Updated Tuesday
The Member of Parliament for Portsmouth North, Penny Mordaunt, has written to Jonathan Frost, Bishop of Portsmouth, about LLF. You can see her letter in full here. Her tweet summarises:
I have written to the Bishop of Portsmouth in advance of February’s General Synod regarding discussions on how the Church will move forward on the issue of same sex relationships. I hope they will back reform.
The Diocese has replied on Twitter:
Dear Penny, thank you for your letter. The views of @JonathanHFrost have been in the public domain since last November. You can find them at portsmouth.anglican.org/LLF Scroll down for more
Updates
Church Times reports further: MPs seek movement from Bishops on same-sex marriage
…The Church Times understands that at least 16 MPs have written to their area or diocesan bishops recommending that the Church change its position on same-sex marriage. This is understood to include the Labour MPs Saron Hodgson, Lilian Greenwood, Nadia Whittome, Alex Norris, Lyn Brown, Kim Leadbetter, Angela Eagle, and Luke Pollard. Neil Coyle, who sits as an independent after his suspension from the Labour Party last year, is also reported to have sent a letter, as has Alicia Kearns, the Conservative MP for Rutland and Melton…
Jonathan Frost’s views are given on the diocesan website as follows:
Bishop Jonathan gave his views on the LLF process in his Presidential Address at Diocesan Synod in November 2022. His column for our diocesan magazine was based on that address, and is reproduced below:
Preserve God’s gift of unity
The Church of England’s ‘Living in Love and Faith’ process has entered its discernment and decision phase. Do join me in praying for the Holy Spirit’s wisdom and guidance, as a possible way forward is framed by our bishops and debated at General Synod in February 2023.
There are, of course, diverse and conscientiously held perspectives among the bishops in relation to identity, sexuality, relationships and marriage; perhaps especially over the question of how to respond faithfully to same-sex relationships. Personally, I am arguing for positive change which would enable us, as a Church, to bless, recognise and encourage signs of God’s grace, presence and holiness in relationships between same-sex couples.
I am aware that many good and faithful Christians will not (or feel they cannot or must not) share my view, believing in all conscience that such a move represents an illegitimate development in the teaching of the Church. But that diversity of view is understandable in a community wrestling with human complexity, truth and the meaning of faithful witness today.
Common ground is emerging too, in the desire of the bishops to preserve the gift of unity in Christ’s Body, the Church. I would argue that Christ’s gift of unity runs deeper than any differences in theological, ethical or pastoral interpretation of these vital issues.
I’m drawn to the verse in John’s gospel: ‘The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us’. The Greek word for ‘dwelt’ suggests ‘tabernacled, set up tent’. It paints a beautiful picture of what God did by entering our human condition, taking flesh and enduring the Cross to draw humanity into fullness of life in Christ: God offers us, in Christ, a big tent to dwell within. Christ is our True Home.
To put it theologically, through the proclamation of the gospel, humanity is invited, through faith, baptism and the gift of the Spirit, into union with Christ’s incarnate, risen and ascended life. As St Paul writes of the early church: ‘our life is hid with Christ in God’.
Fortunately, we don’t get to choose who Jesus invites into the Tent of his Body or calls into ecclesia, the Church on earth. Christ’s Body is a big and hospitable tent: with space for every sinner who, by grace, hears and accepts his invitation to life.
It’s Christ who invites us, who invites you, into this Tent. No test of orthodoxy, class, learning or culture is required; rather, entry is by ‘yes’: our responsive ‘yes’ to Christ’s unmerited, gracious and prior ‘yes’ to us. Of course, navigating life within this Tent, brings untold riches, joys and a lifetime of difficulty – not least the infuriating presence of those also invited into the Tent on what may feel to us an indiscriminate, unsound basis.
PLEASE: LET US ALL PRAY FOR OUR BISHOPS AS THEY MEET TOMORROW!
Not for them to decide what we want them to decide, but for grace and wisdom from God, and quiet spirit, and prayerful listening to the Holy Spirit.
There will be a small number of deeply conservative members of the House of Bishops who will continue to struggle with this, and always will, and some others whose personal position adds complexity. But it’s not just a matter of listening to the Holy Spirit. We are all called to use our God-given intellectual faculties and cooperate with the Holy Spirit. It’s not theological rocket science, although some treat it like that and peddle obfuscation to try to preserve the status quo. But the train has left the station. The status quo is not an option! Penny Mordaunt, writing to… Read more »
I don’t think Penny Mordaunt will be very impressed by what Bishop Frost has had to say. Once again a bishop tells the victims of prejudice and discrimination that we have to be nice to our abusers and welcome them into the tabernacle so that they can carry on telling us how inferior we are and to accept compulsory celibacy. A former Equalities Minister it looks as though Ms Mordaunt has the CofE firmly in her sights.
You are not inferior Fr Dean.
I am saddened by people who create God in their own very flawed image.
Anyone who had doubts about the validity of women priests ought to be won over by the practice. Women clergy have enriched the Church of England and their absence cripples the Roman Catholic Church.
