Here’s the press release from: The Chicago Consultation
International Anglican group initiates “strategy of inclusion”
Chicago Consultation celebrates contributions of gay Christians, urges blessing of same-sex relationships, calls homophobia “a sin whose end time is now”.
(Evanston, Ill.) Anglicans from around the world met near Chicago last week to build international coalitions and develop a strategy for the full inclusion of gay and lesbian Christians in the life of the Church.
Meeting at Seabury-Western Seminary, Dec. 5-7, the 50-member group known as the Chicago Consultation urged leaders of the Episcopal Church to permit the blessing of same-sex relationships and to remove barriers that keep gay candidates from being elected as bishops.
“Some people call it the gay agenda, but we call it the Gospel Agenda,” said the Rev. Bonnie Perry, rector of All Saints Church, Chicago, co-convener of the Consultation. “We are asking our Church and our Communion to see what God has created and know that it is good.”
The Consultation also called upon the Most Rev. Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, to invite Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire as a full participant to the Lambeth Conference. Robinson, a member of the Consultation, is the only diocesan bishop in the Anglican Communion living openly in a same-sex relationship.
“We wanted to affirm Gene,” said Bishop John Bryson Chane of the Diocese of Washington, “but we also wanted to affirm all of the anonymous gay and lesbian Christians who have graced the Church with their God-given gifts—even when the Church has been unwilling to receive them.”
Participants from Africa, England and New Zealand joined fellow Anglicans from Central, North and South America in pledging to work against schismatic leaders who have sought to gain power in the Communion by turning marginalized groups against one another.
“Homophobia is a sin whose end time is now,” said the Rev. Canon Marilyn McCord Adams, Regius Professor of Divinity at Christ Church, Oxford University, in a paper opening the consultation.
Human institutions are riddled with systemic evils, she said. “Our calling is to discern which ones are ripe for uprooting and to take the lead in eradicating them, beginning in the garden behind our own house!”
In three intensive days, punctuated by periods of silent prayer, participants heard papers by Adams, Bishop Stacy Sauls of the Diocese of Lexington, Dean Jenny Te Paa of St. John’s College, Auckland, New Zealand and the Rev. Frederick Quinn of Salt Lake City, Utah and began to develop strategies to advance the cause of full inclusion at the Lambeth Conference in July 2008, and at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Anaheim in 2009.
Te Paa also preached at a Eucharist celebrated with members of the Consultation and the seminary community.
While developing what they dubbed a “strategy of inclusion,” participants also voiced opposition to the current draft of a proposed Anglican Covenant, which would create a centralized governing body with authority over member Churches for the first time in the Communion’s history.
“There was tremendous energy in the plenary sessions, and even more in the breakout groups,” said the Rev. Ruth Meyers, academic dean at Seabury, and co-convener of the Consultation. “It was such a talented and committed group that eventually we abandoned some of the formal presentations and started identifying our priorities and making plans.”
Participants focused particular attention on building international coalitions to work against what the Rev. Mpho Tutu, executive director of the Tutu Institute for Prayer and Pilgrimage in Alexandria, Va., called “interlocking oppressions,” the web of economic, political and social factors that determine who has access to power, resources and social approval, and who does not.
“The issue is human suffering and the attitudes that cause it,” said Bishop Celso Franco de Oliveira of Rio de Janeiro.
Before adjourning, the group made plans to:
The consultation includes two Primates of the Anglican Communion—Archbishop Martin de Jesus Barahona of Central America and Archbishop Carlos Touche-Porter of Mexico, who was unable to attend due to illness; 12 bishops from the Episcopal Church, including 10 diocesan bishops or bishops-elect; four members of the Church’s Executive Council; numerous General Convention deputies, and representatives of groups such as Integrity, Claiming the Blessing and Inclusive Church.
Bonnie Anderson, president of the Episcopal Church’s House of Deputies, attended the consultation as an observer, and said she hopes other groups in the Church will invite her to their meetings in a similar capacity so that she can familiarize herself with their concerns.
Participants from other Churches in the Anglican Communion included the Very Rev. Victor Atta-Baffoe, dean of St. Nicholas College, Cape Coast, Ghana; Bishop Michael Ingham of the Diocese of New Westminster, Canada; Te Paa; the Rev. Jane Shaw, dean of divinity, New College, Oxford and the Rev. Giles Fraser, founder of Inclusive Church in the United Kingdom.
The steering committee was convened by Meyers and Perry and included Bishop Neil Alexander of Atlanta, who was unable to attend the meeting; Chane; the Very Rev. Gary Hall, dean of Seabury-Western; the Rev. Gay Jennings, associate director of the CREDO Institute; Jim Naughton, canon for communications and advancement in the Diocese of Washington; Robinson and Fredrica Harris Thompsett, Mary Wolfe Professor of Historical Theology at Episcopal Divinity School.
The consultation was supported by several grants, including one from the Arcus Foundation of Kalamazoo, Mich., which works to “achieve social justice that is inclusive of sexual orientation, gender identity and race.” Following the conference, the group received a $60,000 grant from the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation, Philadelphia, Pa., to support its future work.
21 CommentsThe text of the address given at the Drenched in Grace conference by the Revd Dr Louis Weil is now available at the Inclusive Church website.
Read it in full at When signs signify – the Baptismal Covenant in its sacramental context.
0 CommentsGLOBAL ANGLICANS SHARE CALL TO AN INCLUSIVE GOSPEL VISION AND MISSION
Inclusive Church supporters are drenched in grace and ready to embrace “costly unity”
Last week, 180 people gathered in Derbyshire, England for “Drenched in Grace”, Inclusive Church’s first residential conference.
We met as Anglicans, committed to our church. We met as evangelicals and charismatics, as catholics, liberals and conservatives. We met at the Lord’s table – the unifying core of the conference. We reclaimed with confidence the orthodoxy of the inclusive Gospel we celebrate in the Anglican Communion.
