially unworkable compromise is being proposed. Few seem convinced that it is really possible to defend the doctrine of marriage as the church has traditionally understood it, while simultaneously offering blessings that by all logical estimation have an essential impact on how the church understands marriage and sexuality.

The tortuous wording surrounding some of the proposed prayers, and the accompanying report, rather illustrates this. A close reading of what is and isn’t being said is necessary, which then rather highlights why for many, ‘Anglican fudge’ is back on the menu. 

The bishops commit “to welcome same-sex couples unreservedly and joyfully”. As progressive campaigners have frequently underlined, rather more than a warm welcome is desired—and indeed the Archbishop of York’s public comments have gone further than this text. But the document only suggests that the welcome is unreserved and joyful; the content of the prayers is much more circumspect, and it is only in the curious section on ‘Everyday faithful relationships’ in the report that sexual activity is named. It isn’t prayed about.

Absent theology

By one reading, this reflects an apparent reticence to pray unreservedly and joyfully for a sexually active same sex union. Furthermore, the criteria for blessing a same sex couple is that they are in a monogamous two person union. But the theological basis for this is unclear, beyond an imitation of the marriage doctrine that already exists—which prompts further questions. If this isn’t in fact akin to marriage, why would the bishops offer a blessing that excludes various other kinds of queer relationship? But if it is much more like marriage, for what theological reasons have they stopped short of proposing marriage equality? Or is this simply about a political consideration concerning whether doctrinal votes would pass in Synod?

For Christian Ethicists (of whom I am one, inasmuch as I have a doctorate in the discipline), the discussion of any moral dilemma often relates to ‘competing goods’. It is clear that plenty of Anglicans affirm that many, if not most of the goods of marriage can be visible in a committed, permanent same-sex union. But the creation ordinance and ‘good’ of the possibility of natural procreation is absent—and in the tradition of the church this has not been seen as a negligible factor.

Suppose that in ten years’ time, churches in Brighton are, like some in Massachusetts today, encountering families of three or more adults, living in sexually active, committed relationships, where (as the Harvard Law Review reports) legal recognition for these relationships is being developed. How might the English church respond to this? If Scripture and tradition have been set on one side, and the only argument we have for moral discernment relates to our experience, I fail to see what logical choice there would be but to continue to use an inappropriately generalised appeal that ‘God is love and those who live in love live in God,’ and for the bishops to offer a further extension to the currently proposed prayers. 

Another way?

So is there another way? In my days as a journalist, I was the reporter for BBC Radio 4’s news coverage of Vincent Nichols’ appointment as (Roman Catholic) Archbishop of Westminster in 2009. I remember asking him about questions of sexuality, and at the time being deeply unconvinced by his appeal to a distinctive Christian vision of same sex friendship, which overlapped considerably with the moral goods of many contemporary gay relationships, but which maintained a distinctive sense of Christian call and vocation. (The Vatican’s position on same sex blessings is a brief and instructive read.) In the intervening years, however, and through my own experience of ministerial formation, I have come to appreciate this distinctively Christian vocation as one which is both coherent with theological tradition, and alert in its critique of some of the wilder excesses found in both straight and queer contemporary sexuality.

Perhaps the Church of England has a literally foundational problem when it comes to questions of marriage, and we can’t quite shake off this wounded Tudor history. But I had rather assumed the bishops would seek to maintain a logical consistency with their previous teaching, and even if blessings were offered to gay couples, an extension of Elizabeth I’s desire not to ‘make windows into men’s souls’ might offer local churches a degree of freedom in their prayers, without compromising or undermining the stated doctrine of holy matrimony. Such an approach might not have pleased everyone, but it would have offered a way for bishops to speak with more obvious coherence about the doctrine of marriage being preserved. 

The third aspect of disagreement left sadly unresolved by this process to date concerns disagreement as a fruitful process. Rather than a theologically cogent, easily understood proposal, we are offered an unresolved, ongoing holding pattern where new questions are thrown up and existing certainties undermined. Even the way for equal marriage is apparently left open (“there is further to go as we seek God’s coming kingdom together”). 

Pastoral implications

The pastoral implications of this for various groups are currently left unanswered. Anyone who has previously seen some element of sexual self-sacrifice as an intrinsic part of their Christian discipleship is now left wondering what the bishops are commending, and how the church now encourages them to live a holy life. Some gay couples remain uncertain about what may or may not be possible for them in future; others remain excluded given their practice of open relationships.  

I happen to believe that if the bishops had proposed pastorally generous solutions that maintained coherence with their previous teaching, they could have offered something to the church which was both more robust theologically and which would have had a much stronger chance of maintaining unity. But in this already strange scenario, a further twist involves the Archbishop of Canterbury both welcoming the developments and saying he won’t take part. One might say that you couldn’t make this up. I cannot imagine his decision will make any positive difference in the wider Communion.

It feels like we are stuck in this holding pattern, seemingly never to land at the airport—because a weak appeal to disagreement has been made as an attempt to bypass hard but necessary theological work. Those who believe in conscience that this is about waiting for gay marriage in church may hope that a few more years in the sky might result in the change for which they long. Others may fear that the plane seems likely to crash, before its planned landing. 

Turbulence ahead

Whatever else happens, there is certainly turbulence ahead. If some parliamentarians get their way, the Church of England’s relationship with the state will be examined afresh if equal marriage is not approved; the threat of disestablishment hangs in the air. It certainly feels as though we are entering a new period of existential reflection in the life of the church: about marriage as one of its most honoured institutions; about the definition of sin and the bishops’ freedom to redefine it; and about what constitutes holiness and flourishing in the particular voluntary calling of the Christian life. 

I recognise that in conscience people of good faith come to radically different conclusions on these issues. But from Acts 15 onwards, the Christian tradition has always claimed it has the internal resources to reach singular, theologically coherent conclusions on complex issues, even with elements of compromise, which enable a united church to move forward in mission. That seems a rather distant hope in today’s Church of England. But it remains my sincere prayer. 


Revd Dr Christopher Landau is the author of Loving Disagreement: the Problem is the Solution (Equipping the Church, 2022).


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389 thoughts on “Good disagreement? This isn’t it”

  1. The only solution is not to have one totally top down uniform Church of Position but to let each Vicar and Parish decide. That is already the case for women priests and women bishops, where there are Anglo Catholic Parishes which have their own flying Bishops if they believe women priests are incompatible with the Bible and teachings of Paul.

    It is also the case for remarriage after divorce, where remarriage of divorcees is left up to individual Vicars if they believe remarriage of divorcees if that divorce was not on the grounds of the spouse’s adultery is incompatible with the teachings of Christ.

    There is no reason the same cannot apply to evangelical Parishes having their own flying Bishops if they do not want to conduct homosexual marriages, even if liberal Catholic Parishes are allowed to do so if they wish. Otherwise if Labour win the next election they may impose homosexual marriage on the Church of England as the established church anyway through Parliament and the law, maybe not even with an opt out for evangelicals who disagree

    Reply
    • I have some sympathy with this. However, this would be starting to turn C of E parishes into independent churches. If we decide whether to have women priests (I say yes, BTW) and whether to have same-sex marriages (in all but name), where do we stop? More importantly, do we get to have the ability to reject our diocesan bishops if they hold a stance on this opposite to how the parish decides? How would that work in the many multi-parish benefices? It might work in the olden days of one parish = one vicar, but would be extremely difficult today.

      I’d love to hear more on this, though.

      Can Parliament impose anything on us if General Synod doesn’t agree? Disestablishment, yes, but as a still established church?

      Reply
      • Yes you do. Hence Parishes which don’t have women priests reject diocesan bishops and have their own flying Bishops like the Bishop of Ebbsfleet.

        Evangelical churches can be made into multi parish benefices if needed. Parliament can impose anything it likes on the Church of England as it is the established church, even if Synod disagrees.

        Reply
        • Parliament can impose anything it likes on the Church of England as it is the established church, even if Synod disagrees.

          Parliament can impose anything it likes on any religion. Parliament could bring back Test Acts. Parliament could make it illegal to be a Presbyterian, or a Muslim, or a Jew. But Parliaments don’t have infinite legislative time and some of those things would be very very complicated and require lots of drafting and debate — effort that a government may prefer to use for something else that affects more than the 0.9% of the UK population who attend the Church of England.

          Reply
    • The only solution is not to have one totally top down uniform Church of Position but to let each Vicar and Parish decide.

      That word basically mean the Church of England ceasing to be a single denomination, and becoming a federation of different church groupings with different theologies, united in the most superficial, in-name-only way.

      As someone who seems to place the highest value on the Church of England being the (singular) established national church, I don’t see how you could welcome such a development as it would mean the end of the thing you seem to care most about, a single established united national church under secular law.

      Perhaps you could explain this apparent contradiction?

      Reply
      • No it wouldn’t, it is already the case for women priests different Parishes take a different line.

        The Church of England is much more flexible than the Roman Catholic Church

        Reply
        • So the explanation of the apparent contradiction is that you don’t really care about unity, only the superficial appearance of unity.

          Should have realised, really.

          Reply
          • If I cared about unity above all I would be Roman Catholic not Anglican wouldn’t I! There what the Pope and Vatican say really does go for every Roman Catholic parish across the world.

            The Church of England let alone the Anglican Communion have always been much loser, after all Henry VIII created the Church of England in the first place as a Catholic and Apostolic church which would still allow him to
            divorce Catherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn which the Pope wouldn’t

          • If I cared about unity above all I would be Roman Catholic not Anglican wouldn’t I!

            Come to think of it why are you an Anglican?

            What do you think the purpose of the Church of England is? If the Church of England didn’t exist — if the UK was a secular republic like France or the USA — why would you think it needed to be invented?

    • If it removes your fears, people getting married rarely want their marriage ceremony presided over by someone who believes their relationship is evil.

      I think it’s more likely Labour would remove the bishops from the house of lords (perhaps have more representation from other denominations and faiths) than force all CofE churches to marry gay people

      Reply
      • I don’t think anyone can rule out a gay couple (perhaps not a sincere Christian couple) choosing to get married in a high-profile conservative church just to make a point.

        Reply
        • I suppose its possible, but almost nobody wants their wedding day to become a court case. Getting married is not the same thing as buying a cake.

          Reply
          • Again for the majority of couples you are probably correct. Only one couple needs to be willing to take a stand (on principle or just for media attention). For everyone else it would be an opportunity to support a ‘side’ that is clearly the majority view today (again, for most, this will also be a sincerely held view).

  2. In his response to Pilling (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0953946814530239a), Oliver O’Donovan wrote: ” Considered faithfulness must involve deliberation on possible courses of action, and it must involve reflection on the shape and practical implications of the truths the church believes.”

    In O’Donovan’s words, LLF’s task was primarily reflective, i.e. it was tasked with reflecting on how the truths of the faith shed light on a new practical question, gathering the interpretative yield from the work of theologians, listening to those who reflect on it in the course of their lives and ministry, and synthesising it in a form that can facilitate deliberation.

    In contrast, a deliberative body is ”charged with recommending a course of action, summing up the practical situation, weighing alternative possibilities, implications, modes of implementation, difficulties etc.”

    Importantly, O’Donovan wrote: ” A good revision in practice cannot be supported by a ‘revisionist’ theology—on the contrary, it needs a thoroughly catholic and orthodox foundation. By articulating carefully love everything theological that two sides in a practical disagreement can say together, we can get the scope of the disagreement in proper perspective, and may open the way to agreement on experiments which have a chance of commending themselves in practice. So long as proposals for experiment come with the label of ‘revisionism’, on the other hand, no church with concerns for its catholicity can embrace them.”

    In essence, it means that, at the very least, LLF should have been able to acknowledge their differences, while articulating the scope of their agreement.

    The latter would provide a launching point for a further deliberative body (e.g. the House of Bishops) to identify a range of permissible catholic options which would likely be received as legitimate developments.

    However, as an example of general agreement, the Pastoral Principles do no more than articulate the manner in which followers of orthodoxy, revisionism and anything in between might co-exist beneficently and disagree amicably.

    While important, there has to be far more common ground than these principles can provide, so that any future deliberative body can propose permissible catholic options that would survive the process of Anglican reception.

    In relation to CofE doctrine and practice, HoB’s proposals reveal themselves to be lacking in the depth of deliberation and weighing of pros and cons that, for example, made the Rochester Report (Women in the episcopacy) so outstanding in identifying differences and establishing the kind of common ground upon which a future deliberative body could make ‘real world’ practical recommendations..

    Instead, for the HoB merely to leave canon B30 unchanged, while introducing draft prayers for blessing (vs. prayers *of* blessing) does not lessen the revisionist tone of the draft proposals.

    For the sake of catholicity, it would have been better to develop prayers for affirmation of mutual Christian love with no sexual connotation whatsoever, while maintaining that clergy continue to be prohibited from entering same-sex marriage.

    Reply
    • The church leadership has allowed for years gay clergy living with their partners, this development is no surprise. Essentially it appears many bishops agree and affirm gay sexual relationships, but just dont want to call it ‘marriage’ but for all intents that is what it is.

      Reply
    • Thanks for these really helpful comments. I agree that Oliver O’Donovan’s work is very important in these debates.

      Reply
  3. I’m really sorry but this is largely fluff. I’ve been reading articles like this ever since I became a Christian a decade and a half ago. This has been the fluffy road of appeasement, in the name of ‘grace’, that too many in the C of E have been treading for too long.

    As was said daily in my grandfather’s day – ‘Don’t you know there’s a war on?!’
    Up and until we realize that this is a battle being waged within a cosmic Spiritual war, we’ll continue espousing and treading this fluff.

    Firstly, go back to Scripture – It is clear we are in a Spiritual war and there is a dark scheming force at work, which has been the case for decades plotting and scheming all this.

    Secondly, again as we go back to Scripture we see many of the Biblical heroes being all to aware of this fact that we remain oblivious to. How fluffy was Elijah as he confronted the agents of Baal? How fluffy was Paul in confronting the Judaizer’s of Galatia? (Gal.1:9)
    How fluffy was Jesus in confronting the Jewish leaders and those not pursuing the will of God?

    And finally, for my money, one of the problems leading to all this has been the very fluffy approach that we’ve taken within the enterprise of Christian ethics for far too long.
    When did this fanciful notion of ‘virtue’ promote itself as being superior to the deontological??
    For virtue ethics to be anything but fanciful fluff, they must be ground in the deontological, ie in God Himself. If any virtue is not grounded in the very nature of our creator Himself, then it is vaccuous. Which then takes us back to the central point that this is all about:

    Has God spoken to us – if so, are we going to respond in obedience?
    And are we going to challenge and even stand up against those who do not?

    Reply
    • I guess it’s a fine line between peacemaking and what you call the “fluffy road of appeasement” – but I believe we’re called to both grace and truth. Virtue ethics has a profoundly important place in Christian ethical tradition. As does turning the other cheek… in all these issues it’s surely a balance!

      Reply
  4. I’m posting this in a bit of a rush so it may be too coherent. When deciding on whether to have women priests, this is a soley PCC decision, isn’t it? Hence, a PCC may decide this just after their current vicar retires. With the LLF stuff, how is this meant to work? What if a vicar thinks it wrong to have LLF blessing, but his/her PCC votes otherwise? Ditto in the opposite direction? What if a vicar is appointed thinking one thing and then comes to the opposite conclusion later?

    Reply
    • I suspect that it is the incumbant who has the sole say-so. That certainly was the case when it came to the marriage of divorcees. My vicar at the time did discuss the issue with the PCC on one occasion, but made clear that it was his decision.

      Reply
  5. “But from Acts 15 onwards, the Christian tradition has always claimed it has the internal resources to reach singular, theologically coherent conclusions on complex issues, even with elements of compromise, which enable a united church to move forward in mission”.
    Really!?
    What about the Arian Controversy? What about the disagreement about Original Sin?
    At the moment the Church is in disagreement about what ‘Mission’ means.

