Andrew Goddard writes: Three weeks ago, on 15th October, it was announced that “The House of Bishops has made a series of key decisions on the future direction of the Church of England’s Living in Love and Faith process”. To widespread surprise across the divisions the process has created in the church, this announcement looked like it amounted to “LLF RIP”, which to some was much too late a step after too much damage had already been done whereas to others—such as David Monteith, the Dean of Canterbury, Mark Oakley, the Dean of Southwark (text and video), and Charlie Bączyk-Bell—it felt like a major betrayal and a decision that the one crumb that had so far been dropped from the table should be accepted as sufficient by gay and lesbian Christians.
Rather than bringing to the February General Synod next year proposals to proceed with commending Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF) for use in “bespoke” services focussed on the same-sex couple, the bishops were once again reversing their plans and returning to using the Canon B2 process. This is almost certain to fail to get the necessary level of support (two-thirds in all 3 Houses) in General Synod.
Rather than offering a timetable for allowing clergy to enter same-sex marriages, an outcome that many felt was imminent back in summer 2023, the bishops have simply laid out a range of options all requiring formal and lengthy legislative processes.
As a result of these decisions, the bishops also decided there was no need for new episcopal arrangements such as Delegated Episcopal Ministry.
What was even more surprising was that these major reversals “were reached with near unanimity”.
What is going on?
The reasons given for this volte-face included “strong consensus on the need for unity, transparency and proper process alongside pastoral care” which begs the question as to whether previously these three elements were not seen as needed. Most important though appeared to be “further legal and theological advice” but that advice was only promised and not delivered at the time leaving no basis to understand or evaluate what had been decided.
This week (on Bonfire Night) this new advice was published. These are lengthy, weighty documents requiring further thought and analysis but an initial assessment can be given of what they show in relation to some rather obvious questions that arise as a result of this next, and seemingly final, phase in the LLF/PLF drama:
- What has changed in this “further legal and theological advice”?
- Is it advising on matters where previously the bishops did not seek such advice?
- Is it explicitly or implicitly revising and/or retracting past advice?
- Or is it just making even clearer what that advice always said, explicitly or implicitly, but the bishops previously sought to downplay or ignore or workaround?
A more detailed history and analysis (of which what follows is a summary) is available here: Legal Theological Advice Full while the key documents (including the latest legal and theological advice) are available and able to be queried by AI in this Google Notebook LM notebook.
Legal Advice
If we ask about how this new legal advice (GS Misc 1432, apparently 12 pages lifted from HB(25)39) compares to previous legal advice one significant difficulty is that so far throughout the PLF process the bishops have refused to publish their legal advice in this full, transparent form. Instead they have simply offered various summaries and assured everyone that they are fair and accurate. The last equivalent level of transparency was back in January 2017 when extracts from legal advice appeared in the Annex to GS 2055 following a similar decision not to proceed (after the Shared Conversations) anywhere near as far as many hoped and expected. However, a review of past legal advice (see my fuller account linked above) shows that there appears to be relatively little in the new published legal advice which is surprising given GS 2055 and those earlier summaries (especially the fullest of them in GS 2346 Annex A and Annex B in February 2024 and GS 2358 Annex C in July 2024). These all make clear in various ways just how hard implementing the sought-for changes is without any change to canons or acknowledgment of a change in doctrine.
Liturgy
In relation to “bespoke services” and how they should be introduced, the new advice largely reiterates (often word for word) previous discussions, focussing on the options of authorisation under Canon B2 or for an experimental period under Canon B5A and commendation for use under Canon B5. The main new element appears to be para 17 which may have increased caution about commending PLF for bespoke services but also weakens the existing commendation for PLF in regular services:
…where a form of service is commended only by a majority of the House of the Bishops, with significant dissent, the position is less clear. Commendation of forms of service has conventionally been by the unanimous decision (or at least a decision from which no bishop actively dissented) of the House of Bishops. Where – as was the case with the PLF Resources – a significant number of bishops dissent, it cannot be said that the episcopate is of a common mind that a form of service meets the requirement that it is “neither contrary to, nor indicative of any departure from, the doctrine of the Church of England in any essential matter”. In those circumstances, a court might consider that less weight should be given to the fact that the form of service had been commended in determining its lawfulness.
Discipline
As regards clergy entering same-sex marriages there is here more new material which may have been significant in the bishops’ decision they had to approach this by canonical changes. In previous legal summaries the options that have been considered are all options involving new doctrine or seeking to work within the current doctrine without canonical change (through appeal to pastoral provision in a time of uncertainty or not enforcing discipline). Perhaps in the light of the theological papers discussed below, para 21 makes a much stronger statement than has been made public before:
It is not obvious what principled basis there would be for changing the legal position….that the Church’s doctrine means it is not open to clergy to enter into same sex marriage…to make such a change would require legislation.
Whereas previous legal advice has focussed on Canon C26, much more attention is now being given to Canon C4 (and its treatment of ordination and further marriage after divorce) which has not appeared previously in the papers. This is also now prominent in the FAOC papers suggesting this path has perhaps now become the most likely one to be used to secure same-sex married clergy on the basis of unchanged doctrine but pastoral accommodation.
The alternative path for avoiding canonical changes was that of not enforcing discipline. This had previously come with significant warnings of the possible legal difficulties and these are seemingly strengthened here which is probably why an option some bishops were perhaps seriously considering is now off the table:
What it plainly is not lawfully open to a bishop to do is to declare that no clergy in his or her diocese will face discipline if they enter into a same sex marriage (para 41).
Although the door is left open to some diversity in practice the warning is stark in the final para 42 that
if there is to be a diversity of practice in how such cases are dealt with, bishops – collectively as the House of Bishops or individually – will need to take great care how they express their intentions in that regard. So far as the House itself is concerned, it will need to avoid including anything in its statement that would render the policy set out there unlawful (and therefore subject to the possibility of being successfully overturned by a court).
In summary, it has always been clear that any ways forward to standalone/bespoke services or permitting clergy to enter same-sex marriage that avoided Canon B2 or changes to other canons faced major difficulties and significant risks of legal challenge. For some reason the bishops pressed on regardless, seeking to introduce such services by commendation and new pastoral guidance without canonical change. It would seem that a majority were so keen to achieve these goals by those means that they simply downplayed the legal difficulties being highlighted.
Summary
Although given the non-publication of previous legal advice there are many “known unknowns” here and possibly some “unknown unknowns”, in short, the answers to the four questions raised earlier appear in relation to the legal advice to be
- What has changed in this legal advice? Nothing in relation to introducing bespoke services and nothing fundamentally different in relation to clergy same-sex marriage although the need for legislation is more directly stated and Canon C4 is introduced into the discussion .
- Is it advising on matters where previously the bishops did not seek such advice? The matters covered in the advice were advised on previously although there is fuller and stronger discussion of the dangers in proceeding to permit clergy same-sex marriage without canonical changes.
- Is it explicitly or implicitly revising and/or retracting past advice? No
- Is it just making even clearer what past advice always said, explicitly or implicitly, but the bishops previously sought to downplay or ignore or workaround? The bishops have now simply had to face up to the legal difficulties that were always there and always being signalled, even if sometimes more subtly, in previous legal advice.
Theological Advice
The difficulty in relation to theological advice has been different from that in relation to legal advice. Here, as far as we know, there has not been unpublished material provided previously to the House but withheld from Synod and the wider church. The difficulty here was rather that the House appeared to think, until several months after it published its original plans and Archbishops and other bishops had made promises and given signals of more developments to come, that it did not need “further theological advice”.
The first tranche of theological advice was therefore only published in two documents in February 2025 (GS Misc 1406 and GS Misc 1407) and there is a helpful 8-page summary booklet of these materials. The newly published material comes in the form of three articles: one on doctrine, one on liturgy, and one on clergy discipline. These are all substantial and rich theological discussions (all helpfully have an executive summary) meriting much more detailed analysis and reflection. The aim here is simply to highlight their most significant elements in relation to the bishops’ decisions (again a fuller analysis in the paper linked above).
Doctrine
“The Nature of Doctrine and The Living God” (GS Misc 1429, 47 pages) is marked by its locating the Church of England’s understanding of doctrine within the wider catholic theological tradition where “all share the view that doctrine is divinely revealed knowledge about God, which in this dispensation, where human sinfulness corrupts our reason, must be regulated by Holy Scripture” (para 15). Given the prominence of appeals to “development of doctrine” it is significant that the paper views as “a potentially unhelpful notion” even while offering a dynamic account of doctrine in dialogue with 9 theologians. Vitally important if there is to be any argument for changing marriage doctrine is the definition that
the church’s understanding of doctrine consists of that which the community has authorised as consistent with the Holy Scriptures or legitimately proved from it. Doctrine, one might say, is communally authorised knowledge about God warranted by the Holy Scriptures (para 55, see also para 146).
As yet the bishops have not attempted to argue for a new understanding of marriage as “consistent with the Holy Scriptures” and any such understanding would appear unlikely to receive communal authorisation. This paper is crucially important in relation to proposed changes in practice because it is clear that “doctrine once communally authorised plays a regulative role in the community” (para 126). The attempts to defend new liturgical or disciplinary practices as “pastoral” or “missional” therefore cannot ignore this fundamental doctrinal test.
Liturgy
“The Doctrine of Marriage and the Prayers of Love and Faith: Texts and Contexts” (GS Misc 1430, 34 pages) which also drew in members of the Liturgical Commission as well as FAOC for its work offers a most helpful account of liturgical theology and its implications. It sees the private/public distinction (largely ignored thus far) as much more significant than the regular/bespoke service distinction and also offers a major critique of the argument that was previously being strongly advanced that all that really matters in relation to passing a doctrinal test in relation to liturgy is the words spoken and these have already been commended so bespoke services should be acceptable.
With the obvious support of the liturgical canons (now supplemented by the doctrine paper’s emphasis on the regulative nature of doctrine), the paper acknowledges that “the central claim is that the issue at stake is not merely pastoral or aesthetic, but potentially doctrinal” (para 9), It recognises the potential problems with any public use of PLF and the risk that this could “blur the distinction between pastoral accompaniment and doctrinal endorsement” (para 40). The danger is recognised of PLF becoming “an instrument of theological partisanship” (para 43), amounting to “a de facto change of doctrine at the local level” (para 59), where “pastoral discretion becomes doctrinal pluralism, without the theological safeguards of collective discernment” (para 60) so that the crucial Anglican link between doctrine and worship “may be placed in jeopardy” (para 64).
In the light of these and other cautions it becomes clear how difficult it was going to be for the bishops to justify simply commending the prayers for use in bespoke services. However, it also raises the question as to whether the original commendation was not a significant mis-step and the question whether any individual cleric can really claim (given the new collective caution of the bishops in relation to commendation) the legal and theological skills to frame a service for same-sex couples which manages to avoid the various doctrinal challenges. Rather than giving support to introducing bespoke services as soon as possible, the paper calls for further deep theological reflection:
The central theological question, then, is whether the Church can enact a rite which is received as celebratory and offered publicly in its worship, while still maintaining that its doctrine of marriage and sexual ethics remains unchanged. The evidence of symbolic action, audience reception, and liturgical theology suggest there are clear and present challenges for this coherence that need prayerful, informed reflection in considering how the Church may want to proceed with the PLF (para 84)
Discipline
“The Exercise of Discipline and Clergy Exemplarity in the Church of England: The Case of Same-Sex Civil Marriages” (GS Misc 1431) is, at 54 pages, the longest of the papers but will be discussed most briefly here as I will return to it in a later post. Like the doctrine paper it represents a plea to consider the connection between doctrine and discipline (understood in a formative and reformative sense not simply a punitive sense). In addition to arguing for doctrine regulating discipline, it also sets out the importance of exemplarity (both individual and familial) in relation to the clergy. In the light of this framework it then theologically explores three possible pathways for permitting clergy in same-sex marriage.
