Justin Welby’s recipe for holding the Anglican Communion together was elucidated in his address to synod:
Already I can hear the arguments being pushed back at me, about compromise, about the wishy-washiness of reconciliation, to quote something I read recently. But this sort of love, and the reconciliation between differing groups that it demands and implies, is not comfortable and soft and wishy-washy. Facilitated conversations may be a clumsy phrase, but it has at its heart a search for good disagreement.
[…..]
We have received a report with disagreement in it on sexuality, through the group led by Sir Joseph Pilling. There is great fear among some, here and round the world, that that will lead to the betrayal of our traditions, to the denial of the authority of scripture, to apostasy, not to use too strong a word. And there is also a great fear that our decisions will lead us to the rejection of LGBT people, to irrelevance in a changing society, to behaviour that many see akin to racism. Both those fears are alive and well in this room today.
We have to find a way forward that is one of holiness and obedience to the call of God and enables us to fulfil our purposes. This cannot be done through fear. How we go forward matters deeply, as does where we arrive.
In attempting to resolve the disagreements in his church about sexuality, Rowan Williams tried to find a middle ground between the opposing views. He used Indaba groups to do this. He didn’t succeed partly because there was no middle ground to find and partly because, even if it had been found, anyone with any common sense knew that once the mythical entity was spotted, it would immediately start to drift leftward.
Justin Welby has astutely noticed that Rowan’s efforts were a dismal failure so, rather than look for a half-way point between opposing views, he is seeking, through the odious tedium euphemistically known as “facilitated conversations”, to convince polar opposites to coexist within one organisation – he calls it “good disagreement”. What will prevent the whole thing flying apart is “love” – it’s all you need, after all.
At heart, I am a simple minded computer technician and, through bitter experience, I have been forced to reach the conclusion that if I write a program in which false and true propositions are compelled to coexist, disaster will ensue. Programmers are renowned for being sentimentally attached to their creations but, no matter how much love I pour into it, a routine whose rules of logic include (1 ∨ 0 = 0) ∧ (1 ∨ 0 = 1) = 1 is destined for spectacular failure.
Now, you may say, that’s all very well for computers; they are by nature binary, almost Kierkegaardian in their Either/Or obsessiveness. When it comes to sexuality and the Church one must expect diverse opinions, differing interpretations, loving disagreement. Complete nonsense. If the church can’t come up with a unified view on a subject which it has been pondering for 2000 years, something whose boundaries are clearly prescribed by the book it claims to follow, something – morality – in which it supposedly specialises, then it is time for the clergy to call it day, dissolve their institutional church and find more useful employment.
Schism. That’s all that’s needed. It happens all the time. According to wiki there are over 40,000 Christian denominations. One more can’t hurt.
What about truth,do we turn a blind eye to truth. Since Jesus is the truth we should be very concerned about truth. Where there is error and lies especially in the main tenets of the faith we should as Paul was to deal with them. Sometimes that means separation.
Hey Tony,
Where are you from?
Diocese of New Westminster,BC
The matter of homosexual conduct is simply an issue of that old nature that we all have. Each of us has different sin tendencies that are a result of various issues including our personality, our upbringing, etc. Tragically the Anglican Communion seems to be falling into line with secular thinking and suggesting one can “bless” sinful activity whatever that activity entails. The Communion needs to return to the true Gospel and if that means parting from the secular governments then that is what is needed. Homosexuality is NOT an identity but clearly sinful according to THE WORD and no truly Christian church can believe otherwise.
We do not HATE homosexuals as the gay and lesbian community proclaim but we do HATE the sin and pray for their repentance just as earnestly as we pray for repentance of our sin.
I tend to let people define themselves. I’m thinking it’s a little weird to get in someone’s face and thell them, in all caps, that what they see as their identity is NOT an identity.
But we all deal with other people’s identity in our own way, of course.
Vincent
Your comments seem rather strange and inconsistent. You “tend to let people define themseves”, but then you criticise Mr Wirrell for “… get[ting] in someone’s face” (only your opinion) and using capital letters to emphasise their point, a practice you then replicate.
When you use the word “identity” do you actually refer to their sexual inclinations or do you have a wider definition?
“But we all deal with other people’s identity in our own way, of course.” Well that is your opinion, it’s not mine. I try to hear what God has said in the Bible about human identity, which is quite a lot really. Then it is incumbent upon me to respond to other people as our Lord Jesus Christ would.
We are not here to condemn people. That it is the function of the Law. The Law condemns all people for their disobedience in order that they might turn to God in their helplessness and find salvation in Jesus Christ.
I was replicating ironically. 😀
I don’t see the Law condemning people on this blog. I see people using the Law, as they interpret it, to be even more smug than I can be. Which takes some doing.