    Phil Almond

    Reply
    • What about the Arian Controversy?

      They reached a theologically coherent conclusion to that: Arius was wrong.

      What about the disagreement about Original Sin?

      No reason that a theologically coherent conclusion couldn’t be reached on that, either. Some people just persist in being wrong.

      At the moment the Church is in disagreement about what ‘Mission’ means.

      But presumably the aim is to come to a theologically coherent conclusion, yes?

      Reply
  6. Surely part of this identifying the central questions of doctrine on which the church should pronounce as opposed to the issues left to personal conscience. The church at a quick guess should be concerned with issues raised in the creeds and in church governance, neither of which define marriage.

    Reply
    • But marriage is rooted in the doctrine of creation, and is pretty central to a theological understanding of what it means to be human made in the image of God.

      Do you think that is secondary? It comes under ‘I believe in God Almighty, maker…’

      Reply
      • Do you thereby disagree with the Reformers, Ian? Calvin saw no such institution of marriage in Genesis: as for it being rooted in the doctrine of creation, so is agriculture and cobbling, he wrote

        “The last of all is marriage, which, while all admit it to be an institution of God, no man ever saw to be a sacrament, until the time of Gregory. And would it ever have occurred to the mind of any sober man? It is a good and holy ordinance of God. And agriculture,
        architecture, shoemaking, and shaving, are lawful ordinances of God; but they are not sacraments. For in a sacrament, the thing required is not only that it be a work of God, but that it be an external ceremony appointed by God to confirm a promise. That there is nothing of the kind in marriage, even children can judge.”

        It is beyond marvellous to see evangelicals resorting to the arguments of the Council of Trent against the Reformation, and the theology of the last few popes.

        Reply
        • Do you thereby disagree with the Reformers, Ian? Calvin saw no such institution of marriage in Genesis: as for it being rooted in the doctrine of creation, so is agriculture and cobbling, he wrote

          I don’t know about Ian Paul, but I firmly agree with Calvin there that marriage is not a sacrament, and see no contradiction with it also being instituted in Genesis and rooted in the nature of creation.

          Perhaps you can explain where you see the contradiction?

          Because you seem to have confused ‘arguing against marriage being a sacrament’ with ‘arguing against marriage being instituted in Genesis’, when these are not the same thing at all.

          Reply
          • Sure, Calvin denies that there is an ‘institution’ of marriage in Scripture, hence in Genesis, or indeed an unchanging ‘form’ of the sacrament. No one would argue that because agriculture is a gift of God in creation, its form cannot be changed or a promise of grace attached to it. As Tertullian remarked: Christians marry just like everyone else.

          • Sure, Calvin denies that there is an ‘institution’ of marriage in Scripture, hence in Genesis, or indeed an unchanging ‘form’ of the sacrament.

            Nowhere in what you quote does Calvin deny that there is an institution of marriage in Scripture. He denies that marriage is a sacrament; but then so does the Church of England (article XXV).

            No one would argue that because agriculture is a gift of God in creation, its form cannot be changed or a promise of grace attached to it.

            But equally there is an essence of the institution of agriculture that, if you change, it is no longer agriculture. The essence of the institution of agriculture is producing food from the soil. The no -essential elements of the form can be changed, from using oxen to using tractors, but if the essence is changed, it simply isn’t agriculture any more. Sowing seeds is agriculture; sowing land-mines is not.

            Similarly the essence of marriage is the two complementary halves of the human race re-uniting as one flesh. The non-essential elements of the form can be changed; but if you change the essence, same by having two of the same half of the human race involved so you no longer have that essential unity-in-difference, then it isn’t marriage any more.

            None of this is incompatible in any way with what Calvin wrote, which is all about marriage not being a sacrament — something everyone sensible agrees with.

      • I’m not sure that you can jump theologically very easily from Genesis 1&2 to the Anglican marriage service, never mind the different cultural settings you are trying to treat as one.

        Reply
      • For me this illustrates exactly what sort of Christian you are: you’re into doctrines, you cross all the t’s and dot all the i’s and I’m sure you even tithe all your spices.

        Other Christians like myself are into good works, we volunteer in our local food banks, we try and be kind to others, we try and live by the fruits of the Spirit, it doesn’t really bother us if people haven’t got all their theology sorted out, what’s important if trying to show God’s love to the people around us.

        Reply
        • For me this illustrates exactly what sort of Christian you are: […]
          Other Christians like myself are into good works,

          False dichotomy; lots of Christians care about doctrine and do good works.

          Of course as you seem to be pro-killing-babies, one might question your definition of ‘good works’ and how ‘good’ they really are.

          Reply
    • The church at a quick guess should be concerned with issues raised in the creeds and in church governance, neither of which define marriage.

      I don’t understand this obsession some people seem to have with the creeds.

      The creeds are just summaries. They aren’t God’s Word, like the Bible is. Their sole virtue is brevity; but by that same token they have to leave a lot of stuff out, including important stuff.

      To rely on a creed is like relying on a three-page summary of the law. It can be useful, it’s certainly a lot handier to carry in your pocket than a full copy of an Act of Parliament, but it’s absolutely no substitute for the authoritative legislation.

      The creeds are no substitute for the Bible.

      Reply
      • Well said, S. Creeds were written as antidotes to the heresies threatening the church at the time they were written. That meant Arianism. Today the threat is liberalism. So I’d be glad to see a new creed for today – although not one written by the liberal bishops who have make a public spectacle of the Church of England in the last week. They would rewrite it thus:

        I believe in one God, whatever the word means
        Maker of heaven and earth, although it might have been there beforehand
        And of all things visible and invisible, but not the supernatural
        And in one lord Jesus Christ…
        Who was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, unless she and Joseph overdid it
        On the third day he rose again according to the scriptures, although we don’t believe those any more…

        Reply
      • I don’t understand this obsession some people seem to have with the creeds.

        I’m being disingenuous here. I do understand. It’s clear that to some people (maybe you can think of examples) religion isn’t about truth: it’s about belonging. You’re not, for example, a Christian rather than a Muslim because you think that the claims of Christianity are true (you think that Jesus was God, born of a virgin, for example) and those of Islam are false (you don’t think that the Quran was dictated by God). Rather you are a Christian or a Muslim depending on your culture. These people think that all religions are equally true, or rather, equally false; that all supernatural claims are wrong, in all religions, and stories of miracles are n not meant to be taken as historical records but are metaphors written by people struggling to express their subjective experiences of the divine.

        These kind of people love creeds because creeds function for them as shibboleths: they are the things you say to mark yourself out as a member of a particular community. They’re not meant to be taken literally as objective truth-claims that can be correct or incorrect (hence you can say the Nicene Creed while denying the virgin birth because you think Jesus had a human father) but rather things that unite those who say them in belonging to the same community.

        Reply
          • (It also helps if you take a sort of Kierkegaardian notion of ‘belief’ as not meaning ‘something I think is true’ but rather ‘something I chose to put faith in’. This is of course nonsense but it allows you to say ‘I believe in X’, which is the form creeds tend to take, even though you don’t actually think X is true but is just something that aesthetically appeals to.)

    • And maybe because when the Creeds were agreed the definition of marriage was not in dispute but universally held as man/woman exclusively…

      It simply didn’t need saying…. like there’s no reference to murder, adultery or theft. And the Creeds are not primarily “how to be holy” guides…

      Reply
  7. I was struck by the article how there is little reference to Christian biblical theological terms, little looking at it were, “through the eyes of the testator” to appropriate a term from interpreting wills and testamentary dispositions.

    I can understand some reasons for that: to employ another idea from the law. To have a right of audience, to address the Court you need to be professionally qualified, need to be aware of the terminology, the whole ethos of the system.
    From the outset, the article establishes a “right to be heard”.

    After that preamble. I pick out what I see as two key but interlocked and cross referencing points.

    1 “Competing goods” Using theological terms that seem to be largely absent in the CoE I’d highlight the goods of:

    1.1 “common grace”, that God graciously bestows on all people in his providence. Is that not what CS Lewis was emphasising in his WW2 broadcasts.

    1.2 Saving grace, the grace of Christian conversion and the operation of a “higher power”, yet not so as to blaspheme Holy Spirit, it is through the operation of the Person of God who is Spirit, who is Holy.

    1.3 Sanctifying grace of Holiness, through the person of God the Holy Spirit.

    1.4 the grace of God in his revealing grace through the whole canon of scripture, including all genres: grace of his law and grace upon grace of the Gospel and his coming among us, as put by CS Lewis, descending into “enemy occupied territory.

    2 Higher Power (see above) this is none other than God the Holy Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead, who is operative in salvation and sanctification.

    3 There certainly are “competing goods”, when the goods of common grace, unknowingly perhaps . perhaps even in self exalting, pride-of-life emnity,(as very life itself is Common grace bestowed on all of life and the material world) seek to be the “ultimate grace” as it were , to usurp the Triune God of Grace

    Andrew Godsall near the very end of the comments to the previous blog article assumes this:
    “One assumes that the work of the Holy Spirit was somehow somewhere present.” In the engagement in the LLF process).

    Yet this is to call on the good offices of the Holy Spirit who, it seems, according to Andrew, was not operative in the writing and composition of the whole canon of scripture, which, as we have it, is “uncorrectable.”

    God the Holy Spirit does not operate contrary to his work of revelation of the whole canon of scripture, which is clear and coherent, on point, not confused and befuddled.

    Revision is enmity.

    Division is sown: division is reaped.

    Reply
    • Thanks for this – for me, these wider pneumatological questions about how the Spirit works through flawed churches are fascinating.

      Reply
    • Where have I ever said that the Holy Spirit was not operative in the writing of Scripture? Please do point to the exact words I used.
      Geoff you have done this before – written here that I have said something only to the find that I had never said such a thing and then had to withdraw your statement with an apology.

      Of course the Holy Spirit was operative in the writing of scripture. What else does inspired actually mean?

      Reply
      • Where have I ever said that the Holy Spirit was not operative in the writing of Scripture?

        ‘Operative’ is a weird so vague as to be utterly useless. You certainly don’t think that the Holy Spirit made sure that Scripture is reliable, do you?

        I think the important questions are:

        (a) in what way do you think that the Holy Spirit was involved in the writing of Scripture, and what effect did that involvement have on the end result?

        (b) do you think the Holy Spirit was uniquely involved in the writing of Scripture, ie, involved in the writing of the documents which make up the canon of the Bible in a way that it was not involved in the writing of any other documents during the whole of human history?

        Reply
  8. I am an Anglican and Church of England in particular as I am Catholic in liturgy I support women priests, homosexual marriage and allowing remarriage of divorcees (certainly if spousal adultery) unlike the Roman Catholic Church.

    That is why the Church of England exists ie for liberal Catholics and that would be the case even if the King didn’t head it and is the case in the US, Welsh and Scottish Anglican churches. Anglo Catholics by contrast can always go full Roman Catholic, as some did over women priests in the Church of England. Evangelicals can always go to Pentecostal, Baptist or charismatic evangelical churches, as some may if homosexual marriages allowed in the Church of England

    Reply
    • I am an Anglican and Church of England in particular as I am Catholic in liturgy I support women priests, homosexual marriage and allowing remarriage of divorcees (certainly if spousal adultery) unlike the Roman Catholic Church.

      What does ‘Catholic in liturgy’ mean? What do you actually believe, theologically?

      Do you believe in the universalist heresy?

      Reply
      • It means I emphasise communion and the Mass and the hierarchy of Bishops more than evangelicals do and also that I don’t take every word of the Bible literally as many evangelicals do too

        Reply
        • It means I emphasise communion and the Mass and the hierarchy of Bishops more than evangelicals do

          Don’t define yourself in opposition to another group, like ‘evangelicals’. Be yourself!

          What does it mean to ‘emphasise communion and the Mass and the hierarchy of Bishops’?

          Do you believe in transubstantiation? Is that what you think is important?

          And you didn’t answer my question about universalism. Are you a universalist?

          Reply
        • You got me there. Guilty. I do try to take the bible literally…

          “It is most important to distinguish literalistic from literal interpretation. The former [literalistic] generates an unlettered, ultimately illiterate reading—one that is incapable of recognizing less obvious uses of language such as metaphor, satire, and so forth. By contrast, the latter [literal] attends to what authors are doing in tending to their words in a certain way. “Literalistic” interpretation is like a word-for-word translation that yields verbally exact or “formally equivalent” versions but that also runs the risk of overlooking the main (illocutionary) point. Literal interpretation, on the other hand, is more like a translation that strives for dynamic equivalence and yields the literary sense. “

          Reply
    • T1,
      We graciously extended the invitation to you to swim the Tiber. Buoyancy aides are available.
      Let’s see how welcome ssm is there.

      Reply
      • We graciously extended the invitation to you to swim the Tiber. Buoyancy aides are available.
        Let’s see how welcome ssm is there.

        It’s quite a consumerist attitude, isn’t it, to want to be able to pick and choose this bit of Romanism but not that bit? To make up one’s own religion entirely according to one’s own preferences?

        Reply
      • I have no intention of swimming the Tiber. I am a liberal Catholic not an Anglo Catholic and support women priests, homosexual marriage and the King as head of my Church. Why would I? The Church of England will always be my Church

        Reply
    • “Evangelicals can always go to Pentecostal, Baptist or charismatic evangelical churches, as some may if homosexual marriages allowed in the Church of England”

      Many former Anglicans have taken that step.

      Reply
    • Liberals can always go to Methodist or Metropolitan churches if they want SSM. Why should evangelicals leave, its liberals who are trying to change the doctrine and practice of the Church.

      Reply
  9. Demonstrating two nights ago outside Lambeth Palace, Jayne Ozanne said, “we talk about unity all the time… but… even talk of unity seems to exclude the LGBT community who are leaving in their droves.”

    https://anglican.ink/2023/01/24/welby-fails-to-calm-protestors-outside-lambeth-palace/

    This demonstration seems to have been a mixture of secular people such as Peter Tatchell, and LGBT Christian people who believe that homosexual activity is not sinful such as Jayne Ozanne. Presumably those in the Church of England who share her views are ‘leaving in droves’ for Methodism. Will they trigger revival in that denomination?

    In the CoE, liberal theology retains its grip on the theological colleges and the bishoprics. Can evangelicals change that?

    Reply
    • Evangelicals can try to change it if they all cooperate under the leadership of CEEC to challenge the rest of the Church at all the synodical levels about the Church’s failure to believe and preach the doctrines of Original Sin, the wrath and condemnation of God which we all face from birth onwards, the necessity of a birth from above to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, the atonement doctrine of penal substitution, eternal retribution on the unsaved, and the wonderful, true promises of the Gospel for all who repent and believe, and, I would add, the view that the Bible rules out the ordination of women – and pray that God would move the hearts of the whole Church that these things are true. Our God is a great big God.

      Phil Almond

      Reply
    • Haha.

      I actually left the CofE for Methodism because I was, to put it mildly, no longer welcome at the church I had been attending for a decade because I publicly admitted attraction to the same sex.

      I think it’s more common for gay people to lose their faith if they experience abuse or rejection from church leadership

      Reply
  10. Conservatives are not interested in good disagreement. They simply wish to preserve the status quo, if not make the discipline for LGBT people even stricter – thet believe the CofE has already offered far too much leniency to lay people who are in same sex relationships.

    Reply
    • Quite right. And liberals aren’t interested in good disagreement either. Both sides are frightened of a fight, though, because of the risk of losing the worldly assets of the Church of England (land, a building in each parish, capital investments) and the right to call yourself the established church. So, what next?