The first option which maintains the strongest connection of doctrine and discipline is revision of the doctrine of marriage but this is only briefly discussed (paras 85-90) because it has been rejected thus far. At the other extreme, with “the greatest risk for discipline to depart from doctrine” (para 197) is discretionary episcopal relaxation of discipline which we have seen the lawyers also raised concerns about. The third via media between these two options, discussion of which takes up about half the paper (paras 91-188), is the path of “pastoral accommodation”. This likely would involve changes to Canon C4 analogous to the changes introduced in 1991 to permit ordination of those in a further marriage. The paper not only helpfully sets out theological arguments for and against the legitimacy of such a line of reasoning but identifies three key questions that need to be considered in relation to such a proposal.
It argues that if applying pastoral accommodation to clergy in civil same-sex marriage created an inconsistency:
- of a different kind than that on offer for further marriage, OR
- related to any other doctrine other than marriage such that it would be contrary to that doctrine or indicative of a departure from it in an essential matter, OR
- that permitted clergy to live in what was not a faithful witness or wholesome example
then, if even only one of these applies, “there is an impediment to supporting pastoral accommodation”.
Here again we can see why the bishops felt they could no longer proceed with a timetable for clergy in same-sex marriage:
- they do not want to change the doctrine of marriage,
- the option some were attracted to of relaxation of discipline has now had theological as well as legal concerns raised,
- the route of pastoral accommodation is highly contested and to proceed requires breaking through a new “triple lock” of significant questions to which little or no serious thought has yet been given.
Summary
In the light of these outlines of each paper, we can now return to the four questions asked earlier and answer them in relation to the theological advice:
- What has changed in this theological advice? The main changes from the limited past advice are the abandonment of the previously crucial language of “pastoral provision in a time of uncertainty” and of any appeal to a sharp distinction between civil marriage and holy matrimony, the restoration of the language of “pastoral accommodation”, and the strong emphasis on the need to relate liturgy to doctrine in relation to more than words and to relate discipline to doctrine.
- Is it advising on matters where previously the bishops did not seek such advice? Yes, the major difference is the bishops have now been given a significant amount of rich theological advice that they had previously sought to avoid being given. The content of that is, to many of us, not surprising but the bishops had previously sought not to think theologically but politically and pastorally, downplaying the significance of doctrine.
- Is it explicitly or implicitly revising and/or retracting past advice? Yes, in the crucial areas noted above. In addition it weakens the previously prominent episcopal appeals to “development of doctrine” and undermines some of the claims that have been made suggesting the PLF as currently commended do not really have doctrinal significance.
- Is it just making even clearer what past advice always said, explicitly or implicitly, but the bishops previously sought to downplay or ignore or workaround? Although some points are clearer than before most of the theological advice is quite simply drawing attention to central questions that have been seemingly ignored until now in the bishops’ discernment and articulation of their plans.
Conclusion: A Missing Piece of the Jigsaw?
It would therefore appear that in relation to theological and legal advice what has happened is that the bishops have had to pay greater attention to the significance of legal advice they had previously received and they have finally been made aware that there are serious theological questions that they have tried to avoid considering particularly as regards the importance of doctrine in relation to liturgy and discipline..
They also appear to be finally recognising and acknowledging that in the last three years they have not been sufficiently transparent or followed proper process.
But that is not all and may even not be the most important explanation for what has happened. Although the press release spoke of the decisions based on legal and theological advice having the consequence that there was no need for “pastoral provision” that may be reversing the real dynamic (putting the advice cart before the episcopacy horse).
It is clear, not least from statements from the Bishops of Manchester and Chelmsford, that there was a widespread episcopal horror at the prospect of having formally to introduce even relatively minor reconfigurations of episcopacy (such as Delegated Episcopal Ministry). These had, however, been recognised as necessary proportional responses (or concessions or the required quid pro quo) if there were to be any further changes in relation to liturgy or discipline.
For some, perhaps many, bishops therefore the key driver explaining their sudden move into reverse gear may have been as much a determination to preserve current structures of episcopacy (perhaps what is alluded to in the Archbishop’s reference to “unity”?) as the legal and theological advice they received. It may well therefore be that the legal and theological advisors who have done such an excellent job in these new papers now need to turn their attention to these questions surrounding ecclesiology and episcopacy if we are to find a way out of the new impasse in which we now find ourselves as a church.
Revd Dr Andrew Goddard is Assistant Minister, St James the Less, Pimlico, (where his wife Lis Goddard is vicar) Tutor in Christian Ethics, Westminster Theological Centre (WTC) and Tutor in Ethics at Ridley Hall, Cambridge. He is a member of the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC) and was a member of the Co-Ordinating Group of LLF and the 2023 subgroup looking at Pastoral Guidance.
Buy me a Coffee
There is a great summary from Tim Wyatt in his weekly substack:
‘Nothing from either the lawyers or FAOC here is particularly novel or groundbreaking. All of this detailed information could have been provided to the House of Bishops back in 2022 when they were pondering what decision to make about LLF. Yet they foolishly decided not to ask for this advice and just ploughed ahead. It’s both bizarre and infuriating we have had to wait until almost three years into this project before we ascertain if said project is legally or theologically viable.
It is therefore entirely on the bishops that the PLF saga has run into the ground. From day one they were offering things to the liberals that they just didn’t have the legal or theological licence to offer. They were writing cheques the church’s doctrine and law would not and could not cash. Having read FAOC’s conclusions, frankly even what they have managed to get over the line – gay blessings in regular church services – seems increasingly dubious.
The conservative anger about an abuse of process and constitutional norms seems pretty much justified now. The theologians — and FAOC is a pretty evenly balanced group and not dominated by conservative thinkers — have said it. The obviously theologically neutral legal team have said it. The bishops should not have tried to get the standalone PLF through on commendation and nor should they have tried to just let gay vicars marry on the nod. Neither would be legal. Neither would be theologically coherent.
So we’ve landed up where we probably always were going to, but only after fruitlessly antagonising both the liberal and conservative wings. For the last time for those at the back: unless and until the liberals get a two-thirds majority in the synod to change the church’s doctrine on marriage, nothing else is possible. This was obvious to me, a theological ignoramus whose knowledge of ecclesiastical law would barely fit on a postcard, over two years ago. It surely therefore should have been obvious to the House of Bishops.’
Blessings for same sex couples in regular church services have already been approved by many PCCs, including ours
Then they are probably acting illegally.
No they are not and you know it. Prayers within services as approved by our PCCs for same sex couples were the key element of LLF approved by ALL 3 houses of Synod by majority vote and if you try and overturn even that be assured you would create civil war in the Church of England. You would of course lose as the PM and government and vast majority of MPs would also be on the side of the Bishops and over 50% of Synod who voted for LLF and prayers for same sex couples within services
Again, Simon, you don’t appear to have understood the process. The prayers were presented as commended by the House of Bishops.
The published advice now, in effect, says that the House was not actually entitled to do that. So Synod was presented with a false claim.
I do understand the process, the House of Bishops have upheld prayers within services for same sex couples as Synod voted by majority for when it voted for LLF.
The published advice certainly does not say they were not entitled to do that. All the bishops have said is that the legal advice requires standalone services to have a 2/3 majority of Synod. Simple majority was still valid to approve prayers within services on the legal advice
Maybe your PCC, and others who have similarly approved such “blessings”, will want to revisit their decision, Simon, in due course…
The Church of England has its own – somewhat tortuous – processes of government, for good reason. It now appears (having read the documents released this week, and Andrew Goddard’s helpful article) that the House of Bishops was mistaken in its belief that it could legitimately “commend” the PLF to clergy without properly navigating those processes.
Moreover, and even more importantly, the prayers very clearly contradict the Church of England’s doctrine of marriage, as revealed in Scripture.
The House of Bishops itself has been very divided on the PLF, we must remember, as has the House of Clergy and the House of Laity. PLF has rightly been described, potentially, as the Church of England’s equivalent to the “Brexit” debate, which divided families, communities and arguably the whole nation.
It seems to me as if Archbishop JW was in far too much a hurry to push through the PLF, and too impatient to wait for a higher level of consensus to be established across the Church of England as a whole before going live with the “cut and paste prayers”, as I think of them.
Absolutely not, we stand firmly behind the prayers for same sex couples our PCC approved fully in line with the prayers for same sex couples within services the Bishops and Synod by majority vote approved when they voted for LLF and to allow Parishes up and down the land to offer.
The Bishops were of course fully entitled to offer prayers for same sex couples within services. Even the Pope and Vatican now allow Roman Catholic priests to offer non liturgical services for same sex couples within services. So no the prayers on no definition contradict the doctrine of marriage, they aren’t even stand alone services, let alone same sex marriages within C of E churches.
Finally, of course, let me remind you even only on a 52% to 48% vote Brexit was finally delivered even if it took a Conservative majority in Parliament in 2019 to do so. However prayers for same sex marriage are not only backed by the Conservatives but Labour, LD, Green and SNP MPs, even Farage has said he and Reform will not reverse same sex marriage and civil unions even if he opposed the passage of same sex marriage a decade ago.
PLF of course is a compromise, it is basically the C of E equivalent of staying in the single market rather than the more full fat Brexit we have now, out of the EU, the single market and customs union. It is still not full same sex marriage in C of E churches or bespoke services for same sex couples which the bishops affirmed needed a 2/3 majority
Simon, your analogy does not hold.
The relationship between Britain and Europe could have taken one of at least four different forms.
As these papers make clear, there is no such middle ground: either prayer are indicative of a departure from doctrine, or they are not.
And they point out that the prayers as commended probably are, and so will likely need to be rethought.
It does. The middle ground position on Brexit would have been to stay in the Single Market and Customs Union, the government of the time did neither.
The middle ground position of LLF is viable though, neither same sex marriages or even bespoke services for same sex couples in C of E churches but still allowing prayers for same sex couples within services.
Prayers are therefore no departure from doctrine, anymore than the prayers for same sex couples the Pope allows RC priests to perform, as they are still not same sex marriages in churches .
The papers do not make clear they are a departure from doctrine. To state they are and reject even that compromise would almost certainly see intervention from this Labour government to impose same sex marriage on the C of E whether it liked it or not, with just an opt out for churches that disagreed. Otherwise the established Church of England would offer even less recognition to same sex couples than the Roman Catholic church in the UK now does and that would be simply unacceptable to PM Starmer and the Labour majority in Parliament
Indeed not even having prayers for same sex couples within services would be the equivalent of a No Deal Brexit, not even the basic EU trade deal the UK got and effectively reverse LLF completely
Or at least the Pope and Vatican certainly now allow non liturgical prayers to be said for same sex couples by Roman Catholic priests
“nothing else is possible”
Nonsense. Plenty else is possible and necessary. Along the way of PLF we dispensed with Issues in Human Sexuality. That leaves a hole to fill. We now, as a Church, seemingly have nothing to say about homosexuality. That might suit those who pine for the days of the ex-gay movement telling parents to disown their children, and that God will change sexuality if you just pray hard enough. I suggest it is both possible and necessary to stop that effort before it gets started, by returning to the questions Issues tried to grapple with and agreeing a new teaching. I suspect we’ll get more convergence than most would expect.
