UPDATE (Thursday 21 October at 11:20pm BST)
The full text of Dean Jensen’s speech to “the forum” (actually Sydney Synod) on 19 October refered to below is available on the Sydney Anglicans website.
A week ago we linked to an article in The Guardian headlined “Evangelicals call Williams a prostitute” which reported on remarks made by Dean Phillip Jensen of Sydney at the annual conference of Reform. Reform was later reported to have apologised for the remarks.
The Sydney Morning Herald, in an article headlined “Sorry, says Jensen, but Anglicans are at war” reports today:
The brother of the Sydney archbishop Peter Jensen used the forum to deny he had damned the Archbishop of Canterbury as an intellectual and theological prostitute last week.
He also denied calling Kings College Chapel in Cambridge a “temple to paganism”.
While admitting loose expressions, confused meanings and the odd slips of the tongue, Mr Jensen apologised for the “great and unnecessary alarm” the headlines had caused.
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation says “Dean Jensen says comments taken out of context”.
There are two questions which deserve a straight reply: (1) If plain talking is no worse than evasion and shilly-shallying (and arguably better, since it has more in common with truth, and no less in common with love) then why do people get condemned for plain talking, while evasion and shilly-shallying are merely ignored? (2) Isn’t it obvious that it is not right to hold publicly to one set of beliefs and privately to another? There’s nothing preventing those who do this seeking office in an alternative organisation, but there’s nothing controversial about pointing out the illogicality of their holding… Read more »