Two cheers for the C of E

Archbishop  of Wales Andy John blesses a locomotive                                    Source: Herald Wales

The intention is in the title, Living in Love and Faith (LLF). The situation would have been clearer if LLF had been titled Living in Sin and Faith.

Today it has been announced that "For the first time, under historic plans outlined on Wednesday 18 January 2023, same-sex couples will be able to come to church to give thanks for their civil marriage or civil partnership and receive God’s blessing. The Bishops of the Church of England will be issuing an apology later this week to LGBTQI+ people for the “rejection, exclusion and hostility” they have faced in churches and the impact this has had on their lives."

Two cheers then for the declaration "The formal teaching of the Church of England as set out in the canons and authorised liturgies – that Holy Matrimony is between one man and one woman for life – would not change."

If the example of the Church in Wales is followed there will be moves to allow same sex weddings in Church as happened when the ordination of women to the priesthood was declared a half-way house having achieved their initial goal.

According to the Archbishop of York, Stephen Cottrell: 

"This is not the end of that journey but we have reached a milestone and I hope that these prayers of love and faith can provide a way for us all to celebrate and affirm same-sex relationships.

"Over the last six years, we have been confronted time and time again with examples of the rejection, exclusion, and hostility that many LGBTQI+ people have received in churches.

"Both personally and on behalf of my fellow bishops I would like to express our deep sorrow and grief at the way LGBTQI+ people and those they love have been treated by the Church which, most of all, ought to recognise everyone as precious and created in the image of God.  We are deeply sorry and ashamed and want to take this opportunity to begin again in the spirit of repentance which our faith teaches us."

The trajectory is obvious. 

I do not know of anyone who has been confronted with examples of "rejection, exclusion, and hostility" of the many LGBTQI+ Abp Cottrell refers to. Only unsupported allegations by activists who label anyone with a contrary opinion to theirs as homophobic.

By contrast many others have experienced rejection and hostility resulting in exclusion simply for striving to remain faithful to their baptismal promises.

Church blessings have become commonplace. Some argue that if inanimate objects, as illustrated above, and animals can be blessed, why not same-sex unions. 

Inanimate objects and animals do not have souls, the cure of which is entrusted by the bishop in the clergy with the words "Receive this cure of souls which is both yours and mine."

Civil partnerships are in themselves a blessing but nothing is ever good enough for those seeking to secularise the Church. 

Hostilities

Some good news for a change:

Aid to the Church in Need reports that Christian girl Farah Shaheen, aged 12, from Pakistan, the subject of an earlier entry A slave for her faith has been joyfully reunited with her family this week following an unexpected court ruling in her favour. Farah had been abducted, forcibly married and made to clear filth in a cattle yard while shackled and attached to a chain. After being rescued, her father went to court to have the marriage rescinded. Aid to the Church in Need mounted a major media campaign in support of Farah, her family and advocates in Pakistan.

That is welcome news but the persecution of Christians around the world continues. From International Christian Concern:

Open Doors reports that "More Christians are murdered for their faith in Nigeria than in any other country. Violent attacks by Boko Haram, Hausa-Fulani Muslim militant herdsmen, ISWAP (an affiliate of the Islamic State group) and other Islamic extremist groups are common in the north and middle belt of the country, and are becoming more common farther south.

"In these attacks, Christians are often murdered or have their property and means of livelihood destroyed. Men and boys are particularly vulnerable to being killed. The women and children left behind are very vulnerable and living testimonies to the power of the attackers. Perpetrators are seldom brought to justice. Christian women are often abducted and raped by these militant groups, and sometimes forced to marry Muslims."

Meanwhile in Great Britain a BBC Radio 4 Woman's Hour interview with the first woman to lead the Muslim Council of Britain has been criticised for being "strikingly hostile" with complainants calling for a greater representation of Muslims within the BBC.

The "hostility" referred to was an attempt by the interviewer to find out how many female imams there are in Britain. Either the Muslim Council's leader did not know or simply refused to say. She could have said so. Instead there are accusations of Islamophobia.

A sense of proportion is needed. 

Hostility

Ven Dr Joanne Woolway Grenfell, Archdeacon of Portsdown                               Source: Premiere

The Ven Dr Joanne Woolway Grenfell, Archdeacon of Portsdown, is one of three new women bishops appointed on the same day last week bringing the total number of women bishops in the Church of England to 22, four years after Rt Rev Libby Lane was named Bishop of Stockport in the Diocese of Chester.

Dr Grenfell was appointed Bishop of Stepney, which covers Islington, Hackney and Tower Hamlets.

One of her first utterances following preferment sounds like another female cleric playing the victim card to hide the truth about the ordination of women. 

Islington's first female bishop said "she feels the pressure not to 'mess up' as she talked about her years spent building relationships with churches that are 'hostile' to women’s ministry."

Churches are not hostile to women's ministry, only to their standing at the Altar in persona Christi. Women do not have to be ordained to have a ministry.

The secular press constantly implies unfairness by referring to employment practice and equality of opportunity without any knowledge of the Church.

Writing about a "Sydney reverend", from ABC Newcastle News: "If you are a woman with hopes of becoming a priest within the Anglican Church of Australia there are a number of dioceses across the country that will allow you to climb the ranks and hold this leadership position." Commenting "Reverend Sawyer" said "there is more work to be done to achieve equality among church leaders."

Unusually there is an explanation of the problem from Archdeacon of Women's Ministry, Kara Hartley, who believes women have plenty of opportunities within the Anglican Church: "It comes down to our understanding that the leadership of priests and bishops in the church is given over to men, it's a reading of theological understanding, a reading of the Bible and so we continue to hold to that," she said.

Kara said she cannot predict what will happen in the future but there is no appetite for this to change. "That doesn't lessen or create inequality between men and women and I think that's an important distinction to make — we don't see a rising through ranks of church life as somehow making people more or less equal," she said.

Latest figures for the Church of England show that more than half the total of people recommended for training as clergy (54%) are women. Nearly a quarter (23%) of paid clergy in senior posts, Bishops, Cathedral Deans or Archdeacons were women in 2017, compared to 12% in 2012.

In the Church in Wales where a third of the diocesan bishops are women with early hopes of parity despite the dismal performance of the first two women bishops, the hostile Archdeacon of Llandaff, the Ven Peggy Jackson, claimed in a debate designed to rid the Church in Wales of 'traditionalist', orthodox Anglicans that women ordinands were treated badly. 

Expecting to be taken at face value, an ordinand rebutted Jackson’s claim that women had to suffer for their calling because their vocation was disputed and dismissed by traditionalists. He had spoken to every current female ordinand in the Church in Wales and reported that all had told him that they had never experienced discrimination claimed by Jackson.

This is where hostility exists in the Church. Despite all the promises, constant efforts are made to exclude traditionalists by any means possible, including deception.  

A sense of pressure, then. is not confined to women's ministry. If they are confident that they are right in their calling they should have the courage to be honest and present the facts, not emotive words such as hostility, prejudice, misogyny, etc, designed to influence supporters of their 'equality' campaign when they have little or no interest whatsoever in priestly ministry.