Since the Bishop of London was at the forefront, promoting this process from the start, should she now consider her position as Bp of London and Archbishop designate?
No.
Such a clear and insightful summary, Andrew.
You are right in that more questions need to be asked. These should primarily be addressed to those Bishops who have not upheld their responsibility to fully address doctrinal and legal issues. If deliberate in their failings, their future in the role requires repentance and re-evaluation. If these failings derive from negligence or ignorance, one must question their basic suitability for the role in the first place.
A secondary question might relate as to how Bishops will respond to those clergy who, in declaring their intention to go against these decisions, proceed with stand-alone services and clergy same-sex marriage anyway.
A line may be drawn under many aspects of LLF, but the issue is not going away any time soon.
‘They have finally been made aware that there are serious theological questions that they have tried to avoid considering particularly as regards the importance of doctrine … They also appear to be finally recognising and acknowledging that in the last three years they have not been sufficiently transparent or followed proper process.’
One doesn’t want to sound judgemental, but surely this is not Christian behaviour – let alone Christian leadership behaviour. A person who has been reborn from above seeks to live his life in accordance with Scripture and in a way pleasing to the Holy Spirit, who guards his conscience. A bishop is supposed to be someone who is theologically literate, living in the light of the Word and transparent in his motivations and intentions. If the quoted paragraph is a fair summary, the majority are not.
Are the majority of bishops in the C of E Christian at all?
But if they ‘tried to avoid’ the questions, that was intentional, meaning that they already were ‘aware’. So it does not make sense to say ‘they have been finally made aware’. They have finally been called to account, more like.
But as bishops they should have been acting honestly in the first place. That does not mean that it may not have been under pressure or coercion that they were corporately not acting honestly.
What now needs to be done is to get hold of the legal advice given to the bishops during the course of LLF; identify the episcopal ringleaders in trying to promote it; draw up a petition to have them sacked and invite everybody in any position in the Church of England to sign it, starting at the top of the hierarchy and running downwards; present that petition to the Supreme Governor of the Church of England.
He won’t act on it but the point would have been made, and sacking is what would happen in any half-competent business.
Why would there be sackings given standalone services were never approved on anything other than an experimental basis? They were also approved on an experimental basis by a majority of synod, much like a majority of shareholders approving the board’s proposals at the AGM
Standalone services have not been approved.
They were approved by majority vote on an experimental basis only as I said by majority in all 3 houses of Synod.
The majority in favour was 13 in the House of Bishops, 7 in the House of Clergy and 4 in the House of Laity
https://www.churchofengland.org/media/press-releases/synod-backs-trial-special-services-asking-gods-blessing-same-sex-couples#:~:text=The%20Church%20of%20England%20has%20agreed%20to,of%20seeking%20permanent%20authorization%20is%20under%20way
https://www.premierchristianity.com/news-analysis/explained-cofe-approves-gay-blessings-for-a-three-year-trial/17913.article
Simon, again, you are reading carelessly, and you are out of date. The motion said: ‘and ask the House to consider whether some standalone services for same-sex couples could be made available for use, possibly on a trial basis’.
The decision was to ‘ask the House whether’; the House thought about it, and said no. So if you have acted on the basis of this motion, you are acting illegally and need to change your decision.
And the phrase ‘time of uncertainty’ in this motion has been rejected and rescinded by the new papers.
The House voted to consider allowing standalone services by majority on a trial basis in each House as I said. However the majority was not 2/3 and so the bishops decided a 2/3 majority was required for standalone services. There has been no further vote by the Synod on it
The Church of England isn’t a business, Simon… General Synod’s members are not its shareholders, the House of Bishops isn’t its Board, and the Archbishop of Canterbury isn’t its CEO… but the way in which things have been run over the last decade or so has given the opposite impression, so it is little wonder that there is so much confusion around the place.
No but Synod does have a big say in how its run the Archbishops and Bishops must consider, as shareholders have a say in how big companies are run the CEO, chair and board must consider and MPs have a say in how the country is run the PM and Cabinet must consider
I can’t follow this debate. Is the idea that a fossilized majority decision remains permanent no matter what has subsequently been said?
The obfuscation is deliberate. Prayers within services were voted for by a majority in all three Houses. They have not been withdrawn. They have not been declared illegal. The latest legal advice (from one lawyer) touches on stand alone services and the licitness of clerical same-sex marriages. Many conservative Christians would like you to believe that the debate is over and that queer folk have been forced back into their closets. It isn’t and they haven’t.
Correct Penelope
They are. They just don’t always interpret scripture like you do and Baptists like you have no bishops anyway!
Please desist from calling me a ‘Baptist’. You don’t know that I am a Baptist, and since I am not, your statement is simply a lie. I was in fact baptised in the Church of England.
So I assume you aren’t an Anglican anymore then?
Simon, it is crazy to think this is a matter of scriptural ”interpretation”. Oughtn’t that to be the business of qualified bible scholars, who do not agree that the basic principle is up for grabs, however much there are (as ever) smaller scale interpretative issues with any text?
Yes. That’s why there’s a whole suite of LLF resources written by scholars.
There are protestant scholars who claim that Catholic scholars are wrong and vice-versa. So entire schools of scholars must be wrong (never mind which, for now). So being a scholar is no proof against error.
Of course one should laud scholarship in specific areas, such as knowledge of Hebrew and Greek. But by and large Paul knew what he was on about at the end of 1 Corinthians 1.
When it comes to scholarship, religious categories like ‘catholic’ and ‘protestant’ scarcely come into play. It is not as though the text of the Bible, nor its background, is any different.
Gatherings of scholars will not divide into catholic and protestant.
There is scarcely awareness of such affiliations.
Many would categorise themselves in a much more nuanced way anyway. After all, they are scholars.
What is so special about 16th century categories as opposed to any other century or as opposed to more essential categories?
Christopher,
You write that “Gatherings of scholars will not divide into catholic and protestant.” They probably won’t divide spontaneously, to be sure, but if you ask them their opinion on the canonical status of the Apocrypha or Mary’s perpetual virginity then you will find a clear division. Try it with protestant and Eastern Orthodox scholars (who haven’t had a liberalising Vatican 2) and you will an even sharper division, running back not 500 but 1000 years.
We should all shut up and leave it to the magisterium? It’s like the reformation never happened…
‘Doctrine once communally organised plays a regulative role in the community.’?
Lindbeck would be proud. The whole thing is reduced to self-reflexive circular sociology as though there were not merely not an awesome wider context but no wider context at all.
The train hasn’t hit the buffers yet. Once the last passenger is off it will go into a siding where it will be given new livery, coals from he’ll and waters from meribah. Then the engine will be turned around and out it will come .
Sorry. Could not resist commenting, the picture at top induced me.
I echo David Shipley’s comment, the immediate pressing concern is likely to be “what happens if this is defied?”
I also think it would be helpful, in light of this reassertion of the validity of the church’s established teaching, if more time and patience was given to ensuring that clergy understood and were uniform in what they were assenting to at their ordination. It seems, from comments here and elsewhere, that people are operating under distinct interpretations of what it means to teach and uphold the doctrine of the church, and what this permits them to teach/not teach.
You have a confessional standard for a reason, it needs to mean something and be binding, with consequences for breaches of it.
“You have a confessional standard for a reason”
The Church of England is not a confessional Church Mat.
No, but you have the 39 articles, the BCP and the ordinal.
It might not be a formal ‘Confession of faith’, but these things represent doctrinal standards to which clergy are bound, do they not? That is why I described them as ‘confessional standards’, as they are the things that define doctrine.
Perhaps I have chosen the wrong terminology, but I am certain you knew what I meant. 😉
Mat, yes they do, and Canon Law (Canon A5) makes that unambiguously clear.
Errrr no. Canon A5 does not say those things define the doctrine, let alone say so with unambiguous clarity. It says that the doctrine is grounded in the Holy Scriptures, and in such teachings of the ancient Fathers and Councils of the Church as they are agreeable to the said Scriptures.
That’s why, for example, you’re able to say that ordination of women is a-ok despite there being not a scintilla of support for that in the 39 articles, BCP, or ordinal.
Mat you need to read this. It is all quite clear
https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2022-06/PROCLAIMtextWEB.pdf
Written by the FAOC and the lawyers – the same people who have written the advice that is now being hailed as decisive.
Like many other mainline Protestant churches, the CofE does not have a *tight* confessional standard (contrast, e.g., confessional Lutheran and confessional Presbyterian churches), but this does not mean that it has no doctrine. It is a “professing” church, as the document to which you link (To Proclaim Afresh) also underlines. It could hardly “proclaim afresh” if it were otherwise.
Andrew, I welcome anyone to comment here, if they follow the comments guidelines.
I do not, though, welcome people commenting here, then insulting and slagging me off in other places. If you want to continue to contribute here, please delete the comment you have made elsewhere.
Ian if you delete the numerous comments on your blog, published by you, slagging off David Runcorn, then I will gladly do so. Though of course I am not the publisher of ANY comments about you.
I don’t ‘publish’ comments on my blog.
You do write comments here and elsewhere. And so you are responsible for them as author.
I will happily delete anything unfair I have written about David, and ask that your reciprocate the respect to me.
You are the publisher and you applauded those comments. And there were many very insulting and definitely slagging off.
You must know the difference between an author and a publisher. You don’t have to publish any comments. It is your choice
I am not interested in your silly word games
You will be welcome here again once you have deleted your defamatory comments about me on TA.
When certain men creep in and start using language as though they are preparing to sue and try to take your home from you- then do anything and everything to protect yourself from them!
Delete anything they object to and avoid them in future.
We are in days where people go to prison for a few hurty words. For real.
We are a fight between good and evil.
I came off ALL social media less than a week ago. Having any view is very dangerous now.
Probably best to both go and edit and remove anything remotely dodgy now and then let it be for a while.
ENDS.
You can only be prison for grossly offensive posts eg threatening violence against someone
You cannot give offense. It is only taken. It is subjective. People have been sent to prison for posts where they made no real or actual threat at all, nor incited a real threat.
Writing ‘do a terrible thing for all I care’ is not inciting or making a threat and yet LAWFARE means that no one is now safe from the LAW or prison if the corrupt powers decide to come after you.
But I was thinking more of private sue-ings for ridiculous home-losing amounts of money for hurty feelings. It is going on out there and very scary.
The Bishops have affirmed that bespoke services for same sex couples in C of E churches need a 2/3 majority of Synod in line with the Canons, as indeed would same sex couples. Fair enough, remarriage of divorcees in C of E churches and ordination of women and women bishops in the C of E required 2/3 of Synod to pass. The Bishop of Chelmsford is right there is no point creating alternative episcopal structures if stand alone services for same sex couples have not yet even achieved the 2/3 majority ordination of women achieved in Synod which then led to flying bishops and those new structures.
Some recognition of same sex couples did need to be given in the established church though given same sex marriage is now legal in the UK. So LLF effectively now allows prayers for same sex couples within services much like the Pope now allows non liturgical prayers for same sex couples to be given by Roman Catholic priests. Had not even that been approved by the Bishops and Synod then it is quite possible the Starmer government would have passed legislation through Parliament using the Labour majority to impose full same sex marriages in standalone services in the C of E as established church even if Synod lacked the 2/3 majority for them (with a concession of opt out for churches that disagreed, much like a private member’s bill by Labour MP Ben Bradshaw proposed).
