Category Archives: Church of England

Anglican Church considers “baptism lite”

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From here:

Church of England baptism services may be re-written to remove some references to Christianity.

The plan for a new ‘baptism lite’ service designed to make christenings more interesting to non-churchgoers will be considered next month by the Church’s parliament, the General Synod.

Supporters say the baptism service should be ‘expressed in culturally appropriate and accessible language’ that is readily understood by ‘non-theologically versed Britons’.
But traditionalist clergy said the idea amounted to ‘dumbing down’.

The new service would be used at 150,000 christenings each year. If the plan is accepted, it will be the third full re-write of the baptism ceremony in around 30 years – the version in the Church’s Book of Common Prayer went virtually unaltered for more than 400 years until 1980.

Complaints centre on three sections of the baptism service from the Church’s latest prayer book, Common Worship, authorised for use in 1997.

In one, parents, godparents or an adult being baptised are asked to ‘reject the devil and all rebellion against God’ and to renounce ‘the deceit and corruption of evil’. They are asked to ‘submit to Christ as Lord’.

Next I suppose there will be Salvation Lite, where we can:

Imagine there’s no Heaven
It’s easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

Oh, sorry, I forgot, the Church of England has already done that.

Anglicans heading for Rome have to vacate their buildings

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From here:

They have worshipped together for decades on the pews of their parish church. Generations of their loved ones have been baptised, married and buried there.

But now a Church of England congregation is being torn apart by the Pope’s offer to welcome disaffected Anglican traditionalists into the Catholic Church.

In a vote which has split the local community and left long-standing friends on opposite sides of a growing divide, 54 parishioners at St Barnabas Tunbridge Wells have indicated that they intended to become Catholics while 18 said they would remain in the established Church….

At St Barnabas the move towards Rome is being led by the vicar, Fr Ed Tomlinson. He believes that traditionalists who oppose the ordination of women have been badly let down by Church leaders.

But he has been told by the diocese of Rochester that if he and his followers leave the Church of England they will no longer be allowed to hold services, even on a shared basis, at St Barnabas – a nineteenth-century red-brick church where Siegfried Sassoon, the First World War poet, was baptised.

The firm stance has infuriated Fr Tomlinson, the vicar since 2006. “The whole thing stinks to high heaven,” he said.

“The Archdeacon made it abundantly clear that he does not want to entertain the notion of shared worship space and that he would resist my remaining here in any capacity.

“How lamentable that a solution based on unity exists but those with authority seem more intent on division.”

I have an eerie feeling of déjà vu. The Church of England’s hierarchy has demonstrated that, for all its prattle about ecumenism, what counts is kow-towing to the earthly power of the rapidly disintegrating ecclesiastical old boys’ – and women’s’ now – club of petty pointy-hatted eco-justice obsessed autocrats that pass for prelates in England’s green and pleasant land.

The Church of England selling the family jewels

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From here:

The Church of England has been secretly plotting the sale of one of its greatest treasures, a set of paintings worth an estimated £15 million, despite concerns the move will provoke a furore.

Leaked documents show senior officials are acutely aware there could be a backlash if the 12 paintings that have hung in the historic home of the Bishops of Durham for 250 years disappeared into the hands of a ‘billionaire from Russia’.

The confidential documents also reveal the Church Commissioners, the Church’s financial arm, have hired a London public relations firm for up to £37,000 to handle the predicted outcry over the sale.

The Commissioners, who include the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, faced such a storm when they last raised the prospect of selling the paintings ten years ago that they were forced to shelve the idea.

Art lovers, MPs and even the then Bishop of Durham, Tom Wright, expressed outrage that the collection of large canvases by the 17th Century Spanish master Francisco de Zurbaran could be moved from its home and even broken up or sold abroad.

No doubt the Church of England needs the cash to continue to promote its “mission” – whatever that is – or perhaps to continue to house its bishops in style – including, up until recently,  Tom Wright, whose attachment to some very expensive paintings doesn’t prevent him noting that in the world the rich get rich at the expense of the poor. One wonders how future bishops of Durham will be able to bring themselves to continue pontificating on the evils of poverty without the consolation of being surrounded by the aesthetic delights of the Spanish masters.

World War 2 in the Church of England

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From the BBC:

The Bishop of Lewes has been criticised for comparing the debate over the ordination of women bishops to the outbreak of World War II.

The Rt Rev Wallace Benn told a Church conference of Anglicans that he felt there was “real serious warfare just around the corner”.

The bishop said the Church of England into which he had been ordained was “not the same Church today”.

Supporters of women’s ordination said the bishop’s views were “demeaning”.