      Reply
      • On a forced choice it would be the liberals who get to keep the historic churches and inherit the billions in assets, as they did in the US Episcopal Church when those opposed to homosexual marriages left for GAFCON.

        Parliament would also ensure the established church was a liberal one on a forced choice via legislation, not an anti homosexual marriage one, in line with UK law

        Reply
        • On a forced choice it would be the liberals who get to keep the historic churches and inherit the billions in assets,

          I expect the wealth would indeed go to thosewinning to fight for it; in other words this most committed to laying up treasures for themselves on Earth.

          Parliament would also ensure the established church was a liberal one on a forced choice via legislation

          If Parliament were to set aside the time to pick apart establishment it seems unlikely they would stop halfway at a ‘liberal Catholic’ church, given that would still exclude atheists, Jews, Muslims, etc. it seems far more likely that it would go the whole way and establish the institutional version of those ‘faith rooms’ you find at airports.

          Works you like that? Where the historic buildings of the Church of England were required to be open to all, to be used for communion on Sundays, Islamic prayers on Friday, and the Jewish sabbath on Saturday, and atheist Humanist celebrations during the week? Because that’s what disestablishment would mean; not a ‘liberal Catholic’ established church but an inclusive, diverse celebration of all faiths, suitable for the King who started he wanted not to be ‘defender of the faith’ but to be ‘defender of faith in general’.

          Would that suit you?

          Reply
          • It wouldn’t be disestablishment though? Why would Parliament want to disestablish the Church of England and lose control of it when as the established church it keeps control of it (and indeed those from other religions and denominations who might want to convert to it)? No it would keep the Church of England as the established church just require it to perform homosexual marriage in compliance with the law of the land.

            The King has said he wants to remain Supreme Governor of the Church of England as he will be at the coronation, just protect those of other denominations and faiths and indeed no faith as he made clear in his Christmas speech. Reflecting the fact the UK he is head of state of is now multi faith with a third non religious

          • No it would keep the Church of England as the established church just require it to perform homosexual marriage in compliance with the law of the land.

            To do that would be very complicated, legislatively. Disestablishment would be simpler; but if they were minded to open up the settlement, why would they stick to making a minor change when it would be no more time-consuming to rewrite the settlement entirely to make it more in keeping with modern, multi-faith Britain?

            So tell me: do you like the idea if the Church of England being replaced by a ‘National Prayer Service, For Those Of All Faiths And None’? Because that’s what you’ll get

            The King has said he wants to remain Supreme Governor of the Church of England

            If he’s said that then he’s changed his mind, hasn’t he? Who’s to say he won’t change it back again?

          • No it wouldn’t be complicated at all, they would just amend the Act which legalised homosexual marriage in 2013 to remove the exemption for the Church of England. Disestablishment would be far more complicated, unwinding centuries of legislation and the role of the King as Supreme Governor. Anyone could pray in Church of England churches too then, as long as they were not intolerant of homosexuals.

            As the King made clear in his broadcast he will be Supreme Governor of the Church of England, just defend faith more broadly too and indeed those of no faith

          • No it wouldn’t be complicated at all, they would just amend the Act which legalised homosexual marriage in 2013 to remove the exemption for the Church of England.

            That would create a situation where the Church of England was required by one law to perform same-sex marriages, but required by another law (its canons, which have the force of law) not to. A total mess. No. It wouldn’t do. Parliament would have to change the canons at the same time; and that would be complicated .

            Disestablishment would be far more complicated, unwinding centuries of legislation and the role of the King as Supreme Governor.

            At the point where you’re changing the canons then total disestablishment is probably easier than trying to unlock the settlement, make a specific tiny change, and then sew it up again. Besides what if you want to make another change in future? Why return control of doctrine to the Synod once you’ve taken it out of their hands? Why not take the opportunity to reshape the Church of England into something more modern and multi-faith?

            Is that what you want? A Church of England for those of all faiths and none?

            As the King made clear in his broadcast he will be Supreme Governor of the Church of England,

            I heard that broadcast. He managed to talk about his visit to Bethlehem and somehow make it all about himself, where his late mother would have made it about Jesus. He may know what he is supposed to say but his actual commitment to Christianity is clearly barely skin deep (but then maybe so is yours?)

          • Even changing Canons would be quicker than the process of disestablishment. Though in likelihood even if Synod hadn’t approved homosexual marriage and changed its Canons before Parliament required to it rapidly would after such legislation.

            Parliament obviously only has control over the Church of England as the established church, if disestablished it loses all such control. Or unless
            Parliament required all evangelical churches, Pentecostal,
            Baptist etc, the Roman Catholic
            Church, all Jewish Synagogues,
            Hindu Temples and Muslim
            mosques to perform homosexual
            marriages too which is obviously
            not going to happen.

            Given your rudeness to the King as Supreme Governor why you insist on staying in it is beyond me anyway?

    • That’s not really a winning point is it?

      Change “Conservatives” to “Jayne Ozanne” and carry the reversals through what you have written and you’ll end up with a critique of *some *so-called progressives voicings.

      It’s not reason just ad hominem

      Reply
    • Progressives are not interested in good disagreement. They simply wish to dispense with any call to restraint and so do everything they feel is right in their own eyes – they believe the CofE has already offered far too much authority to theology, tradition and the wider church catholic.

      See, anyone can write generalised nonsense. 😉

      Reply
      • Actually progessives believe that their theology is right and Conservative theology is clearly wrong. They believe that Conservative theology is causing behavior that leads to great harm to gay people both inside and outside the CofE. (The bishops seem to know this. That’s why the ABC met the protesters with promises about conversion therapy, rather than promises about marriage.)

        Reply
        • Actually progessives believe that their theology is right and Conservative theology is clearly wrong.

          [Rainer Wolfcastle ‘That’s the joke’ image]

          Yes, the point is that the same is true about conservatives: they think their theology is right and progressive theology is clearly wrong, and causing untold harm.

          Reply
    • It’s not about the status quo, it’s the understanding of God’s view on same sex relationships. Why pretend otherwise? Ive yet to see a convincing argument as to the meaning of the Bible taking into account its original context and concluding that God views such relationships as ‘good’.

      Reply
  11. Nonsense? Surely, not by DDO’s, the present and future of the CoE?
    Let’s see how the reasoning of CS Lewis may apply not only to the question of nonsense, but to this present moment in the life of the CoE, particularly with regard to contradiction and confusion re ssm and blessing, and the Person of God. Can God ever be anything other than consistently true to himself?
    This whole farargo is at the horizontal, human level and almost exclusively excludes the Person of God at both the vertical transcendent level and immanent, horizontal level, or what is known as the attributes of God.

    http://theamericanculture.org/the-possible-and-the-impossible-c-s-lewis-on-gods-omnipotence/

    Reply
  12. And you are graciously invited to join your nearest Baptist, Pentecostal or charismatic Evangelical church too if you won’t allow Church of England Parishes even the choice of performing homosexual marriage in the established church in line with the law in England

    Reply
  13. 1 What or which God do you believe?
    2 What is the evangel?

    Is the CoE, buildings and
    hollowed -out forms and formalities, all to be a visual testimony to the lament, call of “Ichabod”.

    As a former solicitor you seem to be greatly untutored in the civil and criminal law of England and Wales, even in the schools of jurisprudence, which includes, natural law.

    Reply
  14. The C of E buildings ultimately belong to the established church and whoever heads it. As a former solicitor you should also know Crown in Parliament alone is supreme in English law.

    Reply
    • The C of E buildings ultimately belong to the established church and whoever heads it.

      Unless Parliament passes a law saying otherwise, of course. Which it might do if it is persuaded to invest the legislative time to open up the settlement.

      Reply
      • No the buildings would still belong to the Church of England whether the established church or not. The question would only be how much the State funds their maintenance, easier of course as the established church

        Reply
        • No the buildings would still belong to the Church of England whether the established church or not.

          Not if Parliament passed a law saying ‘all buildings which formerly belonged to the Church of England more belong to the National Prayer Service’, they wouldn’t.

          Basically Parliament could, if it wanted, nationalise the Church of England. Would you like that?

          Reply
          • Basically Parliament could, if it wanted, nationalise the Church of England.

            … and provided the bishops got transferred to management positions in the new nationalised service, I suspect there’d be nary a peep out of them. Most of them seem to regard themselves as civil servants anyway.

          • And who is going to perform prayer services in the National Prayer Service? Church of England priests. Who is going to perform homosexual marriages in them? Church of England priests. Humanist leaders might be able to use it too but obviously not for prayers as they don’t believe in prayer, maybe for meditation sessions.

            Otherwise Parliament would have to pass laws to oblige all Roman Catholic and Orthodox priests and non Anglican evangelical ministers, all Muslim Imams, all Jewish Rabbis and Hindu priests to perform homosexual marriage too if they wanted to use the National Prayer Service

          • And who is going to perform prayer services in the National Prayer Service? Church of England priests. Who is going to perform homosexual marriages in them? Church of England priests.

            Except now they wouldn’t be Church of England ministers, they’d be National Prayer Service ministers. You’re basically asking the same question as, who’s going to perform operations in the National Health Service hospitals? And we know the answer: the same doctors who used to do the operations in the hospitals when they were charitys, just now they’re employed by the state.

            They’d probably keep the name ‘Church of England’ for the National Prayer Service, of course.

            Otherwise Parliament would have to pass laws to oblige all Roman Catholic and Orthodox priests and non Anglican evangelical ministers, all Muslim Imams, all Jewish Rabbis and Hindu priests to perform homosexual marriage too if they wanted to use the National Prayer Service</i

            I suspect that would be a condition, yes; if not explicitly, then pretty soon an activist same-sex coupe would bring suit against someone who refused to marry them, claiming that the Equality Act forbid all who use the National Prayer Service facilities from discriminating.

          • Or to a newly incorporated National Events and Plural Ceremonies Service. Netflix may be interested. It may get more viewers.

    • That I do thanks, having studied Constitutional and Administrative law. Supremacy of Parliament, involves Separation of Powers, the executive, legislature, and independent judiciary.
      It is high time that separation included separation of church and state.
      It includes the rule of law, of which prof Dicey wrote.
      1 What or who do you worship?
      2 What is the evangel?.

      Reply
  15. Perhaps my views are heretical, but here goes:
    1) Love transcends human comprehension; for example it cannot be entirely be explained by rational processes such as STEM;
    2) It would be abhorrent for me, personally, to expect two consensual non-blood-related adults to be socially forced, or subjected to the expectation of a life of abstinence / non-sexual contact, as this goes against of key component of physical contact within a loving relationship;
    3) The C of E, has more important issues to focus on than what goes on between the bedsheets;
    4) The current mess does nothing to promote harmony and progression within the C of E (a house divided etc);
    5) The current situation does nothing to help the C of E’s public image within secular society;

    Reply
    • Thanks Dave, but a number of observations. Jesus did appear to think that sexual morality was more than just a private concern, and also appeared to think that sex in marriage should be informed by God’s intention of the creation of humanity as male and female.

      About 70% (or more) Christians who attend church on any given Sunday attend other churches who adhere to the historic, majority view of marriage. I don’t see them getting all that much flak for it. The only reason the C of E does is that people think there might be a chance of change.

      If we were to draw a line, retain our doctrine, and move on, I think the media would too.

      Reply
      • Taking your kind feedback into consideration and, if you will allow me to expand on this point, does this mean that a man and a woman – both of whom are divorced and who have been identified by the courts as the “wronged party” should not engage in sexual union, as they are both outside of marriage; remaining essentially sexless?

        I agree with your latter point, that we need to disagree in the love of Christ and move on, to other issues affecting both the Church of England and wider everyday society.

        I feel that this matter will never be amicably resolved.

        Reply
    • Dave, you say:

      “expectation of a life of abstinence / non-sexual contact, as this goes against of key component of physical contact within a loving relationship.”

      Why do you think that sexual physical contact is a “key component” within a loving relationship? Surely there are lots of loving relationships between people which have physical contact which is non-sexual. In fact, most loving relationships are non-sexual.

      I think it is a key thing to recognise in all this that sexual attraction and sexual desire are not in themselves love. Also, any discussion of ‘love’ needs to recognise the variety of different kinds of love – we have all read C.S. Lewis’ “The Four Loves”, haven’t we?

      Kierkegaard wrote a piece called “Works of Love” in which he sets out reasons why erotic love – associated with sexual attraction – is deficient compared with neighbour love. It is the latter which is closest to God’s love for us, and which is commanded of us.

      Part of the problem in all this is that erotic love and sexual activity have become idols.

      Reply
      • David B- “Part of the problem in this is that erotic love and sexual activity have become idols”. These are not part of the problem – they are at the root of problem! In what is viewed in Reformed theology as the creation ordinances , three verses stand out: Genesis 1:27; 2:7 and 2:24. Man (generically – 1:27) has been created in the image of God. The man (male) shall leave his parents and be united with his wife(2:24).
        Male and female shall become one flesh and the significance of this psychosomatic union? Not only is it an expression of “erotic love/ sexual activity”; it is a glorious reflection of God’s creative activity. The male/female union takes us not only into the heart of an individual relationship. It also reminds us the corporate nature of humanity as a recreating species.
        I would submit therefore that human sexuality( not “cleanliness”) in all its many aspects is “next to Godliness”. But now it seems, we want a “God” in our own image. “God is love” has become “love is God” and “self” love has usurped the rightful place of the Creator God. Yes! These human qualities have become idols!

        Reply
      • Though it shouldnt be forgotten that God’s relationship with the church is expressed as bridegroom and bride, so it’s not really surprising that ‘neighbour’ love isnt the first thing you think of.

        Reply
        • Though it shouldnt be forgotten that God’s relationship with the church is expressed as bridegroom and bride, so it’s not really surprising that ‘neighbour’ love isnt the first thing you think of.

          Surely the first thing you should think of is the way Jesus taught us to address God — a loving relationship far more than neighbourliness but still decidedly non-sexual.

          Reply
  16. No it doesn’t, the rule of law is only an ideal theory. In reality Parliament can pass any law it likes, including imposing homosexual marriage on the Church of England.

    If you don’t like the established church so much you are supposed to be a part I suggest you leave it now and find your nearest Baptist, Pentecostal or charismatic Evangelical church. It is just inevitable anyway you will leave as homosexual marriage will be allowed in the Church of England in the next few years, whether by Synod or by Parliament

    Reply
    • In reality Parliament can pass any law it likes, including imposing homosexual marriage on the Church of England.

      Of course it can; but it isn’t working from a blank slate. It has to try to write laws which don’t cause unintended consequences when read in the context of the centuries of existing laws. So some laws are more complicated than others.

      A law to directly change a bit of Church of England doctrine would be very complicated, because of the centuries of law that has grown up around the established church’s legal position. So if Parliament were going to go to all that trouble, why would they only change that one little bit of doctrine? They wouldn’t, at the very least they’d want to make it easier for them to change other bits of doctrine in the future.

      So they may as well, if they’re going to do that, just nationalise the Church of England, make the vicars and bishops into civil servants, and be done with it.

      Would you like that?

      Reply
    • Pleased you have finally admitted that there is no such statutory legal mandated, imposed at law at present as you rattled on and on with S.
      We’ll just have to wait and see won’t we. House of Lords abolished to boot!
      Would it be imposed equally on all religions, Catholic, Islam, Judaism?
      Would it affect the biblical, scriptural, spiritual, material, reality of the Sovereignty of the Triune God of ChristianityGod who in his righteous judgement gives us over to our unrighteous desires: the church ( called out from the world, in it but not of it) of the Lord Jesus Christ is the first to be judged.
      1 What or who do you worship?
      2 What is the evangel?