Of course the Bishops have also confirmed that a simple majority only is needed for Synod to approve clergy being in same sex marriages. Rightly so as these would be civil only not in church
Those who believe in God had no doubts that God
would arise and His enemies would be scattered
When one abandons God and the veracity of His Word and
Mind men are then described as
“walking in the Imagination of their own hearts”
A simple word study of the Imaginations of men
will show the absurdity of their position when God Arises.
Seeing the folly of imaginations in Scriptures folk like Wm Butler
Blaize Pascal and Jonathan Edwards might be forgiven for
blistering polemics against any forms of imagination in the Christian Life.
However, Alexander Whyte makes the case for a sanctified
Imagination in the saints “Imagination in Prayer @ biblehub.
Felicitations to those who have contended for the faith
once delivered to the C of E who yet might encounter
those who will rebel overtly still.
The battle has and will be fought in the Heavenlies;
For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal [sectarian]
But are mighty through God to the pulling down of
Strongholds,
Casting down imaginations, and every high thing
that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God,
and bringing into captivity every thought
to the obedience of Christ. 2 COR. 10 : 3 – 5
Overcomers do so from a position of Rest.
When God scatters His enemies what frequently happens is that
His enemies begin to fight each other to their own detriment.
An example might be present day Israel; though surrounded by
militant Islamist nations; because of their internal divisions
and fighting between themselves they cannot unite against their common enemy.
Pray God that Synod wil not imagine a vain thing.
Fight the Good Fight of Faith
Shalom.
I don’t think anyone can accuse Netanyahu of not fighting his neighbours hard enough!
The key word here is ‘advice’. All legal advice is capable of different interpretations (rather like scripture, tradition, and doctrine). The Bishops and the other two Houses are quite free to challenge or disregard this advice in February.
Producing yet more turgid GS Mics simply shows how strangely in thrall the Church is to modern, neoliberal culture.
One man’s turgid conformity to neoliberalism is another man’s faithfulness to due process I guess. 😉
I think legal advice is interpreted, by it’s nature. Else it would be legal information. That’s a little pedantic perhaps, but I think the ‘advice=optional’ comparisons is a little misleading. Is it legally binding, no, they can dismiss it, but the exact point of commissioning/requesting such advice is to obey it. 🙂
Ooof, two emojis in a single comment. How cringe-inducingly “gen alpha”, my apologies.
Love emojis 🙂
I take your point but I don’t think the witterings of church reports and synod papers can be described as due process.
They imitate secular scientific reports. For respectability?
I think it almost certain that some churches will defy the legal advice. Their attitude then will be ‘ well what are you going to do about it’?
Judges 21:25 comes to mind..
Why is it that when I meet individual bishops they seem genuinely kind, honest, intelligent, wise, godly, prayerful etc but when they speak or act en bloc they give the appearance of being fools at best and knaves at worst? Alone and as pastors they shine; together and as politicians they suck.
Yet the House of Clergy and House of Laity also approved LLF by majority vote in Synod, not just the House of Bishops
Simon, LLF has been a process with different stages. So it does not make much sense to say ‘Synod voted for LLF’. The one thing they clearly voted for in February 2023 is that nothing should be indicative of a change of doctrine of marriage.
They also clearly voted for prayers for same sex couples within C of E church services
(1) First stage: They are under orders to be united, present a united front.
(2) Second stage: This necessarily involves them in a lot of lying.
(3) Having trained in righteousness, they hate doing this lying and are shackled by self loathing.
?
Under orders from whom?
Under pressure perhaps, but the middle Welby period contained huge pressure to toe a line which included unanimous House of Bishops votes, albeit once or twice the now Dean of Windsor pressed the ‘wrong’ button by mistake (or not, as the case may be) and albeit Bp Henderson sometimes clarified he had meant more or less the opposite of what he had said. I would be driven half mad by pressure to conform, given that it is often the same thing as pressure neither to think nor to be truthful.So maybe these poor bishops were too.
Besides which, the sequence I outlined left out the earlier stages: namely,we have a media which will taunt those who do not show unity, and those who are scared of this happening brief beforehand that unity has to be shown.
Where is the weight to be found? Opinion of PCD counts for naught as against specialist legal opinion. Why was that advice not made public, if the consensus of the Bishops was that it was only a matter of opinion. Why then did they misrepresent the substance of specialist legal advice and thereby mislead and influence Synod?
As an observer of this blog and a couple of other Anglican blogs, it seems that some key influencers, carrying some heft at Synod in the matter of legal advice were all the Archbishops, then and now.
Is there any hope for the CoE? Not if vows are not vows at ordination, and are but public misrepresentations.
That being so, why would anyone trust anyone ordained in the CoE?
Can trust be restored? So far there is no to little evidence that it can.
Discipline may be a beginning.
Because, Geoff, to bring up to date what Jesus said to the Pharisees in Matthew 23, they are church liberals. Like evangelicals they believe that the Bible is a narrative for Christians to live by, but unlike evangelicals they believe that this narrative is not true. Liberal theology is hypocritical, because liberals speak differently amongst themselves and when they speak in public. Amongst each other, liberals use language that questions countless events in the scriptures, including the miracles and even the virgin birth and Resurrection of Christ – anything supernatural. The liberal view is a form of secret knowledge for insiders, an anti-supernatural form of gnosticism. Knowingly to speak the Creed while using its words to mean one thing amongst other liberals but something else to the rest of the world is to be a liar. Doubtless Satan regards liberal theologians as ‘useful idiots’ (in a phrase commonly attributed to Lenin). Certainly they use the same expression that Satan did in Genesis 3:1 – “Did God really say…?” Liberal bishops and clergy take a salary from churches for providing oversight even as they sow doubt. They are parasites on the body of Christ, traitors, backstabbers of His Bride, without fear of God.
Hi Ian
Is this the sort of rabble rousing rhetoric* you want on your blog?
Just asking.
*Offensive and insulting.
Would you like Jesus cancelled for his comments to the Pharisees?
Personally I thought it sounded more like 2 Peter ….
Liberals speak differently amongst each other? How would you know? Tedious straw man arguments aren’t terribly impressive.
A) I don’t want anyone ‘cancelled’.
B) You’re not Jesus
C) I was hoping Ian might show some consistency in his disapproval of insults.
If even pagans can know right conduct in this matter, as Paul affirms in Romans 1, how much less excuse do liberal Christians have?
Liberalism is not Christian.
https://www.kevinhalloran.net/quote-summary-of-j-gresham-machen-christianity-and-liberalism/
A search would also bring up a short article by Roger Olson on Patheos, with a corroborating conclusion: Against Liberal Theology.
Ha ha! Snap!!
Jesus was somewhat liberal himself, he was rather more willing to forgive those who repented of their sins than the more reactionary Old Testament was for starters.
He wasn’t a pure laissez-faire liberal capitalist admittedly, he believed wealth should be created primarily to help others, not just for oneself
Jesus was (is) willing to forgive those who repented of their sins …not those who are so wicked that they create a liberal false Jesus and call sins ‘good’ and ‘holy’ when committed over and over with a smile.
‘Jesus was somewhat liberal himself, he was rather more willing to forgive those who repented of their sins than the more reactionary Old Testament was for starters.’
I just want to unpack this slightly.
The Old Testament was about The Law.
People who tried to keep the law would find they just couldn’t do it and would cry out to God to help them.
Jesus came to fulfil the law and answered that cry.
So hidden IN Christ the Law is fulfilled in us and we are safe.
Step outside of Christ and make a new half -Christianeze and half do what we want self-righteousness and we are OUTSIDE of Jesus and will be burned to a frazzle come that dreadful day of Judgement.
This isn’t a game.
God Almighty is terrifying.
Jesus Christ will return to Judge.
And woe to him who is found outside of Christ.
Get IN Christ.
And get your arms and legs tucked in safely!
If there is one thing you do in life, do this.
It is not hate that tells you this truth. It is real Love.
Sort it out some of you.
If you are not completely wicked and even if you are. Repent! Time is short and none of us are promised tomorrow.
You have removed God’s love entirely from your Gospel. What a wicked thing to do.
Simon,
There is no difference in theology between Old and New Testament. The only differences are that Redeemer Jesus has come in the flesh, and God is now in the business of running a church (an opt-in organisation) rather than a nation (an opt-out organisation), which has a rather different constitution as a result.
Do you remember this verse: Abraham believed, and it was credited to him as righteousness (Genesis 15:6)?
Liberal Christianity is not Christianity at all.
How does the Church defend the sheep from the wolves and goats?
It (The sheepdogs STAND UP and FIGHT)
Now, because you have been asleep for so long and so much keener on being thought ‘nice’, hoodwinked by certain evil men who crept in amongst you into wanting everyone to ‘flourish’ and ‘disagree well’ You have allowed Truth to be turned into a lie. You have called what is wicked as though it were good and you have allowed the evil-doers to promote each other and grow in volume.
Now you have a problem….the world will side with the evil-doers, the liberals, the false Christians, the goats, the tares, the lovers of sensuous pleasure, the perverse.
So.
What will you do to wrestle the church back from the grip of Satan’s minions?
How far will you go?
Are you prepared to lose everything? Because these people are happy to take everything you have.
How will you protect the sheep who are being told lies and half truths and a distorted gospel by wicked men who flout Church law then play the hard done by victim endlessly.
These evil ones are amongst you and you put up with it well enough.
Put on your full armour and rise up.
Can you not hear their belligerence?
They disregard God and have no fear of him.
They distort his words and treat him as a tame trinket
They prowl and pervert the truth and Christ is not in them.
Those destined for Hell are roaring around the leadership of the C of E.
What are you going to do about it?
Jude 4: For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.
Jude 12: These are spots in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves.
Jude 18: mockers in the last time who would walk according to their own ungodly lusts.
19 These are sensual persons, who cause divisions, not having the Spirit.
Rabble of Holy men- be roused! Stand up for Jesus Christ and fight! The gates of Hell will not prevail!
Glory to God!
Ian
Perhaps you might like to put smug vs. ungodly lusts, evil ones, Satan’s minions, wolves in your insult balance.
I couldn’t care less about Jeannie’s hysterical outbursts. But, you know, motes and beams.
Penny, left to my own devices I’m far more wicked than you could ever be.
I no longer have planks and motes.
All the better to see clearly to sound the alarm and warn those heading to a cliff edge.
Christ Jesus is returning as Judge.
Get on the ark!
So, I believe in Jesus’ teaching to prioritise loving God and loving neighbour over everything else. I believe that to find life you need to be prepared to lose your life in the cause of following Jesus. I believe he rose again from the dead and that one day before him every knee will bow. I am also a liberal Christian, so you would describe me as one of “Satan’s minions”??
As you ask, the fact that you are rejecting a gentle kick up the bum to stand up for Jesus Christ and Sound Doctrine and being personally defensive would suggest that probably …but hey- judge yourself honestly- I don’t know you! I’m just trying to make sure Jesus doesn’t say that to you when he returns.
Any true Christian KNOWS there is a dying world of lost souls out there and we need to be doing far more to snatch them out of the fire.
Allowing Liberalism to infect the Holy Church isn’t the way to achieve that.
Look at your own liberalism in the cold light of day, belief by belief and work out if you are fighting God or standing up for him.
One of the temptations with Liberalism is it’s walking in the flesh and not the Spirit. Because it is 2025 and people should be able to do what they like in their own bedrooms, who cares, grow up…I’m a civilised open minded person etc…
We set ourselves up as more loving and nicer than God Almighty himself, (which is cray cray)……or ‘did God really mean that…’ or times have changed…or its not loving to not include everyone equally etc etc
All this is modern thinking……but Satan is the one who sets himself up in opposition to God and if you are living by the above mindset then you are serving Satan and not God.
