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| Credit: PoliticalCharge/DailyKos |
In a move influenced by Black Lives Matter, Minorities should have a say on future Church of England bishops to improve diversity, reports Mail Online:
"All future Church of England bishops should be approved by a representative from black or minority groups, leaders have recommended. The reforms will give a black or ethnic minority churchgoer an effective veto over who lands the most senior posts. The move, which was influenced by the Black Lives Matter movement, follows a year of Anglican agonising over race...The authors said the BLM movement ‘provides a particular context to the conclusion of our work and brings into sharp focus the issues of diversity highlighted throughout our report’."
According to the New York Post, Marxist BLM leader and co-founder reportedly "raked in big bucks from jail reform initiative".
NYP also tweeted that the BLM founder has 'built up a million-dollar property empire with at least four homes'. Something else for the Church of England's Marxist bishops to ponder.
Another minority, the Church in Wales, reports that "the Church is on track to be more inclusive, better organised and equipped and more focused on outreach", according to their Archbishop who was making his final Presidential Address to GB members before he retires in May.
The Archbishop's hope was that the Church "might grow in an ever-deepening, radically inclusive love for each other and for those not yet a part of us".
'Inclusive' has come to mean openly gay while many have been set apart by the policies of the Bench of Bishops.
Charity begins at home but there is no love in the Church in Wales for anyone who fails to comply with their woke agenda.
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| Source: Church in Wales |
One of the ironies of the GB meeting held online earlier this week was the enthusiastic support for a private members motion calling for 2022 to be a year of Biblical literacy.
Voting was: For 92, Against 1 with 3 abstentions.
Archbishop Davies supported the motion 'with all his heart' but the problem for the Bench is not literacy (the ability to read and write) but interpretation.
The Rev Dr Kevin Ellis who seconded the motion posed the question: How can we tell the story if we don't know it? Quite! The more so if the story is re-interpreted for reasons of political expediency.
The Standing Committee reported that: "A Bill to authorise experimental use of proposed revisions to the Book of Common Prayer (a service of blessing following a civil partnership or marriage between two people of the same sex) has been submitted to the Standing Committee by the Bench of Bishops", undeterred by earlier
criticism that it is not legitimate to set aside the Church’s traditional understanding of what the Bible has to say about same-sex relationships to satisfy a handful of homosexuals and lesbians who may or may not choose to avail themselves of the opportunity of having their union blessed. Explanatory memorandum
here.
The divorced and
re-married Bishop of Bangor who will be the senior bishop in the Church in Wales following the archbishop's retirement and first inline for election to Archbishop if Buggins' turn applies again. He has also been told that his plea for gay marriage was
not convincing.
Another well received Report, Faithful Stewards in a Changing Church (Understanding Ordained Ministry in the Light of the 2020 vision) concludes as follows:
Our Pilgrimage
If the metaphor of an expedition has any merit, then ours is not simply a long trek in
a wilderness (however much it may seem that way at times). It is a pilgrimage from an upper
room in Jerusalem to the multicultural Wales of today, in which we follow in the footsteps of
Jesus Christ, in whose life we minister. Like any long pilgrimage, our own has experienced
many highs and lows, times when we have marched on with energy and determination and
times when we have become lost among the temptations and concerns of our world. But in
every stage, those called to ordained ministry have rediscovered their priestly vocation to
offer themselves in holy service to all within their care. As we embark on the next phase of
our pilgrimage within the fast-changing social landscape of 21st-century Wales, it is our prayer
that we may come to embrace a renewed vision of our shared ministry to God’s people and
find our deepest joy in Christ Jesus “in whose service lies perfect freedom”.
'Multicultural Wales of today' has come a long way from the upper room in Jerusalem.
The Bench of Bishops is hell-bent on interpreting the Bible to reflect secular changes but as the bishop of Monmouth aptly reminded GB, only a tiny minority of the population of Wales, less than 1%, regularly attends Church in Wales services.
Another minority (mis)leading a minority.
I recall, rather a lot of decades ago when governments of both major political parties were urging Commonwealth citizens to come to the UK to fill gaps in the labour market, a story told - in the 'Church Times, I think - of a black Commonwealth family who responded to that call and moved to Britain. As they had been observant Anglicans in the place whence they came, once they settled in they sought out their local parish church and turned up for Sunday worship.
ReplyDeleteOn their third Sunday, as they were leaving the church building, the incumbent button-holed them and asked fot a quiet word. Regretfully, he informed them, he had to tell them that their presence at Sunday worship had stirred up some disquiet within the congregation and he now felt that he had no option but to ask them on the future to worship elsewhere. So much for Galatians 3:28!