Speaking at the Reform conference of conservative Anglicans in Hoddesdon, Hertfordshire, the bishop said: “I’m about to use an analogy, and I use it quite deliberately and carefully.

“I feel very much increasingly that we’re in January of 1939.

“What we must not do is create a phoney war, but we need to be aware that there is real serious warfare just around the corner.”

Christina Rees, of Women and the Church (Watch), said the bishop’s views were “demeaning”.

Whatever one’s view of the legitimacy of women bishops, the above comment from Christina Rees is at least useful for the light it sheds on how liberals think: they don’t. Whether Ms. Rees finds opposition to lady bishops demeaning or not is beside the point. The truth is, there are two factions at war with each other in the worldwide Anglican Church. One holds to the orthodoxy of 2000 years of Christian understanding, the other wants to adopt innovations that – the orthodox would claim – make the Church less than Christian.

For all of Rowan Williams’ Hegalian finagling, the two factions can’t coexist within the same organisation: they are diametrically opposed to one another. Lady bishops are the tip of the iceberg; the Anglican Communion is already at war with itself and Christina Rees along, with her cohorts, should open her demeaned eyes and recognise that what Rev. Wallace said is true. It is going to get much worse.

A Church of England vicar, the Devil’s Interval and the “liberative theology of darkness”

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Just when you thought you’d heard everything from the CofE:

The Rev Rachel Mann claims that the much-maligned form of music [heavy metal] demonstrates the “liberative theology of darkness”, allowing its tattooed and pierced fans to be more “relaxed and fun” by acknowledging the worst in human nature.

She says that by contrast, churchgoers can appear too sincere and take themselves too seriously.

The priest admits that many will be “concerned” about metal lyrics praising Satan and mocking Christianity, but insists it is just a form of “play-acting”.

Miss Mann, priest-in-charge of St Nicholas’s, Burnage, writes in this week’s Church Times: “Since Black Sabbath effectively created it in 1969 by using the dissonant sound of the medieval ‘Devil’s chord’, heavy metal has been cast as dumb, crass, and on, occasions satanic; music hardly fit for intelligent debate, led alone theological reflection.

For more information on the “Devil’s Interval” take a look here. And here it is as a diminished 5th in a distinctly non-devilish snippet (the dissonance in the 2nd and 4th bars):

Sad to say, Rev Mann can’t seem to make the distinction between the silly demonization of a musical interval and integrating Satan, darkness, violence, destruction and death into one’s Christian life. I suppose it’s just the next step in inclusion:

Miss Mann says that heavy metal songs, characterized by distorted guitar sounds, “intense” beats and “muscular” vocals, are “unafraid to deal with death, violence and destruction”.

Its “predominantly male and white” fans “generally like tattoos and piercings” but are “graceful, welcoming and gentle”.

“The music’s willingness to deal with nihilistic and, on occasion, extremely unpleasant subjects seems to offer its fans a space to accept others in a way that shames many Christians.

“Metal’s refusal to repress the bleak and violent truths of human nature liberates its fans to be more relaxed and fun people”.

She goes on to claim that “metal has no fear of human darkness” and while some Christians are similarly unafraid, “many are yet to discover its potential as a place of integration”.

Women Bishops and the Church of England

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At its synod, the Church of England voted not to allow a provision to grant alternative male oversight to clergy and parishes who believe a woman should not serve as a bishop.

I have always been ambivalent about the legitimacy of women bishops: I think there are good arguments on both sides. That being said, it seems to me inconsistent to allow women priests but disallow women bishops. So, although I have reservations, I find myself not completely averse to either women priests or bishops.

But is this really about women being called by God to serve as priests and bishops? I don’t think so: if it were we wouldn’t need a campaign:

Christina Rees, of Women and the Church, which campaigns in favour of women bishops, said: “We have already tried our best to keep everyone in [the church] and to increase the level of communion between those who hold different views on women’s ministry.

None of the recent battles at the CofE synod focussed much on God’s calling: the big thing is the battle for Equality – a secular notion that is the antithesis of Christian service, sacrifice, dying to self, humility, placing others high than oneself and carrying one’s cross. Not that I am much good at any of those things either – but then I’m not mounting a campaign to further their antipode.

One thing that rules out all these ladies for bishop is – they are too eager to become one: that should disqualify anyone.

Other than ambition, lust for power and vanity, I can’t imagine why anyone would want to be a bishop. I know of very few bishops who are sufficiently unpretentious to be taken at all seriously: better to become a barmaid, they occasionally make sense.

Kingsley Amis, in his Advice to a Writer, restores proportion to the office of bishop and archbishop. Ladies, take note.  It even has a Canadian ending:

That time you heard the archbishop fart
You did quite right to say.
And should the ploughboy turn up gold
The news would make our day.
But when the ploughboy farts henceforth
Forget about it, eh?