Quit trying to serve two masters.
There is nothing more loving than telling those in danger the truth of their predicament. If you are one of them then wake up and wake up now.
God invented love and kindness. You aren’t nicer than him nor will you ever be.
Yes, and the main thing in liberalism is the lack of appropriate awe.
There doesn’t appear to be any Good News in that: what Jesus has done, God in Trinity: salvation and sanctification.
It appears to be self salvation by self effort, by works.
Paying heed of Gresham, it appears to be an illustration of what he highlights, and concludes as a different religion This is so much missing that is core Christianity: sin, repentance, incarnation, the cross, resurrection, redemption.
Which Jesus? Just a good man, or deluded (CS Lewis) or who he said he was: God.
So which God is to be loved? The one of our own making, or the one of self revelation, in and through the canon of scripture?
Sorry Geoff…I’ve lost the thread of this…which post are you responding to here?
Jeannie,
It is difficult to follow the cascade of comments on my phone.
The comment is in response to Nigel Jones, self identification as his liberal core beliefs.
Gotcha, thanks
Nigel,
Tell me in what way you consider yourself a liberal Christian and tell me if you take a salary from the church to propagate your views and I shall give you, in all respect, my answer to that question.
They would and they do. But it seems that only some insults matter to the publisher of this blog.
Invariably this topic engenders more heat than light
When men “walk in the imagination of their own minds”
When they say “Let us cast off their bands /restrictions”
We need to chillax.
Isaiah 18:4
This is what the LORD says to me:
“I will remain quiet and will look on from my dwelling place, ……
. like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest.”
.” God sits calmly in the heavens, smiling
on their vain attempts Psalm 2:4
See Also -. 1:26; English Standard Version
He who sits in the heavens laughs;
the Lord holds them in derision.
Psalm 37:13; New American Standard Bible
The Lord laughs at him, For He sees that his day is coming.
Psalm 59:8. New Living Translation
But LORD, you laugh at them. You scoff
at all the hostile nations.
Let he who has ears to hear, hear
what the Spirit says to the Church(es)
For some alas,the last thing they will hear is God’s Laughter.
I have to be honest and admit that I did not get to the end of Andrew’s article. There is only so much I can take of legal this and theological that; canon this and canon that; acronym this and acronym that. What I wanted to see was how the episcopacy sought the mind of Christ. Where was Andrew’s account of the bishops going into prolonged prayer and fasting? Where is his reminder of the bishops asking all of us to pray for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon them? Where is his detailing of General Synod taking half an hour out to do that Ignatian thing of imagining Christ standing before them, and what he might be saying to them? I suspect Andrew has not included the above because none of it happened. Instead, I discern in his article what we have seen so often before: our bishops hitching up their robes and running down the street, desperately trying to catch up with an elite metropolitan bandwagon disappearing over the horizon.
Theologically and scripturally I tend to be against with the whole LLF thing. Emotionally, I feel massive compassion for gay couples who can’t marry. I sometimes imagine my wife and I in a world when 90% of the people are gay and where parts of scripture say that the love my wife and I have for each other is unnatural. So, I am massively torn on this issue. But, instead of wrestling with my conscience, I prefer to appeal to the Christ who turned Matthew the tax collector and Simon the Zealot into brothers for a higher cause.
It is clear but the whole LLF thing was half baked, as Andrew makes explicit. Our congregation watched all of the LLF videos and my overriding impression was that they were party political broadcasts by a party utterly unconvinced by its own policies.
I cannot claim to have divined the mind of Christ on this issue, but I do wish more of us spent more time in prayer and less time shooting down those who disagree with us — something I see with great sadness in many posts on this website, including some relating to this article.
Thank you, David, for your genuine pastoral words.
Thanks for this wise perspective and corrective to so much that is written about the LLF saga. ‘Less time shooting down those we disagree with’ – very good advice. To which I would add, a recognition on all sides, that however deep, convinced and theological our commitments we all may (just may) need to amend our view at some point in the future. None of us knows what the future may hold for the church. To deny that possibility would be a very strange position to adopt but at times the impression by different sides is given that no position except our own has any credibility and that disagreement is totally unacceptable.
So no side but your own Tim?
Nothing else is objective, absolute, except the subjective. There is no need for objective truth that transcends time yet ‘inhabits’ time, from age to age, time to time; invariable from place to place.
We are called to stand. Where? In whom?
And yet, no armour is required in a spiritual battle, where false peace, peace, is declared from a seat on the fence- bench.
The bench of Bishops with their own vested interests have been convicted by the rules of natural justice as applied in England and Wales, rules that are beyond matters of indifference
Christopher, If there were no sides/factions/ tribes or whatever term we wish to use, then the current intemperate and unhelpful labels such as orthodox, progressive, ConEvo, liberal, etc would not be so prevalent. I was only making a very obvious point, that all of us may (only may, not will) find that we want to change our mind. It’s perfectly possible to be clear and committed in our view on a given topic but able to acknowledge that our view may be mistaken. I would be amazed if any of us didn’t have the experience of changing our mind on a topic we were previously certain about, including very significant ones.
Indeed. Over a twenty-year period I held almost every possible position on the issue of same-sex blessings/marriage, but at the start (when I was a standard conservative evangelical), I would never have believed I could change my mind on the subject.
God, however, has been very patient with me, and I’m very grateful that he has yet more light and truth to break forth from his holy word.
Tim Chesterton:
I’m sure you have changed your mind over twenty years about homosexuality (maybe also about the licitness of Christians serving in the military, on which you seem to take a Mennonite view). But the question you must have faced is: did you change your mind because you came to a better intellectual understanding of the issues (like the non-specialist finally starting to get the hang of quantum mechanics or calculus) or because it is a personal family issue for you? Separating the personal from the principle is an extraordinarily difficult task for the best of us, especially when there are children involved.
I had a liberal catholic clerical colleague whose daughter was in a same-sex partnership and raised children with her, and this obviously coloured his outlook.
Renewing the mind by the “washing of the word” is an imperative that is pertain, not by cultural osmosis of the mind. In the world, not of it.
Why have you changed your mind, Tim?
What are the main factors and influences.
Has God changed his mind? How has he communicated that change, to you?
He hasn’t communicated that universally, has he?
You described yourself as evangelical, what did that comprise?
TIm, you misunderstand my point – pretty much 100%.
I know that people often act tribal and factional and ideological. That is, of couse, what proves that those particular people are not yet worth listening to. So we listen instead to those who are scholarly, evidence based, and anti-ideological, and not to the others.
You get my point now?
James, Geoff.
My apologies, the comment system here gives no way for me to reply directly to your comments (beyond a certain level of indentation, there is no more ‘reply’ button).
Regarding the story of my change of heart, I’ve told it in some detail at the Inclusive Evangelicals website here: https://www.inclusiveevangelicals.com/post/from-rejection-to-affirmation-my-personal-journey I don’t think there’s any need for me to add to that.
James, my current position on military service for Christians is in line with the majority opinion of the first two or three Christian centuries. A good overview of this can be found at https://anabaptistfaith.org/early-church-fathers-on-war-violence-and-pacifism/. But I don’t expect to convince anyone here of that position and won’t comment further on it.
”Sides”?
If there are ”sides” that is tribal, unintelligent, and probably ideological.
Whereas anyone who can think will have a developed, nuanced and detailed position.
But it looks like you, Tim, are prioritising the former over the latter. Exactly the wrong way round, by definition.
Of course there are sides in this ‘issue’. Of course there are tribes and ideologies. Otherwise there would never have been disputes over ‘issues’ such as the ordination of women. And some of the discourse here is strikingly unintelligent.
The sad thing is that you seem utterly unaware of your own tribe and of your own deeply held ideology.
Of course not.
Tribes are binary and polar. Evidence very rarely is.
It is not that you show inability to (a) demonstrate that ideology is always at work, (b) understand that there will be higher and lower degrees of it, (c) understand that people will have greater and lesser abilities to counteract it and adjust for it, (d) understand that some people want nothing to do with it
…but that you show *repeated* ability to digest these points, and therefore we listen to those who have reached the stage of being able to digest them.
After all of which, what you said was unsupported assertion anyway – see (a).
Christopher
Your ideology is clear with every stroke of the keys. This has been pointed out many times. By others as well.
I have always said that I would be horrified if my faith is the same in five years’ time as it is now. Pilgrimage is a constant joy because God is bouncing up and down with excitement to show each of us what is over the next hill. Whatever that may be is for Him to reveal, not for us to work out using our puny reason.
But there is a difference between understanding better what we already believe, and adopting a whole new paradigm. The Scriptures are full of admonitions to hold fast what we have received from Christ’s apostles – not to sit loose and be indeterminate, showing the mark of the last person to sit on us. Or in scriptural terms, “that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes” (Ephesians 4.14).
As regards PLF, the bishops achieved the perversely brillant outcome of offending everyone: implying gay marriage is godly and worthy of blessing offends the 50% of us who are conservative about scripture and doctrine; refusing to conduct these apparently godly marriages offends the 50% of us who ask why on earth not.
Somewhere in JW’s memorabilia will be an effusive letter from Screwtape commending him for his achievement on this matter.
No, he actually reached the majority position. Hence all 3 houses of Synod voted for LLF and prayers for same sex couples within services.
Conservative evangelicals and conservative Anglo Catholics would have blocked same sex marriages in C of E churches. Liberal Catholics and open evangelicals would not have accepted no form of recognition at all for same sex couples in C of E churches.
A majority in synod is not a majority amongst the faithful. I find Conservatives and Liberals I know to be against PLF, albeit for the vastly different reasons I set out above.
It is a majority of the faithful in the C of E, who elect the Synod representatives. Hardline Conservatives and hardline Liberals may object to PLF but they also object to each other’s positions of no recognition for same sex couples at all or full same sex marriage in churches. Hence the moderate majority of Synod voted for PLF
Whatever the issue may be, there is no such thing as a democratic vote which either reveals the truth or can be said to define the truth; at best, democracy gives a snapshot of the opinion distribution of those who voted at one precise point in time. But in reality then there can be no certainty that the way individuals vote accurately represents their own genuine opinion – unknown psychological pressures and perverse human logic may very possibly be involved! And of course there’s the issue of how accurately those who vote have been picked to represent the wider body of people on whose behalf the decision is being made…
As far as Christians are concerned, even the briefest moment of reflection on that reality must tell us that a democratic vote is about as unreliable a way of determining the mind of God on an issue as is possible to imagine. More serious still is the enormity of any group of human beings assuming any right whatsoever to determine the mind of God.
The whole LLF thing was not about the necessary decision-making which concerns the practical human issues of organising a nationwide church; it concerned a radical change in doctrine on a first order issue of God’s creative intention for the boundary within which human beings should behave. Thus it directly concerned where the truth did or did not lie. That demanded at very least an in-depth consultation of the whole of scripture, backed up with what science tells us about human biology, and what our long accumulated human experience tells us about how human beings naturally flourish through the bonding of men and women and the nurture of children in the family units which consequently arise.
Indeed the C of E position now almost lines up with the Roman Catholic position. The Pope and Vatican have now authorised very similar non liturgical prayers for same sex couples to be done by RC priests
All to often it is forgotten that our God is Lord of Lords’
Yes in our creeds we mouth the platitude but in reality
we do not honour him.
We forget that He has raised us up to be seated with Christ where He waits untill His enemies are made his footstool.
John realized this on the isle of Patmos where he was for the “kingdom and patience of Christ”.