So I don't at all doubt that racism does exist, here and there, in some congregations. though in my Anglican days I never saw any sign of it myself. But then I never lived and worked in areas which had significant immigrant communities. However I do recall a degree of unease when folk thought by the congregation, after an interval, to be 'a bit odd' started turning up at services! Maybe some, in some places, would have considered blacks to be 'a bit odd' too?
But the notion, if this is seriously the case, that 'minorities' - who may not even be Anglican or even Christian; that's not entirely clear - should have some sort of deciding role in episcopal nominations is an unprecedented step. It's bad enough that in England, due to establishment, politicians - who may have no Christian conviction, much less a commitment to the Anglican way - get some degree of say in episcopal appointments. This suggestion, if we're to take it at face value as described here, strikes me as worse still.
When the Bishop of Monmouth reminded the Governing Body of the Church in Wales that fewer than 1% of the Welsh population attends church regularly, AB, did it cross her mind that she and her civil partner may be part of the reason?
ReplyDeleteJohn Elllis’s comment reminded me of why I’m not a racist. My father was a cricket watcher from the time, as a young child, he saw W G Grace play. Another of his heroes Leary – later Lord — Constantine, was one of the world’s greatest cricketers, playing for the West Indies. He was also a lawyer, a politician and also a perfect gentleman.
This is the story I heard from my father. Every year Leary Constantine brought his wife and daughter across to England to stay in a hotel in London. However, in 1943, when he came down to breakfast the first morning he was told the hotel was sorry but he would have to leave. They had some American army officers staying in the hotel and they would not be able to remain if there were black people resident. My father was a quiet, gentle man who never raised his voice. When he heard this I had never seen him so furious, so outraged and so deeply ashamed. To a six year old it was a very powerful memory and an enduring lesson.
Anglican Misfit.
I wonder whether your father would be so outraged and so deeply ashamed of your comment about the Bishop and her civil partner being responsible for church decline? I am not to sure whether that six year old ever did learn the lesson your father taught you about prejudice, or if he did, the lesson was not as powerful or as enduring as you suggest. Or have I misunderstood you and you are accepting of LGBT people as acceptably gay as you are of Leary Constantine for being black?
DeleteQuestioning Misfit
Might it be a good idea to consider learning the difference between a comment and a question before trying to remove the splinter from someone else's eye?
DeletePot-Kettle-Black, Ruth, pot-kettle-black my lovely. Questioning Misfit
DeleteAs the Yanks say Ruth, you can't teach stupid.
DeletePatronising and sexist too.
@ Questioning Misfit:
DeleteIt seems to me that there's an inherent problem around a bishop who is publicly in an intimate relationship which, as far as I know, the Church has thus far declined to endorse.
Unless, of course, I'm behind the page; I don't these days keep up with the various nuanced shifts and changes which Anglican provinces seem to have made on this issue.
There are many that don't accept that she is a Bishop quite apart from her being a lesbian.
Delete@ Exodus:
DeleteTrue, but my perspective is that that ship has long sailed as far as Anglicanism is concerned.
I had no specific difficulty around women's ordination in itself, but when I first learned the faith as an enquirer in the 1960s, the church taught me that Anglicans held to the scriptures, the creeds and the order of the universal Church, and that was central to the Anglican claim of being an inherent part of the Catholic Church, and not just another denomination or sect.
Thirty years later a core part of that message was effectively repudiated. I didn't think that was credible then, and I still don't. It's why I abandoned Anglicanism twenty-five years ago.
There are many of us who don't accept that ship has sailed and many more who didn't embark on that cruise, hence so many empty Churches on Sundays and ever growing difficulties paying Parish shares.
DeleteThe difference between "to" and too also seems lost on Questioning Misfit.
Delete@ Exodus:
DeleteI don't think that not accepting the ship has sailed has prevented it from sailing! With the result, as you seem to imply, that many just felt unable to embark on the cruise.
The irony is that the folk the new reformers seek to accommodate are generally rather unlikely to be disposed towards Christian discipleship, but are simply seeking to advance their discrete agenda on another front. Whereas once committed folk are shunted to the margins, or even abandon the ship completely.
And as you say, congregations diminish and, other than for parishes benefiting from genereous historic bequests cannily invested, paying the share becomes an ever-increasingly steep mountain to climb.
PP: I thought the Bishop of Monmouth, spoke well. She is well respected in her Diocese, at least she consults and not dictates or imposes. Her recent appointments are transparent. The chaos of past events are behind us.
ReplyDeleteIf we consider previous postings (last year) in the turbulence of the diocese, causing great harm to its faithful and its mission. It was at that time suggested in many post threads, that the diocese needed a Bishop who United. We finally have that, and it has been proven in the new energy, engagement and thinking.