Church of England synod votes against women bishops amendment

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The amendment would have allowed clergy who do not recognise the validity of women bishops to seek alternative oversight from a male bishop.

From the Church Times:

General Synod votes against Archbishops’ amendment
10/07/2010 17:15:00

The latest (5.15pm) from General Synod meeting in York: Synod has voted against the amendment proposed by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York that would have allowed for “co-ordinate jurisdiction” for those opposed to women bishops.

The vote was narrowly lost in the House of Clergy. The numbers:

Bishops: 25 for 15 against 0 abstain
Clergy: 85 for 90 against 5 abstain
Laity: 106 for 86 against 4 abstain

As a whole, more Synod members were in favour – 216 to 191.

For conservatives who can’t accept women bishops – and who would like the Church of England to remain intact – this is bad news.

For Rowan Williams this is bad news: it is another example of his failed leadership.

For those – like me – who think  liberal and conservative versions of Christianity are actually two different religions and that, because of this,  a split is inevitable, this could be good news: why delay the inevitable?

For the average non-Anglican it is not news at all.

Interestingly, it was the clergy who defeated this motion, not the laity (too much common sense?) or bishops (too politically astute?).

Carry on bishop

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I just wish I’d been there with my camera:Add an Image

Meetings of Church of England bishops are usually sedate – and that’s how they like it.

But last week’s proved decidedly more eventful, when they found themselves sharing their conference hotel with a hen party.

It was the cue for Carry On-style high farce which culminated in the Bishop of Winchester, the Rt Rev Michael Scott-Joynt, 67, gallantly offering his dressing gown to a naked girl, who was apparently locked out of her hotel room.

Other bishops soon became aware of drink-induced vomiting and screaming – and everyone was eventually forced to evacuate the hotel in the middle of the night when a reveller let off a fire alarm.

The Bishop of Wakefield, the Rt Rev Stephen Platten, 63, said: ‘The alarm seems to have been triggered when two young ladies, who were pickled, came back late at night.

‘One of the ladies was naked and one of the bishops had to give her his dressing gown to cover her nakedness. I think the other woman was trying to take her clothes off, too, but she was stopped in time.’

Nearly 50 bishops, among them the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, had gathered at the £130-a-night Park Inn Hotel in York for the meeting, where the main item was admitting women to the episcopate.

Rowan Williams denied foreknowledge of the ladies’ night out and shortly after tussling with Rev. Michael Scott-Joynt in an attempt to thwart his dressing gown manoeuvre, inspired by the moment, burst forth into this peroration: “Nothing will stop sex being tragic and comic.  It is above all the area of our lives where we can be rejected in our bodily entirety, where we can venture into the exposed spontaneity and find ourselves looking foolish or even repellent: so that the perception of ourselves we are offered is negating and damaging.  And it is also where the awful incongruity of our situation can break through as comedy, even farce.”

It’s just not like that in England

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Maybe it’s got something to do with the weather in the UK: it’s usually grey. In keeping with avoiding black and white, in July 2008, Tom Wright criticised GAFCON in this way:

It is to say, rather, that the GAFCON proposals are not only not needed in England but are positively harmful and indeed offensive. This was more or less what I said on the radio last Thursday, where I distinguished carefully between the American and English situations. AS FAR AS ENGLAND IS CONCERNED, it is damaging, arrogant and irrelevant for GAFCON leaders to say, as they are now doing, ‘choose you this day whom you will serve’, with the implication that there are now only two parties in the church, the orthodox and the liberals, and that to refuse to sign up to GAFCON is to decide for the liberals. Things are just not like that. Certainly not here in England.

The Church of England does seem to be moving full steam ahead in that direction, though:

A proposal to give the partners of gay priests some of the same rights that are awarded to priests’ spouses is likely to spark a new row over homosexuality.

Bishops and senior clergy will debate at next month’s General Synod whether the Church should provide same-sex couples with the same financial benefits as are awarded to married couples.

Traditionalists have expressed strong opposition to the move, which they claim would give official recognition to homosexual relationships.

They warn that affording equal treatment to heterosexual and homosexual couples would undermine the Church’s teaching on marriage.

At present, the Church bars clergy from being in active gay relationships, although it bowed to pressure to allow them to enter civil partnerships on the condition that they are celibate.

If this is sufficiently important to risk the stability – what’s left of it – of the Church of England by bringing a motion to General Synod, there must surely be a significant number of homosexual clergy in “celibate” – nudge, wink – relationships. If this motion is brought to GS, let alone if it passes, it will make a mockery of the CoE’s teaching on marriage.

So, Tom, is it time for  ‘choose you this day whom you will serve’, yet?