      Reply
  17. Logically Parliament could only impose homosexual marriage on the established church, otherwise yes it would have to impose homosexual marriage on Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Roman Catholics, Baptists, charismatic evangelicals, Pentecostal etc too

    Reply
  18. Logically Parliament could only impose homosexual marriage on the established church, otherwise yes it would have to impose homosexual marriage on Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Roman Catholics, Baptists, charismatic evangelicals, Pentecostals etc too

    Reply
    • But then you run into equality laws, never mind legislation being subject to Judicial Review a battle that has raged down the ages between parliament and the independent judiciary.
      You seem to think that England has an unwritten constituon a frequent error. It is merely uncodified and includes rule of law, Judicial and law and equity and ecclesiastical..
      Enough there for a lawyer’s bun fight.
      Your fear and self interest are uppermost here as to seek to trip a short -circuit CoE ecclesiastical own parliamentary processes.

      Reply
      • Parliament can of course amend equality laws if it wished and Judicial review has no power to override clearly written Statute law passed through Parliament.

        Reply
        • Parliament can of course amend equality laws if it wished

          It can but that’s more complexity and Parliamentary time required and therefore not available for something else that affects more than 0.9% of the population.

          and Judicial review has no power to override clearly written Statute law passed through Parliament.

          No, but if you have two statutes which are clearly contradictory — which is easy to do if you’re not sufficiently careful — then the courts have to figure out which one applies in which situations. The issue isn’t that the courts might override statute law — they can’t — but that the courts, already overworked, might get further clogged up unnecessarily trying to disentangle a government’s legislative mess.

          Reply
          • Clearly written statutes? You are seriously untutored in the law and the canons of statutory construction,

            Scripture is clear on ssm and sss according to all canons of Christian construction of the legislative canon of scripture.

            Your comments here verge on frivolous and vexatious, (let alone tedious repetition) a cause for striking out at law. You’d be given short shrift in court.

          • The canon laws governing the Church of England cannot just be changed by Synod but by Parliament too as it is the established church

          • And legal history and common law, case law, have many precedents of parliament having to go back to the legal draftsman to over-rule with revised legislation, the Court’s interpretation of statute.
            T1, you do sound rather desperate.
            As you bash on, you knock yourself out!

          • Yes, so Parliament always gets its way in the end, even if it must go back and amend legislation to make it clearer if a court ruling interprets it in a different way

          • Yes, so Parliament always gets its way in the end

            It does. But it can take a long time; and it’s doubtful whether a government would want to spend all that time on something that affects only 0.9% of the population.

        • If the Westminster Parliament started passing laws anywhere close to the extremes of its supposedly unlimited power, British courts could (and would) just grant themselves expansive judicial review, as they did with the supposedly unreviewable royal prerogative in the ’80s. (The original Marbury v. Madison was itself conjured from whole cloth; likewise “parliamentary sovereignty” itself, which appears to exit purey because the superbly named Dicey said it did.)

          Parliament has realistic power here only because the CoE is currently established. If church is no longer tied to the State, it’ll have the freedom it desires. Question is, will it pay that price?

          Reply
          • The courts can never overrule Parliament as we don’t have a written constitution unlike the US. So Marbury v Madison is irrelevant in the UK as ultimate power in our constitution is solely held by Crown in Parliament.

            The royal prerogative and executive power alone is not supreme but if passed into statute law by Parliament it is. There is zero chance the Bishops will ever give up being the established church and the power and influence and status that comes with that. They will tell evangelicals to walk if it comes to a forced choice between continuing to refuse homosexual marriage in their churches or not being the established church if Parliament passed legislation requiring homosexual marriage be allowed in C of E Parishes

          • If the Westminster Parliament started passing laws anywhere close to the extremes of its supposedly unlimited power, British courts could (and would) just grant themselves expansive judicial review, as they did with the supposedly unreviewable royal prerogative in the ’80s.

            But the courts depend for the enforcement of their decisions on the apparatus of the state, which is controlled by the government. The Court can’t simply grant itself powers, unless the government agrees to abide by them.

            (The original Marbury v. Madison was itself conjured from whole cloth;

            M&M was a masterpiece of trickery; by giving the President the ruling he wanted, but only by reasoning that the Court had absolute power to strike down legislation, they forced the President into accepting the Court’s power-grab in order to get his way. Had those particular circumstances not arisen, and the Court had tried without that precedent to simply declare it had the power to strike down legislation against the will if the executive, it’s likely the ruling would simply have been ignored, and American legislative and political history would have been very different.

            likewise “parliamentary sovereignty” itself, which appears to exit purey because the superbly named Dicey said it did.)

            It exists because everybody accepts it does, and because to reject it now after so long would plunge everything into chaos.

            Parliament has realistic power here only because the CoE is currently established.

            Even then, while Parliament certainly has the power to carry through on these threats, will a government really spend the large amounts of Parliamentary time and political capital necessary to legislate here on something that affects 0.9% of the population? I think these threats may be like Putin’s dark hints about nuclear escalation: fundamentally empty.

          • James, many thanks for your nonsense stopping intervention. It is like a breath of fresh air. My constitutional law student days had ended be fore the 80’s, but what you write seems to follow the course of the history of the relationship between the Courts and independant Judiciary and Parliament.
            Thanks for the link. I’ll look at it tomorrow.

          • They will tell evangelicals to walk

            But they have no power to make evangelicals walk. That would take a new Act of Conformity. And while that’s certainly within Parliament’s powers, can you really imagine any party in existence passing one?

          • (Reply to S) Agreed that Marbury’s an ingenious piece of judicial Aikido, and that enforcement ultimately rests on the willingness of the powerful to obey (Lincoln famously straight-up ignored the SCOTUS when he felt like it).

            Other common law jurisdictions following the Westminster System have seen judicial supremacy asserted absent the unique circumstances surrounding Marbury (including Australia and Israel, the second of which is interesting as Israel, like Great Britain, lacks a codified constitution), and in 1991, British judges awarded themselves the power to “disapply” Acts that conflicted with E.U. law.

            Does this make a British Marbury likely at present? Not at all. But it does illustrate why governments aren’t keen to push their assumed powers anywhere close to their theoretical limits. (Even Dicey, high priest of parliamentary supremacy, admitted that practically, it’s always give way to popular sovereignty, he just thought it’d be bad form.) If the CoE is disestablished, realistic risk of state interference in its doctrines evaporates.

          • I can certainly imagine Labour in government passing one? Why do they care less about evangelicals in the Church of England, who are almost all rightwing social conservatives anyway. Labour could happily pass legislation removing evangelical churches from the Church of England if they refuse to allow other churches within the established church to perform homosexual marriages

          • I can certainly imagine Labour in government passing one? Why do they care less about evangelicals in the Church of England

            Exactly my point. I can’t see them passing an Act of Uniformity because they simply don’t care enough about what goes on inside the Church of England — which, again, only affects 0.9% of the population.

            ‘Why are you wasting Parliamentary time passing an Act straight out of the seventeenth century, when the health service is in crisis, the economy is melting down, and the climate is dying?’ would be the media cry.

          • James Byron,
            Once again for posting this. Looking at it again, though not in the detail I would have previously looked, it brought a wry smile, as the complexity of the British Constitution is little understood even as the error of an ” unwritten constitution” is perpetuated, and common law is almost completely ignored.
            While I didn’t study comparative Constitutional law, I think I can identify key differences.
            Dicey’s famous ” blue eye babies” limit or boundary, I hadn’t realised at the time, as an atheist teen, may have had loud echoes or heavy nods to Moses. Now, how far that very principle, rather than perhaps it’s extreme illustration, has been applied in practice.
            Abortion might be a topic that meets Dickey’s boundary, especially in hindsight with the collection a statistics, that could be followed through, especially in USA and SCOTUS distinguishing Roe v Wade.
            In Higher court deliberations, the concept of ( sometimes unwritten) public policy, form part of the judgement, such as the avoidance of setting a legal precedent that could with reasonable foreseeability precipitate a multiplicity of legal actions.
            As a sometime agent for the Crown Prosecution Service, written guidance for weighing law and evidence was issued. Plea bargaining was all part of the accepted custom in the criminal justice system in weighing
            court cost and time, including official sentencing guidelines, in weighing the evidence, bargaining even on the date of the trial, and sometimes during trial. All part of the Constitution.
            In my time Law Lord Denning was a student hero of many. However itt is little wonder that he didn’t make it to highest ranks of the highest Court, due in particular, I think, to his methodology in delegated authority, Administrative law cases.
            I think he was more of the realist school rather than the positive school of jurisprudence.

  19. There is a real differences between the present proposals for local decision on the prayers and the situation in relation to marriage after divorce; a) the bishops provided for a careful examination by the clergy and the couple to be married and b) there is an explicit recognition that the second marriage involves repentance for what was involved in the divorce.

    Reply
    • That’s helpful. There seem to be so many loose theological or pastoral threads in what is currently being proposed.

      Reply
  20. It is an interesting article and it might be right. But are actually now in a conflict situation? is our situation about LGBT+ more like the conflict in Galatia, 2 Peter, Jude, the Arian conflict and the Reformation, not mere disagreement. Good disagreement with good methods should work on secondary issues such as the identity of the antichrist, the millenium, etc. but does it work on issues where both sides see it as critical and something they just can not compromise on because they would then need to change their theological worldview? Good conflict anyone?

    Reply
    • If both sides reckon Christ is living, powerful and on their side, one of them is deluded. So let them fight and the godly side will win while the other will be educated.

      Reply
      • So let them fight and the godly side will win

        One word hope that the godly side would win (and of course in the long run that is true) but I don’t think there’s any guarantee that, in a fallen world, the side which wins will necessarily be the godly one.

        Reply
        • PC1, Peter,
          Win? Successful?
          What is rarely seen in any of this, is an opportunity taken to promote and publish, the evangel to all and any, outside and inside the Christian church, not only the CoE, but in this context, primarily the CoE, to those steadfastly hostile to the evangel in evangelicalism, who can’t even articulate it even in its simplicity, just as Glenn Scrivener, does in a response to Sandi Toksvig. Whether she knows it, let alone believes it, is beside the point.

          Reply
      • Was God on the side of the Romans when they destroyed the temple, massacred Jewish people and wiped Israel off the map for nearly two millennia?

        Winning doesn’t mean you have Gods blessing

        Reply
    • It’s certainly the case that this is a protracted conflict. But because the bishops repeatedly refer to disagreement, and because that’s the area in which I’ve worked and published, it seemed appropriate to analyse whether my understanding of what qualifies as effective theological disagreement is being witnessed here.

      Reply
      • Why on earth does ‘Good Disagreement’ as a principle refer generally only to one issue, when thousands of issues exist?
        The suspicious minded are bound to have a field day at such a situation.

        Reply
          • I already said ‘generally’.

            Research what was the specific occasion of the concept coming into existence.

            Then secondly research in what contexts the phrase has, in practice, been used.

            Then thirdly, ponder the fact that it is being used in a context where (in a world of many real and acknowledged inner-Christian controversies) there was till very recently little controversy, and biblically remains none on the essential topic of acceptability or otherwise, albeit some on more minor details.

          • “I already said ‘generally’.”

            No change there then Christopher 🙂

            The concept of agreeing to differ has been around a rather long time.

          • It certainly has been around for a long time. Scarcely a day goes by without encountering it.

            And it is entirely bogus, for 5 separate reasons:

            People who love truth never once agree to differ, and for 5 separate reasons:
            (1) Because then the conversation is terminated before most of the factors have even been discussed!
            (2) Because it is terminated by the unilateral diktat of the person who is losing the argument (generally). I wonder why….
            (3) Because then one does not care about either arriving at the truth or (believe it or not) even getting closer to the truth.
            (4) Because it is a convenient ploy for those whose arguments do not deserve a place at the table (because of self contradiction, logical fallacies or whatever) but who want to retain one.
            (5) It is an unexamined cliche.

  21. Christopher (Landau) thank you for your article which is most interesting.
    May I ask you to expand on this statement, which I find somewhat limited.
    “But the creation ordinance and ‘good’ of the possibility of natural procreation is absent—and in the tradition of the church this has not been seen as a negligible factor.”

    Can you say where the Church has found difficulty with those of mature years, and unable to procreate, getting married? C S Lewis is held by some here as a kind of hero. But he married late in life with no intention or hope of procreation. Was his marriage in some way inferior?

    And does the Church have a problem with family planning – be that by natural or artificial means? The C of E doesn’t seem to have such a problem.

    Part of the problem with writing about good disagreement in this context is that none of us write in a dispassionate way. We all have an angle. And therefore our commitment to good disagreement is always compromised. I fear that is true of much of what you have written here, but would be equally true of whatever I might write as well.

    Reply
    • The question of a man and woman getting married when older can be answered in two ways. The first is that the Bible (read that?) does relate more than one story of older couples unexpectedly producing children, and children of some significance!

      The second is to realise the difference between essential and contingent difference. Sex between to people of the same sex cannot, by its essential nature, produce childen. It is of its essential nature that sex between a man and a woman is directed towards procreation. The need for contraception for those wish to control fecundity is evidence for this. That sex between a particular man and particular woman does not result in children is due to their individual circumstances and does not change the essential nature and directedness of the activity.

      The primary reason for marriage in the BCP service for its solemnisation is that the children that very often are the product of the relationship are properly cared for.

      If Shadowlands is not terribly inaccurate, CS Lewis married Joy Davidman initially to enable her to remain in the UK. It was only when she fell ill with cancer that he decided to marry her properly – i.e. in the eyes of God. Given that she was dying, I’m not sure that question of children was actually on the agenda.

      Reply
      • “The first is that the Bible (read that?) does relate more than one story of older couples unexpectedly producing children, and children of some significance!”
        David, do you know children born who were of no significance?

        Ahhh if you like the BCP marriage service you must be one of those brute beasts who have no understanding.

        “I’m not sure that question of children was actually on the agenda.”
        Errmmm….that was exactly my point.

        Reply
        • Errmmm….that was exactly my point.

          And yet you seem to have ignored the main point of the reply, the distinction between essential and contingent differences, in order to pick up on irrelevancies.

          Reply
    • I was struck by this too, and I think it’s immoral to seek to have more children in today’s overpopulated world. Not having children is certainly more moral these days. All power to the condom!

      The other thing which struck me was the mention of celibacy being part of Christian discipleship. I rather hoped the author was speaking about himself but on looking him up in Google it turns out he’s married, of course! Why is it that straight married people think it’s appropriate to lecture us about celibacy when they themselves won’t lift that yoke.

      Reply
      • That ruffles my feathers too sometimes, but objectively most men are straight and by the time theyre in their 30s mostly married (if not that’s when the tongues start wagging), so it’s not really surprising most voices on this issue on the ‘conservative’ side come from straight people.

        But what do you say to those gay Christians who have chosen the celibacy route? Ignore?

        Reply
        • I would be asking why they have chosen celibacy since it is obviously better for man not to be alone.

          In my case it was because of the churchmanship I was involved in. I had all these straight people (who were married or were going out with partners) affirming my ‘choice’ and praying the gay away with me and it all lead me to having a breakdown and seeing a psychiatrist (at the Tavistock which has been in the news recently) who said I had to reconcile my sexuality and my faith or face further mental illness.

          I chose to listen to an expert and slowly get better, finding a gay friendly church and eventually a partner whom I eventually married at an amazing church wedding with 200 family and friends.

          However I still suffer from the depression I caused myself and am very angry that people like the so-called ‘rev’are still forcing their unhealthy immoral beliefs onto vulnerable people and destroying their lives.

          Reply
          • Yet my life is not ‘destroyed’ by holding a similar belief. And in quoting Genesis you completely ignored the fact that God created a woman, not another man, so the man ‘was not alone’. As for experts, many will hold the same opinion as that expressed to you, others will not. And reconciling one’s faith with sexuality is not the same as changing one’s faith beliefs so they align with one’s sexual feelings.

            Believe me I know where youre coming from, but these are not immoral beliefs.