Without getting into sexuality issues, I agree with Ruth in her "...remove the splinter". Time will continue to reveal the leadership of each of the three female bishops, but I have yet to hear the level of criticism on the ground in Momouth as previously known prior to and during the vacant see, or if herein with much respect, believed, the turbulence noted in the other two dioceses. Time will tell!
I'm not at all convinced by the continual assumption in this blog that "had the CinW not ordained women, had not modernised its services, had not sought to contextualise Scripture ..." its churches would be packed out today. First, you have no "control" - it could well be that, had things stayed the same, they would be even emptier than they are! Second, I'm sure that the reason for the churches' decline is largely to be found in the increasing secularism of society itself and the generalised abandonment of religious values, than in the Church itself. Hankering after a Golden Age simply won't do!
ReplyDeleteBy now, the numbers attending a Church in Wales service on Sundays will be less than fifteen thousand across the entire Principality, how could our Churches possibly be emptier than they already are?
DeleteHow could our Churches possibly be emptier? By becoming non-conformist Chapels!
DeleteThank you Baptist Trainfan for being the voice of reason. I for one am sick of the assumption that the reason for the Church's decline is the ordination of women. This is a classic case of the "post hoc, ergo propter hoc" fallacy. The reason people don't attend church is that many, perhaps most, don't believe in God, and even the people who do feel that they have better things to do with their Sunday mornings. Actually, I am a regular attended at two Anglican churches in Wales (currently mostly on-line), one where the numbers have been stable for many years, one where the numbers are actually increasing slightly. The former has a female assistant curate, the latter a female incumbent. I know it's only anecdata, but I think it shows that women in orders is not the reason for decline. Who are these women's intimate partners if any? I really have no idea and it's none of my business. It's between them and God.
Delete@ Baptist Trainfan & Martin:
DeleteI share your scepticism that the ordination of women - or, indeed any of the other things BT mentioned - have had any really significant effect on the huge decline over the last half-century in the number of Anglican Christians in Wales. Other than prompting a few people like me to conclude that Anglicanism no longer offered what it promised when I first explored faith as a hesitant and previously entirely secular teenager!
But, looking back over the years, it does seem to me that matters such as liturgical reform and women in ordained ministry were often presented as if they would be key answers to the church's predicament, and I never for a moment believed that they were. They might be issues worth pursuing on their own merits - I certainly thought that liturgical revision was - but, having 'come in from the outside' and still retaining something of the outsider's outlook, I was convinced by the 1970s (having by then experienced the vitality - or in some cases the lack thereof! - of a number of parishes) that the ongoing secularization of our society was the real challenge and that Anglicanism was no better prepared than Welsh nonconformity had previously been to meet it.
Indeed, there were times when I felt that revising liturgies, or worship styles, or the interiors of church buildings, or who could and should be ordained, or whether the Christian response to same-sex intimate relationships were in the category of reordering the deckchairs on the deck of the 'Titanic' and failing to prioritize the looming iceberg!
PP. I have to agree with Baptist here. We know the earlier years of the Church were strong and vibrant, that proven. But, right now, all denomination are dwindling. The CiW is no exception. However, the CiW has only just put it's toe into secular society hoping against all odds it's new methods save its future: mission areas, church army projects, HTB projects x2 (Wrexham & Cardiff). New reordering of buildings for more community use. Messy Church, Pram & Buggy Services, Taize, and at last services online.
ReplyDeleteBut, we are way behind others. If we look at the huge mega Churches in Wales, Kings Newport has minimum 1000 worshipers Sunday morning, similar numbers at others in Cardiff, Cwmbran, Swansea m, Wrexham and Bangor. 6 Cathedrals nowhere near one of those.
Why? That is the key question, what are they doing differently? In a recent publication " Doing Church" there are many good examples of new ways to attract people. Take a look at some of our excellent work, it's not all gloom!
But, it's great to discuss, argue and debate here, but, isn't it time the pew sitter became more outspoken bringing the hierarchy to account?
'We know the earlier years of the Church were strong and vibrant ...'
DeleteWhen that's said about Christianity in Wales, it's usually said with the chapels in mind - a touch of 'How Green Was My Valley'!
But in retrospect I think insufficient attention was paid to the reasons which might have lain behind that. The chapels for quite a long a while benefited from very considerable numbers of gwrandwyr - 'hearers'; folk who frequented the chapel because the only social community alternative in many smaller places - boozing in the boozer! - wasn't, for whatever reason, to their taste.
But they were only 'hearers'; they listened to the sermons, they frequented the bible classes, they appreciated the social life which chapel offered - but only a relative few of them committed to baptism or to full membership, dependent on the denomination.
But in the aftermath of the first world war a variety of other entertainments and distractions emerged which simply hadn't existed in smaller Welsh communities in the late Victorian and Edwardian eras - notably cinemas and the 'wireless'. Social life was no longer a simple choice between the chapel and the pub. And so the gwrandwyr fairly swiftly fell away. And with their departure many of the chapels became unviable, which meant that the crisis of emptying churches hit Welsh nonconformity first.
Welsh Anglicanism had always stood outside all of that; while it may have had numbers of worshippers who were never confirmed and thus were never communicants, it never had a significant class of gwrandwyr; in any case, in the days when most parishes - other than the relatively few ostentatiously anglo-catholic ones - had Matins as their principal morning service, the difference between the confirmed and unconfirmed wan't especially obvious. If you were posher, you went to Matins; if you were servant or labouring class you went to Evensong. If there was Holy Communion afterwards for those of the super-devout who 'stayed behind', you didn't really stand out if you quietly left.
I think Welsh Anglicans were lulled into what turned out to be a false sense of security because during the mid-1960s numbers of Anglican communicants in Wales were actually gently rising, while Welsh nonconformity - other than in certain fashionable or definitively evangelical congregation which drew in an eclectic and particular constituency - was already all too obviously in serious decline.
But in fact that proved to be a false dawn. Secularization ultimately gnawed at Anglicanism too. It just took a while longer for the real effect to be felt.
@PP: The reason why "mega" churches appear to thrive is that (to coin a phrase from the 1950s) they are "bright, light and modern", with none of the historic baggage one finds in traditional churches of all denominations, whether Anglican, Nonconformist or anything else. No jumble sales; no old ladies; no flower rota; no roof appeal; no middle-aged or elderly vicar or minister trying to be "with it" and failing; no varnished pitchpine, A&M hymns or pointy windows -- nothing, in short, remotely resembling Religion as commonly experienced. And most significant of all: no "grey areas", but a set of beliefs (substitutionary atonement, the total depravity of unredeemed mankind, gays go to hell, and all the lot) that is presented with conviction and must be accepted as Gospel, however far in fact it falls short of the Faith Once Delivered. I know where I'd rather be!
Delete@ Matthew:
DeleteI can't speak for anyone else, but I think you're spot on there. It's always been a puzzle to me how it is that what strike me as viscerally vicious views have an evident appeal to some folk who, I believe, are genuinely questing to be virtuous
@ John Ellis: You wrote, "But, looking back over the years, it does seem to me that matters such as liturgical reform and women in ordained ministry were often presented as if they would be key answers to the church's predicament". May I add Ecumenism to that list? Don't get me wrong, I'm confirmed ecumaniac ... but, once again, we were told that 'the' reason people didn't come to church was that the different denominations were always at each others' throats; if only they joined together then people would come flocking. So Ecumenical Projects were set up: Cardiff East, Penrhys, Swindon ... and although good may have come out of them, they haven't delivered the "golden egg". Indeed, the complexity of running things ecumenically has, in my view, led to far too much time being wasted in denominational discussion, and often a losing of the particular distinctives of each tradition.
ReplyDeleteOn the whole I agree with you on that.
DeleteMy single reservation is your suggestion of 'far too much time being wasted in denominational discussion, and often a losing of the particular distinctives of each tradition'. During the late 1970s, after 'Covenanting for Union' had been launched, I was living in the east of Newport and the 'Covenanting Churches' movement in that area was reputed to be more active, lively and impactful there than almost anywhere else in Wales.
Despite that, I felt that it made minimal practical impact on local east Newport churches, either among clergy or congregants. If Newport East was deemed a model, the Covenant for Union elsewhere must have been moribund, practically speaking!
'Denominational discussion' might perhaps arguably have 'wasted' too much of the time of the small numbers of clergy and lay people already inclined to indulge in that sort of thing. But it seemed to me to be very much a minority concern, and its impact on the life of covenanting church congregations of all traditions seemed to me at the time to be pretty minimal.
Christian reunion has always struck me as an unambiguously worthy goal. But, as you say, to expect it to deliver the 'golden egg' of religious revival is illusory. When I first visited Swansea in the autumn of 1964, I recall seeing a slogan painted in vivid white on the high rocks just on the Swansea side of Llansawel/Briton Ferry. It read 'A GREAT REVIVAL IS COMING TO WALES; FEAR GOD THE GREAT'. Over the years the paint weathered, and the last time I passed that way I noticed that the slogan had now become invisible. Rather like the 'Great Revival'!
Yes, I'd go with all that. What I was thinking about re. "denominational discussion" was the time it can take for individual churches to make decisions when, in some cases, they have to first consult with two or more denominations, or wait for their ecumenical Sponsoring Body to meet.
DeleteFor sure it's usually a slow process. And one which, from past experience, seems to deliver not that much.
DeleteSadly.