The motion to change the marriage canon to allow the marriage of same-sex couples has failed to pass. To pass, the vote had to have a 2/3 majority for laity, clergy and bishops. It was very close and, interestingly, in spite of the bishops declaring they would not have the necessary majority – they did; it was the clergy that prevented the motion passing.
The numbers were (66.7% needed in each category for it to pass):
Bishops Yes: 68.2%
Clergy Yes: 66.23%
Laity Yes: 72.2%
Many daft things are said at Anglican synods, but the example below from the lesser known morologist Bruce Bryant-Scott must surely set the standard for the stupidest piece of clerical amphigory to assault the General Synod of 2016.
Apparently some at synod have felt bullied and “unsafe” in their discussion groups. No information is at hand as to the nature of the bullying, so one is left to speculate. Have clergy brought guns to the synod? Knives? Are legs and arms being broken with baseball bats?
Or are tender souls shrivelling under the onslaught of vigorous disagreement. Poor dears. Whatever it is, the Primate is calling for holy manners – whatever they are.
From here:
In an impromptu speech and prayer that lasted nearly 20 minutes, Archbishop Fred Hiltz, primate of the Anglican Church of Canada, sternly reminded members of General Synod to show “holy manners” toward one another when discussing same-sex marriage in their neighbourhood groups.
“Some of the neighbourhood groups, as I understand it, have worked very well, and indeed are eager to get back together,” he said.
“For some there was more of a challenge, and for some, very difficult experiences. And it has come to my attention, as a pastor to this community and this church, that some of the behaviour that’s been exhibited has been less than the standard set out in these norms,” Hiltz said, referring to the eight guidelines members were instructed to follow to ensure a respectful level of debate in their groups.
“Some members of synod have experienced bullying. Some members of our synod are deeply hurt. Some of them are deeply offended. Some are feeling unsafe to continue to speak lest they be reprimanded, and so they’re feeling silenced,” Hiltz said.
“This kind of behaviour is not appropriate,” he said. “It’s unacceptable. And it ought not, and I pray will not, be tolerated.”
There is a “conscience clause” that will permit clergy to opt out of marrying same-sex couples if a change is made to the marriage canon. The question was asked at synod whether legal action could be taken against a cleric who refuses to marry a same-sex couple:
This was the wrong question to ask. What should have been asked was: “if I do get sued will the Anglican Church of Canada pay for my defence?” The law will not protect a clergyman – an expensive defence lawyer will. That will be the real test of the ACoC’s commitment to the conscience clause.
A plot is afoot to prepare delegates for something other than a yes or no decision for the marriage canon vote – resolution C003 – on Monday. The liberals fear that the vote will not go their way so machinations are underway to produce the desired result no matter what the outcome of the vote. Something less “binary”.
From here:
But he [Dean Iain Luke] added that given the deep divisions that exist within the Canadian Anglican church on matters of doctrine, the church should look at new ways of framing its decision-making process that do not inevitably lead to a binary of winners and losers.
It was a position Ambidge agreed with.
“I don’t think the Westminster parliamentary system is serving us well for things other than budgets,” he said. “For things that hit us not in the head or the heart but the soul, I think we need to learn a whole lot from the Indigenous people, because Westminster is really not helping us at all.”
Here is the fellow on the left after he slipped into something more comfortable – less binary, perhaps – for the Pride Parade:
Synod delegates have asked to discuss three seemingly innocuous questions:
After an introduction to the report of the commission on the marriage canon presented by some members of the commission, General Synod members, seated at roughly 30 tables, were asked to discuss three questions with the others at their tables: What is your overall impression of the report? What does marriage mean to you? Has your understanding of marriage changed in your lifetime?
Whether same-sex activity is right or wrong is not being discussed. That is because the ACoC has already decreed that same-sex activity can be holy. Once you have gone that far, marriage is a small next step; conservative Anglicans have been fighting a rearguard action ever since and, short of a miracle – a commodity in short supply in the ACoC – the liberal juggernaut will roll on until it gets its way.
Since General Synod 12 years ago already affirmed the sanctity of adult, committed, same-sex relationships, Jennings said, “we did not see it as our job to reopen the debate as to whether homosexuality is fundamentally sinful or whatever—that is no longer the teaching of our church. I realize that for some of you, this might seem unsatisfactory, but it was not the question before us.”
Amidst the predictable sycophancy from Hiltz’s employees, the youth delegate from the Diocese of Caledonia – one of the few dioceses to have a theologically conservative bishop – hits the nail on the head. The address was tendentious.