            Peter

          • I think it’s very sad that people are single when they could be in a supportive relationship. You only live once, this isn’t the dress rehearsal.

            I know a celibate gay who lives in a community house, maybe that is a way forward? And I know a priest in the cofe who has a celibate relationship with partner. Maybe that could be an option too?

            But don’t choose singleness when you could be sharing your life when a significant other and supporting them.

            The genesis quote is true for all relationships, not just str8 ones.

            You’re lucky your life wasn’t destroyed. People handle things differently, we’re not all the same. I went through the whole ex-gay movement and was screwed up by it, and people like Jayne Ozanne and Vicky Beeching have written books about their similar experiences. I don’t know anyone who has been made str8 by the ex-gay process and I’m glad this is going out of vogue now.

    • I would admit that I usually just write off any argument relying on fertility for lots of reasons, but primarily its that real life is much more messy than that. Real life doesn’t always allow for biological mother, biological father, biological children and, as Genesis shows us, that’s not necessarily an ideal family anyway.

      I know lots of gay couples with kids – they are either biological kids of one of the partners (either from a previous relationship or in this one, but with assistance) or they have been adopted because they were unable to be parented by their biological parents.

      Appealing to fertility is too simplistic to be applied to reality because it says biological kids of gay parents must be also banned from having married parents and ignores all the kids who need adopting entirely.

      It’s also yet another rule that is only applied to gays and never straights – nobody is suggesting banning infertile straight people from marrying

      Reply
      • Real life doesn’t always allow for biological mother, biological father, biological children and, as Genesis shows us, that’s not necessarily an ideal family anyway.

        Actually that is the ideal. The fact that in a fallen world the ideal isn’t always possible, or falls short of the ideal, doesn’t change that the ideal is for a child to be brought up by its two biological parents in a loving and secure home.

        Many things — war, illness, sin — can get in the way and when they do we have to make the best of the broken situation in which we find ourselves. But the ideal is still the ideal even though in a fallen with the perfect ideal doesn’t exist.

        Reply
        • It’s a very heterosexual point of view that heterosexual relationships are ideal, but if I accept that assumption …

          Why arent people who, through no fault of their own, attracted to the same sex (who may have their own biological children) allowed to make the best of the situation (according to the CofE?)?

          Why are infertile straight couples without children allowed to marry, but not fertile gay couples with their own biological children?

          Reply
          • Why arent people who, through no fault of their own, attracted to the same sex (who may have their own biological children) allowed to make the best of the situation (according to the CofE?)?

            Um, they are? That’s exactly the current position of the Church of England.

            Why are infertile straight couples without children allowed to marry, but not fertile gay couples with their own biological children?

            There’s no such thing as a ‘fertile gay couple[] with their own biological children’. Any child will be the biological child not of the gay couple but of another couple, one of which is a member of the gay couple and one of which isn’t.

          • It’s not ‘a heterosexual point of view’, it is biology. Going back millions of years. Why else do male and female exist at all?
            Why do we have to make such incomparably fundamental obvious points?

          • S

            No, gay people are not allowed to be married in the church of England and discouraged from forming relationships or having children. The argument against changes this hinges on whether gay marriage is too far from the “ideal” or not. This is what the whole discussion is about!

          • Christopher

            It may be your biology (if you are heterosexual), but we are talking about gay people, not straight people. If there were no difference then there would be no tensions

          • No, gay people are not allowed to be married in the church of England and discouraged from forming relationships or having children.

            Yes. They are encouraged to make the best of it.

            That ‘the best of it’ doesn’t look exactly like you would with it did, doesn’t change that.

          • S

            Do you honestly *honestly* believe that the best thing every gay person can do with respect to relationships is cit themselves off and lead a solitary life, avoiding romance and family?

          • the best thing every gay person can do with respect to relationships is cit themselves off and lead a solitary life, avoiding romance and family?

            A life without a sexual relationship is in no way necessarily ‘a solitary life’ — have you never heard of friendship? — and neither is it necessarily devoid of family.

            And of course plenty of heterosexual people never marry or have a sexual relationship. Do you think they all live solitary lives, devoid of family?

    • Do you believe that Sarah gave conceived at 90?

      If “yes” then there is always a chance of potential life to come from a heterosexual marriage, no matter what the age of the spouses are.

      I suspect you would say “no” given that I believe you deny Biblical inerrancy, the virgin birth and that miracles happened. Maybe most miracles, or would you deny the resurrection also?

      Reply
  22. What this all reveals, in sum, is the depth of real and apparent sin in our lives, so that none of us have any excuse at judgement. It make God’s judgement even more just, as it were, as if that were ever possible.
    There is no hiding place, but one.

    Reply
    • At the bottom of my parents road is the largest abortion clinic in the country, or at least it used to be. There were always ‘christian’ protesters outside, harassing the poor girls who often came from Northern Ireland. I’m so glad that exclusion zones have been set up to keep these evil people at bay.

      I would be horrified if bishops would turn out to pray in these places!

      Reply
          • No it doesn’t. Please stop making things up about me. I’m sure you wouldn’t like someone to do the same to you. Treat others as you yourself would like to be treated!

          • ‘Treat others as you yourself would like to be treated!’

            Well, it has always seemed to me that Ian Paul exercises a very lax hand and tolerant attitude to commenters on this blog whatever their persuasion may be.
            Could it be that your comments are sometime removed because of the very thing you accuse me of?

            People protesting and praying outside abortion clinics against the evil of destroying thousands of unborn children each year and praying for all those involved in the process- to your mind -are ‘evil people’.

            Are they really that evil ? – which is more evil do you think?

        • I’ve no idea why my posts are removed, there’s no pattern to it. Some posts were removed where I was praising the good and tolerant behaviour of one of the posters, thanking her for modelling generosity of spirit, other posts were challenging Ian on things. I guess that if he doesn’t like something, he will just remove it, but he only removes posts from people who aren’t going along with his view. Homophobes on here can say the most horrible things about us and their posts remain. This blog’s a bit like twitter: as soon as someone posts something against the grain, there’s an immediate pile on by Ian and his sycophants. One commenter even called me a coward for posting late at night. I reminded him that I work night shifts and he just doubled down instead of apologising!

          I think that removing posts is abuse. If a post is so bad then it can be judged by all the readers of the blog. If it is removed then it can’t be judged on it’s merit, it lack of.

          And it’s also a form of gaslighting, you read the comments the next day and you’re sure you responded to a couple of them, but there’s no evidence of it. Are you going mad and imagining things?

          Reply
        • Women have been controlled by men for millennia, I’m hardly going to join in with that evil behaviour. I tend to think you have to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes before you comment. I’ve never been pregnant so don’t know what it’s like. I’ve certainly never been a scared teenage girl having to make their way on their own from Northern Ireland into Manchester and then having to walk between a phalanx of religions protesters to get into a clinic.

          The only time I’ve had to do that was at the 20th anniversary of the gay Christian movement at Southwark cathedral. There were two lines of protestors with horrible banners and BBC and ITN cameras with massive floodlights. My two friends were literally shaking with fear as I grabbed both their hands and marched to the entrance. We were called all sorts of horrible names by these evangelical so-called ‘christians’ and a terrible radio punter called Ann Atkins had organised national day of prayer against us. The cathedral was packed and the atmosphere electric, I’ll never forget it!

          So I think the protestors are much more evil. The God I worship is on the side of the oppressed and downtrodden, not joining in with the oppression.

          I guess you’re one of those who think that every sperm is sacred, every emission literally teeming with life, or the potential of life, and so even having a nocturnal seepage would be a sin. I’m more open to deciding where to draw the line. I think the law in the UK is 24 weeks, but as I said, I’m hardly going to tell a woman what they should or should not do.

          Reply
          • ‘I guess you’re one of those who think that every sperm is sacred, every emission literally teeming with life, or the potential of life, and so even having a nocturnal seepage would be a sin.’

            Actually I’m not, but I am a fan of Monty Python.

            ‘I guess that if he doesn’t like something, he will just remove it, but he only removes posts from people who aren’t going along with his view’

            No he doesn’t. There are plenty of posts here that he does not agree with that are not removed. Could it be to do with way you post?

          • think that every sperm is sacred, every emission literally teeming with life, or the potential of life, and so even having a nocturnal seepage would be a sin. I’m more open to deciding where to draw the line.

            There is actually an obvious place to draw the line, which is that any fertilised embryo (not ‘every sperm’) is a potential human being, and the way we treat such is revelatory of our view of human life.

            Any attempt to draw a line anywhere else is to some degree arbitrary — obviously a number like ‘24 weeks’ is totally arbitrary, a medical criterion like ‘is capable of independent survival’ is less arbitrary but gets earlier and earlier as medical technology advances.

          • I know the Bible is important for you re-formed types so let’s see where it draws the line.

            Rather than at conception it goes along with Monty python: “Since Onan knew that the offspring would not be his, he spilled his semen on the ground… What he did was displeasing in the sight of the Lord, and he put him to death.”

          • I had to look this one up as I’d forgotten where it was, but in numbers 5 Moses is given instructions by God to make a potion to induce an abortion, a primitive morning after pill: “May this water that brings a curse enter your body so that your abdomen swells or your womb miscarries”

            So God is actually pro abortion!

          • Silent prayer and not moving a muscle while tenderly standing up for little babies in front of a closed clinic is certainly a particularly bad form of ‘harassment’.

          • Silent prayer and not moving a muscle while tenderly standing up for little babies in front of a closed clinic is certainly a particularly bad form of ‘harassment’.

            I think the idea is that what is a particularly bad form of harassment is ‘making people feel guilty’.

            We should avoid, always, at all costs, making people feel guilty. Right?

          • No. Because it is their own conscience that is being revived to make them feel guilty. And if we prefer consciences to be deadened than revived, what sort of people are we?

          • I have seen no harassment but even if so then it is the price of my freedoms, which you are so cavalier with.

            And what about a little thought for the unborn?

          • “We should avoid, always, at all costs, making people feel guilty. Right?”

            Surely you would want to attract people to your religion? If you really had good news for people then you might find people more receptive. Although telling people you have good news and then giving them bad news is normally known as lying.

          • Surely you would want to attract people to your religion?

            Not really. I want to tell people the truth. What they then do with that information is up to them.

      • Whereas killing the little humans would be just fine. What is abusive is preventing their killing.
        That is not just inaccurate: it is a 180 degree turn from what is good and right.

        Reply
  23. Posted twice for some reason.
    Origen Adam, your posts come across to me as full of hate and bitterness particularly towards Ian Paul. You invoke the same judgmentalism as you accuse others of. Clearly you had a bad experience in a evangelical church that has framed this. Yet venting your spleen in this way will neither help you or others who are trying to understand your POV.

    Ian and others here, have set out the theological rationale for the CofE to reject SSM as they see in a way that perhaps you do not, its wider implications for the the Anglican Communion and no less for the authority of the Bible itself. It is not because they hate gays like you.

    You remarked earlier that your therapist stated that you needed to find
    a way of reconciling your faith with the way you perceive your self as a gay man. You clearly seem to have achieved this to some extent by finding a church that will marry you and settled down with someone.

    Yet l would imagine there are many others who have testified on say the Living Out website, who have faced the same situation as you, yet responded differently. They certainly do not feel the need to respond with the visceral loathing that you display here. And even those like James Byron and Blair who profoundly disagree with Ian and post on this blog sometimes, manage to do so with graciousness.

    So l am genuinely baffled as why you bother to post here. Does it make you feel better to express yourself in this way? A form of therapy in itself perhaps?

    Reply
    • I’m full of admiration for people like Blair! However we’re all different. Blair is very well read and educated. I didn’t have the same education as he did and so won’t engage in the same nuanced way.

      People like Ian Paul and Andrew Goddard cause immense harm to LGBTs by publishing what I would consider hate material. I once implored Andrew to stop writing stuff against us as his words can be used by bigots world wide, but unfortunately it fell on deaf ears. Why people like Andrew and Ian don’t use their skills for the good of humanity is beyond me. It’s such a waste of their God given talent.

      I post to give another voice into the mix. Ian Paul publishes at least 2 negative articles about LGBTs a week. I’ve implored him several times to write something positive about us. He could research the lives of famous gays and their contribution to society, like Alan Turing for example.

      Being gay means we’re unencumbered by a family so we have a lot more time to be creative. This hate blog is all about othering us, and the people who come in droves to hate only come for these articles. Just look at the few comments on Ian’s other posts compared with the inordinate amount of comments on the hate posts.

      Ian vents his spleen in his articles. They may sound all theological and intellectual, but in reality it’s just flowery hate material. He thinks it’s okay to publish these but anytime someone makes a comment that he disagrees with he will just delete it. Or label it as ‘abusive comment removed’ But he is blind to the fact that he has written a huge essay that is abusive and othering to an oppressed minority.

      You may think he has removed comments for good reason, but he even removes my comments where I thank someone for their post or praise them! He does the same to me on his Facebook. Sometimes I’m sure I’ve written something, so I write it again, and then the next day is gone again! It’s like being gaslighted, it’s just abusive.

      Reply
  24. I’ve just seen Justin Welbys interview on Sky News. It’s very frustrating and to my mind shows he is not demonstrating good disagreement. He said a lot of (deliberately?) antagonistic things, but most importantly again said that these new blessings are not blessings of gay relationships, just blessings of individuals.

    I think this is a really important thing to clear up. Are these blessings for SSRs or not? Good disagreement cannot happen where nobody can say for sure what they are even being asked to discuss.

    Reply
      • If the proposal is to bless same sex relationships then why is Justin Welby saying they are not?

        If the proposal is merely to bless individuals then how is this any change? And why are the press office and other bishops saying that they are blessing same sex relationships? And why are conservative types upset by it?

        Reply
      • Why? The US, Welsh and Scottish Anglican provinces already allow homosexual marriages in their churches anyway. Just let each province decide

        Reply
      • I doubt it. Individual bishops and priests will act according to their own conscience. If the people of any given church agree with it there wont be an issue. People will just be pragmatic about it. If however the CoE decided to hold formal gay weddings in church , that’s a different matter.

        Peter

        Reply
          • No it wouldn’t, not if the Parish agreed

            It would, because it would require the Church of England to renounce its view of the Bible and that’s a Big Deal, not something that can be done on a parish-by-parish basis.

          • It would because then it would be changing the very definition of marriage as understood by the church. Of course those who are ‘pro’ try to ignore that argument even though that is at the heart of the issue.

          • The Church of England’s view of the Bible is not set in stone, for goodness sake the Church of England was founded so Henry VIII could divorce his wife and marry his mistress Anne Boleyn after the Pope disagreed. The only thing set in stone in the Church of England is it is established church with the King at its head!

          • No it wouldn’t. The Church of England already changed its view of marriage in 2002 when it allowed Vicars to remarry divorcees even if no spousal adultery when they divorced on a conscience basis

          • The Church of England’s view of the Bible is not set in stone

            It is if it wants to remain a Christian church, but then you don’t really care about that, do you? As far as you’re concerned the only important thing is that the Church of England stays associated with the Crown; you regard God as an optional extra, or an irrelevance to be junked if He ever gets in the way of the worldly status you crave, isn’t that right?

          • S

            The CofE has changed its mind on what it thinks the bible says of women, slavery, remarriage after divorce, what clothes priests have to wear during the eucharist, who is head of the church, whether anyone can marry physically in church (used to be at the church door, I understand), whether marriages should be free on Christmas day, if gay conversion therapy is an important ministry or an abusive practice etc etc

          • The CofE has changed its mind on what it thinks the bible says

            That’s as may be, but this would require the Church of England not just to change its mind on what the Bible says, but on what the Bible is.

            Which is, I’m sure you can see, a much bigger deal.

          • How so?

            How is it a big deal?

            It requires abandoning the idea that the Bible is the inspired Word of God written, completely reliable and authoritative in all matters of faith and morals.

            And once you no longer think that, then you have no reason to believe in, say, the virgin birth; the trinity; when you get right down to it, you have no evidence for the Resurrection. The whole basis of Christianity as factual collapses like a house of cards, and you’re left with some kind of hollowed-out demythologised ‘Sea of Faith’ style religion which is about ‘how we understand the divine in ourselves’ rather than about the solid factual claim that a real, physical man, born of woman but without any human father, walked and talked and healed the sick and calmed storms and turned water into wine and died and then rose again, and is still alive today.

            So yeah it’s a bit of a big deal.

    • It would be very odd to ‘bless’ an individual when the only reason they would be standing in front of the priest with his/her partner was because of their same-sex relationship. I have sympathy for Welby given his position but he’s being mealy-mouthed.

      But I did notice in the interview that he ‘seemed’ to say he was for blessing such relationships and the only reason why he personally wasnt going to was because of his position in the Anglican church. He said that is why the Archbishop of York was free to bless such relationships.

      Reply
      • Presumably because no gay people exist outside of England and care of gay people doesn’t count as community care because gay people are not people (apologies but I felt quite angry at some of the things JW said in that interview. I think it was a disgraceful interview and he ought to apologize)

        Reply
    • I have just watched the Sandi Toksvig/Archbishop of Canterbury video. Basically she wants to church to conform to the 21st Century world and is threatening to lobby Government on this, using her “celebrity” status. Can someone please tell this narcissitic woman that the church was formed by being counter cultural and is expressly instructed to be “in the world, but not of the world”. We are followers of Christ, not of man made laws. The A of C seems incapable of informing her.

      Reply
      • I have just watched the Sandi Toksvig/Archbishop of Canterbury video. Basically she wants to church to conform to the 21st Century world

        I’m still slightly nonplussed as to why a Danish Atheist cares what the Archbishop of Canterbury thinks about anything. Isn’t that a bit like me caring what the Ayatollah thinks?

        Reply
        • And Tatchel, the Ozzie atheist, atheist politicians, who wouldn’t foot in a church ( unlike Tatchel, but only to attack) have a deep rooted hostility to Christianity, that is not placarded in protest against, say Islam.
          Christianity is the target and the CoE is regarded as it’s soft, liberal; liberal arts and liberal social science centre. Theology is irrelevant, or a straightjacket, to be debunked and deconstructed and denied and detonated all in the name of imposter, counterfeit,
          contingent, freedom.

          Reply
          • To be fair to Tatchell he has protested outside the Saudi embassy too. There were plenty of protests over Qatar holding the World Cup too from the likes of Joe Lycett given homosexuality is illegal there

          • Which is no doubt why she thinks the CoE should go the same way. But if she is an atheist, I find it very odd that she thinks she can dictate to a church as to what it should do. But then she’s probably one of those who believes Jesus was just a ‘nice man’. CS Lewis would have a few words to say about that nonsense. But then we have MPs like Chris Bryant saying similar silly things in the Commons, like Jesus never said anything about gay sexual relationships (ignoring the fact there was no reason for Him to) and that it’s all about ‘love’. Sounds like living life as a Beatle’s song, but we all know what Lennon thought about religion.

          • But if she is an atheist, I find it very odd that she thinks she can dictate to a church as to what it should do.

            I find it very odd that she cares what a church does. It would be like me caring what the Ayatollah thinks, wouldn’t it? It’s not so much that I have no right to dictate what a different religion teaches, it’s more why would I care? I think their whole religion is based on a lie, so why do I care about some little detail? Similarly she presumably, as an atheist, thinks that the Archbishop’s whole world-view is based on a huge error, ie, the existence of God. So why would she care about a minor detail of something she thinks is utterly wrong at its very core?

      • There are three separate issues all going on at once
        – the (perceived?) failure of the church of england to deal with past cases of abuse and ensure they don’t happen again (which was actually what the protest was about I think)
        – discrimination against gay people with respect to public services.
        – the theology of the Church of England

        I think Sandi Toksvig is more concerned with cases of abuse and discrimination than theology. FWIW she *is* a British citizen, politician and an OBE. Peter Tatchell is also a British Citizen and long time human rights campaigner.

        Reply
          • Geoff

            I think it’s complicated, because the Church of Englands status as the established church is complicated.

            However my point was that discrimination in public services is one of the issues here alongside church of England theology. It’s not *just* about abstract theology

        • I wasn’t aware that the Church of England is a ‘public service’. Certainly it offers services every Sunday and does a lot of good community work, but l thought it’s main purpose was to call people to repent from sin and preach the gospel. Or have l got it wrong?

          Reply
          • Certainly it offers services every Sunday

            Aren’t those services of worship offered to God though, rather than services offered to the public?

          • Only in part. The average Church of England Vicar does more weddings and funerals and baptisms for people in the Parish than evangelising in the High Street. Holy Communion also plays as much a part in the Church of England than sermons, prayer and Bible reading. Apart from a brief period under Cromwell (who executed the King, abolished Bishops and the House of Lords and scrapped the BCP), the Church of England has always been an Episcopal Church with the King as its head and a Catholic and Apostolic Church

          • Holy Communion also plays as much a part in the Church of England than sermons, prayer and Bible reading

            Isn’t Holy Communion a service offered to God, rather than a service to the public?

          • Yes you’ve got it wrong. The church of England is an arm of the state, it’s not a private club. If you want to attend a private club there are plenty of denominations around. Indeed, evangelicals are known for starting a new private club every time they fail to agree on how to strain a gnat.

            The state has sanctioned gay marriage, and it’s bizarre that an arm of the state doesn’t allow it. It’s so strange.

          • In answer to the point that CofE doesn’t provide public services

            Non religous marriages (registry office) have all sorts of rules around them (eg you’re not allowed to mention God) *because* all straight people have the alternative option of marriage in the established church. This option is not open to gay people. Therefore in this aspect there are two different levels of public service being offered to gay and straight.

            The CofE is also involved in national government, state education, hospital chaplaincy and, in some places, post offices

          • In answer to the point that CofE doesn’t provide public services

            No one said it doesn’t provide publuc services. It provides, for example, schools. Just that providing public services is beside its major point, which is providing services to God.

            Non religous marriages (registry office) have all sorts of rules around them (eg you’re not allowed to mention God) *because* all straight people have the alternative option of marriage in the established church.

            Like this: surely a marriage service is not a sevice provided to the couple being married; it is a service that the couple provide to God. Right? Just like Holy Communion is us serving God by obeying His commandment to do it in remembrance of Him.

            It is therefore not a ‘public service’ being provided to the public by the Church of England.

          • It is in the sense that anyone living or born in a Church of England Parish can get married in the Parish church there, even if they rarely attend church. That is part of its role as the established church

          • It is in the sense that anyone living or born in a Church of England Parish can get married in the Parish church there, even if they rarely attend church.

            That’s not a public service though. The Church of England has a legal duty to let couples use the church for their marriage Service yes. But the service there isn’t being provided to the couple by the Church of England. The service is being provided by the couple to God.

            But I think I’ve worked you out. You basically resent the whole idea of God bring involved in the Church of England. That’s why when you describe it you only ever mention the King, and not the King of Kings. So it’s no wonder you don’t understand what service is actually being done, for whom, by whom.

            By the way you never answered the question about your Eucharistic theology.

          • Yes it is being provided by the Church of England to the couple, even atheists resident in a Church of England Parish can get married in the Parish church. That doesn’t mean God and Christ have no part in the Church of England, those who attend weekly communion services or Alpha courses or Bible readings and discussions etc the Church runs will be Christians. However in terms of weddings and funerals the responsibility of the Parish is to the residents of the Parish, including to be married or buried there whether they are Christians or not.

            My Eucharist theology is standard C of E, the bread and wine contain Christ’s spiritual presence but do not literally turn into his body and blood as Roman Catholics do

          • Same as residents of a village can attend their local Church primary school even if they rarely attend Church in the Parish (though for Church secondary schools which have catchment areas covering multiple Parishes and towns as well as nearby villages then regular Church attendance is a requirement of admission)

          • Yes it is being provided by the Church of England to the couple, even atheists resident in a Church of England Parish can get married in the Parish church.

            But my point is that what is happening in a marriage service is that the couple are committing their relationship to God, right? They are the ones doing the service, for God, of pledging their relationship to him, right?

            It’s totally different from, say, a couple getting married in a registry office or a hotel. Then, the venue is providing a service to the couple: they’re providing a venue for the couple to have a party with their friends and family to celebrate their relationship.

            But the Church of England marriage service isn’t that. It’s not a venue to have a party to celebrate a relationship. It’s a solemn pledging to God of the relationship.

            So what ‘public service’ is the Church of England providing here? None. They are not providing any service to the couple; they are not a ‘public alternative’ to a registry office or a hotel. A church wedding is a totally different thing to a wedding in a registry office or a hotel.

            My Eucharist theology is standard C of E, the bread and wine contain Christ’s spiritual presence but do not literally turn into his body and blood as Roman Catholics do

            So you say you place more emphasis on Holy Communion than on the sermon. Okay. Why do you take Holy Communion? Do you do it as a humble service to God because He commanded you to do it in remembrance of Him? Do you do it because you like the pretty music? Or some other reason?

          • S

            If the service is provided by God and the CofE has no hand in it then why not let anyone use the church for marriage? It seems to me very much that the restrictions on marriage come primarily from Justin Welby (with a lot of support) who I really hope is not God!

          • If the service is provided by God and the CofE has no hand in it then why not let anyone use the church for marriage?

            Because — and I would have thought this would be obvious? — it would clearly be unethical for the Church of England to facilitate the offering to God of a service that it sincerely believed to be contrary to His will.

          • S

            So would you concede that the CofE are at least stewards of marriage in parish churches and stewards of marriages with a religious aspect in England and are prohibiting gay people from accessing them? (Even though they claim to believe that they are doing the moral thing)

          • So would you concede that the CofE are at least stewards of marriage in parish churches and stewards of marriages with a religious aspect in England and are prohibiting gay people from accessing them?

            No. There is nothing stopping gay people from offering any service to God that they like. There is nothing stopping a same-sex couple from hiring a venue and performing a service pledging their relationship to God, if that’s what they think God wants them to do. And if they want their relationship legally recognised by the state, there’s nothing stopping them from obtaining that recognition either (the one thing they can’t do is have a civil registrar present at a quasi-religious service, but there are ways around that).

            The Church of England is not stopping anyone from doing any of these things.

  25. What is rare in any of this, is the opportunity being taken to promote and publish the evangel, to those outside the church and inside the Christian church, even specifically the CoE, for that is the context, where there steadfast hostility to those labelled, evangelical, by some who cannot articulate what the evangel is even in its simplest form.
    Glenn Scrivener does not shy away from it. It matters not one jot whether Toksvig nor anyone inside or outside the church, knows or believes it.
    The Good News of Jesus has been proclaimed.
    Well done the good and faithful, scribe, Scrivener.

    Reply
    • I think it’s difficult to sell “you must never have a romantic relationship” as “Good News” in the current culture!

      Reply
      • I think it’s difficult to sell “you must never have a romantic relationship” as “Good News” in the current culture!

        And whose fault is that?

        Reply
      • Why?
        It is what or rather, who the church is for. It certainly isn’t self absorbed, sex- centric. Neither is it a *sell* of consumerism Christianity.

        Reply
        • Geoff – you’re wanting the Good News to be proclaimed outside the church and inside the church.

          Like it or not the pursuit of a lifelong relationship is an essential part of Western culture and, in my experience in every church I have attended, church culture too.

          Reply
          • Like it or not the pursuit of a lifelong relationship is an essential part of Western culture

            And do you think that is the single biggest flaw of Western culture, or just among the top five?

          • S

            Off the top of my head I’d say the biggest flaw in Western culture is racism.

            I dont see a lifelong relationship as a negative thing though

          • Off the top of my head I’d say the biggest flaw in Western culture is racism.

            That’s weird ’cause although racism is a big flaw, contemporary Western culture is probably one of the least racist cultures to have ever existed in the whole history of the planet Earth.

            I dont see a lifelong relationship as a negative thing though

            Nobody does. What’s a negative is making the pursuit of one the main function of life.

            https://www.cslewisinstitute.org/resources/reflections-july-2017/

          • I don’t think (m)any people see a lifelong relationship as the main purpose in life.

            However, in our culture, even in our church culture, telling someone that they can never marry or telling someone they must get a divorce and perhaps even leave their children is not Good News

    • If you join a club in which the rules are made by God and you don’t like them then leave.

      Or if you’re an atheist, don’t join the club in the first place but then still demand a say in the rules… no, I don’t get it either.

      Reply
      • “Dont like the rules then leave” isnt Good News.

        The church needs to find a way of explaining why telling gay people they must lead a solitary life (and will still find a lot of hostility even if they achieve that) is somehow Good News within the context of a culture that is so focused on lifelong relationship

        Reply
        • “Dont like the rules then leave” isnt Good News.

          Not ‘don’t like the rules then leave’.

          But: don’t believe in God, don’t join a church.

          Seriously. If you don’t believe in God why would you join a church?

          If you believe in God, and you disagree with me about same-sex marriages in the church, then I will debate the point at length. Too much length, probably.

          But if you’re an atheist, and you disagree with me about same-sex marriages in church? Just shut up. Go away. Why do you care? You think the whole of Christianity is utterly mistaken; why do you care about the details of doctrine?

          Reply
          • S

            I believe in God, but I’m not interested in joining your church.

            I strongly disagree with theology that bars gay people from same sex marriage, but I don’t think this is the best forum to go into detail on that.

          • I believe in God, but I’m not interested in joining your church

            And I’m not interested in forcing you to, so our interests are aligned. Rejoice!

          • You’ve also successfully changed the conversation. My point was about Good News!

            ‘Changed the conversation’? You replied to me, so if anyone was trying to ‘change the conversation’ it was you, yes?

          • They don’t have any good news for anyone that’s the problem. Even their good news is bad news: what sort of God would punish an innocent person instead of the one who’s guilty! It’s like something that was dreamed up after playing rugger in a public school. Let’s have a whipping boy who will take my punishment! No room for personal responsibility here.

          • Even their good news is bad news: what sort of God would punish an innocent person instead of the one who’s guilty!

            As a guilty person, I’m actually quite thankful that the only innocent person who ever lived was willing to take my punishment. Are you not?

          • No. I’d rather take responsibility for my actions. Punishing another person in my place is a horrendous idea.

            If you wrong me and ask for my forgiveness then I would grant it. I don’t need to punish an innocent third party as well, I just forgive!

          • No. I’d rather take responsibility for my actions. Punishing another person in my place is a horrendous idea.

            Okay, well, then, I very much fear that God will give you what you ask for, and by that time it will be too late for you to regret your pride.

          • Origen – thanks for the link – it looks interesting and (if it is still in print) I’ll order it.

            I’m not sure I like any of these atonement theories. The idea that Jesus is put on the naughty seat and gets a jolly good spanking for our sins doesn’t really add up (as you say). I’m also not at all sure that ‘ransom’ adds up either. ‘Christus Victor’ does add up – in the crucifixion Christ went into battle on our behalf and in the resurrection we see the victory on our behalf. Any theorising beyond this seems to muck it up somewhat.

          • ‘Christus Victor’ does add up – in the crucifixion Christ went into battle on our behalf and in the resurrection we see the victory on our behalf.

            I used to like the Christis Victor model — it appeals to my sense of the dramatic, Satan tricked, thinking he is victorious, until victory is snatched from him at his moment of triumph!