We offered a model of engagement to the Communion at large. In our disagreements we acknowledged the primacy of God’s love in which we are all held together, but we did not keep silent about our differences.
Dr Jenny Te Paa (St John’s College, Auckland NZ) opened the conference. In a strong speech, Te Paa reminded us “how pervasive the reach of enmity has become amongst us.” She urged us “not so much to focus too intently and singularly on the bad behaviour of the few, but rather to focus anew on the very good behaviour of the many.”
Revd Dr Sharon Moughtin-Mumby in her talk “Out of the Silence” said “I believe it is vital for us to …. refuse to skip over the difficult and challenging or awkward passages of the Bible, just as in Inclusive Church we are committed to refusing to skip over those who can be made to feel like the difficult, challenging or awkward members of the people of God.”
Revd Dr Louis Weil (Berkeley, California) spoke about the central place baptism holds in our ecclesial understanding. Speaking of the sacraments of baptism and communion, he said “our obsession with validity has weakened the boldness of the sacramental signs. This creates a low level of expectation and weakens our understanding of mission.” We are in communion with one another by God’s grace, not by any human action. “I am in communion with Peter Akinola (the Archbishop of Nigeria)” he said. “I will remain in communion with Peter Akinola until we are both on the other side.”
Canon Lucy Winkett (St Paul’s Cathedral) spoke of the need to “forge relationships on the anvil of profound disagreement.” “The worry that we have as Anglicans is that our faith can be so driven by fear that our liturgy is tedious and our public pronouncements shrill and irrelevant.” In a powerful and wide ranging address she called for engagement with others across the theological spectrum.
Mark Russell, the Chief Executive of Church Army, sent us out into the world, calling passionately for the church to unite. “Unity is not saying that we will always agree with each other, unity is a deeper spiritual concept. Unity allows me to love my brothers and sisters even when I don’t always agree with them. Love allows me to hold difference and diversity.” He challenged us to “go from here, with a renewed vision to pursue a costly unity, and a vision to bring a gospel of hope to all.”
Many present are increasingly alienated and distanced from the church which they see as home. They are being rendered spiritually homeless. A common question was – why are our episcopal friends, who value and support classical Anglican comprehensiveness, so silent? Why do they, with few exceptions, leave the field clear to those who continually seek to undermine the Communion and deny its profound unity?
We have a Gospel to proclaim in a world disenchanted by the actions of those who proclaim a message which excludes. We invite them to meet with us, so that we can together move into the world with a vision of costly unity and hope for all in Jesus Christ.
21 CommentsThe full text of the concluding keynote address by Mark Russell, Chief Executive of the Church Army, can now be found at Go into the world.
And the welcoming remarks by Giles Goddard at the conference opening can be found here.
For the other talks, see entries below.
3 CommentsHere are links to audio recordings of two of today’s keynote talks.
Both of these presentations were outstanding and I strongly recommend listening to it all.
Louis Weil on When Signs Signify
Lucy Winkett on Our sound is our wound
(Text versions of these will also be available later.)
Meanwhile the full text of two other talks are already available:
Each of us was given grace: an address by Dr Jenny Plane Te Paa (audio linked here previously).
Out of the silence: an address by the Revd Dr Sharon Moughtin-Mumby
(Dr Moughtin-Mumby was unable to be present but her address was read by the Revd Canon Giles Goddard, chair of Inclusive Church.)
7 CommentsThe InclusiveChurch conference Drenched in Grace opened with a keynote speech by Jenny Te Paa.
Jenny Te Paa condemns “the reach of enmity” among Anglicans The first Inclusive Church conference opened today at the Hayes Conference Centre in Derbyshire, England with an address by Dr Jenny Plane Te Paa. In a strong speech, Te Paa reminded us “how pervasive the reach of enmity has become amongst us.” She urged us “not to notice the bad behaviour of the few, but the good behaviour of the many.” Calling to mind the great humanitarian needs of the world, Te Paa lamented our obsession with drawing lines that exclude, which is distracting us from the enormous suffering so many people face. We must not “fret and fight” while people are literally dying.
Te Paa is a Principal of the College of St John the Evangelist in Auckland, New Zealand, was a member of the 2003 Lambeth Commission, and assisted in the St Augustine’s Seminar responsible for planning the detailed content for the forthcoming Lambeth Conference 2008.
The Revd Canon Giles Goddard, chair of Inclusive Church, said, “We are not a pressure group of the like-minded.” He added, “We are ordinary Anglicans who love our church, and we are deeply concerned by the way in which the effort to exclude is overtaking the calling to live the Gospel.”
180 people have gathered here at a time in which many people are concerned that the generous tolerance which has characterized Anglicanism is under serious threat from those who wish to divide the church. The conference includes participants from all parts of Great Britain and throughout the Anglican Communion.
Information for Editors: IC is a growing network of Anglicans from across the Anglican Communion working to celebrate the traditional diversity of Anglicanism.
For further information contact Revd Canon Giles Goddard – 07762 373 674 or
Revd. Philip Chester – 07515 815710
Savi Hensman has written a little more about the session on the IC blog at Each of us was given grace.
And you can listen to the entire speech by going to Audio from Jenny Te Paa address.
40 CommentsJust two weeks to go before the InclusiveChurch residential conference, Drenched in Grace. A description of the programme can be found here.
Keynote speakers –
Over 15 workshops will cover the spectrum of Anglican concerns, from women in the episcopate to inclusive liturgy, and from the Millennium Development Goals to welcoming transgendered people.
Download the brochure with booking form (PDF) here.
34 CommentsThe correspondence which started last January has recently resumed.
See the most recent letters:
Andrew to Giles on 16 September
Giles to Andrew on 3 November
This correspondence appears on both InclusiveChurch and Fulcrum. For the context see here.