“”A son honors his father, and a servant his master. But if I am a father, where is My honor? And if I am a master, where is your fear of Me?” says the LORD of Hosts to you priests who despise My name. “But you ask, ‘How have we despised Your name?
Just because you parrot “Lord, Lord”and do not honour Him
you forfeit His knowledge of you.
John Newton in his masterful sermon “King of Kings and Lord of Lords”@ biblehub.com. details several instances in Scripture
detailing God scattering of those who ” walk in the imaginations of their own hearts”.
It is a great comforting sermon to the saints who honour His Name and a stark warning to those who ” forget God”.
PSALM 50 V 22 Shalom.
A distinction between liberals and conservatives is drawn quite a lot in this discussion (though the term ‘conservative’ is mostly eschewed by the non-liberals). One suggested definition of ‘liberal’ is that they ‘use language that questions countless supernatural events in the scriptures’.
When it comes to the supernatural, the two most significant events in the Bible, and history itself, are the Creation – creation in six days as per Genesis 1 and Christ’s resurrection. These are the foundations of the gospel. Destroy these and everything collapses, as every Darwinist, Marxist etc knows. See Matt 19:4, John 1:2, Acts 17:24, Rom 1:19f, II Pet 3:4f, Rev 4:11 if this is not self-evident.
But while nearly everyone who has commented believes in the Resurrection (despite the ‘liberal’ label), almost no one among the non-liberals believes in the Creation. With regard to the most foundational of Christian doctrines, the ‘conservatives’ are liberals.
Non-liberals justify their departure from Genesis on the grounds that Genesis must be accommodated to what naturalistic/atheistic scientists assert happened: scientists are a higher and more creditworthy authority than Scripture. But that is essentially a liberal position. Liberals justify SSM and ecclesiastic blessings of SS relationships in the same way as non-liberals attempt to get round ‘created’, ‘in the beginning’ and ‘six days’ – i.e. by arguing that it is all a matter of ‘interpretation’ in the light of what we know now.
‘The impression by different sides is given that no position except our own has any credibility and that disagreement is totally unacceptable.’ Here then is a possible route towards more harmony: why not agree that liberals and conservatives are essentially of the same mind, that conservatives are only less absolute in their rejection of the supernatural because they are less consistent?
“Non-liberals justify their departure from Genesis … it is all a matter of ‘interpretation’ in the light of what we know now.”
Thanks for this Steven, an important point and I’ve felt the same for some time. The charge of inconsistency (or even hypocrisy) is not unfairly levelled at ‘conservatives’ because of this, and I am convinced that many of our problems (in the western church at least) stem from a non-historical treatment of Genesis. From my experience the default position of even some ‘conservative’ churches (though not often stated) is that of theistic evolution, which is sheer syncretism. This is a position which is in flat contradiction to Matthew 19:4 (and Mark 10:6) as you note, it accepts death before sin and therefore undermines the gospel.
Wonderfully, Darwin’s influence appears to be waning even among evolutionary biologists (see here https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsfs.2017.0015). This Royal Society meeting has not received the attention it deserves and was welcomed by both the Intelligent Design and Creationist communities alike, with similarities to what both have been saying for decades. Now is an excellent time for the western church to reevaluate its understanding of Genesis, given developments in recent years.
And of course, we mustn’t forget that Darwin was crystal clear in his underlying aim:
“I have lately read Morley’s Life of Voltaire & he insists strongly that direct attacks on Christianity (even when written with the wonderful force & vigour of Voltaire) produce little permanent effect: real good seems only to follow from slow & silent side attacks.”
https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-9105.xml
Thanks. I was at the Royal Society you mention.
Today I have been reading how according to the latest genetic analyses, human beings differ from chimpanzees not by 1-2% (as was first claimed back in 2005) but by at least 12.5%. This was communicated in a wonderful summary in German (the latest issue of Studium Integrale, though I did also check out the primary source, Yoo et al 2025) (and Casey Luskin has also written several secondary articles).
And on the astronomy front the Big Bang scenario is also in crisis.
So for a Christian to go along with Darwinian evolution on earth and Big Bang cosmology in the heavens is not only to choose a position that makes no sense biblically, but to choose scientific paradigms that are crumbling before our eyes – the worst of both worlds, intellectually.
The way to understand the geological record correctly is as per the link under my name. In that field ICR, AiG et al. do not have the answers.
The commonality is a rejection of the Goodness of God. It is common to nomianism and anti-nomianism.
Also common is the anti-supernatural rejection of the incarnation, without which there is no Good News in the supernatural Triune God of Christianity. It is the opposite of a closed material world system on which much religion is predicated, salvation for all by intellect and/or works in the goodness of all self-serving-worship of humanity.
Where there is lack of commonality is the question of sin and its eternal and universal significance.
The letter to Romans sets out the substance and scope of the problem of sin and overcoming.
Romans 18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.
21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.
28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
I don’t quite see the point of cutting and pasting this long quote from Romans, given that we all have Bibles and can look it up for ourselves. Also, traditionalists seem to think that those of us who have changed our minds on the subject are blissfully unaware of passages like this. I can assure you, the truth is that we have read them, pondered them, researched the cultural background, read the commentaries and scholarly opinions, and prayed for the guidance of the Spirit of Jesus, in some cases over many years.
That, Tim, is an illustration of the substance of difference: sin, it’s significance, scope.
Do you recognise sin for what it is, greivous, and as set against the Holiness of God.
It is distinctly odd that the only avoidance of sin in this whole episode and process of LLF is the entrenched avoidance of its very mention.
Tim Chesterton:
I know you have pondered the issue of homosexuality over many years (as well as the licitness of Christians serving in the military, on which you now seem to take a Mennonite view), and you have done so for a large part in the context of the very liberal Canadian Anglican Church, with its women bishops, partnered gay clergy, the extreme syncretism of the former Bishop of New Westminster, and the departure of evangelicals like Jim Packer and St John Shaughnessy. Not an easy place to be an evangelical at all, especially in such a secular country like Canada.
But the question you must have faced is: did you change your mind because you came to a better intellectual understanding of the issues (like the non-specialist finally starting to get the hang of quantum mechanics or calculus) or because it is a personal family issue for you? Separating the personal from the principle is an extraordinarily difficult task for the best of us, especially when there are children involved.
I had a liberal catholic clerical colleague whose daughter was in a same-sex partnership and raised children with her, and this obviously coloured his outlook. Notice also how Dick Cheney’s thinking on same-sex marriage ‘evolved’ from conservative opposition to strongly supporting it. I don’t think Dick Cheney did much theological reflection in his life. Our Lord did warn us of the danger of loving family more than him (Matthew 10.37).
Geoff, sorry, I really don’t understand this comment, and i like to think I’m a reasonably intelligent person.
Sin – yes, I pray the daily office, and every day I confess my sins to God and ask God’s forgiveness and help to truly repent. I also appreciate the way our Canadian daily office words the confession: ‘We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbour as ourselves.’ This is the heart of sin, to fall short of the love of God and neighbour.
This is a reply to James Thompson’s post, but because of the strangeness of the comment thread, I can’t post it as a reply to him.
James, I appreciate your challenge about whether I changed my mind because of study or because of personal experience. I would say, both. I have definitely done a lot of reading and study, but also, a close family member came out as a lesbian, and I also made friends with a good number of gay and lesbian Christians.
I don’t apologise for this; after all, it has happened before in areas which today would be completely uncontroversial. For instance, I would venture to suggest that most of the eighteenth century Christians who changed their minds about the legitimacy of slavery did so, not because of disinterested Bible study, but because they heard the stories of actual slaves and their experiences. Before this time,, most Christians had read the scriptures as being supportive of slavery as long as you were nice to your slaves. But it wasn’t until people like Olaudah Equiano and Frederick Douglass shared their stories that Christians began to think again.
I am actually quite suspicious of disembodied doctrine. I don’t think I really come to believe a word of Jesus until I begin to try to practice it. Many times in the history of Christianity, it has been the school of hard knocks that has challenged people to rethink their theology. This doesn’t invalidate the rethinking; rather, it grounds it in lived reality.
…and yet no matter how much time and attention it is given, not ‘seeing the point’ remains a theme.
Romans 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
Including ‘gossips’, ‘slanderers’, the greedy, the merciless.
It’s a long list. And it’s even better in ‘the Message’:
‘Since they didn’t bother to acknowledge God, God quit bothering them and let them run loose. And then all hell broke loose: rampant evil, grabbing and grasping, vicious backstabbing. They made life hell on earth with their envy, wanton killing, bickering, and cheating. Look at them: mean-spirited, venomous, fork-tongued God-bashers. Bullies, swaggerers, insufferable windbags! They keep inventing new ways of wrecking lives. They ditch their parents when they get in the way. Stupid, slimy, cruel, cold-blooded. And it’s not as if they don’t know better. They know perfectly well they’re spitting in God’s face. And they don’t care—worse, they hand out prizes to those who do the worst things best!’
An excellent and very intelligent article by Peter Collier (retired Senior Circuit Judge and former Vicar-General of the Province of York) makes useful reading alongside Andrew’s article. I commend it for its clarity and precision:
https://viamedia.news/2025/11/08/where-does-the-house-of-bishops-currently-stand-on-the-use-of-prayers-of-love-and-faith-some-reflections/
The article commended by Susannah is indeed worth reading. Two take-home points:
1. There need be no substantial difference, as regards blessing the SS couple, between a standalone service and a regular service in which LLF prayers are incorporated. What the Faith and Order Commission was concerned about in its advice was the unspoken implication of doctrine that the mere act of holding a standalone service might convey.
Note the italics. As things stand, the couple can be blessed and prayed over (and exchange rings?) in a regular service and the congregants can be relied on not to read into these acts any departure from the Church’s teaching on marriage. But congregants cannot be so relied on if no other things take place in the service and the focus is solely on the couple.
Such legal niceties were precisely what Jesus castigated the Pharisees for (Matt 23:16-19). Why, then, should his reaction be any different now? “Woe to you, bishops and clergy! Outwardly you appear righteous, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.”
2. Any cleric who conducted a standalone service of blessing notwithstanding would theoretically be subject to disciplinary action under the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Measure 1963. If found guilty, he/she would be subject to a ‘monition’, i.e. something rather less than a rap on the knuckles. But for various reasons, including cost and the need for the Bishop to approve such action, matters would never proceed that far, so the legal instrument is a dead letter.
As far as I am aware (someone correct me if I’m wrong), this would also theoretically be the procedure if a cleric entered a SS ‘marriage’. Officially, it is not permitted, but in practice, the Church is not willing to take action, least of all the action of disqualifying the cleric.
What about the rules of natural justice that we’re ignored, when the Bishops determined not to publish legal advice and thereby misleading and influencing Synod in it’s decision making, voting. Nor any consideration of whether the Bishops were consequently in collective breach of any duty of care to Synod; whether they were acting ultra vires.
The article doesn’t address those matters.
Not that I’ve seen anywhere the legal advice, nor any theological reasoning for what is and isn’t a blessing, nor any consideration of what sin is and holiness.
What is clear is that the burden of the article is to point out that there will be no remedy, for all practical purposes for breach. Discipline will not happen.
The article reads more like Counsel’s opinion having been instructed by client clergy seeking to pursue, to carry out, services.
What is also interesting is whether the author would be declaring an interest if setting out a ratio decidendi in a role of judge in these matters; as in an interest in his theological beliefs and the way in which he would have voted on matters of ssm/b at Synod.
Let’s get real shall we.