            I’m less keen on it now. I wouldn’t discount it entirely — all models of the atonement are necessarily incomplete, like models of light as a wave or as a particle — but I feel ‘Christus Victor’ has a serious flaw in how it presents Satan as God’s equal, a significant, almost dualist power, whom God can’t defeat in a straightforward contest but must resort to trickery to outwit.

            Obviously that’s totally wrong: Christianity is not a dualist religion, with a war being waged between the evenly-matched forces of light and darkness. That’s Star Wars. Rather, God is supreme; the creator of all. Sayan is a jumped-up functionary with ideas above his station.

            So while, like all models of the atonement, ‘Christis Victor’ does have something in it, be very careful. It has significant flaws.

          • The idea that Jesus is put on the naughty seat and gets a jolly good spanking for our sins doesn’t really add up

            By the way, I think the reason for your total misunderstanding of substitutionary models of the atonement is probably because you’re dividing the persons here. You need to go and have a good long sit on the heresy step and think about what you’ve done.

            Maybe while you’re there you can watch this handy video:

            https://youtu.be/KQLfgaUoQCw

          • The Deeper Magic of the Divine Exchange is precisely how Satan was defeated at the Cross.
            No need to polarise substitution (which is necessarily penal) and Victor. Victor is just the overall umbrella picture: substitution is its mechanism.

          • S

            Actually I genuinely made a mistake in which reply was to which comment. I think if you are going to accuse me of lying about even that then its difficult to have any good faith discussion!

            The format of these comments is very difficult to follow on my android

          • I think if you are going to accuse me of lying about even that then its difficult to have any good faith discussion!

            I never accused you of lying. I pointed out that what you wrote was not true. I completely accept that was the result of honest error and no deception was intended.

            The format of these comments is very difficult to follow on my android

            Very difficult to follow just in general, I find. I have made mistakes myself in inserting comments at the wrong places. Hence always quoting what I am replying to.

  26. Well said, Origen. The Spirit of the Law, rather than the letter. Jesus gave us a New Commandment…
    I write as a woman in 2023. Times have changed, and our view and interpretation of Scripture must also change. If not, I should not even be allowed to add my comments…

    Reply
      • Are you playing dumber than usual? The cofe only accepted women recently in their typical fudge like style, the Roman Catholics don’t, most house churches didn’t when I was growing up, and new frontiers still don’t. It’s liberal churches which you hate who have done the trailblazing.

        Reply
    • Thanks Angela. I think you’ll mostly find the letter of the law here I’m afraid. And usually the people wielding it will try and destroy you at the first opportunity.

      But welcome anyway!

      Reply
  27. The Church of England was set up after the English Reformation to be the established church with the King as its head yes. It was not set up to be a purely Bible based church taking every word of the Bible literally. It has not been and never will be a purely evangelical church (the only time it ever got close to that was under Oliver Cromwell but soon reverted to type at the Reformation)

    Reply
    • The Church of England was set up after the English Reformation to be the established church with the King as its head yes

      And with nothing to do with God at all. WE GET IT.

      Reply
          • He’s stoking the furnace for you now!

            And oh, I deserve that furnace. As do you, for that matter. As does everyone.

            But perhaps, by God’s grace, I will be saved from getting what I deserve. Perhaps you will be too.

          • I assure you that no-one deserves it. What sort of God would torture people for eternity because they got a few things wrong?

            You need to revisit your re-formed thinking and engage your brain!

          • I assure you that no-one deserves it.

            I know I do.

            What sort of God would torture people for eternity because they got a few things wrong?

            Just punishment is not torture.

          • So 70 years of getting a few things wrong results in an eternity of “just punishment”? Your god sounds more and more like the guy downstairs!

          • So 70 years of getting a few things wrong results in an eternity of “just punishment”?

            Who’s talking about ‘70 years of getting a few things wrong’? My soul is in eternal revolt against the rightful ruler of all of creation; I am a high traitor on a universal and eternal scale. And so are you.

            Your god sounds more and more like the guy downstairs!

            You seem to have this bizarre idea that punishing sin is something God choose to do, and could choose not to do. What nonsense. God could no more leave sin unpunished, and still be God, than a fire could decide not to burn the hand of someone who touches it, and remain a fire.

            God doesn’t get up in the morning and decide, ‘I will torment sinners today’. God’s nature of perfect justice is such that merely bringing sin into His presence must be agony. As long as we cling onto our sin, we simply can’t bear to be in His presence. That’s not God being nasty; it’s just a consequence of His unchanging, perfect nature, and not something that could be otherwise, without God ceasing to be God.

          • Don’t bring me into your fantasy religion, I think it’s tragic you would even think this way. You don’t come across as a particularly nice person but you’re certainly not totally depraved. What an inhuman theory to base your life upon, especially when there are plenty of other theories out there!

            Your god is incapable of forgiving without punishing someone? I suggest you’re limiting what God can do.

            Thankfully mainstream Christian belief is far more generous to Him. He came and lived amongst sinners without being in agony.

            In the charismatic movement that I grew up in we believed that children, far from being born with original sin, were already part of the kingdom and our job was to try and keep them there. There is no sin that is original, we used to joke!

          • What an inhuman theory to base your life upon, especially when there are plenty of other theories out there!

            You’re right, there are lots of other nice theories out there. But the problem is that all those other theories are false and mine is true.

            It would be nice if one of the nicer theories were true. But then it would be nice if I could fly. And I could live my life as if one of the nicer theories were true. And that would be nice, until I found myself halfway down the outside of the Shard wondering why the ground won’t stop getting closer.

            Your god is incapable of forgiving without punishing someone? I suggest you’re limiting what God can do.

            If saying that God can’t stop being God is limiting what God can do, then yes I am. But no one (okay, no one sensible) thinks that God can do things that are logically impossible. So I’m fine with that.

            He came and lived amongst sinners without being in agony.

            He was in quite a lot of agony on the cross though. And not just physical agony.

            In the charismatic movement that I grew up in we believed that children, far from being born with original sin, were already part of the kingdom and our job was to try and keep them there. There is no sin that is original, we used to joke!

            Yes, there are lots of groups out there teaching falsehoods. I’m sure you encountered one early in your life. I hope you see through the lies before it’s too late.

          • “But the problem is that all those other theories are false and mine is true.”

            Do you ever read back what you write before posting? How on earth do you know that other theories are false but yours are true? I’m genuinely intrigued now!

          • How on earth do you know that other theories are false but yours are true?

            How do you know my theory is false and yours is true?

          • “How do you know my theory is false and yours is true?”

            I don’t. But please tell me why yours is true, and others are false? Do you have proof? Did an angel tell you in a dream??

          • I don’t.

            And yet above you write as if you’re sure that my theory is wrong, eg: ‘Don’t bring me into your fantasy religion’, ‘You need to revisit your re-formed thinking and engage your brain!’.

            I am merely being explicit about what you try to skate over. We both think our theory is true and the others are false. I’m just up-front about it.

    • Exam Paper “Church History”

      “The Church of England was set up after the English Reformation to be the established church with the King as its head .”

      Q. What biblical and theological ideas shaped the emerging Church of England during the reformation in England and on the continent?

      Q. Why is this key to understanding the church of england today?

      Reply
      • Henry VIII ensured the Church of England was not a Calvinist or even Lutheran church but a Catholic and Apostolic church with the monarch as its head not the Pope

        Reply
        • Henry VIII ensured the Church of England was not a Calvinist or even Lutheran church but a Catholic and Apostolic church with the monarch as its head not the Pope

          And which has nothing to do with God YES WE GET IT.

          Reply
          • It doesn’t matter whether he was right or wrong, that is what he founded the Church of England to be. If you don’t like it, leave it

          • It doesn’t matter whether he was right or wrong, that is what he founded the Church of England to be.

            Surely if he was wrong, then the existence of the Church of England is a terrible mistake and we should disestablish (and possibly dissolve) it forthwith.

            So: was he right or wrong? Should we get rid of the Church of England, or keep it?

            Give reasons for your answer.

          • I have to presume from your answer that you don’t have any answers… just repeating irrelevant distractions…

            Another interesting question — though I doubt there’d be any answer — would be, ‘Okay, so Henry VIII did X and Y and Z… was he right to do those things, or wrong? Why?’

        • He was right, hence I am a member of the Church of England who want it to remain the established church with the King as Supreme Governor.

          If you disagree with that I suggest you leave and find another church, as the whole point of the Church of England is to be the established Church with the King as Supreme Governor

          Reply
          • He was right

            Okay; why do you think he was right? Obviously lots of people at the time, and since, thought he was wrong. But you think he was right. Why? How would you defend Henry’s actions to someone who thinks that he was wrong to establish the Church of England, and that we should disestablish it?

  28. It is now transparent that Living in Love and Faith (LLF) was no more than an attempt by the bishops to snow under the biblically-based opposition to same-sex church weddings, and that they long knew what they wanted to do. This was already obvious to those who took the LLF course, as I did via Zoom arranged by several local parishes. The bishops – and archbishops – clearly have no fear of the Lord, and consequently no wisdom.

    Reply
    • and that they long knew what they wanted to do

      Not denying this, but isn’t it remarkable that having had so long to prepare for what they wanted to do, they have done it so badly?

      Reply
    • I agree with you both, but there are many bishops; they are reasonably educated; we should therefore not speak of them as though they were an amorphous mass. They are being stultified by the three line whip on unity. I can only compare the straitjacket put on members of the Royal Family about what they can say, where they can go etc.. Eventually it could cause some people to crack psychologically, and they would have my sympathy. They have done all this training and thinking all to no avail because they are forced into a mould.

      Reply
      • I don’t agree, Christopher. In Parliament defying a 3-line whip means the end of your chances of Cabinet and being frozen out by a body of people with whom you fraternise closely every day. If a bishop breaks unity over SSM, what would happen to him (or just maybe her)? Nothing except a few grumbling words at occasional meetings of bishops, which would, in Denis Healey’s phrase, be like “being savaged by a dead sheep”. Bishops continue to be boss in their home dioceses.

        No wisdom, no guts, and apostate liberal theology. Any bishop who wants to avoid being categorised with this majority should break ranks, otherwise they don’t deserve to be categorised differently. Worse still, they get paid to spread heresy out of the collection plates of the faithful. Hypocrites. All of this is why I invoked the verse about fear of the Lord being the beginning of wisdom. They have none of either and I would not change places with them for all the gold in the Bank of England.

        Reply
      • I don’t agree, though:

        (1) People who have done much study in their lifetimes are unlikely to relish being squeezed into an imposed uniformity.

        (2) And it is quite impossible that *every* single one of the bishops is broadly in agreement. It would be impossible for even 90% to be, on an issue like this. Which means that the explanation for their formal unity is something else.

        Remember the time when the Bishop of Coventry was the *only* one to vote a certain way, maybe or maybe not because he pressed the ‘wrong’ button? But why would the most conservative also just so happen to be the same one who pressed the wrong button?

        It is much more likely that it has been impressed upon them (as in politics) that if they make no show of unity then there is no hope and things will become far too complicated, and anything they want to happen will not happen and they will lose respect as a body.

        (3) However, there is also a third factor. That is: when people achieve promotion then (if it had always been all about the promotion for them) they moderate. When Abp Carey was first appointed in 1990 he wrote an article showing solidarity with Abp Habgood and Bp Jenkins, and also swung a thurible with relish.

        I believe that we need to consider this carefully. The reward of promotion has in the last 10-20 years been handed out to several erstwhile evangelicals in the knowledge that promotion and worldly success is by far the best way to blunt their cutting edge.

        In an interview in Michael Green’s 80s he said how he was known as the bishop maker, having mentored numerous bishops, but as soon as they achieved that promotion they lost their cutting edge. That level of plain talking, even about friends, is exactly what there should be, and we are very far from it.

        And also that is why we see the Conservative Evangelicals remaining as pastor-teachers and being extremely successful at it. Ending up with more influence than bishops and more followers too. Which is what renouncing worldly ambition brings.

        It is important to consider these different dimensions of what is going on here.

        The dishonesty and man-pleasing of fudge cries out to heaven.

        Reply
        • To which I would add that the present fudge is unsustainable. But it is far worse than that. Any element that once enters never leaves, because the church just splinters and fragments, with all the fragments remaining in existence. So the fudge will be there, somewhere within the church, for evermore. Short of a Campbell level revival or an Ezra level reformation – for which we pray.

          Reply
    • It’s still not clear what’s happening

      The press office and some bishops say they are going to allow blessings of SSRs (not only marriage), but not allow same sex marriage itself in church.

      The lawyers and Justin Welby say, no, they will only bless gay individuals, not SSRs.

      Both cannot be correct, which means someone is lying or has been deliberately misled at a very high level. You guys lay into the gays about sexual sin, but to my mind dishonesty is a far clearer biblical sin – why is it ok for church leaders to lie (which the bible explicitly says is sin), but not ok for gay people to marry (which is not explicitly stated in the bible)?

      Reply
      • why is it ok for church leaders to lie

        I don’t think anyone has suggested it is? Have you found anyone — on either side — who is happy with the way the bishops have behaved on this issue? If so, where?

        Reply
      • ‘Both cannot be correct, which means someone is lying or has been deliberately misled at a very high level. You guys lay into the gays about sexual sin, but to my mind dishonesty is a far clearer biblical sin – why is it ok for church leaders to lie (which the bible explicitly says is sin), but not ok for gay people to marry (which is not explicitly stated in the bible)?’

        I think you are spot on here. My complaint to those involved in this, above all else, is the rank dishonesty in the whole process.

        I still await an adequate response to my challenge on this.

        Reply
        • My complaint to those involved in this, above all else, is the rank dishonesty in the whole process.

          What it looks like to me — or what I fear it looks like — is that the bishops are deliberately trying to make things as obscure as possible in an attempt to pull off a ‘constructive ambiguity’ outcome where everyone can convince themselves that the Church of England believes what they want the Church of England to believe, because no one will be able to prove that it doesn’t.

          This is of course totally dishonest. But given that the very existence of Andrew Godsall and his tortured interpretations the language in Church of England statements suggests it has worked before, you can see why they might be tempted to try it again.

          I don’t think it will though. Andrew Godsall is clearly highly motivated to find interpretations of the language that allow him to make it say what he wants it to say. He wants to stay in the tent, and for the tent to continue to exist and have its social cachet, more that he wants to win (because he doesn’t really believe any of it is actually objectively true, so what matters to him is that everyone can say the same words).

          But on this issue I get the impression that neither side will be happy with that. Progressives won’t be satisfied with a form of words that they can tell themselves mean that the Church of England approves of same-sex marriage, if conservatives can say the same words while telling themselves it means that same-sex marriages are still invalid. Because things have moved on from people wanting toleration to wanting validation. It’s no long enough to not have your relationship seem as invalid; more it must be positively and unambiguously held as valid.

          And conservatives won’t be happy with ambiguity because they think, with some justification, that any ambiguity in doctrine will be used to normalise progressive practice, which will then later be used as evidence that the doctrine needs to change simply to align it with practice.

          Plus, the progressives think that victory us within their grasp (see the number here who insist that their preferred outcome is inevitable) so they have no incentive to compromise. And conservatives pick up on that triumphalism and so it seems to them the fight is existential: either they win or they will be pushed out of the Church of England. There is no trust that any ‘mutual flourishing’ arrangements will be adhered to in the long term.

          So as well as being morally wrong because it’s dishonest, I think the context is now such that it won’t even work, and will end up doing more damage the longer it is tried.

          Reply
          • Most liberals in the Church of England are compromising, only a small minority of them want to force evangelical churches to conduct homosexual marriages to. They would get an opt out as Anglo Catholic churches do from women priests and bishops and some Vicars do from remarrying divorced couples.

            It is most evangelicals refusing to compromise by refusing to allow liberal Catholic churches to conduct homosexual marriages even if they want to

          • This sounds correct. In analysis and in outcome both.

            Certainly the Global South Fellowship has seen through this recent ‘constructive ambiguity.’ (See their reaction). So in addition to what happens in the declining CofE, the former role it had in the Anglican Communion is pretty much over.

          • Most liberals in the Church of England are compromising, only a small minority of them want to force evangelical churches to conduct homosexual marriages to.

            That would still involve the Church of England changing its doctrine of marriage to include same-sex marriages, so it’s not a compromise: it would be a straightforward case of the progressive side bring everything it wants.

          • The Anglican communion is already split, Anglican provinces in the US, Scotland and Wales have already allowed homosexual marriage. It is also a recent invention, most of sub Saharan Africa has only become Christian in the last 100 to 150 years after all. The Archbishop of Canterbury is also only lead Anglican Bishop in the Church of England not Africa. He is merely symbolic first amongst equals, not even first alone. He is nor Supreme head of the Anglican Communion as the Pope is of the Roman Catholic Church.

            The Church of England has been the established church in England for 500 years by contrast, the Anglican Communion is only a recent invention mirroring the Commonwealth as the British Empire ended.

          • No the progressive side getting everything it wants is a minority of them working with the likely new Labour government after the next general election to change legislation to force the Church of England to conduct homosexual marriages in all of its churches with no opt out for evangelicals.

            Removal of the opt out is certainly possible if evangelicals don’t compromise now before Labour get in

          • No the progressive side getting everything it wants is a minority of them working with the likely new Labour government after the next general election to change legislation to force the Church of England to conduct homosexual marriages in all of its churches with no opt out for evangelicals.

            The progressive side getting what it wants is a redefinition of the Church of England’s doctrine of marriage to include same-sex marriages. That’s why one of the free clear bits of the bishops’ doomed attempt at compromise-by-ambiguity is that that redefinition is not happening, which is why it has been rejected by the progressive side.

            Honestly, it’s as of you think that the entirely of the conservative position is that they don’t want to have to conduct same-sex marriages because they might get gay germs from standing too close, or something equally childish.

          • Yawn! People are still speaking of ”conservative” vs ”progressive”.

            Not only is ”progressive” an arrogant and untrue designation, but its uncritical use marks the user as uncritical for future reference – in instances where it is not merely a shorthand. I am sure it is generally a shorthand in the present instance.

            But also both are nothing but package-deal ideologies, and in any debate ideologies are never to be listened to at all, only reasoned evidenced arguments. The fact that not only are they being listened to but they are also being set up as the two main options (ahead of any independent thought, apparently) shows how pointless it is to think debates can necessarily progress very far even in decades.

          • Yawn! People are still speaking of ”conservative” vs ”progressive”.

            If you can come up with better one-word descriptions then please do.

          • Conservative / Traditional vs Culturally-Compliant or Culturally-Conformist. Sorry that the last are not really one word, but that does describe the reality. ‘Progressive’ has to be avoided as simultaneously arrogant and inaccurate.
            But the main point is that both are nothing but ideologies, and we should never pay the slightest attention to those, only to evidence and argument, logic and common sense.
            The entire debate has been conducted without realisation of this basic point (for, after all, it is not as though in honest debate the likeliest answers always congregate at 2 poles!! – hence we have here, at least in part, dishonest debate). Which is one reason why it is so wearisome and – more importantly – a demonic waste of time.

          • The Church of England as the established church has already redefined its view of marriage to include divorced couples in line with English law, even if not for spousal adultery. No reason it cannot do the same to include homosexual marriages in line with English law too with no compulsion to perform homosexual marriages on Parishes that disagree

          • No reason it cannot do the same to include homosexual marriages in line with English law too

            No reason except that to do so would require it to totally change its view of the Bible.

          • T1

            Honestly I don’t know where this idea comes from that liberals want to *force* conservatives to preside over same sex marriages. As I think I already pointed out – for the vast majority of couples, their marriage is one of the most important things to them. They don’t want to be married by someone who disapproves of them or their guests!

            When we got married we worked hard to find a photographer who would be comfortable with our guests, never mind the officiant!!

            Of course, it’s pretty natural to want to convince someone who disagrees with you of your point of view, but that’s quite different than forcing them to carry something out against their will.

    • And the Church Catholic predates the established Church in England. So what? Is this a what is older contest?

      An independent, denominated Church in England, you shall have it.

      And God bless its future.

      Reply
  29. We are getting close to the pure Babel-like gobbledegook foreshadowed in the climactic banquet scene of Lewis, That Hideous Strength.

    Because of the multiple incoherence of the woke worldview and (worse) the way it fails to match reality in the first place, when people are asked questions about it they can um and ah and also tie themselves in knots. This has happened to Nicola Sturgeon within the last week but also to Abp Cottrell.

    Reply
  30. As was predictable, Thinking Anglicans are throwing the new, mostly thoughtful Evangelical/trad document on the nature of matrimony back in the authors’ faces because the proscriptions of divorce are as strong as and more dominical than those on homosexual behaviour.

    Of course, the chickens have come home to roost, but NB quite regularly in the case of divorce there are unwilling deserted parties who are not responsible for the damage.

    Reply
  31. Leaving aside the idea of a monarch ‘creating a Church’ (The Church of England was created ad the established church in England by Henry VIII in 1534), it is at least reassuring to see Christopher Cocksworth et al. articulating its self-understanding regarding Holy Matrimony. Until 2023.

    Reply
  32. It would be more accurate historically to say: the kinds of tensions inherent in relations between Electors and Bishops in the Holy Roman Empire burst their bounds in the case of England and Henry VIII, due to his demand for an annulment. ‘Creating a church’ isn’t this.

    Reply
    • Henry’s sister Margaret had just got an annulment. But the Pope was dominated by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles, whose mother was Catherine of Aragon’s sister. That is why Rome simply sat on Henry’s request.

      Reply
  33. Well Roman Catholics and Baptists and Pentecostals also have a passion to share Jesus Christ around the world. It is not a reason to bring them into communion with the Church of England

    Reply
    • It is not a reason to bring them into communion with the Church of England

      But if they wanted to be in communion with the Church of England, would you have turned them away?

      Reply
        • Yes, if they did not subscribe to Anglican theology

          And they did subscribe to the same theology as the Church of England, so that’s fine.

          The issue is that some within the Church of England now want to change the Church of England’s theology, and they don’t want to.

          Reply
        • (Like you. You want the Church of England to change its theology. That is what is causing the conflict with the African churches which want to stick with the old theology.)

          Reply
          • The Church of England’s core theology is a Protestant and Reformed church in the Catholic and Apostolic tradition with the King as its head. Not opposition to homosexual marriage.

            So the African churches have already broken with one aspect of C of E theology since they joined the Anglican communion in 1867 when their nations and churches declared independence and no longer have the British monarch as their head

          • In fact logically the Anglican communion should only be the UK Anglican churches, Canada, Australia and New Zealand and a few Caribbean nations now on that basis

          • The Church of England’s core theology is a Protestant and Reformed church in the Catholic and Apostolic tradition with the King as its head. Not opposition to homosexual marriage.

            The Church of England’s theology is that marriage is only possible between one man and one woman: canon B30. The canons define the Church of England’s theology. You want that canon changed. Ergo you want the Church of England’s theology changed.

            The other churches do not want the theology changed.

            That is the source of the conflict. You want change; they don’t.

          • And Canon A6 confirms ‘The government of the Church of England under the Queen’s Majesty, by archbishops, bishops, deans, archdeacons, and the rest of the clergy and of the laity that bear office in the same, is not repugnant to the Word of God.’ Canon A7 ‘We acknowledge that the Queen’s excellent Majesty, acting according to the laws of the realm, is the highest power under God in this kingdom, and has supreme authority over all persons in all causes, as well ecclesiastical as civil.’ Canon A1 ‘The Church of England, established according to the laws of this realm under the Queen’s Majesty, belongs to the true and apostolic Church of Christ; and, as our duty to the said Church of England requires, we do constitute and ordain that no member thereof shall be at liberty to maintain or hold the contrary.’

            So even if the Canon regarding marriage is not changed to include homosexual marriage, the African Churches have already broken with the Church of England and its Canons by not maintaining government under the British Crown, and no longer acknowledging the British monarch as the highest power under God and the Church established under the laws of the Monarch

          • So even if the Canon regarding marriage is not changed to include homosexual marriage, the African Churches have already broken with the Church of England and its Canons by not maintaining government under the British Crown, and no longer acknowledging the British monarch as the highest power under God and the Church established under the laws of the Monarch

            No they haven’t. Canon A6 says that the form of government of the Church of England is not repugnant to God. The African churches have never said that it is repugnant. Canon A6 does not say that it is the only form of church government which is not repugnant to God, merely that it is a form which is not repugnant to God. So other churches are free to govern themselves in different way, without breaking or changing Canon A6.

            Canon A7 establishes the Crown as the highest power under God in this kingdom. That is, in the Kingdom of England. It may have escaped your notice but those other churches are not in England. Canon A7 does not say that the Crown is the highest authority under God in the whole world. Only in England. So no, the African churches haven’t broken or changed that one.

            Canon A1 says that the Church of England belongs to the true and apostolic Church of Christ; none of the African churches have ever said it doesn’t. So again they haven’t broken or changed that one.

            So no, the other churches haven’t broken or changed any of the canons. It’s you who want to change the theology of the Church of England, and the other churches don’t want to change, and that is the core of the current disagreement.

            You want the theology to change. They don’t. It’s as simple as that.

          • Canon A7 clearly acknowledges the British monarch as the highest power after God. The African churches by not only not having the monarch as their head but also being in nations which do not even have the British monarch as their head of state any more as they did when realms of the British crown have therefore broken one of the most fundamental canons of the Church of England and one of the key reasons why they were united with the Church of England in 1867 in the first place!!

          • Canon A7 clearly acknowledges the British monarch as the highest power after God.

            Yes — in this kingdom. ‘We acknowledge that the Queen’s excellent Majesty, acting according to the laws of the realm, is the highest power under God in this kingdom’

            Not even at the height of the Empire did the Church of England claim the Crown as the highest power under God in the whole world!

            The African churches by not only not having the monarch as their head but also being in nations which do not even have the British monarch as their head of state any more as they did when realms of the British crown have therefore broken one of the most fundamental canons of the Church of England and one of the key reasons why they were united with the Church of England in 1867 in the first place!!

            Any church in an ex-British colony has already schismed from the Anglican Communion by the very fact of being in a territory that gained its independence from the UK?

            That’s what you’re going with?

            Seriously?

            Look, just be clear about what’s going on. You want the Church of England to change its theology. Several other members of the Anglican Communion don’t want the theology to change (while of course yet other members have already changed their theology). That is the nub of the present difficulties.

            You want the Church of England to change its theology.

          • You can’t on the one hand say the Church of England canon that acknowledges the British Monarch as the highest power under God applies only to England and not the rest of the Anglican communion and on the other say the Church of England canon that marriage is between a man and woman applies to Anglicans the world over!

            Yes, the Anglican Communion was created in 1867 when Queen Victoria was monarch of every African nation that joined it and effectively head of most of their churches too. So the African nations by declaring independence and removing the British monarch as their head of state broke with one of the key canons of the Church of England long ago. As I said earlier on that basis only really Australia, New Zealand, Canada and a few Caribbean nations which retain the King as head of state still comply with all the canons of the Church of England and are still in full Communion with the Church of England as per the intention of its creation in 1867.

          • You can’t on the one hand say the Church of England canon that acknowledges the British Monarch as the highest power under God applies only to England and not the rest of the Anglican communion and on the other say the Church of England canon that marriage is between a man and woman applies to Anglicans the world over!

            Canon A7 explicitly says it only applies to England (‘in this kingdom’).

            Canon B30 has no such geographical qualification.

            So yes, I can say that, because that is what the canons themselves say.

            So the African nations by declaring independence and removing the British monarch as their head of state broke with one of the key canons of the Church of England long ago. As I said earlier on that basis only really Australia, New Zealand, Canada and a few Caribbean nations which retain the King as head of state still comply with all the canons of the Church of England and are still in full Communion with the Church of England as per the intention of its creation in 1867.

            Wow. And I thought I was out of touch with the times.

            Tell you what I’m sure your ‘know your place, natives! If your nation becomes independent then you are out of the Anglican Communion!’ stance will go down really well in Lambeth Palace. Why don’t you go suggest it to them?

          • On the same logic of course the US Episcopalian Church would not be part of the Anglican Communion, not having the King as head of it or the USA and allowing homosexual marriage too

          • On the same logic of course the US Episcopalian Church would not be part of the Anglican Communion, not having the King as head of it or the USA and allowing homosexual marriage too

            Perhaps that should have given you the clue that your logic is wrong?

            Look, it’s quite simple: you want the Church of England to change its theology, don’t you?

  34. “The African churches” is clearly racist/empire-ist on its face.

    The Global South Fellowship is not “the African churches” vis a vis the Church (of England).

    Please try to understand something outside of your ken.

    Reply
      • It is painful to have to do the work for you, as it underscores your baleful, parochial frame of reference.

        Alexandria, Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, Sydney, Indian Ocean, Myanmar, Melanesia, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, SE Asia, South America…and yes, African Provinces…

        Reply
  35. The African nations of the Anglican Communion were part of the Kingdom in 1867 for goodness sake, Queen Victoria was their monarch and head of state! So the African nations have clearly broken that key canon of the Church of England by removing the British monarch as their head of state as well as head of their Anglican churches. They are ALL canons of the Church of England NOT the Anglican communion otherwise, so on your definition the Church of England canon on marriage B30 doesn’t apply if A7 doesn’t apply to the African churches

    Reply
    • The African nations of the Anglican Communion were part of the Kingdom in 1867 for goodness sake, Queen Victoria was their monarch and head of state!

      No, they weren’t. The two don’t necessarily do together. For example, right now King Charles is the head of state of Canada, but Canada is not part of the Kingdom of England.

      You need to look up the term ‘personal union’. the same person can be monarch of several different kingdoms; that does not make them the same kingdom.

      So the African nations have clearly broken that key canon of the Church of England by removing the British monarch as their head of state as well as head of their Anglican churches.

      That’s just nonsense. I can’t even argue against it because it doesn’t make sense. It’s not even wrong.

      They are ALL canons of the Church of England NOT the Anglican communion otherwise, so on your definition the Church of England canon on marriage B30 doesn’t apply if A7 doesn’t apply to the African churches

      Canon A7 does apply; if any church, in Africa or anywhere else, were to claim that the Crown was not the highest authority under God in England (ie, basically if they were to start saying England should become a republic) then the Church of England would be perfectly within its rights to take umbrage and suggest that this would be a barrier to the maintenance of communion.

      So, anyway, getting off this side-track: you want the Church of England to change its theology, right?

      Reply
    • Only Rhodesia made a unilateral declaration of independence. The rest were *granted* independence by the UK. You need to look up the details of those agreements before making statements about the consequences for the church.

      Reply
      • And only after independence movements in those nations, not because they wanted to without that. It was also those countries themselves who chose to remove the King as head of state and head of their churches

        Reply
        • It was also those countries themselves who chose to remove the King as head of state and head of their churches

          And I still think you should take you ‘and by doing so those uppity natives broke communion with the Church of England’ theory to Lambeth Palace and see how well it goes down.

          Like the proverbial bucket of cold sick, I’d guess, and quite rightly.

          Reply
  36. You have the T1 amongst you.

    Could you remind his empire-oriented self that his “African churches” reflex is off target.

    The Global Anglican Fellowship:

    Alexandria, Bangladesh, Brazil, Chile, Sydney, Indian Ocean, Myanmar, Melanesia, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, SE Asia, South America…and yes, African Provinces…

    It is tiresome to have to widen the lens so constantly, historically and geographically, to correct his short-sightedness.

    Reply

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