Helen King Independent Is the Church of England safe for children and young people?
The Church Mouse What is the Church’s of England’s doctrine?
Susan Hunt Surviving Church Blackburn and Kenneth -Safeguarding Failures in the Church
Steve Reeves ISB 11 I can’t believe what you say, because I see what you do.
The Church of England isn’t safe for anyone at all – except bishops still in post.
Amen to that, Janet. That’s exactly right.
That’s what the Alliance has been saying for sometime, something has to give.
The Alliance’s “solution” is to make churches even less safe for LGBT Christians, and does nothing to address the other issues. Plus, given that it was members of the Alliance that allowed Mike Pilavachi to operate in plain sight maybe your focus should be there?
Yes indeed Janet, as Realist below says, “That’s exactly right”. However the cause of the problem seems to lie with the many Diocesan Safeguarding Advisers who operate a make- it- up -as -you- go- along policy with the bishops saying, “we cannot intervene with the DSAs and their decisions”.
There are some good DSAs. I think the cause of the problem is partly our labyrinthine structures, and partly a lack of will at the very top.
Totally agree Janet. Well said
Certainly that Janet but it only takes one bad DSA to ruin someone’s life and there seems to be more than that. I am referring specifically to those falsely accused who cannot find justice because as Lord Carlile said some of the DSAs are untrained amateurs dealing with legal matters.
‘I can’t believe what you say, because I see what you do.’ Week after week TA publishes the tawdry tale of the CofE’s safeguarding failures. Much of it is picked up by the national media. Yet the archbishops and bishops continue to stall and obfuscate. Not only with safeguarding matters but also with the lives of lgbtqi+ people too. Warm words, profuse apologies and hints at future ‘progress’; but only crumbs materialise. I know there are some hard faced and cynical bishops but I think most of them are fundamentally good people. How do they feel when they read ‘I… Read more »
Which bishops dare break ranks and speak the truth which is plain to ordinary people?
The bishops of Newcastle and Birkenhead are pretty good.
Surely most of the bishops have reached the most senior point in their careers and have nothing to lose.
They’re expected to maintain collegiality with other bishops. Many don’t seem to feel free to speak out until they retire.
A wonderful piece from The Church Mouse, laying out the problem of establishing doctrine. When I was undergoing the ‘vocations process’ before ordination, I made sure to read the Canons (both of 1604 and as they now stand), the BCP, the Ordinal, the Articles, and many of the Homilies. My pre-priesting retreat reading was The King’s Book of 1543. I know for a fact this exploration is rare, but it gave me a clear understanding of where the Church of England had come from and quite a lot of insight into why we articulate our current positions as we do.… Read more »
It is undoubtedly rare Evan! But esp since the Reformation the laity were schooled in Christian ” basics” by a catechism. The 1979 Episcopal Prayer Book has an Outline of the Faith..it has been copied elsewhere e.g. South Africa. The Revised Catechism ( which I believe is still authorized) was much used in Confirmation classes in the 60s. It is a pity I think the C of E hasn’t tried to provide a short statement of its understanding of the Christian Faith for those who come and for enquirers. But perhaps it is beyond us now..
Why this constant agonising over doctrine, liberal or conservative?
Do people think they will be saved by subscribing to the right catechism rather than by doing what is right and practicing the mitzvot the best they can?
What is the CofE’s doctrine? who cares and why?
Deciding ‘what is right’ is an act of doctrine-making. The Commandments are statements of doctrine, ie. teaching. One either lives right doctrine or one does not, but one must discern what it is before one can enact it. That is why people agonise over it.
Salvation by faith alone, is a doctrinal statement. John Firth was burnt at the stake because he believed this doctrine mattered, not that he didn’t believe in doctrine.
It’s not ‘deciding what is right’ that has divided Christians into different denominations.
I think that’s exactly what’s created division- disagreement on what’s right and how we discern it. Doctrine isn’t some abstract ‘theological’ idea; it’s as simple as asking how do we follow the commandment that says ‘do not kill’ (assuming someone doesn’t ask whether it actually means ‘do not murder’?).
I’d class that as ethics rather than doctrine. Doctrine is ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord.’
