Following the most recent Church of England General Synod, it was announced that three groups would take forward the work of the ‘Living in Love and Faith’ (LLF) project relating to prayers for same-sex couples, and would be overseen by a programme board chaired by the Archbishop of York.
These three working groups are looking at pastoral guidance, the introduction of standalone ‘Prayers of Love and Faith’, and charged with proposing provisions or a ‘settlement’, as deemed necessary.
The concept of settlement raises different questions for different constituencies. Many liberals are asking why anything further than the freedom not to use the LLF prayers is needed. For those of us who wish to hold onto an historic, Anglican and Biblical understanding, the question is why would others not want to offer a settlement that secures our position in the Church of England and which might help, to some degree at least, to secure the unity of which the bishops continually speak?
Within our own constituency, people have raised a number of questions around settlement – which this article addresses.
1. Should we just ‘hold our ground’ and pray?
Some have suggested that our focus should not be on advocating settlement, rather on ‘holding our ground’ and praying that God will restore and revive His church. This is, of course, a prayer that I imagine most of us would subscribe to. At the same time, we should not discount the possibility that God is working to revive and refine His church through such a settlement. And I’m not sure that a commitment to pray for revival discounts the necessity of institutional engagement and rearrangement.
2. Let’s not worry, it would be illegal to change the doctrine of marriage, wouldn’t it?
Some in our constituency are quite rightly pointing out the legal and theological challenges to the aspirations of the House of Bishops to introduce the standalone services and make it possible for clergy to marry same-sex partners. It is clear to most people that this does in effect change the doctrine of marriage within the Church of England and ride roughshod over good synodical process. However, the sad reality is that it appears that, despite being aware of this, the House of Bishops has a mind to driving this forward. And if it’s true that ‘where there’s a will, there’s a way’, then I imagine the House of Bishops will find a way to justify their aspirations to themselves and sanction a course of action that they feel will be defensible. In practice, it would be possible to allow clergy to marry a same-sex partner by not implementing the same disciplinary procedures that might be expected of them, rather than by actively pursuing a change in the doctrine of marriage. In practice, the end result is the same, though the House of Bishops may choose to deny this.
3. The idea of ‘settling’ suggests enabling space for liberalism, and I can’t support that!
Some in our constituency are nervous about the idea of ‘settlement’ because they believe in good conscience that they are not able to support in any way a proposal that defends or makes space for liberalism. The conscience of these brothers and sisters must be recognised, but at the same time we have to face the reality that we might be having to choose not between good and bad, but between the lesser of two evils. If the choice is between the doctrine of the whole of the Church of the England changing, or differentiating in such a way that part of the Church of England retains its Biblical doctrine, then a vote for settlement might be a vote for orthodoxy.
4. We should hold on until the next General Synod elections – we’ll win more seats.
Finally, some are encouraging us to ‘hold the ground’ until the next General Synod election at which point we can gain control of the Synod. Speaking as someone who has been on General Synod since 2005, and currently chair of EGGS (Evangelical Group on General Synod)– the largest group in Synod, it is my view that this is wishful thinking – and though I would welcome it, I do not believe even our best effort would give us the voting ‘power’ in dioceses to achieve this end.
Readers will be aware that other provinces in the Anglican Communion have already liberalised their ethics around sex and marriage (see ‘Learning from Elsewhere’ – available to watch on the Church of England Evangelical Council’s website). There are obviously a number of lessons that we can learn from the experience of others, but these would include the need to pursue settlement, rather than find ourselves being ‘boiled in the proverbial pan’.
Our hope in pursuing settlement is that it would guarantee orthodoxy a secure base within the Church of England for the future. The statistics suggest that the current growth in the Church of England can be found primarily in evangelical churches – and such a secure base would thereby provide the starting point for growth going forward. God willing, this could be a base from which the orthodoxy of the Church of England could be re-established. A different question always needs to be asked: ‘What happens if we don’t get an acceptable settlement?’ But that’s another article…
Imagining the CofE 'de facto parallel province' as a reality
You may have heard mention of a ‘de facto parallel province within the Church of England’ over these last few …