25 CommentsThe full text of the talk given by retired Swedish bishop Christina Odenberg, at a lunchtime meeting during the York General Synod sessions last July, can be found on the InclusiveChurch website.
And if you haven’t yet booked for Drenched in Grace in November, go here for details.
26 CommentsDr Joseph Cassidy of St Chad’s College, Durham gave a talk on the place of humility and grace within the Anglican Communion, to the Inclusive Church day conference held at St Matthew’s Westminster on 22 September.
The full text of his talk can be found here.
9 Commentspress release from InclusiveChurch
Covenant proposals and extra-Provincial Bishops
5th July 2007
The growing number of bishops created by African provinces for “pastoral oversight” in North America (and potentially in other provinces), the attempts to create a Covenant that defines Anglican doctrine and ethics, and the apparent intention to organise an alternative to the Lambeth Conference in London next year all point towards one thing. The strategy to destabilise the Anglican Communion is moving into another phase.
The creation by the provinces of Uganda, Kenya and Nigeria of extra-provincial Bishops is against the expressed wish of the Windsor Report and the post Lambeth ’98 process of listening and reconciliation. It is more evidence that the Primates of those provinces and their supporters in the US and Britain profoundly misunderstand the nature of the Communion. We very much regret that the Chair of the Covenant Design Group, the Archbishop of the West Indies, has welcomed these appointments.
Inclusive Church’s aim is to support and celebrate the traditional breadth and generosity of the Gospel of Jesus Christ as it has been received and passed on through Anglican history and lived out in the Communion. This creates challenges when there are fundamental disagreements. But the way to respond to disagreements is not to walk apart, nor to create separate structures, nor to seek to impose one particular point of view on the Communion. It is to engage, to communicate, to speak, to listen and to learn.
Clearly there are outstanding issues over how the Communion should respond to the reality that many Provinces include lesbian and gay Christians who live with partners in loving, faithful relationships. But the extraordinary way in which this issue has been allowed to dominate the life of the Communion over the past ten years is not coincidence.
There can be little doubt that the issue is being used by some, mainly conservative, Christians as a lever to try to change the Communion into something it is not; from a conciliar church into a confessional one. From a praxis-based Communion where the bonds between us are the bonds of fellowship and love to a codified Communion where exclusions are legally determined and legally enforced, and where the Communion defines itself not by who it includes but by who it excludes.
The Covenant process has been moved, by this group, away from its original intention which was to affirm the bonds of fellowship which exist. The way in which the draft was received by some at the Primates meeting in Tanzania is indication that, whatever the intention, it will be used to enforce a particular interpretation of the Scriptures to the detriment of the life of the Communion. We do not need a Curia, and the process of drafting a Covenant is already giving more power to the Primates than is justified by our history, by our life and by some of their actions to date.
Hard cases make bad laws. We wish to see, urgently, greater understanding between provinces, and we can see the value of a Covenant which enables this to happen . But the proposed draft before us is likely to be an instrument of further division, not unification. Some of our structures may need reform – but it is already clear that this Covenant process is unlikely to help.
The suggestion of an alternative “not the Lambeth Conference” is, simply, sad. Those who suggest it are walking away from the possibility of dialogue. The suggestion has little to do with dealing with our post-imperial past, and little to do with ensuring that particular voices are heard. It has a great deal to do with power; and with the location of power in the Communion.
We call on those supporting these actions to recognise that there is more than one answer to the questions which face us. Resolution will be achieved only through mutual respect and communication, and an acknowledgement that different views are sincerely held by faithful and loyal members of the Communion.
Inclusive Church is deeply committed to continuing the debate over these questions. The Anglican Communon has faced problems before and moved through them. With God’s help, we will again.
Giles Goddard
Chair, IC
press release from InclusiveChurch:
“Global Centre” Comes To UK
InclusiveChurch is delighted to announce that the Most Revd Dr Idris Jones, Bishop of Glasgow & Galloway, has agreed to join the Archbishop of Mexico as a Patron of InclusiveChurch.
Bishop Idris is Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church and a Primate of the Anglican Communion. He said:
“It is a privilege to be associated with Inclusive Church. The Anglican Communion is seeking how it may develop and deepen its life today – what better way could there be than working to keep our church as welcoming and encouraging to everyone who wants to follow Jesus so that everyone of us can be challenged by God’s love.”
We also announce that the Archbishop of Mexico, Bishop Carlos Touché-Porter, will be in England in September 2007. Bishop Carlos was a co-signatory of the Declaration by the Global Centre released in May 2007 which reaffirmed the call of Latin American bishops to preserve the “participative, diverse, ample and inclusive” nature of the Communion.
During his visit the Archbishop will take part in two major conferences:
These conferences will inform discussions at “DRENCHED IN GRACE”, InclusiveChurch’s first residential conference to be held in Derbyshire on 21st – 23rd November. “Drenched in Grace” will be a celebration and restatement of broad and inclusive Anglicanism. A discount of £20 applies for bookings received before the end of June. For further information go here.
For further information or advance registration contact InclusiveChurch here.
23 CommentsTwo documents have been published by InclusiveChurch and can be found from this page:
An Anglican Covenant?
InclusiveChurch believes that the Anglican Communion offers a creative and dynamic vision of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Our structures, while loose and complex, mean that both tradition and development have a vital place in our attempts to live out the Gospel. Following the first Draft issued by the Covenant Drafting Committee and the way in which it influenced the Primates’ discussions in Dar Es Salaam, we have serious doubts about the proposed Draft Covenant. Tim Bartel and Savi Hensman have written responses which can be seen below:
- Casting off the Garment of Humility – Tim Bartel sets out some of the implications of the wording of the proposed Covenant.
- Love and Witness in a broken world – Savitri Hensman sets out her concern that the Covenant will lead to more, not less, disunity
The links above are to MS Word documents. For ease of access html pages are also available:
2 CommentsPress Release from InclusiveChurch
26th March 2007
We acknowledge the frustration which has led the Bishops of the Episcopal Church (TEC) to reject the requests of the Dar Es Salaam Communique for the creation of a parallel church structure.