Rather comically, there is a comment under the article that claims the bias is not only acceptable but required because, under canon law, the primate is supposed to speak and write prophetically to the Anglican Church of Canada. It must be pure coincidence that this is the first time ever that a “prophecy” has been lifted wholesale from contemporary secular values.
Read all the reactions here:
Asher Worley, youth delegate, diocese of Caledonia
For me, basically, he clearly had an agenda, and in my view, the chairperson—the chairman of a meeting like this—simply needs to be more neutral, so I felt that he was being inappropriate in that way. He had his opinion, and it wasn’t veiled. I guess that it wasn’t veiled is a good thing, but that he had an opinion in the first place, and that he expressed it, was, I believe, inappropriate.What he said was not unexpected, but it wasn’t—let’s put it this way: I don’t agree. I’m trying to think of a way to put this so that I’m not being rude or discourteous. I was looking for a more neutral, this is what we’re doing, but we have to still be in God’s Word, and we have to be searching the Scriptures, because as a church, our main objective is to preach God’s Word—so it was just not what I was looking for in my primate.
Unsurprisingly, changes to the marriage canon occupy a significant portion of the address.
Also unsurprising is that there is a clear undercurrent that Hiltz favours the change. Hiltz would have us think that the important thing is not so much whether same-sex activity aligns with how God expects us to behave as revealed in the Bible, but whether the two sides can hold together and disagree with charity. Truth must be subservient to a satisfactory outcome of ecclesiastical transactional analysis: the disagreement must be good disagreement, then we will all be OK together as diversity prayers waft heavenward in clouds of smudging smoke. No-one will leave and clergy pensions will be secure.
Needless to say, that is all nonsense: both sides can’t be right and, since this time the issue is marriage itself not just blessings, there will be less “core doctrine” wiggle room. The disagreement will be vigorous, divisive and probably bitter. Perhaps that is “good disagreement” in that it would at least be honest..
The whole address can be found here:
With you, I am aware that for many throughout the Church, the issue of this Synod is the proposed amendment of the Marriage Canon to make provision for the solemnizing of same-sex marriages in our church. This matter is before us as a result of deliberations on Resolution C003 at General Synod 2013, passed in our accustomed way of voting as bishops and as clergy and laity voting together; and then by request of each of the Orders voting separately – bishops, clergy, and laity. This resolution directed the Council of General Synod (COGS) to bring forward the necessary amendments to the Marriage Canon. As you will hear in some depth this evening, COGS appointed a Commission on the Marriage Canon to address the request. The commission honoured in full the amendments to the original Resolution C003, including broad consultation across our church, with the Anglican Communion and within ecumenical circles in the Church Catholic.
The commission produced a report entitled, “This Holy Estate” which included substantial reflection on the subject of Covenantal Love in a marriage relationship and an invitation to consider some models for understanding same sex marriage. The Report was presented at the September 2015 meeting of the Council of General Synod and commended for study throughout the Church. At the special meeting of the House of Bishops in February, I did a cross-country check as to how the Church was engaging the report diocese by diocese. It appeared that the level of engagement had been nowhere near what had been hoped. I regret that and to be honest it has left me wondering what that says about our Church.
I am grateful that over the course of the next couple of days, members of Synod will have opportunity in Neighbourhood Groups to talk about the report.
I want to make an appeal to Synod that in these conversations and then in debate, we be especially and gently mindful of all those whose lives and loves and longings we are discussing – all those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, and questioning. They are members of our families and extended families; they are our neighbours and our friends. They are members of our parishes. They are our clergy. They bear on their brow the same cross all the rest of us do. They pray with us. They hear the Word of God with us. They break bread with us. They are sent like the rest of us to live by that ancient call, that great commission, “You are my witnesses”.
I hope we will all enter into these conversations in the spirit in which they have been designed. I trust they will draw us together in a good way, preparing us for the consideration of the Resolution on Monday, July 11. I take this opportunity on behalf of Synod to thank our Chancellor for the time and care he gave in preparing a memo for all members of Synod with respect to “Issues in Dealing with Resolution A051”. Drawing on the Declaration of Principles in the Handbook of the General Synod and the Rules of Order and Procedure with which we carry out our work, the Chancellor helps us understand all that can happen to a resolution once it is before the Synod. The memo speaks not only to how the Synod handles the resolution, but also to things we need to bear in mind should the resolution pass or not. The Chancellor will speak to his memo at the outset of our legislative session on Monday. I am convinced as I am sure many of you are that it will be enormously helpful with respect to our need for clarity in order and procedure.