The divide in this question is between those who believe God and obey him and those who have crept in to the C of E who believe their flesh and wants more and who want to be dominant in the C of E primarily, whilst either thinking God is a softie pickle who changes his mind to suit their desires or he is a nasty little homophobe.
They don’t accuse him of that of course- they reserve that for his followers (who, because they follow Christ, stand on what God says even if they personally aren’t particularly bothered one way or t’other)
Plenty here are saying now that The Church doesn’t have the appetite to discipline those clergy who are willing to defy Synod…yet they are, by the rumblings, gearing up to defy.
When I suggested on here a bit ago that a holy Christian may stumble upon a gay blessing element within a regular service- in front of the next generations of innocent children- and they may stand up and loudly protest the evil of it, another poster remarked that would be considered a crime.
Indeed that Christian could be arrested and sent to prison.
This is what you leaders have brought us to.
The wicked flaunt their wickedness and those who would turn tables of evil over are liable to be in prison.
Well it is very biblical at least.
Godly men and women and children are to stay silent and affirm, condone and support that which God abhors. At the cost of their freedom if they don’t go along with it.
Unbelievable.
But you are taking us there. You are responsible for this mess.
You may think I’m exaggerating. People are already being arrested for silently praying, for preaching the gospel in the market square, for refusing to affirm delusions.
I get with the death of the dishonest parody plan process that there was going to be a lot of unhappy bunnies…but the brazenness I’m detecting still is off the scale.
I hereby move that every sermon in every church should address the reality of SIN at some point, for the rest of the decade.
DISCIPLINE must be restored.
Mark these men – these blemishes.
Them and their facilitators.
They are destroying the Church of England from within.
Stop ‘disagreeing well’ with depraved minds and start fighting for the holiness of Christ’s Church.
YOU FEW who are actual followers of Christ- STOP appointing anyone other than holy followers of Christ to the key positions.
Get a grip. Fight.
Oh, for God’s sake Ian, you really believe Andrew needs to apologise and then you publish this unhinged drivel? This comment is simply atrocious. And it’s not the only one. You must know who Jeannie is, but, like Geoff, you allow her to be anonymous. And, in the safety of that anonymity she writes screeds of offensive and insulting claptrap.
She is not anonymous, as she gives her name. Do you want her date of birth and street address too? Would you give yours?
If you don’t like the way this blog is run you are free to leave and start your own.
There are lots of people called Jeannie and Geoff. Why does Ian allow them to remain anonymous?
I apologise. I see Jeannie’s full name above. This does not deny my other points.
Yes, Penelope, it’s uncomfortable when people blow their tops and dare to overturn the tables. We Christians are well aware of how that turned out for someone long ago. But have you considered that your apparent anger at what you consider to be drivel and offensive comes across as fear rather than confidence that you have anything helpful to say in response?
The urge to silence other people’s right to speak freely reveals the kind of totalitarian mindset which is born of ideological capture. Could that have something to do with why Jeannie’s lack of self censorship touches a raw nerve for you? By all means say exactly what you think – you usually do! I defend your right to do it. But please try to be chilled when others choose to exercise exactly the same freedom.
I do not wish to censor Jeannie’s views, even though I find them odious. I do strongly object to her nasty rhetoric (which is seriously unhinged). I also object to the hypocrisy which censors quite mild criticism and publishes this filth.
This blog isn’t a public utility, it’s the private property of Ian Paul. Often comments I make on ‘Thinking Anglicans’ don’t appear – not because they attack anyone (they never do) but because the editors don’t like my point of view. As an ordained and orthodox Anglican of many years (and four degrees so I think I qualify as a ‘thinking Anglican’) I don’t like that but it isn’t my blog so I accept it with a Gallic ”haussement des epaules.
The remedy is to begin your own blog which is very easy to do.
James, shall we make a list of all the very well qualified people who get blocked by ‘Thinking’ Anglicans for no better reason than that their comments are awkward to their ideology?
I know David Shepherd was banned. The reasons given for my own ban – about a decade ago, when I was the contributor most likely to quote actual numbers and studies, were pitiful: namely that I was writing nonsense. Yet no evidence was supplied. And secondly, anything that was nonsense could have been gainsaid by improved information. Was it? No. A strange silence descended at that point.
I wonder how many are aware of the degree of censorship of the well informed that takes place both there and at Surviving Church.
Reminds me of the BBC and other broadcasters, which more or less create and maintain an Overton Window, with scarcely any quotation of academic studies in sight, and certain things (e.g. abortion kills a human) which are obvious yet are in the category of things one is apparently not ”allowed” to say.
Christopher,
I suspect the list of the banned would be a long one, longer than the number of those who comment. Well, it’s Simon Sarmiento’s blog, so he has every right to control who enters, just as I control entry to my own home.
That said, ‘Thinking Anglicans’ isn’t really a blog, it’s basically a set of links to (mainly) liberal and LGBTQIA+ web pieces. One of the great merits of Psephizo is that it is very much a mouthpiece for original, creative thought and expression, as well as offering a very light hand in censorship. It is very far from exercising thought control and liberal dissenters have really no obstacles in saying their piece, if they avoid as hominems (and even then, plenty of them get through). The classical definition of ‘liberal’, methinks.
As for the BBC, it is well known that it is a lockstep, liberal organisation utterly suffused with DEI-ism and a deep antipathy to old-style Britishness and to Christianity (not Lord Reith’s BBC, in other words). The fact that it ran cover for years for Jimmy Saville and Huw Edwards and their criminal behaviour tells you all you need to know about its ‘values#. I wouldn’t care less about its obvious bias were it not for the fact that it is actually a public body financed by a public tax and it persecutes people who only want to watch ITV or Freeview. Its abolition cannot come too soon.
I have no interest in starting a blog. And, as I have observed, often, the reason I have commented here more than on TA is because of this blog’s ideological slant.
However, I do expect intellectual challenge and reasoned argument not screeds of scripture (I have several bibles, thank you) and screeds of abusive ranting. I also find it ironic that sarcasm and irony are punished by this blog’s publisher, yet unhinged diatribes go unchecked.
Penny,
You get plenty of intellectual challenge here and reasoned argument here, it’s just that you dismiss it with a ‘de haut en bas’ assumption of your intellectual superiority. With acidulousness.
Of course you don’t want to start your own blog, any more than I want to wash my own clothes or cook my own food (which I do). But telling a host how to run his own private blog is not a right that you or I have.
You clearly don’t like evangelicals and consider them (us) as your spiritual inferiors.
If you cannot be bothered doing the hard work of running a blog and would prefer to hear congenial ideas, ‘Thinking Anglicans’ is much more your cup of tea. Why don’t you try it for Advent?
James
I read TA and Via Media et al. And there used to be some engaging debates on this blog. David Shepherd and David Runcorn posted excellent comments. But many of those worth engaging with have deserted Psephizo, leaving room, it seems, for a lot of hysterical drivel. ‘S’ was a great offender. But his(?) place has been eagerly occupied by Geoff and Anthony and now Jeannie – who surpasses them all in unhinged rhetoric. Yes, I am often sarcastic and acerbic, partly because I am, but also because I hope to see some more grown up theology and ecclesiology here. I’m swiftly losing that hope.
Penelope,
As a purveyor of what you call hysterical drivel, my impression is simply that you don’t like challenge to your views and you resort to ad homs when people don’t back off.
Blog fights are not like boxing. You can deliver what you consider a knockout blow – and God might even take the view that you have won the argument – but it still doesn’t necessarily shut the other person up. If you can’t take that fact, the best thing to do is stick to blogs where everybody agrees with you in the first place.
Penny,
I disagree with Davif Runcorn not because of his manner – he is a peaceful and considerate person- but because I find his exegesis ultimately unconvincing and the systemic consequences of what he wants – same-sex ”marriage’ – would ultimately destroy Christianity. You probably think that ‘hysterical drivel’, but I am not going to debate that other than to say that Christian doctrine is an organic whole and corruption in anthropology leads, in time, to corruption in divinity. The bizarreness in Leicester a while back concerning a young lesbian on the General Synod and her romantic interest is a terrible instance of what I mean.
David Runcorn does care about people who feel isolated and troubled over their sexual feelings, and that is evidently a godly concern. I have said this on a number of times.
But being sarcastic and acerbic and resorting to ad hominem attacks on others is not a godly way, it is not spiritual. I remember that French saying:’This animal is dangerous. When attacked it defends itself,’
James, in terms of Simon Sarmiento controlling entry to Thinking Anglicans, there is no way that dishonesty can be justified. It is the ‘It’s my ball so I say who is out’ argument. But that is not an argument.
It deliberately creates a false impression of the range of what people are saying.
And the fact that the qualifications level of those who are banned clearly exceeds that of those who are not says it all.
Even more does it say it all on a site claimed to be ‘Thinking’. The irony is palpable. We call ourselves thinking; but if you think, you will be out on your ear.
I confronted SS about this in front of the assembled, when he led a meeting in the Houses of Parliament many years ago. He said, ‘Thank you’, and immediately changed the subject!
I was then subjected to a counselling session by a transgender person just in case my feelings had been hurt.
What on EARTH has it got to do with feelings? It has to do with truth and honesty.
Even when SS banned me, he (labouring under the same feelings-orientated system which I thought was restricted to children and adolescents) said ‘I have been considering a way of saying this that will not hurt your feelings: Basically, what you talk is sheer nonsense.’
I am still waiting for the details. And I am also still waiting for the refutation. More than 10 years on.
James
I don’t get much reasoned argument these days. I don’t for one moment think you’re hysterical, but is drawing attention to your occasional hubris ad hom? It might be. But, contra Ian’s rebuke about same, it seems a lot less inflammatory than some of the rhetoric now appearing. I would have a lot more respect for other views if they were simply and succinctly expressed, rather than screeds of scripture and skubala.
People can simultaneously understand how much emotion is due a subject (e.g., a great deal) while also being highly rational in
the content of what they say. The two are not opposites. To be cold or unemotional about things that matter is neither human nor orthodox. Often it is those who are most emotional who ‘get it’.
I do not find Jeannie’s comment unhinged or drivel. Or atrocious. Although I covet your thesaurus.
Your comment borders quite close to cancel culture. Not that this is unexpected.
Cancel culture is such a cheap jibe.
Anyway, I have no wish to censor Jeannie’s views – reprehensible though they may be.
I do wish she could curb her filthy language though.
I don’t think that declaring openly at such a service (the article states that it would be on ‘consecrated ground’) that it is a Not Marriage, consecrated, in the eyes of the CoE is hate, as that is unchanged doctrine, which is not hate crime.
Try arguing that point to the five police officers said couple would surely phone for- citing Fear, alarm and distress and Homophobia.
When you are tasered to the floor and your teeth knocked out, bundled into the locked cage at the back of a police car in front of the whole congregation and held in the custody block in a filthy and cold cell for 24 hours before Christian Concern can get you out on bail.
Then months of hellish stress and fear before it all goes away.
I was actually a police officers wife for twenty years, so I do know of what I write.
And to be sure….this dystopian nightmare is not far away unless you stand up and fight (with words).
So, your husband tasered innocent people, knocked their teeth out and left them in cold and filthy cells?
That wasn’t said. A misreading by someone who has no experience of the police and criminal justice system.
So what was “I was actually a police officers wife for twenty years, so I do know of what I write” about then? I read it as Jeannie saying that she knew police officers really did taser you, knock your teeth out, and bundle you into a cold and filthy cell for 24 hours for things like a breach of the peace. It’s deranged fearmongering, and disgraceful that you’re going along with it.
