THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND
AND THE CULTURE WAR
The General Synod of the Church of England meets this week, February 6-9. The only issue on the agenda anyone is talking about is that of same-sex blessings in church.
The General Synod in 2021.
On January 18, 2023, bishops of the C of E issued a report resulting from a six-year study of the issue of the interface of same-sex marriage and the church. They said that marriage remains a union of a man and a woman but that same-sex couples can have "blessings" in the church. This seemed to be a typical Anglican perfectly reasonable "middle way" between polar opposite positions on the issue.
The Synod is set to take up voting on the bishop's report. The General Synod is made up of three houses, Bishops, Clergy, and Laity, with 483 members in all. It is the central governing body of the Church of England which remains the established church in England. Everyone will be eagerly awaiting the voting in each house. (Same-sex marriages have been legal in England since 2014.)
The official agenda of the Synod lists the bishops' report as the last item on Wednesday. Find the report on Living in Love and Faith HERE. The Synod sessions are being livestreamed on Youtube.
While the bishops' report appears superficially as a reasonable compromise without taking sides, in reality it is not. Let me explain.
The central part of the issue is whether homosexual relations are inherently sinful. Most traditional denominations, e.g. the Roman Catholic Church, condemn such as sinful. In the Church of England, the far edges on both sides, catholic and evangelical, agree that homosexual acts are in and of themselves sinful. If homosexual arrangements are inherently sinful, then they must not be blessed in church since this would be the Body of Christ condoning sin. Such a thing should be unthinkable. This is now, and has been all along, the explicit anti position.
On the contrary, those who support same-sex marriage in the church say that homosexual relations are not inherently sinful, but are morally neutral. This was the position of the pro-homosexual-rights coalition in the American church in the late 1980's and early 1990's when this issue arose there. The Episcopal Church did not openly debate the question of sin and homosexuality (just as the Church of England will not likely debate the issue now). The specific point of contention in the Episcopal Church was whether open and partnered homosexuals should be allowed ordination. It resolved the issue by de facto settlement. General Convention removed sexual orientation as an impediment to ordination and a church court ruled that no one could be denied Holy Orders on the basis of sexual orientation. By 1996, the American Episcopal Church had in effect settled the issue with the unspoken recognition of the moral neutrality of homosexuality. The pro faction won the fight. By the late 1990's, the Episcopal Church began moving to the blessing of same-sex unions in church. In 2003, the Church very visibly effectuated its stand for moral neutrality by affirming a partnered homosexual man as a bishop. Finally, in 2015, the Episcopal Church adopted same-sex marriages in church. So, in America, the question of whether homosexual acts were sinful was answered in the context of the progressive actions of the Church. The consensus opinion as of the early 1990's, if unspoken, was that they were not inherently sinful.
The anti factions today are making the same arguments (homosexuality=sin) as they made decades ago in America. Perhaps the best example of this is Archbishop Foley Beach's LETTER in opposition to the bishop's report ("God does not bless sin...").
Thus, the English bishops' new report gives a tacit answer to the question of homosexuality and sin for the Church of England. By allowing blessings in church, albeit at the discretion of the clergy, is is giving a back-door endorsement to the position of moral neutrality and tacit rejection of the charge of sin. Once moral neutrality is established by consensus, even by silent understanding, the issue of sin is removed and the only logical way forward is to allow same-sex marriage in the church since there could be no logical moral opposition to homosexual unions.
So, on considering the underlying issues, the C of E's adoption of the bishops' report will be a major win for the homosexual-rights movement since it would be adopting a stand of neutrality rather than condemnation as sin. If the General Synod approves the report, as it seems probable, this will be the turning point in the struggle for rights for all people in the C of E. In future, the impediment of same-sex marriage in church would have no moral substance. It would be cut off at the knees, just as it was in America. Given the famous English reason and logic, it would just be a matter of time before the C of E establishes same-sex marriage in church.
As for the Archbishop of Canterbury, it is time for him to show some leadership in England. He was appointed by the Supreme Governor of the Church of England to be the Church's spiritual head. Of all people, he should know that appeasement does not work. The anti-homosexual-rights equatorial African bishops' vehement opposition to any independent Anglican church in the world recognizing equality for and inclusion of homosexuals in the church will not soften from his weak gestures of conciliation to them. They have been leading a civil war in the Anglican Communion since their first victory at Bull Run in 1998. They will not give up their war against homosexuality now. The culture war is in full blown mode. Right now the prime battlefield is in England (the new Battle of Britain).
Anyway, the question at hand is not the Anglican Communion. It is whether the Church of England will approve of the bishops' new proposal to allow the blessings of same-sex unions in church while maintaining that a marriage ceremony in church can only be between a man and a woman. How the other 41 independent Anglican churches in the world respond to this is their business just as the C of E's decisions are its own business. This is the nature of the Anglican Communion. It is a loose confederation of 42 independent churches bonded together by the historic English prayer books.
So, the mother church of all Anglicanism is finally caught up in the great culture war of the contemporary world. It has no choice but to confront the issue of homosexuality now. The Church is, after all, a social institution. It must respond to the society around it and should do so in the best Christian way it can discern. Given the historic reasonableness of the English, not to mention the great moral courage they have shown time and again in history, I think we can trust the leaders of our ancestral faith to guide the national church into rightful settlements for all the people of its domain.
Find a news article about the upcoming Synod HERE.