We welcome their strong affirmations of the equality before God and human rights of all people.
We wish members of TEC to know that we fully support them in their response to the Primates.
To lose the long-cherished principles of provincial autonomy, respect for diversity and active participation of laypeople and clergy would be to lose many of the defining principles of our Anglican inheritance. We have no tradition of centralising authority in the hands of a few senior bishops.
The majority of members of the Church of England find the continued failure of Anglicans to recognise the full inclusion of gay and lesbian people absolutely unacceptable.
It is increasingly clear to us that the process which the Communion has followed over lesbian and gay Christians has been very seriously flawed. Comparisons have been drawn with the ordination of women. In relation to that question a moratorium was imposed in 1948. But the next twenty years led to a conditional acceptance, following a great deal of work by the Communion and a serious and sustained engagement with the question.
But the initial Lambeth resolution in 1978 calling for sustained engagement over issues of human sexuality was honoured only in the breach. Twenty years later at Lambeth 98, the conclusions of the working party charged with coming up with a response to these questions were hijacked by a few conservative bishops with the active support of the then Archbishop of Canterbury. A resolution was produced which rowed back from the 1978 call. In other words, the “conservative” position became a “regressive” position.
In this context, the frustration felt by the Episcopal Church and expressed by its Bishops last week is entirely understandable. To add weight to that frustration, the “listening process” which was called for by Lambeth 98 and again in the Windsor Report has not been carried out with any degree of seriousness by those people who have most to lose by genuine engagement – that is, those parts of TEC loosely grouped under the American Anglican Council, the Province of Nigeria and conservative groups in England. And the cross-border incursions condemned by the Windsor process have, far from coming to a halt, merely increased.
In the meantime, the Church of England has moved on. The debates at General Synod on Wednesday 28th February showed that there is a desire by Synod to take a more mature and supportive approach to Christians who genuinely see the inclusion of lesbian and gay people as a Gospel imperative.
We are now in the ridiculous position where we have gay clergy living in relationship at all levels of the hierarchy – and where the blessing of same-sex relationships is taking place in a significant number of parishes. Parishes trying to live out the radical and inclusive welcome of Jesus Christ are thriving. But because of the untenable policy of the House of Bishops none of this can be acknowledged.
In the meantime, the Archbishop of Nigeria is proceeding at full speed with his support for the homophobic legislation proposed in that country which breaches the UN Declaration on Human Rights, unchecked by his brother Primates.
In this context, we do not see that Lambeth 1.10 can be considered any longer to hold legitimacy or credence. Nor do we see that the Windsor process (which was planned as a process of reconciliation but has been used as a process of exclusion) can continue any further. The road map, effectively, was torn up at Dar Es Salaam. We are now in a new world, in which it is hard to see how a meaningful Covenant can be agreed.
This week it is worth remembering that the entire House of Bishops was originally opposed to the abolition of the slave trade. It took William Wilberforce and his colleagues over twenty years to convince the Church of the rightness of their cause.
InclusiveChurch remains committed to its fundamental aim: to celebrate the diverse gifts of all members of the body of Christ; and in the ordering of our common life to open the ministries of deacon, priest and bishop to those so called to serve by God, regardless of their sex, race or sexual orientation. We will continue to work to fulfil that aim across the Anglican Communion. We look forward to ever increasing friendship with inclusive Christians around the world.
Giles Goddard, Chair, IC
51 Commentspress release – 12th March 2007
Archbishop of Mexico becomes Patron of InclusiveChurch
InclusiveChurch is pleased to announce that the Archbishop of Mexico, the Most Revd. Carlos Touche-Porter, has agreed to be Patron of InclusiveChurch.
The Archbishop said “As an Anglican committed to promote inclusiveness and diversity in our Church, I rejoice, celebrate and support the ministry of Inclusive Church. May the Anglican Communion continue to be a house of prayer for all people, where everyone is welcome, valued and respected”. He is Presiding Bishop of La Iglesia Anglicana de Mexico and a Primate of the Anglican Communion.
Archbishop Carlos preached at a service hosted by Affirming Catholicism in Westminster Abbey on Monday 26th February. His sermon can be found here.
The Revd. Dr Giles Fraser said “Archbishop Carlos represents traditional Anglicanism of a sort that is familiar to ordinary members of the Church of England. His approach stands in marked contrast to the dangerous distortion that is occurring in other parts of our communion. We are delighted to have him as our Patron.”
A seminar on “Anglican Inclusion – A Global Tradition” is being organised by IC to take place in the summer. Further details will follow.
54 CommentsPress Release 2 March 2007
A good day for the Church of England. A bad time for the Church of Nigeria
Members of the General Synod are to be congratulated on the tone and quality of the debates on Wednesday 28th February. In the first substantial debates on issues around human sexuality since the infamous “Higton debate” in 1987, contributions from all positions were characterised by honesty, charity and generosity.
InclusiveChurch hopes that the debates reflect a new understanding and respect for differing theological positions about lesbian and gay people within and outside the Church. We hope too that this new understanding will bring about a greater sense of cohesion between different parts of the Church so that we can now better preach and show the gospel of Christ’s love to those we serve.
John Ward, a member of General Synod and chair of the General Synod Human Sexuality Group, said ‘There are no winners or losers. I am delighted that we can now be in dialogue without fear and that lesbian and gay Christians are affirmed as full members of the Church. I believe that through prayer and communication something changed yesterday in Synod’
As a Church we are once again called to “to engage in an open, full and Godly dialogue about human sexuality…and acknowledge the importance of lesbian and gay members of the Church of England participating in the listening process as full members of the Church.” We hope that process of dialogue will include prayer, together, by people with differing understandings of the issues. Those of us who support a more inclusive position do this with deep respect and love for the word of God in the Bible. That love must be at the heart of the listening process so that all sides can engage with trust and confidence.
The motion on Civil Partnerships was amended to “note the intention of the House [of Bishops] to keep their Pastoral Statement under review”. Clearly the present arrangements are not working. We hope that a review of the Pastoral Statement will begin soon.
We view with concern the demands placed on the Episcopal Church by the Primates, especially as we are very aware that there are lesbian or gay clergy at all levels of the hierarchy of the Church of England, some of whom have entered into Civil Partnerships.
In the context of Synod’s debates we deeply regret the continuing support of the Church of Nigeria for legislation to criminalise lesbian and gay people. This appears to be a breach of Lambeth 1.10 which restates the need to resist homophobia in all its forms. We encourage all who have contact with the Church of Nigeria to make their concerns clear. The Anglican Communion does deep damage to its mission if it is seen to be supporting legislation which is in clear breach of the United Nations Convention on Human Rights. A letter on this from 250 American faith leaders can be found at http://hrw.org/english/docs/2007/02/27/nigeri15425.htm
Giles Goddard, Chair, IC
8 CommentsPRESS RELEASE
THE PRIMATES’ MEETING OF THE ANGLICAN COMMUNION
from Inclusive Church, Changing Attitude England,
and Changing Attitude Nigeria
Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania
19 February 2007
Inclusive Church and Changing Attitude give a cautious welcome to the communiqué issued today by the Primates of the Anglican Communion meeting in Dar Es Salaam. We commend the work that the primates have done to further the mission of the church and to strengthen the bonds of the Anglican Communion. In particular we value the progress achieved on the listening process and the Anglican Covenant.
The standard of teaching on human sexuality set out in Resolution 1.10 of the Lambeth Conference of 1998 has never been one that Christian lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered (LGBT) people have accepted. It was drafted and agreed in our absence. The bishops who drafted the original version of the Resolution refused to meet us and hear our testimony. It is not possible for us to be bound by teaching drafted by a largely male, heterosexual body of bishops. The Anglican Communion can never come to an integrated teaching on human sexuality until it has listened with open mind and heart to our experience and Christian testimony. We subscribe to a high Christian sexual and relational ethic. We object outright to the idea that it is possible to divide our innate sexual identity as lesbian and gay people from what the church insists on calling ‘genital activity’. Like heterosexuals we believe the love between two mature adults should be expressed in a faithful, life-long partnership in which sexual expression is integral.
The Primates request that the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church ‘make an unequivocal common covenant with the bishops that they will not authorise any Rite of Blessing for same-sex unions in their dioceses or through General Convention’. The request not to authorise any Rite of Blessing in the Episcopal Church will be an intolerable burden for LGBT Anglicans. The Episcopal Church is not alone in having many faithful lesbian and gay couples who seek God’s blessing on their relationship. We know that in England, the USA and Canada as well as other Provinces, priests will continue to find ways to bless such relationships. If the church can condone the blessing of so many inanimate objects, it is surely right to bless the love of two people of the same gender. We pray for the day when the church can support the authorisation of same-sex blessings.
The Primates also request that the House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church ‘confirm that ‘a candidate for Episcopal orders living in a same-sex union shall not receive the necessary consent’. There is no prohibition on a single or celibate lesbian or gay priest receiving the necessary consent. Dioceses who wish to nominate a partnered lesbian or gay priest and such priests themselves are being asked to make a great personal sacrifice. In England, priests who are gay will also continue to be nominated and consecrated as bishops, as they will in other Provinces.
The Revd Giles Goddard, chair of Inclusive Church, said:
“The arguments over human sexuality have been dominating the life of the Anglican Communion for too long. We need, urgently, now to find a way to move on, so that the Gospel for all people can be freshly proclaimed in a changing world. The Primates meeting has begun to show us a way forward. We trust that the Lambeth Conference will be allowed to be a restatement of the heart of Christ’s message of love for the world.”
The Revd Scott Gunn, TEC representative to Inclusive Church, said:
“I am grateful that Bishop Katharine is recognised as the legitimate ecclesiastical authority in the United States. My hope is that the Anglican Communion can return to its focus on mission and evangelism. I hope they will shift the focus of attention away from a legalistic examination of the Episcopal Church towards a Gospel life of hope, reconciliation, justice and love.”
The Revd Colin Coward, Director of Changing Attitude England, said:
“I rejoice that the Primates are committed to the continuing unity of our world-wide Communion of churches. We LGBT Anglicans in Changing Attitude England and Nigeria are also faithfully committed to our church. We know the pilgrimage journey to our promised land of full inclusion is going to be long and hard. There are millions of Anglicans who have yet to learn about the deep faith of LGBT people in the Lord Jesus Christ and of our lives committed to prayer, worship, justice and evangelism. We are present in every Province and country of the Anglican Communion and we want to participate in the listening process in order that our stories of faithful obedience to God can be heard. We have been misrepresented for too long. Now is the time for people across the world to learn about LGBT Anglicans in Africa, Asia and South America.”
“I am saddened that our brothers and sisters in the Episcopal Church have been asked to carry a burden on behalf of us all. With the Episcopal Church and the Canadian Church, we in England are also seeking honesty in the ordination of priests who are lesbian or gay priests and the consecration of bishops who are gay. We look forward to the day when we can include our lesbian sisters among those who will be consecrated as bishops in England.”
Davis Mac-Iyalla, Director of Changing Attitude Nigeria, said:
“Our presence here in Dar Es Salaam at the Primates meeting demonstrates our loyalty to the Communion. We are committed to participating in the listening process and we want to be heard. We hope the Anglican Communion office and Canon Philip Groves, facilitator to the listening process help us communicate our experience directly to them if the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) refuses to participate.”
“My own Primate received me warmly the first time we met on Wednesday 14 February. I had hoped the next time we met we would have been able to develop our first meeting and have some conversation together but it didn’t happen. I hope we will meet again and he will be able to hear the voice of one of his own gay Nigerian members.”
STATEMENT ON THE PRIMATES’ MEETING OF THE ANGLICAN COMMUNION
Full Inclusion
We celebrate the fact that the majority of Primates have modelled what it means to be an inclusive church this week, welcoming Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori from the Episcopal Church of the USA. Bishop Katharine has brought hope to many lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Anglicans across the world. She is committed to the full inclusion of all people in the Episcopal Church. Her voice will remind other primates that Gospel justice will not have been accomplished until the church is fully open to everyone, including LGBT people. Her presence has changed the Primates’ Meeting from being an exclusively male club. Another step has been taken towards the full inclusion of women in our church. We long for the day when all people are welcomed into the church, without regard to race, sexual orientation, economic means, gender, physical or mental challenge, or any other division.
Listening Process
We approve of the progress made by the Revd Canon Philip Groves as he develops his work on the listening process, inviting every province in the Communion to demonstrate how they are responding to the Lambeth 1.10 commitment to listen. We look forward to the development of his proposals for the Lambeth Conference 2008 and offer our full support to him in his work.
We hope that the Listening Process will be undertaken by every Province with the awareness that to listen properly means being open to the possibility of change by all involved. We trust the Holy Spirit, through this process and through our common Anglican life, to lead us into all truth.
The primates and the bishops who will gather at the Lambeth Conference 2008 have yet to hear directly from LGBT people. This remains a major challenge for the church. The listening process needs to be undertaken in every province and by every primate and bishop. We urge renewed emphasis on the listening process throughout the Communion.
Same-sex blessings
The cost of the decision not to authorise any Rite of Blessing for same-sex unions in the Episcopal Church is a serious means that LGBT people in America are being asked to carry an intolerable burden. As in England and other parts of the Communion which acknowledge that God blesses covenanted, faithful relationships, we know that priests with the courage of their own spiritual convictions will continue to welcome those who come for blessing.
Covenant
We welcome the framework of the draft covenant for the Anglican Communion. For 500 years Anglicanism has been a creedal, rather than a confessional church. We believe that the ancient creeds of the church are sufficient now, as they have been for over 1,600 years. We remain concerned about the increased tendency in Anglicanism to centralise authority.
In particular we welcome the commitment to ensure that ‘biblical texts are handled faithfully, respectfully, comprehensively and coherently’ [3(3)], to ‘nurture and respond to prophetic and faithful leadership and ministry to assist our Churches as courageous witnesses to the transformative power of the Gospel in the world’ [3(4)] and ‘to seek to transform unjust structures of society’ [4.1].
Theological Diversity
From its inception, the church has been diverse in its theological understanding. We believe that in our many diverse cultures it is to be expected that people will experience God and express their faith in a variety of ways appropriate to their own culture. In our conversations with Tanzanian Anglicans from local congregations, we have heard that while they may not agree with our own view of human sexuality, there is a high level of understanding and acceptance of diversity. They view the threat of schism as posing a great danger to local mission and evangelism, while they continue to hope for a global, diverse Anglican Communion.
As we work to build up the Kingdom of God, we urge sensitivity in our diverse cultures, that not all cultures people are prepared to welcome LGBT at this time.
Working together
Members of Inclusive Church, Integrity USA, and Changing Attitude Nigeria and England have worked together in harmony this week. We have prayed for the Primates. We have given many interviews to the press and media. We have built friendships with other Anglicans across our diversity of opinions. We have talked to many members of the Tanzanian press and helped them some of them begin to understand the experience of LGBT people. We have made contact with LGBT Anglicans from Tanzania and we hope to build on our new friendships. Those Primates who spoke with us encouraged us to work for the unity of the Anglican Communion and for the full inclusion of all, and especially LGBT people.
Prayers
We encourage all people to pray for the primates, bishops, clergy, and people of the Anglican Communion. We especially urge prayer for the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the Primate of Nigeria Peter Akinola, and the Primate of the Episcopal Church Katharine Jefferts Schori. Each of these three Primates faces tremendous pressure of leadership, and we pray that the Holy Spirit will guide them.
Conclusion: Hope for living the Gospel
We look forward to a time when our conversations will be dominated by concerns of mission, evangelism, and service rather than by threats of discrimination, persecution, and schism.
We read the Gospels as commending radical inclusion. Jesus again and again shared meals with outcasts, treasured those whom the culture rejected, and taught that religious practice must be loving. St. Paul urged the earliest Christian communities to be people of Gospel love and hope, rather than people enslaved to the Law. We firmly believe that LGBT Christians belong at the centre of our common life in Christ, not at the margins.
We hope that the church will live this vision. In short, we seek a church that embraces all people as God’s precious children. We want an inclusive church.
END
MEDIA CONTACTS:
The Revd Colin Coward
Director of Changing Attitude England
+44 7770 844302
Email colin@changingattitude.org
Davis Mac-Iyalla
Director of Changing Attitude Nigeria
+234 8025866133
Email davis@nigeria.changingattitude.org
The Revd Scott A Gunn
ECUSA representative to Inclusive Church
+255 762 400949 (in Tanzania until 2 p.m. GMT Wednesday 21 February)
+1 508 720 1500 (in the US any time)
sgunn@swingspan.com
InclusiveChurch is appealing for donations. The campaign, launched last month, is named A Thousand Hundreds.
HOW YOU CAN HELP US SAY ENOUGH IS ENOUGH
It was, in the end, two American parishes in Virginia going over from the Anglican Communion to the Archbishop of Nigeria that did it. And as a result, the broad, worldwide Anglican organization known as InclusiveChurch is doing two things: making a stand, and starting an appeal.
We know we don’t have much time.
The decision for everyone to go their separate ways could be taken at the Lambeth Conference next year. Meetings leading up to it start
nextthis month.You can help, whether you’re not a regular churchgoer or not, by contributing to our A Thousand Hundreds campaign. We’re looking for a thousand donations of a hundred pounds.
There are full details of this appeal on the IC website.
The Church Times reported the launch, see ‘Broad centre’ group launches campaign by Rachel Harden.
7 CommentsFrom the Church of England Newspaper
Turbulent Times: Continuing our series in which campaigning groups outline their future for the Church. This week: Inclusive Church.
Why it is time to focus on the positive aspects of the Church
by Brian Lewis
The Anglican Communion is a truly remarkable phenomenon, an extraordinary kaleidoscope of churches each embodying its own particular history and engaging with its local community in its own distinctive way. The existence of the Communion has meant that churches that are very different from each other have been able to work together as partners, partners in mission sharing spiritual gifts, and partners in material assistance and development.
Inclusive Church hopes that through the work of the Primates’ meeting and the actions of the other “instruments of unity” the Anglican Communion will come to a renewed understanding of its worth and a deeper historical perspective on its differences. There is much talk of the fractures in the Communion but not enough recognition of the works of partnership and the expressions of unity that still go on in very many places; churches from “the North” (including TEC) and “the South” (including in Africa) are still working as partners in mission, poverty relief and development. We hope for a communion that recovers a broader perspective on the issues of the current day and we dare to hope that the Church of England will contribute to this by developing its own understanding of what it means to be an inclusive church. The Church of England will, by a more honest and tolerant recognition of the divergent views within itself, contribute to the wider Communion discovering ways to hold differences without irrevocable division.
When we speak of our hope for an inclusive church we mean a church that will live out the promise of the Gospel. A church that will celebrate the diverse gifts of all members of the Body of Christ, and in the ordering of our common life open the ministries of deacon, priest and bishop to those so called to serve by God, regardless of their gender, race or sexual orientation. The just ordering of the Church’s common life will strengthen its proclamation of the Gospel. Our failure to be inclusive is a real barrier between the church and the wider society we seek to serve and evangelise.
A theology of inclusion is not in opposition to theology that values conversion and sanctification. For us inclusion means that we recognise that God desires salvation for all regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation and that we are all called to lives that are faithful, honest, other enriching and socially responsible again regardless of our race, gender or sexual orientation. It is the church’s task to help the Christian discern a pattern of holy living in response to that Gospel challenge. That response will be based on the serious reading of, and attending, to Scripture in a way that does not confuse the Gospel with either the presuppositions and exclusions of the first century, or an uncritical acceptance of the mores of the culture of today.
The ordination of women to the priesthood is not the church giving up obedience to God and following the culture of the day, it is the church joyfully recognising the leadership gifts God has given to women as well as men and bringing that into the life of our church in our world today. We believe that Scripture teaches us God intends men and women to work in partnership, a partnership expressed in ministry, lay and ordained. This is not a departure from biblical truth it is the church coming to understand it more fully over time, a process encouraged and authenticated by women responding faithfully to God’s call as the church has increasingly opened its lay and ordained ministries to women.
The society in which we live and proclaim the Gospel accepts the right of women to full participation at all levels. So deeply is this part of our society that we have legal sanctions to prevent individuals or organisations denying women the opportunity to advance to all levels of leadership. Yet we have only managed to hesitantly and conditionally recognise what women in the priesthood have brought to the church. Our failure to move easily and speedily to bring women into the episcopate has made us appear strange, irrational, and frankly unwell to the society we hope to evangelise.
We hope for a church that will have the courage to say Yes to women in ministry and leadership. We believe that when our church finally admits women to the episcopate in a way that does not diminish the fullness of that ministry this will not change the essential nature of the episcopate but rather remove an artificial cultural barrier that excludes those whom God has called. It is an uncomfortable truth that some of reactions to the election of Katharine Jefferts Schori to the position of Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church revealed how superficial the Communion claim to agreement on women in the episcopate is. Women bishops in the Church of England will be an encouragement to those parts of the Communion where this is not yet a reality and strengthen the place in the Communion of those churches in which women already take their rightful place.
If attitudes to women bishops (especially primates!) are one apparent challenge to the Communion’s unity, differing approaches to homosexuality seem to be an even greater threat. Then again we are told that the principal cause of division is not homosexuality but the proper place of Scripture in determining the theology and ethical position of the Church. But first let us note that the same level of division has not come from divergent views of how the Bible should determine the church’s position on other issues. For example some churches in the Communion allow those previously divorced to marry in their churches, others regard that as a betrayal of the clear teaching of the Bible but there is no talk of dividing the Communion over it. We are left with the question of why the issue of homosexuality has produced the visceral response, the violence of language and the depth of division that it has.
The issue of homosexuality is not new – not even to the bishops of the Anglican Communion. Nearly thirty years ago, in 1978, the Lambeth Conference resolved:
“While we reaffirm heterosexuality as the scriptural norm, we recognise the need
for deep and dispassionate study of the question of homosexuality, which would
take seriously both the teaching of Scripture and the results of scientific and
medical research. The Church, recognising the need for pastoral concern for those
who are homosexual, encourages dialogue with them.”
With the notable exception of a few (the Churches in Canada and the USA for example) this study has not been carried out and where it has the results have been ignored in the other parts of the Communion.
The Lambeth Conference of 1988 resolved
“This Conference:
1. Reaffirms the statement of the Lambeth Conference of 1978 on homosexuality, recognising the continuing need in the next decade for “deep and dispassionate study of the question of homosexuality, which would take seriously both the teaching of Scripture and the results of scientific and medical research.”
2. Urges such study and reflection to take account of biological, genetic and psychological research being undertaken by other agencies, and the socio-cultural factors that lead to the different attitudes in the provinces of our Communion.
3. Calls each province to reassess, in the light of such study and because of our concern for human rights, its care for and attitude towards persons of homosexual orientation. “
Could a Lambeth Resolution have been more carefully and studiously ignored?
It is in the context of these resolutions and the complete failure of the Communion to respond to them that we should see the more widely quoted resolution 1.10 of 1998.
We are however, where we are, and Inclusive Church is determined to journey in hope. It is not too late for the Primates to listen to each other with a greater spirit of generosity than they appear to have found in the recent past. The “Windsor process” might achieve greater success if it is broadened to involve the whole Communion at deeper levels. At present it seems to depend on the Bishops indeed the Primates alone. The Lambeth Commission was mandated to report to the Archbishop of Canterbury in preparation for the meetings of the both Primates and the Anglican Consultative Council. It was perhaps a lost opportunity that the Primates acted at Dromantine without waiting for the ACC to meet and bring its wisdom to the table. Their call for members of the ACC to voluntarily suspend their own membership was particularly damaging. The ACC is after all the duly constituted representative body of laity, clergy and bishops in the Communion. When the ACC did meet with the “voluntary” self-suspension of the North American churches it was notable that the suspension was confirmed by a margin less than the votes of the excluded provinces. The Primates decision to exclude would not have been confirmed by the ACC if it had met with its properly constituted membership. May we hope that the Primates will seek ways of acting that are less about determining who may come to the ACC and the Lambeth Conference and more about listening to what might come from those bodies if they are allowed to have their own integrity and purposes.
If the ACC has been somewhat sidelined, how much more the Church of England. With the Archbishop of Canterbury engaged in his delicate role as the “fourth instrument of unity” and choosing to exercise that role in the manner he has, the Church of England has been effectively voiceless. The recent decision to add the Archbishop of York to the Primates meeting may help but it is late in the day and with due respect to the Archbishop of York he was not the one chosen by the due process of the Church of England to represent it.
It is our hope that the Church of England will make a more positive contribution to bringing reconciliation to the Communion by modelling a more irenic and constructive model of debate than we have seen within the Communion to date. At its next meeting General Synod will consider a private members motion that calls for recognition of the diversity of views within the Church of England and the honest and sincere nature of those views. It is a serious attempt to set the ground for a genuine intelligent conversation within the Church of England about the nature of homosexuality, how we read and attend to scripture and how we proclaim the gospel afresh in the society in which we are set. This is not a naive expression of the view that if we can just talk to each other we will discover that we all really agree. We might, but its also very possible we won’t. If we can not come to agreement we still owe it to the people of the church and to the mission of the church to get past caricatures of each other and come to a deeper understanding of what it is the other is really saying. We do not yet know what we might achieve by sitting down to understand the others context, nor should we imagine that we have already heard all that the other has to say, or that we each understand what the other means by the language used. This is not a romantic call to sentimentality it is an invitation to the hard work of dialogue.
The Archbishops’ Council report “Into the New Quinquenium” (General Synod Feb. 06) speaks of the life of the Church being expressed “in its transforming engagement with the society in which it is set”. We journey in hope to the day we become an inclusive church, ordering our common life with justice and celebrating the gifts God has given all his people; while we remain hampered by the cultural presuppositions of a previous age we can not hope to engage and speak to the society in which we are set.
The Rev’d Brian Lewis is a member of the Inclusive Church Executive, a member of General Synod, a parish priest and chairs the Newham Faith Communities Forum.
22 CommentsPress release from InclusiveChurch
An interactive network for the voice of liberal Anglicans.
InclusiveChurch responds to adoption debate
The debate on gay adoption highlights an increasingly serious problem within the Church of England.
We have been called to bear witness to the gospel of generous, redemptive love and justice, but time and again we are perceived to be more concerned with rejection than welcome, with bunker-digging rather than dialogue.
The collective sigh of relief that was breathed and the profound joy that was felt across the country when women were ordained to the priesthood, from those outside as well as those inside the Church, has now been overshadowed.
Instead, the Church is now associated more and more strongly in the public mind with another form of discrimination – homophobia. We are now in a situation where, however carefully public statements are worded, the Church’s of England’s grudging response to the Equality Act, and to last year’s civil partnerships legislation, only encourages the belief that ‘the Church has a problem with gays’.
Meanwhile, the country has moved on. Civil partnerships have been warmly welcomed by gay and lesbian people and their friends and families, with uptake take-up far in excess of Government predictions. And around the country gay couples are getting on with the tough and uniquely valuable vocation of bringing up adopted children.
The Church is certainly called to be counter-cultural. We are certainly called, for example, to challenge trade injustice, to question policy on the international arms trade, to resist consumerism – not least its trivialisation of God’s precious gift of sexuality – in short, to try to work for the good of all people under the eyes of God.
But sometimes our resistance to lessons learned in the secular world appears to be a denial of the possibility of progress.
We cannot control God’s outrageously inclusive Gospel. We should, rather, be asking what God is teaching us through our lesbian and gay brothers and sisters who have heard the Gospel message of salvation and redemption, and become part of the Christian community.
To this end, the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement has organised a conference on “Faith, homophobia and human rights” on February 17th.
And the Church of England’s General Synod is preparing to discuss a motion on February 21st which includes the following:
‘That this Synod acknowledge the diversity of opinion about homosexuality within the Church of England and that these divergent opinions come from honest and legitimate attempts to read the scriptures with integrity, understand the nature of homosexual orientation, and respect the patterns of holy living to which lesbian and gay Christians aspire…’
We support these initiatives. As a church, we are in danger of becoming like sheep bleating in our little fold while real life goes by on the road outside. We acknowledge the diversity of opinion within the church. But it is our hope and prayer that the conference and the debate may be occasions to move away from rejection, so that we can jointly preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ’s love for God’s world to which we are all committed, trusting that the Spirit will through dialogue and mutual respect lead us into all truth. .
Revd Briony Martin, Vice Chair, InclusiveChurch
50 Comments