Having worked as a 24 hour duty solicitor for police station and court call outs, and separately as an agent for the CPS, I’m aware of the risks. Use of tazers was well after my time, as was the introduction of hate crime. Media reports of mob-handed police response and the affect on the accused in the whole process is something not to be recommended. Arrest and detention with the accompanying loss of liberty is no small matter, frequently prejudged by officers in attendance. The arrest and detention of street preachers have been odious examples. As has a high profile journalist, even a former police officer, who was robust enough to see the process through to the Court’s vindication, but not without high personal cost through the length of proceedings.
More grievious still, within the CoE is the case of Bernard Randall.
Whatevers else the service is it is NOT a marriage service, no matter what the parties may hope, think or feel.
The Theologians introduced the error that the Bible
is a book of stories and poetry and that we may interpret them as one might attempt to interpret dreams, hence they became dreamers. Jude 1:8 Likewise also these filthy dreamers defile the flesh, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities.
The results of which is that Christians were deluded int
fighting each other with their own “interpretations”.
There is little value in quoting scripture to those who
walk in the imaginations of their own hearts
because their “interpretations” are but devices of satan ,
“and we are not ignorant of his devices” 2 Cor 2:11
Job 5:12 He disappoints the devices of the crafty, so that
their hands cannot perform their enterprise.
Job 21:27 Behold, I know your thoughts, and the devices
which ye wrongfully imagine against me.
The results of such devices is that we end up in
interminable disputings for decades and God is forgotten.
Many have all kind of beliefs about God but it is a rare thing
to find those who actually Trust God.
The cry goes up “Lift up[open] [surrender] your gates that the King of Glory may come in] Who is this king of glory? [never heard of him?]
Ps 24:8 Who is this King of glory? The LORD strong and mighty,
the LORD mighty in battle.
Ps 24:10 Who is this King of glory? The LORD of hosts,
he is the King of glory. Selah.
Ex.15 v3 The Jah is a man of war; The Jehovah is His name.
68:4 Sing unto God, sing praises to his name: extol him that rideth upon the heavens by his name JAH, and rejoice before him.
Ps 60:12 Through God we shall do valiantly: for he it is that shall tread down our enemies.
Ps 91:13 Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.
Saints “be strong in the Lord and the power of His might”
for these dreamers ” know not the Scriptures nor the Power of God” [Jesus]
He is the Lion of Judah to his enemies and the Lamb of God to his friends.Shalom.
Adam Bell,
She is aware of what takes place. It does NOT say her husband took part. Public Order Offences cover a lot more than a breach of the peace.
I represented a woman as court duty solicitor. She had been arrested, held overnight for drunk and disorderly. She pleased not guilty and after a trial with 4 police officers all with the same note book version in opposition to only my client, she was found not guilty. She had been a bystander to a street brawl. Police vans had been called. She had pointed out to one officer that the person he was arresting had nothing to do with it. She was arrested for drunk and disorderly and put in a van along with all the others.
You speak with high dudgeon on matters you know nothing about, that is, the police and criminal justice system. Much more could be said with other examples of police misconduct.
Given the conduct of the Metropolitan Police that has been revealed recently and the shocking disclosures of the past two or three years (especially of their conduct toward women), I would be amazed to hear anyone speaking up for the police in this country.
I see them around our town – too many of them overweight, tattooed and strutting around – and I conclude that Blair and co. corrupted our police. The Tories did nothing to turn around the rot that Blair started – in fact it got worse with the Stasi-like behaviour we saw during the ‘pandemic’. Conservative-minded folk who were natural supporters of the police are now their fiercest critics – a real revolution since the 1980s when the left routinely attacked the police as Thatcher’s ‘goons’.
I know nothing about the police and criminal justice system? How interesting. Your arrogance and prejudices are getting the better of you.
Adam: I don’t know what you know (or don’t know) about the British police. But I do know you show an extraordinary inability to understand what someone has written – or perhaps you have pretended to misunderstand and used that to launch a personal attack?
Either way, it reflects poorly on your reading comprehension.
Since when did a woman being wrongfully arrested around a brawl on a Friday night equate to the police being expected to taser, beat up, and very seriously injure someone (i.e. knock their teeth out) who objected to a same-sex marriage service taking place on a Saturday afternoon? This is pretty basic stuff, even for someone who presumably retired ~30 years ago (i.e. before the 1998 Crime and Disorder Act).
Adam: Again you demonstrate either your inability to read with comprehension or (more likely) purposeful misreading for deflection, putting words in someone’s mouth to draw attrntion away from what she was saying. Very poor form. It was obvious that the examples given were illustrations of the egregious conduct that British police have demonstrated recently – to say nothing of the scandals in the Metropolitan Police, the politically directed campaign against Tommy Robinson, the arrest of street preachers, and the arrest and charging of a woman standing silently outside an abortion clinic. Wrongful arrest, imprisonment in a cell and cooking up a story among four cops is clear evidence of corruption.
Stop the deflection games and read correctly. If you want same-sex ‘marriage’, say so openly. Engage the issues.
What she was saying?
Just to remind you:
“When you are tasered to the floor and your teeth knocked out, bundled into the locked cage at the back of a police car in front of the whole congregation and held in the custody block in a filthy and cold cell for 24 hours”
Followed by:
“I was actually a police officers wife for twenty years, so I do know of what I write.”
If anyone’s deflecting (Met scandals, Tommy Robinson, abortion clinics etc.) I think it’s you.
Adsm: you repeat your wilful deflection. Any intelligent person could see that the writer was saying that as the wife of a police officer she knew the kind of violent and illegal things some police get up to – because, obviously, married couples talk to each other about the things that happen in their worlds of work. Did you not know that?
You deliberately distorted what Jeannie wrote and Penelope did the same, but you don’t have the grace to resile from it.
The examples I gave were entirely relevant because they all concern police corruption and political interference by the police in peaceful legal behaviour by people – which could certainly happen in public church services.
As I said, you want to see same-sex marriage in the Church of England, so say so openly and stop playing distorting what people write, it isn’t honest.
Deflection and distortion by, errr, repeating what Jeannie wrote? Is this the “intellectual challenge” you were going on about?
And where did you get the idea that protesting in a Church service is “peaceful legal behaviour”? There have been examples of people doing such protests, and it’s usually gotten them arrested under the 1860 Ecclesiastical Courts Jurisdiction Act.
The separate elements of incidents of actual past police political Lawfare where ‘the process is the punishment’ were brought together in my post as a prophetic warning for a future horror show where holy men and women could be subjected to being hauled off by police on the say so of LLF couples annoyed that their parody service in front of innocent children, and holy Christians in regular services may be challenged.
Future dystopia….not past tense.
I clearly wrote-
‘And to be sure….this dystopian nightmare is not far away unless you stand up and fight (with words).’
Adam wrote- And where did you get the idea that protesting in a Church service is “peaceful legal behaviour”? There have been examples of people doing such protests, and it’s usually gotten them arrested under the 1860 Ecclesiastical Courts Jurisdiction Act.
My prophetic warning has produced a clanging response from liberals, seemingly outraged at the very idea that any parishioner could actually open their mouths and speak during a service.
You do realise of course, that a church service is the gathering of the believers and is not a theatrical production which must be completely scripted and where the congregant are just paying bums on seats who must remain silent or face arrest?
A believer may, in an orderly fashion, gently but firmly rebuke or warn the body of Christ when they are committing a Sin. Indeed, staying silent would be a greater sin and you would get to share in the sin you stayed silent about.
So my warning that holy people may be arrested when standing up for Christ and the gospel is actually affirmed right here by Adam.
So, Synod and bishops- this is your doing. What exactly are you going to do, and do fast, to clean up the holy church and protect your congregations from those who would happily use Lawfare against the holy soldiers?
Jeannie,
Hauled off by the police? You actually wrote “tasered to the floor and your teeth knocked out”. Have some honesty please.
Be outraged that you can’t disrupt and protest in a Church service if you like. But that’s been against the law in this country for quite some time. The current legislation goes back to 1860, and that built on offences from the 1500s. It’s why Peter Tatchell would, rightly, get arrested when he disrupted services. And let’s be clear that your hypothetical protest (which I really doubt you would be capable of doing gently or in an orderly fashion) would be a lot less about standing up for Christ or the Gospel, and a lot more about stoking your own vanity and ego, and a real “theatrical production”.
There is a very obvious moment to protest in a wedding service: when the person conducting says words to the effect that ““If anyone has any reason why these two should not be joined in marriage, let them speak now”…
And your deliberate misreadings, to join in with PCD, as you accuse me of disgracefully going along with it. Pointing out matters of fact, from professional qualification and experience are deemed by you to be arrogance. And yet your comment based on ignorance are not!
But enough of this. Bye.
Geoff- try to ignore their nonsense. It is an attempt to cause deflection away from the thrust of what was being said.
Because it matters.
To return to a couple of previous posts…
Alan Kempson writes-
There is little value in quoting scripture to those who
walk in the imaginations of their own hearts
because their “interpretations” are but devices of Satan,
“and we are not ignorant of his devices” 2 Cor 2:11
Job 5:12 He disappoints the devices of the crafty, so that
their hands cannot perform their enterprise.
Job 21:27 Behold, I know your thoughts, and the devices
which ye wrongfully imagine against me.
The results of such devices is that we end up in
interminable disputings for decades and God is forgotten.’
and I posted…
Stop ‘disagreeing well’ with depraved minds and start fighting for the holiness of Christ’s Church.
YOU FEW who are actual followers of Christ- STOP appointing anyone other than holy followers of Christ to the key positions.
Can I put in a little comment which is not an interpersonal argument?
The image with this post is very curious. I presume that it is intended to illustrate “the LLF train hitting the buffers.” However, the “buffers” are strangely aligned: one is above a rail and the other to the side of the track. Their height is not correct to meet the buffers on the locomotive. But above all that: they are facing the wrong way!!!!
Is this fine example of how AI does not understand anything intended to illustrate the lack of understanding exhibited by, er, your choice of villain?
(For some nice pictures of buffers, a quick search found these: https://www.oleo.co.uk/products/buffer-stops/sliding-friction-buffer-stop)
Nor does it show LLF being shunted into a siding, off the main line tracks.
Or its a fair representation of the CofE organizational ability…
Post Ordination Train-ing.
Mine was like this. Cack-handed, sometimes led by non-Christians, and a waste of several evenings and weekend.
Compulsory ‘Safeguarding training’ is no better.
A further thought. It is doubtful that many a retired senior Circuit Judge would be phelgmatic if he were asked to make a judgment, decision, without written legal argumentation being presented to him before and advocated during the hearing. The case would likely be dismissed with less than equanimity.
Or, if in a trial the prosecution were withholding matters of evidence from the court, there would be a mis-trial overruled on appeal.
(For anyone who is a lawyer, it is acknowledged that there is a separation between matters of law and fact/evidence in a criminal trial.) However, in a Magistrates Court, lay Justices would be better made aware of the law, and advised by the legally qualified clerk, after both parties made representations, legal arguments.
Either way, in civil or criminal tribunals, there are rules in place to seek to effect natural justice and reliability of decision making.
From all of the articles by Andrew Goddard, that has not happened through LLF, in Synods, and that has not been addressed by the piece by the retired Senior Circuit Judge.
Should there be a re-hearing by Synod due to abuse of process…….. and lack of effective remedy for breach?
Worn out, exhausted with far too many wounded by the wayside, entrenched is self dug trenches.
Hear the Gospel call of Jesus, “Come to me… ‘