I have a suggestion. Anyone who has any doubts should read the enthronement sermon of Bishop Cherry Vann.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://monmouth.contentfiles.net/media/documents/Bishop_Cherry_Vann_enthronement.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiZoMjTic38AhUgSvEDHWT3DVgQFnoECBYQAQ&usg=AOvVaw1eN7OA4IRfNFUwLIByjGEu
”Jesus’s harshest words, we might recall, were said to those who thought they’d got it right, those who felt themselves superior and those who considered they had nothing to learn from those who in their eyes were ‘sinners’ ”
(Bishop Cherry Vann)
“a bishop tells the victims of prejudice and discrimination that we have to be nice to our abusers and welcome them into the tabernacle so that they can carry on telling us how inferior we are and to accept compulsory celibacy.”
Thank you Fr. Dean. Well put!
Conservatives don’t mind GLBT people in churches, as long as the GLBT people are in the pews on their knees in abject misery over their sinful state, with their hands outstretched — holding the weekly donations so the priests can continue to remind them how sinful they are.
This really is not what the mainstream of conservatives think or want though, is it?
My experience in the USA, over several decades and being at conservative churches and fighting conservative political initiatives and seeing national conservative groups in action is that’s exactly what they want. GLBT people are welcome in conservative houses of worship — as long as they sit there and be lectured how sinful they are. And in secular politics, GLBT people are convenient targets to get the faithful out to vote. Equating trans people with sexual predators lurking in bathrooms is positively loathsome, but it sure drives the gullible to the polls to defeat trans nondiscrimination measures. US Supreme Court justices… Read more »
I mentioned the inequality of churches (in general, not just the CofE) in another post a week or so back, and suggested it was time someone in Parliament did something about it.(We are, allegedly, all equal before the throne of God, after all, but obviously don’t like believing it.) Someone replied, pointing out that the CofE enjoys a dispensation from the equality laws and therefore makes its own rules. (My paraphrase) Now that reminded me of the old ‘Crown Exemption’ privilege which exempted hospitals, prisons, and other Government organisations from a number of safety laws, building regs and such like… Read more »
Thank you John, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat and travel at the back of the bus. Time and again bishops tells the LGBTQI community that we are inherently inferior and must travel at the back of the church’s bus – only the ‘nice’ straight people are allowed loving sexual intimacy or a white wedding – go to the back of the bus.
Thank you, too, Father, for the encouragement. I suspect you and I could talk for quite some time about this subject – and the inconsistencies and injustices we’ve both come across, but this isn’t the place, or time. Incidentally, Rosa Parks wasn’t the first dissident – I recall reading that a famous black boxer – may have been Joe Louis – refused to do the same thing during his wartime military service. Court martialed for it, he said he’d enlisted to fight racial injustice of any sort, anywhere, and the officers on the board agreed with his stand. They reprimanded… Read more »
Me too.
Come Holy Spirit! Fill the hearts of the Church of England’s Bishops with the fire of your love – ‘the Great Love of God as revealed in The Son‘. I was impressed by the eirenic statement of Bishop Jonathan to his Diocese of Portsmouth. Especially by these words about our unity in Christ – a given: – “It’s Christ who invites us, who invites you, into this Tent. No test of orthodoxy, class, learning or culture is required; rather, entry is by ‘yes’: our responsive ‘yes’ to Christ’s unmerited, gracious and prior ‘yes’ to us. Of course, navigating life within… Read more »
Penny Mordaunt, the irony of a cabinet minister telling the church to be more inclusive as her Dickensian government pushes people into hunger and premature death.
Not to mention stirring up hatred for ‘the other’, and blaming ‘furriners’ for all this country’s economic and structural problems.
What do the conservatives think will be the penalty for not doing as they say? Eternal torment? That won’t have much traction for those who don’t believe in an afterlife or a “hanging judge”. Deathbed regrets? Well, possibly, but regrets for not having been more adventurous in the pursuit of delight and love, both of which can be pretty elusive. I may be wrong—I suppose it’s just possible—but I thought the incarnation was about humanity being divinised, so self-flagellation by denial of one’s humanity I regard as an illness. It certainly can lead to one. I read the statements of… Read more »
“What do the conservatives think will be the penalty for not doing as they say? Eternal torment? That won’t have much traction for those who don’t believe in an afterlife or a ‘hanging judge’.” Thank you and Amen! I don’t know whether to laugh or cry when some conservative minister threatens atheists, for example, with eternal damnation and estrangement from God. Do they even think before uttering such an inanity? Threatening someone with something they think doesn’t exist is no threat at all. Worship as I say, Stanley Monkhouse, or I’ll sic Lord Voldemort on you! has about the same… Read more »
pp-PG, I look forward to Voldemort’s visit. In pastoral ministry I came to the view that most churchgoers saw the afterlife as being like club class on the Dublin-Holyhead ferries: unlimited food and booze, comfy seats, and a better class of customer, all paid for in advance by good behaviour and the correct number of Hail Marys or Jesus-come-and-fill-me choruses. I patronise those ferries quite a bit and much prefer cattle class seated next to the cafe and inhaling the rich aromas of fish and chips, or a fry-up (especially if the sea is rough). If there is a heaven,… Read more »
In 2012 I was sitting having coffee with the lead bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Denmark. That church had recently decided to accept same-sex marriage. I asked him what the reaction to this decision had been in the wider population. He replied, “People are thankful that their church has not let them down”. Everyone, he said, had the right to a service in their local church. Although the minister could refuse to conduct such a service, s/he was obliged to let another minister to do so. Their situation is helped by the fact that, as Lutherans, they do… Read more »
My question to everyone posting is how, as a member of my local Church who believes we should have same sex marriages, help bring about this change? Prayer, obviously. But does writing to my Bishop with my views make any difference?