And to live it it has to come from the heart. Discernment involves the will and the mind; all three must come together. And to do so, we need the Holy Spirit to enlighten all three.
I think you are mistaken.
Ethical precepts are different from doctrine.
Do not kill is a fundamentally different kind of statement from the speculations concerning the character of the Trinity.
And yet the ‘why’ is the foundation of the ‘what’; doctrine and ethics are inseparable. We do not kill *because* mankind is made in God’s image, a creature rather than the Creator of life, and therefore to take life is not within our right. Without thy why, the what has no significance. Ethics are not self-evident and, in any cultural or religious context, are based on doctrines either explicit or assumed.
Walls are built on a foundation, and are part of the same structure. But walls and foundation are distinct from each other.
Possibly, but doctrine precedes ethics and ethics cannot exist without doctrine. Otherwise it is arbitrary and culturally contingent. (Some people are fine with this, I recognise).
So you’re saying that nonbelievers or heretics can’t be ethical? I’ve know many such who were more ethical than lots of doctrinally ‘pure’ people.
Secular people have doctrines too, though they’re not usually articulated as such. One doesn’t have to include God to have presuppositions about the world which undergird one’s behaviours.
You said above that ‘We do not kill *because* mankind is made in God’s image, a creature rather than the Creator of life’.
Plenty of people think it’s wrong to kill without necessarily believing we are created in God’s image. And plenty have killed in God’s name.
Yes, ‘we’ Christians do not kill for this reason. I wouldn’t presume to speak for others’ reasoning.
By that definition, those without a religious life (the “unchurched,” if you will), who therefore have no recognized doctrine, can have no code of ethics. That makes no sense to me, as many secular professions (lawyers, doctors, psychiatrists, accountants, etc.) have organizations that have and enforce a code of ethics.
See my response to Janet. ‘Doctrine’ doesn’t necessarily assume the existence of God.
Well said – doctrine is over-rated.
In the editor’s preface to the Surviving Church piece it is stated that, “It is enormously expensive to force a high-profile church employee to resign”. But it is relatively straightforward, and inexpensive, to summarily dismiss an errant employee – even a high-profile one – without notice pay, as long as there is evidence of gross misconduct, and the correct procedures have been followed. But as the discussion on another thread shows, the canon wasn’t an employee, so there was no applicable procedure. It is now in the public interest to discover the exact circumstances (and amount) of the settlement, and… Read more »
Are any CofE clergy employees? Or are they “office holders”?
Yes, chaplains in the public sector are employees, as are certain clergy who are employed directly by a diocese.
Yes, quite a lot are employees. Some are employed to clergy roles in other institutions, like schools, universities, hospitals, and prisons. Some are central diocesan staff, who are usually employed by the diocesan board of finance. Some, like bishops’ chaplains, are employed by the bishop in his/her corporate capacity. Some are employed by the NCIs. Some are employed by TEIs. But nearly all parish clergy and cathedral clergy are office-holders, whether under freehold or common tenure. (And, of course, there are lots of clergy who are in secular employment and are licensed to exercise their ministries in a self-supporting, usually… Read more »
This is, to me, an unforeseen consequence of an “established church”. On my side of the pond, all clergy (of whatever stripe) are employees, Among the RC, they are employed (usually) by their diocese. In TEC, they are employed by the vestry of their parish or by the diocese. Among most other Protestant denominations, they are employed by their congregation or by the regional authority of their denomination. Rabbis are employed by their congregations.
And, like all employees, the relevant taxes are deducted from their wages.
Not just the Established Church. Certainly in my denomination (Baptist Union of Great Britain) ministers are office-holders, albeit responsible to their own church rather than the denomination as a whole. I can’t speak of course for other major Nonconformist denominations which have more centralised structures.
In the Church of Scotland ministers are categorised as ‘self-employed’, and stipends were usually paid by the local church, although increasingly through the church nationally, given the state of much local church finance. They are also responsible for paying their own tax and National Insurance. Ministers are chosen by the local congregation, but inducted by the local Presbytery, and are accountable to it. If a congregation has a complaint or safeguarding issue with its minister, the goes to the presbytery acting as a ‘court’ of the church. Any appeal then goes up a level to the General Assembly through its… Read more »
What is the local presbytery? Is it eh body of elders in a parish/church, or is it the equivalent of a deanery chapter in the C of E? Or something else again?
Presbytery is all the ministers in a particular area and a selection of elders (one per parish, or one per charge, not sure).
A small correction: Church of Scotland congregations do not pay ministers directly. They all pay an equivalent of parish share currently called “Giving to Grow”. The difference is that it’s compulsory and amounts to 60% of income for most parishes, which is brutal for those in smaller parishes with unavoidably higher expenses e.g. off the gas grid, minister lives on the mainland and has to be provided with accommodation when visiting, and so on.
A presbytery consists of the minister and one representative elder of each church within its bounds. A presbytery also includes retired ministers, chaplains and RE teachers who are ordained ministers. To attain to the Presbyterian principle of an equal number of ministers and elders, a number of ‘equalizing’ elders will also be appointed. Recent reform of Presbyterian into larger geographical areas means that a presbytery may now have as many as 150 members. I doubt if there is any equivalent within the C of E.
This is rather like the deanery synod system down south, which comprises clergy in the local area along with two representatives from each parish, elected by the annual parochial church meeting. If the church were to go down the employee status route for parish clergy, this might be an appropriate forum for electing the lay members of a disciplinary panel to handle clergy conduct and capability matters, chaired by the area dean. It would mean that less serious issues, short of dismissal, could be handled locally in accordance with ACAS codes of practice. This panel would only be convened when… Read more »
This needs some clarification, as regards TEC. Rectors may indeed be “employees”, but not in the same sense as in secular employment, where one can be fired (at least in the US) for essentially any reason at all. A parish vestry cannot simply fire a rector. Typically they might make things so uncomfortable for him/her that the rector leaves. That’s about the extent of what they can do, although I suppose the vestry can vote to stop paying the rector. These days, “Priest-in-Charge” is becoming more and more common, where the clergy is on a 3-year (for example) contract, which… Read more »
I’m pretty sure a rector can be fired “for cause”–embezzlement, sexual abuse, as examples.
Yes, but surely by their bishop, not by their parish? (this is certainly the case in Canada) If it’s by their parish, then TEC is much farther down the road to congregationalism than I realised.
I was involved with clergy discipline for a number of years in the nineties and the aughts. The TEC canons have changed a couple of times since then but I have kept up with this area a bit. So let me give a couple of thoughts (subject to the welcome correction of anyone who has better current knowledge). In TEC rectors essentially have the same position as university professors with tenure. A parish can get rid of a rector but it can be very expensive and time consuming. If the parish can make a strong case that rector has been… Read more »
This is my experience of the situation as well.
For the sake of completeness, I should add a couple of other comments related to TEC. In TEC (generally, at least in my experience) a rector is the head clergyperson of a parish. A parish is a congregation that is self-supporting (receiving no regular operating funds from the diocese) and which owes no money for the acquisition of its property. A congregation that regularly receives operating funds from the diocese or still owes money for the acquisition of its property is a mission. (This can lead to some odd situations — some of the large congregations in my diocese are… Read more »
Thank you. That does sound very congregational. In my neck of the woods the bishop has a lot more power.
I suspect the relative lack of power for bishops to remove clergy from TEC congregations arises out of TEC’s history. As a Canadian, you’re quite aware there was no Church of England bishop in North America until after the American Revolution. That means, in the colonies that became the US, there was a period of almost 200 years from the establishment of the first church in North America (Jamestown) and a North American bishop. That situation meant that there were no supervising resident bishops. It also meant that all priests had to come from England or Americans had to go… Read more »
If I may add to this. Dioceses were also formed typically within the confines of what would become the individual states, beginning of course with the colonies. Once they had enough congregational girth, they petitioned the General Convention to enter as a new diocese. That is, dioceses were not formed by a central agency. There were prominent missionary figures (Philander Chase for example) but this was not to “start a diocese” but to preach the Gospel. I am sure Dr Primrose can recall that the Presiding Bishop was simply a diocesan bishop elected to preside. It would take some time… Read more »
The first Canadian diocesan synods date to the 1850s. As a result of a Judicial Committee of the Privy Council decision in 1861 (Long v. Gray), all Anglican churches in colonies of the British Empire became self-governing. Two of our four ecclesiastical provinces predate General Synod (Canada: 1860 [covering the old area of Lower Canada], Rupert’s Land: 1875, Ontario: 1911, BC and Yukon: 1914). Thus, although the Church was called ‘The Church of England in Canada’ until 1955, this did not signify that it was part of the Church of England. Self-government is a lot older than that for us,… Read more »
Clergy office-holders in the Church of England are regarded as employees for tax purposes, so income tax and National Insurance contributions are deducted at source via the Church Commissioners payroll. The HLC scheme is a special scheme agreed between the Church and the tax authorities which allows full-time clergy to offset heating, lighting, cleaning and garden upkeep costs against their gross stipend, and is regarded as a benefit in kind. It means that they receive a proportion of their net stipend tax free, of an amount equivalent to these costs.
Inquiries in the C of E never are set up to get at the truth, and their recommendations are rarely followed. In this case, who would set it up and draw up the terms of reference, and who would fund it? Who would it report to? Both archbishops were appealed to and felt they couldn’t act; are they going to want their decisions closely examined?
There may be an opportunity at the next meeting of General Synod for questions and answers on the topic. And is this is a matter of public law rather than private contract, there may be a number of routes available to get at the truth and examine the issues in the round. For example there could be a judicial review, or the Ecclesiastical Committee of Parliament calling witnesses, or even a public inquiry like the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry.
Inconvenient questions are routinely not answered or evaded at Synod. Often the real skewering of poor conduct is not in the written question and answer but in the oral supplementary question which is delivered without notice.
Last Synod, Safeguarding questions were listed at the end of the Q&A paper and not reached so no testing of the answers. Insufficient time for questions is allocated. Q&As are our only real opportunity to embarrass the Establishment who cannot plan for every eventuality.
Synod can be misled without sanction.
Yes Minister contains a reflection or two on the purpose of inquiries which is germane to this point – this YouTube clip is an example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RA1VTG3Z23U
Rowan Williams, then Archbishop of Canterbury, offered a different reading of the situation; that trying not to be judgemental about homosexual clergy could lead to “overcompensation”, and the feeling that they should have a second chance if abuse had happened. A head teacher at our local C of E primary school when he found out that a male teacher was grooming and sexually abusing boys at the school offered to give the teacher a good reference provided he resigned, which he did. Only for that same teacher to be given a job at our local comprehensive so that the abuse… Read more »
You quote from my piece for the Independent, Adrian, which is in turn using the evidence given to IICSA. The former ABC was reflecting on reasons for why people were so keen to cover up abuse, and was going beyond the usual points about protecting the institution. It is of course “evil” and the pattern of moving abusers on is precisely that of the Roman Catholic Church, as exposed in ‘Spotlight’, which I wrote about 8 years ago on https://shared-conversations.com/2016/02/28/sex-and-power-in-the-spotlight/
Sorry I do not buy the second chance overcompensation argument. What I would accept is weakness, and prissy inability to articulate the crime committed. This leads to people thinking that offence was quite minor & allows perpetrator to build support base who threaten to cause trouble.
Janet, the piece you linked is very wise, thank you You rightly describe the complexity of this. For example the numbers of priests in the RC church who abuse is dwarfed by the numbers who engage in routine consensual sex, either gay or straight. And as you say, that brings in the habit of concealment. And whilst some of the free rein given to abusive same sex behaviour may be overcompensation by straight people, it may also be other priests saying there but for the grace of God go I. I think you are exactly right in saying much (not… Read more »
Sorry, my apologies, wrong attribution. Helen King not Janet Fife.
Thank you, Helen, for helpful clarification. I was/am troubled by the risk of sliding into crude generalisations about the causes of specific behaviours and we end up with assertions of the sort seen occasionally on TA to the effect that homosexuals should not be eligible for ordination. As frequently pointed out on TA, homosexuality and abuse of minors are not the same thing. Heterosexuals groom and abuse young girls, and murder women. Process which is too difficult to use leads to the sort of parcel passing Adrian refers to, and not only in addressing paedophiles. When I was working we… Read more »
Surely, the first head had a duty of care to report it as a safeguarding issue, and his actions only compounded the offence? There’s a tension here between the Christian ideal – you’ve repented, you’ve done your time so its over and in the past and have a fresh start, and the reality of a society which says ‘oh, no, you haven’t.’ We’ve institutionalised unforgiveness. God gives second chances; the world generally doesn’t. Life becomes a balancing act, between the ideal and the reality. Practically speaking, whatever wrong we’ve done, in this case in terms of crimes, has consequences which… Read more »
John, do you really mean this? Unless you are the victim, forgiveness is not yours to offer, though you may advocate it. That I think is part of the mess the CofE offers to victims. ‘I am being magnanimous, as the gospel teaches, I suggest you catch up’. Sub text ‘this happens all the time, move on’. You can’t mean that. Understanding and compassion are necessary but not at the expense of the victim.
The head teacher was surely guilty, at the least of professional misconduct?
After reading the articles and the comments I went away and read some of Siegfried Sassoon’s poems. They felt relevant to me There is so much to be depressed and indeed, angry about. It’s a miserable state of affairs. But in the darkness I see beacons of light. I see them in some of the comments here and in some of the blog posts. I see people who care. They might lack the agency to change things, but they care and are precious. Let’s not focus so hard on the negatives that we fall to see those, many part of… Read more »
Sometimes you need to get angry before things start to change. People who think ‘Peadophiles need help not condemnation’ make me angry.
Adrian , paedophiles most definitely need help very badly . However this help does not mean covering up what they’ve done, unilaterally deciding they’ve repented when they are probably grooming you , believing what they tell you because deception is part of grooming and getting so caught up in saving them that their unfortunate victims are ignored and forgotten. Back at the day job before I retired colleagues and I found working with most religious denominations hugely challenging because of what we termed the ‘f’ word . No- in these cases it was forgiveness … which meant trying to avoid… Read more »
I came across that, Susanna in my job as a professional driver’s licence officer – and hinted at it a little in my previous post. God forgives, yes, but he also says ‘go, and sin no more’. There have to be legal and social consequences for sinful acts – child abuse undoubtedly being one – which no amount of divine forgiveness can ignore. Indeed, isn’t part of the traditional Christian teaching that you have to make recompense for criminal actions? To own up to the authorities and face the consequences, as proof of the sincerity of your repentance? Or, should… Read more »
John, the problem for me arises when any sexual activity I engage in is categorised as a sinful act and I am told that the answer is to go and sin no more.
Hear, hear! Well said, Susanna.
I most certainly didn’t suggest that.
Paedophiles do need help. Abuse of children deserves condemnation. Not all of the former engage in the latter, and they should get whatever help is needed to keep it that way.
What help do you suggest? Conversion therapy?
Not funny. At all.
Kate, I am interested, which of Sassoon’s poems are relevant here, and why.
Thank you
One quote comes to mind immediately – see if it’s one Kate is thinking of. “If they were there, there’s no need to explain, because you know they’ll understand. If they weren’t there, there’s no point explaining, because they’ll never understand.” So many of these issues are like that – in part you have to experience them – to live through them either for yourself or with someone close to you to actually appreciate the pain involved. There but for the love of God go I – or any one of us – has to be kept in mind, particularly… Read more »
Fair point.
Some people ask me why I am so focussed on these issues. I am not a survivor. I worked in the field professionally.
As a result, many (abused and accused) have shared their stories. When you hear them and observe the obfuscation, incompetence, inconsistency evasion and mala fides within the Church Establishment I cannot walk away.
You think things are bad? – it’s actually worse than you know. There is still no sign of coherent change.
Sobering comments.
Lack of will to change is illustrated by the safeguarding courses in our diocese (only first two modules open to lay peasantry) where none of the scenarios have a priest or deacon (let alone a bishop) as the suspect/perpetrator.
I was out today and came back desperately hoping a learned psychiatrist would have entered the conversation to summarise the current thinking on paedophiles. From a distance it is tempting to ascribe child sexual abuse as mental illness – or perhaps personality disorder. When I trained – a very long time ago – the definition of a paedophile was someone whose primary sexual attraction was to pre- pubescent children. I don’t think this fits John Smythe. The Australian Institute of Criminology published a paper about ten years ago by Kelly Richards called Misperceptions about Child Sex Offenders where she makes… Read more »
We had a training morning at church today, and I got the chance to ask someone about it. Their response was that there can be mental illness involved in some, but not every case of both paedophilia and abuse. Unfortunately we didn’t have time to talk properly.
Control and domination are equally involved – the worst abusers I’ve come across (in an admittedly limited experience) have all had precisely those ‘qualities’ to a sociopathic degree.
Martin your final comment – “it’s actually worse than you know. There is still no sign of coherent change” – is very helpful for me. After 75 years as a Christian, 45 years a priest, 30 years an activist and campaigner and psychotherapist, the culture of the Church of England looks to be incredibly unhealthy. And attempts to engage with the Church that has been familiar to me throughout my life, and the information about safeguarding and the repeated failures of the institution and hierarch, give me the impression that my desire to develop a theologically literate, healthy, creative, Christ-like… Read more »
John Buchan once likened ‘civilised society’ to a fragile glass floor above a cess pit. Sadly, particularly in my more depressive moments, I think he was right.
Human nature being what it is, nothing would surprise me in terms of what some people can get up to. The problem is that any ‘closed shop’ professional body has the capacity to turn self-protectively inwards to shield its reputation; and I doubt it will alter.
Me – I just believe in fairness, honesty and integrity as essential parts of life.
That’s certainly a relevant quote, I think.
All of A Child’s Prayer of course, but I was thinking of most of them and his reaction to a dreadful situation. When I wrote the post I had been up most of the night helping a survivor gather evidence for the police (who are being pretty incompetent) and I think the bleakness in Sassoon’s poetry really fits the mood.
Thanks to you both John and Kate. I was only aware of Sassoon’s biographical writings and his wartime protest, which I guess is the context for John’s quote.
But I am also aware that Sassoon is one step in a chain of gay poets: Walt Whitman, Edward Carpenter, Sassoon and Wilfred Owen. Each one mentored and encouraged the next to a certain extent, and, it seems, pressed for greater personal authenticity in their writing. So that made me curious about Kate’s comment.
I shall have to explore Sassoon’s poetry. Thank you.
Great poets all. Dulce et Decorum Est, is one of my favs. Simon, you may be interested in these links. More suppressed history perhaps. “Prescott said even if evidence surfaced confirming McCrae’s homosexuality, nothing would change” Well nothing except sweet honesty. God!
https://www.thespec.com/news/canada/sexual-preference-of-john-mccrae-questioned-by-museum/article_46832348-5e67-513f-8f5b-539046eb1282.html
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47380/in-flanders-fields
You could include Christ and the Soldier in your reading. It’s quite challenging.
I think Sassoon is an excellent poet. His poems are short stories in miniature but I wouldn’t recommend them to anyone unless their mood is secure.
Thanks Kate, I will have a look.
Thanks, both Simon and Kate. I didn’t know Sassoon and Owen were gay – my knowledge is limited to their war experiences. Simon’s right about the context of the quote – what we would now call PTSD – but it is very relevant to a lot of other issues. It came up this morning in the church training session I referred to above, referring to people who are drug and substance abusers. You have to understand what led them down that road in order to understand and empathise with them – to see it through their eyes. My experience and… Read more »
John,
This might help.
https://rictornorton.co.uk/owen.htm
Like for the post made by Rod Gillis, many people who revere Sassoon and Owen for their war poetry have struggled to accept the clear evidence of their homosexuality.
Thanks for the link, Simon. I’ll look later as, this being Sunday, I’m rather busy!
And there is the splendid Gerard Manley Hopkins who became a Jesuit priest and wrote incredibly powerful poetry about depression . Something I read recently said it is ‘unlikely that he considered himself a homosexual’ but he suffered torment about his preoccupation with male beauty….
Mr Hopkins is a name I recognise, though again am unfamiliar with his works. Its interesting to note that a good many creative people suffer with depression; the two seem to go together. And, equally interesting, I’m meeting more people who are transitioning within the model railway world; I have several such friends within the local societies, and met someone else yesterday. As we shared a rather specialised area of interest within the hobby, we got on extremely well together, and should see more of each other. As with faith itself, a common interest transcends everything else. The late Gilbert… Read more »
Wilfred Owen is one of my favourite poets. Along with (a completely different style) John Clare.
I discovered this morning that the news paper article in the first link of my previous comment may not be open access—although I was able to read it yesterday? Here is a link about the same controversy i.e. the sexuality of WWI poet Col. McCrae. It is actually a much better piece authored by Dr. Sean Kheraj associate professor of Canadian and environmental history in the Department of History at Toronto Metropolitan University. Interesting to follow the embedded link at the end about the controversy in California. Heterocentrism in Canadian History: The John McCrae “Controversy” – Sean Kheraj: Canadian History… Read more »
Rod, on the one side, you get historians arguing about the “meaning” of homosexuality, which is often seen a an abstract definition, or a set of actions or understandings which change over time. But many of us who are gay do not see it as an abstract set of concepts, but as an intrinsic disposition in a percentage of the population, stable over history. People who come out of the womb programmed to be gay, although they will need to hit puberty to begin to realise what they are. This is not about abstract concepts of “what is homosexuality” but… Read more »
Simon, thanks so much for this. I think what you articulate in part is a distinction between expression and essence. Your final paragraph here is very helpful. It is a corrective to something that is missing in the debate over the controversy as it is bantered back and forth in the articles I reference. If I may, I will point out what troubled me about the controversy and especially the articles to which historian Sean Kheraj responds. What troubled me is not that complicated really. As many here will no doubt know, both Lt. Col. John McCrae and his poem,… Read more »
Rod, my own arguments may not be mainstream in academic discourse, but it is only in the past ten years that research showed that homosexuality might well be caused by developments in the womb, and that it is intrinsic in nature. Such research carries the obvious implication that homosexuality would be stable across history. Academia is still catching up with this, and not always successfully. Do you attach the label homosexual to the behaviour, or the self-understanding, or the person? And could a person be homosexual even if they were a lifelong celibate and (due to the culture around them)… Read more »
Indeed. Would not be the first time that academia has played catch up. I think the same thing needs to happen in terms of ‘refreshing’ the liturgical page. Let me tell you about something that happened to me this morning when I was filling in as celebrant at Holy Communion. The liturgy was all prepared for me and on the screen. The Eucharistic prayer we used would normally read: “It is indeed right we should praise you, gracious God for you created all things. You formed us in your own image: male and female you created us”. However that last… Read more »
Rod, can I recommend a small but very readable book called “A Little Gay Natural History” published by the UK’s Natural History Museum.
So far over 1,500 animal species have been found to display same sex sexual/erotic behaviour, and a huge number of varied species in plants, animals, fungi etc display a wide range of different gendered and sexual lives, including quite a few that change gender half way through life.
The person who prepared your liturgy was being very wise, and very accurate.
Rod’s comment about changed liturgy surprised me, simply because, living in England, I can’t remember when I didn’t use the phrase ‘you made us in your own image.’ But then, most of my adult involvement used an Alternative Service Book (Series 3, I think) and the 1662 version was relegated to the cupboard under the belfry. More interesting is the comment about John McCrae – obviously I know his poem, but nothing else about him, save that he, too, died in the Great War. It brings other people to mind as well, Robert Baden Powell for one, who it would… Read more »
A self correction needed here – I meant John Betjeman, not J B Priestley. You can blame my old boss, Michael Portillo, for that slip, by talking about the latter gentleman on a recent tv show!
More pertinently, its striking how many of these people were both creative and depressive, as well as being gay. They seem to go together in various combinations, almost as if they’re essential counterpoints. Can anybody better schooled in psychology than I am add to that?
I don’t think you mean John Betjeman. He was very actively heterosexual according to the biographies and as evidenced by his own writing.
John. Homosexuality is indeed linked to depression, but the question is whether depression is caused by the homosexuality, or by society’s prejudice against homosexuality. In past centuries many men and women might grow up with a gay intrinsic disposition but because such things were not discussed they might have no idea why they were the way they were and what to do about it. Even if they realised the cause, then the illegality created problems with having long term loving relationships. In such conditions depression might not be surprising. But things have changed. Many of my own friends have happy… Read more »