... 'Senior Anglicans' who wrote a letter about homosexuality before the Anglican Primates' Meeting make up an interesting list. OK, it is composed partly of sprightly old gents who having retired from their sees no longer feel constrained by office; but have a look at some of the others. All those Deans, including the deans of once 'Catholic' dioceses and cathedrals such as Truro and Exeter and Chichester. And, most sinister, those professionally involved in the vetting and brainwashing of clergy and seminarians. The Principal of Mirfield (!!! ... what would Raymond Raynes have said? ...) and just you read the CVs of David Ison and Martyn Percy.
Will Vacancy-in-See committees really be able to hold the line against an obviously considerable number of ambitious apparatchiks? For how long?
Women Bishops ... Presbyterians at the Altar ... Sanctified Sodomy ... is there any (present, imminent, probable) aberration, or combination of aberrations, which will lift the veil from the eyes of 'Catholics' who still linger over there?
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Did you read the letter itself?
It was a condemnation of homophobia, no more.
Or are you suggesting the correct Christian response is hatred and bigotry?
I most certainly did.
"No more", indeed.
Are you suggesting that context has nothing to do with the meaning of a document? Or that it was the merest coincidence that this document came out just before the 'primates' were about to discuss the extent to which equivalence between marriage and perverted relationships is a communion-breaking issue?
Just read the letter and it obviously calls for acceptance of all that is involved in being gay.It is the usual
call for love and acceptance of all things that are clearly sinful and unnatural.A very sad commentary on the 'leadership' of what was once a bulwark against these very things.
"Homophobia" is fear of being politically censured by those who promote sodomy and same-sex "marriage."
Many politically moderate and left-wing people are "homophobic" - and with good reason.
It is entirely in its context to say that.
Given the context for the Primates' gathering was Lambeth 1.10, which condemned both changes to marriage doctrine and homophobia, and the way that resolution was being ignored, the letter set in its context principally says 'don't forget we've agreed that there are two issues in this debate, don't just deal with the one.'
And, Father, I'm sure Fr. Raynes would have objected to bullying and segregating a portion of the population. CR had something of a history in South Africa on that score, which he wasn't exactly opposed to.
@Charlemagne - where? Exactly what in the letter says that? It condemns action that the Church has been complicit in in attacking gay men - and we are not talking about condemning of sin, we are talking violence and execution.
@ChrisB - No. In the Churches of Uganda and of Nigeria, homophobia is promoting laws that advocate state sanctioned execution and imprisonment for being gay (even if you are completely celibate). In Syria and Iraq, homophobia is ISIS throwing you off a roof for being raped by a senior leader. It is about fear, but people who are gay being bullied and attacked so that they are (rightly) fearful. Not handwringing.
If the Church wants to maintain the traditional teaching, and have any hope of being taken seriously with it, she cannot condemn those parts that attempt to change doctrine, without also condemning those who are engaged in homophobia. Especially when, in an Anglican context, she has said that is her position (and notable, a group - the Lambeth Conference - with the authority to say that, unlike this week's informal meeting of Primates, which has no official standing).
There appears to be no point in continuing a conversation once the term "homophobia" has been introduced. It is derived from the Leninist technique of pathologizing all opponents as mad, and intended as a form of emotional bullying. Before the real bullying begins and the trains take you away.
A simple list of all the sexual acts that the Church considers ultra vires might be the simplest and best response, unadorned with theology or analysis that is already destined to be ignored.
Esau traded his birthright for a mess of pottage. The list would be a rather spicier mess; still a very poor exchange.
Yes, that's right Austin. There is no discrimination at all against LGB groups. Just like there has never been any subjugation of women in patriarchal culture. And racism, that's just the natural order of things, along with slavery.
Or we could look at reality. Where all of these so-called 'Leninist' labels are identifiers of real problems. And real problems that in many cases the Church has supported and continues to support.
Three cheers for Lenin, who was always spot on!
All of these dreadful problems will be magicked away, evidently, when the Church encourages Christian men to stimulate other Christian men to orgasm. Stands to reason.
You have more faith in the power of anal sex than most gay men then I suspect. (Given it is a practice that a significant percentage of gay men do not practise). The issue is not about the means of stimulation. We all look like prats if we make it out to be. The issue is about relating to human beings as fully human, and not stigmatising them on the grounds of who they are attracted to.
But if you prefer, worry about what too many seem to think the far more important question: whether a penis has been near an anus recently.
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