The companion absolutely necessary to clarity in this matter before Synod is charity, charity one toward another. I recognize that much is at stake in our deliberations, including how we understand the authority of the word of God, the nature of tradition and the defining of doctrine. How we understand what constitutes responsible pastoral care of LGBTQ persons. What is at stake for some is our Church’s commitment to dignity, inclusion and fair treatment of LGBTQ persons in our midst, inclusion meaning full and equal access to all ministrations of the Church including the solemnizing of their marriages.
For some, an issue at stake is our capacity to remain in communion with one another in the face of deeply held differences of conviction over this matter. “How big is our Church?” was a question posed to me in recent days. It was quickly followed by two more. “How committed are we to making room for one another? Can there be in the spirit of pastoral generosity a place for us all?”
For some an issue at stake is the catholicity of the Church and the impact of decisions we make on our relationships with other churches within the Anglican Communion and with churches with whom we are in ongoing or emerging dialogue.
For some what remains at stake is a continued wrestling with the conclusion of the 2005 St. Michael Report that “the blessing of same sex unions is a matter of doctrine” (para 42), but “not a matter of what is often referred to as core doctrine in the sense of being creedal, it is a matter of doctrine that does not hinder or impair our common affirmations of the three historic creeds” (para 42). The commission concluded also that such blessings are not “a communion breaking issue”. For some what is at stake is their continued wrestling with the significant dilemma named in the St. Michael Report and within which the Church is deeply immersed (nationally and internationally). The dilemma is articulated in the following questions;
Is it theologically and doctrinally responsible for one member church of the Communion to approve a course of action which it has reason to believe may be destructive of the unity of the Communion?
Is it theologically and doctrinally responsible to accept unity as the value which transcends all others, and therefore for a member church of the Communion to refrain from making a decision when it believes it has an urgent gospel mandate to proceed?
In our deliberations about this matter which is clearly divisive, I hope we can embrace the principle of what the Archbishop of Canterbury calls “good disagreement”—that is, disagreement in which we will not dismiss, despise, or demonize the other, but rather turn to one another with a commitment to speak graciously, listen intently and learn of the perspective from which another thinks. While we acknowledge the strain in our relationships, let us not get to a point where any of us says to another “I have no need of you” (1 Corinthians 12:21). On the contrary, let us never forget our call “to make every effort, to maintain the unity of the Spirit to the bonds of peace”. (Ephesians 4:3)
My appeal to the members of this Synod is that we exercise holy manners, conducting ourselves in such a way that reflects that ancient call, that great commission “You are my witnesses”.
For Hiltz, whether the church should marry or not marry same-sex couples all comes down to inclusion. Not, I hasten to add, the inclusion in the church of the just the person but also the inclusion of what the person does. In Hitz’s mind Christianity must affirm, accept, condone and, naturally, include not only the person – his essence – but the expression of his essence, how, in the vain little pantomime of his three score and ten years he acts out his essential nature. At least, when it comes to sex; in particular, homoerotic sex.
That is because the Anglican Church of Canada has largely abandoned the idea that, because of the Fall, man is inherently sinful and all creation is subject to the bondage of corruption under the weight of that sin. Thus, we are led to the inescapable conclusion that the urges of the church’s homosexual clergy are there because God put them there.
A lusty young heterosexual could make use of the same principle to explain his unfettered promiscuity, too, of course. But, then, there aren’t many lusty young heterosexual clergy in the ACoC.
From here:
This is the body that through its history has also wrestled with numerous issues within the Church and in the world at large over which we have often found ourselves in deep disagreement. Many of the issues have centred around inclusion—the place of women in the councils of the Church, the place of women as priests and bishops, the place of young people and their voice and vote, the place of children at the Eucharistic table, the place of those married and divorced and wanting to marry again, the place of religious communities whose life transcends diocesan boundaries, the place of Indigenous Peoples from status as observers, to guests, to partners, to members in Synod, and the place of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered and questioning people within the Church and their equality of access to all the ministrations of the Church including the solemnizing of their marriages.
And that which I was afraid of is come unto me. Job 3:25.
What do Anglican Church of Canada clergy fear most? Losing their stipend.
General Synod 2016 has begun and a vote to change the marriage canon is scheduled for Monday. In the unlikely event it passes, the few remaining conservatives will have yet more incentive to leave. If it fails to pass, many dioceses are determined to proceed with same-sex marriages without the approval of synod. For the national church this would be ideal, since it accomplishes what their leaders want while allowing them to protest that no official approval has been granted. Either result signals further division resulting in more people leaving and less revenue for clergy salaries; a tragedy of biblical proportions. That which the bishops fear most is about to come upon them.
Hence, hot off the press from the synod ostrich farm, we have the quote of the day:
