A Cosy Chat In The Lion’s Den
by Mark Chater
I’m no Daniel. In fact, I shrink from confrontation. Even a disagreement on social media can make me want to crawl back into bed. Cowardice in me is corrected only by another fault – stubbornness. So when I see an act of blatant injustice, or an instance of spiritual pride, I’m impulsively up and over the barricade before my cowardice has had time to cry ‘stop!’.
So it was with my reaction to the latest homophobic schism in the Church of England. Not surprisingly most evangelicals do not like it when a decision goes against them, but they are now taking steps to split the church.
Background
We might need to go back a bit here and just quickly review the back story. Skip this paragraph if you already know the context. It has taken six decades of struggle to get General Synod, the governing body of the Church of England, to the point of doing anything positive for lesbian, gay and bisexual church members. The latest education process, begun in 2017, called Living in Love and Faith (LLF) was rolled out in 2020 in all dioceses to air the issues and prepare the way for some kind of positive step. In 2024, General Synod took a decision to go ahead with prayers of blessing for same-sex relationships on an experimental basis. This led to a specially-formed group of opponents, calling themselves ‘The Alliance’, making a threat to leave.
Some of those opponents have since gone ahead and done this, announcing it to the world with great pride, including the Church of England Evangelical Council (CEEC)
They have ‘ordained’ (without proper episcopal authority) people for ministry, people who will not be trained by any recognised route to ordination; those ‘ministers’ will break bread in memory of Jesus (lay presidency at Eucharist is a red line for many Anglicans of all stripes); they are withholding money from their diocese, encouraging others of like mind to do the same; and they are setting up what they call a ‘parallel province’ of bishops, including bishops from overseas, to give alternative episcopal oversight to these activities. They are well-funded and have been preparing this move for some considerable time.
They are doing all this without the authority of the College of Bishops or the General Synod. It is a schism.
When I learnt about this, I had two conflicting emotions. One part of me said: they should go, it will solve a lot of problems. Our divisions have become irreconcilable and unmanageable; their homophobia is getting in the way of justice and giving bad witness to a society that is increasingly at ease with LGB rights. Let them go, so that we who remain can get on with the business of giving full inclusion to LGB members in a sacramental, catholic and apostolic church. The other part of me felt outraged that one part of the body, having lost the argument in General Synod, wants to take its bat away and is taking steps to split the church, causing yet more hurt and division. They proudly call themselves traditional, mainstream, conservative, biblical, faithful, etc, and until now they had the power to foist their prejudices on the rest of us. Now they can no longer do so, they are playing the victim and claiming they have ‘no choice’ but to create a schism. They want to play by their own rules but still stay in General Synod in order to obstruct progress towards inclusion. The hypocrisy! This part of me feels they should be disciplined, their licences removed, their positions given to others.
Two conflicting emotions: kick them out, or rein them in.
A strange silence…
There has been a strange silence from most of the organisations representing Christian LGB people in the UK. Neither OneBodyOneFaith (formerly LGCM), nor Inclusive Church, nor Via Media, and not even Together for the C of E, the coalition recently formed to campaign and support the General Synod’s decision on same-sex blessings, have made any statement at all. Nor have any of the Bishops directly involved. Inclusive Evangelicals has posted one blog criticising the CEEC and the ‘ordinations’ – mainly on the grounds that all seven candidates were white.
Revd Colin Coward, a retired priest and psychotherapist, founder of Changing Attitude and a regular blogger on the issue, is the only public figure to have voiced his concerns. He draws attention to the spiritual pride and homophobia inherent in the schismatic actions.
Individual members of the Church of England have expressed a range of reactions. Rev Charlie Bell, a priest, writer and prominent LGBT campaigner, argues that the leaders of the schismatic churches should have their licences removed. Others, such as Rev Robert Thompson, also a priest and leading campaigner, has suggested that if withholding money from the diocese goes unpunished, his own parish and others might also consider this option in order to challenge the bishops to speak out. These and other comments can be found on Facebook. One respondent in a discussion thread offered the view that maybe the schismatics should be allowed to stay, so as to show them the charity and inclusion they manifestly fail to show us.
Challenging The Alliance
Now it happens that I am acquainted with one of The Alliance signatories (there were 27 in the original letter, though some have since been redacted) and was genuinely shocked to see his name at the foot of a letter threatening schism. I asked if he would see me, and so I went in fear and trembling to meet him. I shrink from confrontation, but I also react strongly to injustice. I was anxious in case my demeanour in the meeting would either be too nicey-nicey or too aggressive – I can sometimes go either way. I prayed and meditated to find balance. As it turned out, our conversation was cordial, but it was not a meeting of minds. I did say to him that his discriminatory position on LGB issues was bad theology. He did tell me that, if asked, he would not bless my civil partnership because it was against scripture. (I have written elsewhere on the misuse of Matthew 19 in this regard.)
I came away with at least six unanswered questions, which I think could be put publicly to any signatory of The Alliance’s letter. They are:
- Is the church’s treatment of LGB members sinful, in the view of Alliance signatories and CEEC leaders?
- Do the Alliance and the CEEC speak out against the murderous homophobia in some other parts of the Anglican communion, eg Nigeria, Uganda?
- Some leading evangelicals claim to feel bullied and/or pressured by the General Synod decision. They say they do not trust the assurances given that they will not be pressured to bless same-sex relationships against their conscience. They do not trust the wider CofE to maintain their parishes and ordination training routes free of doctrinal impurity. It is hard to reconcile this with the evangelicals’ claim to have the best parish growth model and the largest number of candidates for ordination. Can both these claims be true?
- The signatories claim that experimental same-sex blessings are a change in doctrine in an essential matter (this usually means doctrines like the Trinity, incarnation and resurrection) and should therefore have been considered under a different procedure in General Synod – a ‘B2’ proposal, requiring a two-thirds majority in each house. (The proposals were approved under ‘B5’, which requires only a simple majority.) It is clear that what they really wanted was to stop the proposals from being approved. Will they acknowledge that their preference for ‘B2’ is in reality a device to prevent blessings from being approved?
- Is it fair that some parishes will withhold their parish share and create their own non-authorised episcopal oversight, yet still remain part of the C of E, voting in General Synod?
- Are they willing to recognise that the views broadcast by these evangelical clergy (on LLF and the General Synod decision) are not necessarily shared by the lay people in their parishes?
No doubt there are other pertinent questions which will occur to readers. I think we can profitably address a range of critical questions on the public-facing websites and social media accounts of St Helen’s Bishopsgate, All Souls Langham Place, the CEEC – The Church of England Evangelical Council, and all signatories of the Alliance letter.
That way, we will at least be calling out the double standards and we might make some of them think again about their actions. It is not much, but it is something.
Thank you for any appropriate action you are willing to take. LGB Christians would be grateful to be informed, in confidence, unless declared otherwise.
About Mark Chater
Mark is a theologian and educationalist. He lives with his same-sex partner in Westmorland. He is retired from a 40-year career as a teacher, researcher, civil servant and charity CEO.
Q. Why is Mark a member of LGB Christians?
A. In some churches and religious schools, our love is not recognised. We are under attack from two directions: reactionary theology with a wrong understanding of scripture, and spurious gender ideology with little or no regard for scientific reality. Both are hostile to same-sex love. We see many examples of this. Here are three examples that bother me:
- I see people in churches and religious schools still being told that God disapproves of their desire.
- I see my sisters being told they cannot govern their own spaces and the words they use for themselves.
- And I see my brothers and sisters, in and out of the churches, being bullied, censored, cancelled and persecuted if they insist on their rights.
Same-sex love is real and good, it is a part of God’s creation, it has won its rights through hard struggle, and is making its positive contribution to churches and society.
Q. What else has Mark written?
A. Mark has written or edited eight books, including Jesus Christ, Learning Teacher: where theology and pedagogy meet (SCM Press, 2020), Reforming RE: Power and knowledge in a worldviews curriculum (John Catt, 2020), which was followed by a series of teachers’ blogs on the Reforming RE website; and he contributed chapters for On the Subject of Values and the Value of Subjects (John Catt, 2022).
Q. How does Mark see the wider picture?
A. The struggle for LGB rights in the church is not over. Many organisations that formerly stood up for us have been distracted by other agendas. We need to keep standing up for the goodness of same-sex desire, for good theology, intelligent use of scripture, inclusive pastoral practice, for free and courteous speech. We need to help make these the hallmarks of mainstream churches, as well as church schools and Christian universities. Some churches have broken through into equality; others need a continuing, challenging engagement from us; some churches have slipped backwards into intolerance and hypocrisy. To address this takes persistence and patience.
Q. What is Mark’s manifesto?
A. All of us, straight and LGB, allies and friends, religious and secular, can work together to:
- Guard young LGBs against bullying and manipulation
- Protect teenagers from the pressure to go to war against their own body and sexuality
- Speak up for the good reality of biological sex and the good diversities of sexual attraction
- Treat the Bible as a rich, complex revelation, as sacred literature written in specific times and places, not as a magical manual for controlling other people’s love
- Respect same-sex love, respect the reality of biological sex, respect equality, respect freedom of belief – all of them part of God’s creation.
Q. How does Mark see the wider picture?
A. The struggle for LGB rights in the church is not over. Many organisations that formerly stood up for us have been distracted by other agendas. We need to keep standing up for the goodness of same-sex desire, for good theology, intelligent use of scripture, inclusive pastoral practice, for free and courteous speech.
We need to help make these the hallmarks of mainstream churches, as well as church schools and Christian universities. Some churches have broken through into equality; others need a continuing, challenging engagement from us; some churches have slipped backwards into intolerance and hypocrisy. To address this takes persistence and patience.