The Parting of Friends?
3. Anglicans and Sex
Introduction
We have seen in the first two lectures how the Anglican
Communion grew up almost 'by accident': as, we might say, 'the
Church of England overseas' (in the old Empire, and in
chaplaincies) but also as 'the Anglican Church abroad' (through
Scotland to the United States). The historical lineage is clear:
almost all the varied churches of the Anglican Communion trace
their origins back to the church in England, to the sixteenth
century Book of Common Prayer and to Cranmer's Ordinal. Through
this historical tradition run the threads that identify the member
churches of the Anglican Communion as part of the one, holy,
catholic and apostolic Church, of which the Roman Catholic and the
Orthodox Churches are also expressions. We have seen how important
for Anglicans have been these threads as they are identified in the
'Lambeth Quadrilateral': the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New
Testament as 'containing all things necessary to salvation' and as
being the rule and ultimate standard of faith; the Apostles' Creed
as the Baptismal Symbol and the Nicene Creed as 'the sufficient
statement of the Christian faith'; the two Sacraments ordained by
Christ himself - Baptism and the Supper of the Lord; and 'the
historic Episcopate, locally adapted in the methods of its
administration to the varying needs of the nations and peoples
called of God into the unity of his Church '. We have also seen
some of the difficulties in interpreting exactly how to identify
what the Holy Scriptures do 'contain' and what we mean by 'the
historic Episcopate, locally adapted'.
We have noted that what holds Anglicans together is not just our
adherence to these marks of Christian tradition but the
contemporary structures which operate as 'instruments of unity':
the Lambeth Conferences of all the bishops, held every ten years
since 1867; the Anglican Consultative Council; the regular meetings
of the primates of the provinces; and the ministry of the
Archbishop of Canterbury. We have seen that these are basically
consultative structures and that there are few powers of
coercion at any level. The exercise of authority within the
Anglican Communion is largely through consultation, rarely through
coercion. The way Anglicans experience authority was classically
described at the 1948 Lambeth Conference in the following way:
The positive nature of the authority which binds the Anglican
Communion together is ... moral and spiritual, resting on the truth
of the Gospel, and on a charity that is patient and willing to
defer its common mind.
Authority, as inherited by the Anglican Communion from the ...
church of the early centuries of the Christian era, is single in
that it is derived from a single divine source, and reflects within
itself the richness and historicity of the divine Revelation, the
authority of the eternal Father, the incarnate Son, and the
life-giving Spirit. It is dispersed among Scripture, Tradition,
Creeds, the Ministry of the Word and Sacraments, the witness of
saints, and the consensus fidelium, which is the continuing
experience of the Holy Spirit through the faithful in the
church.
What may be surprising to us about this definition is that,
though it talks of the 'common mind' of the Anglican Communion, of
the Ministry of the Word and Sacraments, the witness of saints, and
the consensus fidelium', it does not speak about the role of
the bishops in forming and expressing that common mind. Yet the
role of the bishops is proving crucial in developing our
understanding of what it is to be Anglican. The resolutions of
Lambeth Conferences, where all the bishops meet together, and the
statements of the primates are the nearest thing Anglicans have to
a magisterium. The problem we have is that certain churches of the
Anglican Communion, even certain provinces, refuse to be bound by
them.
The question, then, of our understanding of what it is to be a
bishop, of who can be a member of 'the historic Episcopate' and how
the historic Episcopate may be 'locally adapted in its
administration to the varying needs of the nations and peoples
called of God into the unity of his Church' is central to the
current disputes within the Anglican Communion. Last week, we
looked at the issues surrounding women in the episcopate; this week
I shall be looking particularly at the issues surrounding the
ordination of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003.
The Ordination of Gene Robinson and its Sequel
The ordination of Gene Robinson was, then, an ordination to that
'historic episcopate' of which the Lambeth Quadrilateral speaks. He
was selected and ordained in accordance with the canons of the
Episcopal Church of the United States of America (ECUSA), but to
many both in the United States and beyond it he was a surprising
choice. To understand that surprise we have to say a word more
about what it is to be a bishop.
[1]
It could be
said that the role of the bishop is to represent the whole of the
local church to God, and the whole of God's truth to the local
church. In this sense, the bishop's role is both apostolic and
catholic. The bishop's responsibility is to ensure that the local
church remains faithful to the 'apostles' teaching' and fully
participant in the life of the whole ('catholic') church which is
living according to that teaching. This is why it is vital that the
bishop both has the full confidence of the local church - the
bishop should not be someone who divides but someone who unites -
and plays their part within the episcope of the wider
church. From the earliest times two practices of the church have
symbolised these roles: first, the cry of the people at the
ordination 'axios estin' ('he is worthy') and, secondly, the
practice of ordination by three bishops in good standing, so that
there is always an overlapping tradition of episcope to
ensure faithful succession.
Against this background, we can see that the election of Gene
Robinson was problematic on two fronts. First, he is divorced. He
has publicly said that he and his wife divorced by mutual consent.
In many parts of the world, including England, the fact that
someone is divorced, especially divorced without alleging fault by
the other party, would raise questions about his being fitted for
episcopacy.
[2]
To my mind, this is quite as serious
an issue as Robinson's being actively homosexual, and one that has
been much less discussed. The English bishops make it clear in
Issues in Human Sexualitythat they expect a higher standard
of sexual discipline in the clergy than the laity precisely because
of the representational role of the clergy within the church. We
need to ask whether it is right that in some parts of the Anglican
Communion a divorced person would be eligible to become a bishop
whereas in other parts they would not. Should there be some common
standard in canon law on this issue?
The issue, though, that has attracted much more publicity is
that Robinson made it publicly known, before his election, that he
is in a sexually active, committed homosexual relationship. I shall
say more about Christian tradition and its attitude to
homosexuality later in this lecture, but here we can note that at
the 1998 Lambeth Conference there was a major debate on sexuality.
In the conference report the bishops confessed that they were 'not
of one mind about homosexuality'.
[3]
In the
resolutions they made it clear that they rejected homosexual
practice as 'incompatible with Scripture' and that they could not
'advise the legitimising or blessing of same sex unions nor
ordaining those involved in same gender unions'.
[4]
On the one hand, they called on 'all our people to minister
pastorally and sensitively to all irrespective of sexual
orientation and to condemn irrational fear of homosexuals, violence
within marriage and any trivialisation and commercialisation of
sex'. On the other, the concerns of those strongly opposed to any
departure from the traditional teaching on homosexuality, as
expressed in a number of resolutions, were noted.
[5]
This was a very difficult area for the whole
conference, the treatment of which left many on both sides in the
debate unhappy or hurt. However, the compromise reached did not
give grounds for any individual province of the Anglican Communion
to ordain a practising homosexual to episcopal ministry, nor to
allow the blessing of same-sex unions.
[6]
The
debate had, however, shown how deeply the issue was felt on both
sides, and how divisive it would be if the issue were pressed by
any single province. Nevertheless, the process by which Gene
Robinson was elected and consecrated as Bishop of New Hampshire was
entirely according to the canon law of ECUSA and the Presiding
Bishop was one of the co-consecrators.
Once more, there is an issue besides the immediate issue of
Robinson's homosexuality which troubled many in America and in
other parts of the Anglican Communion: did a number of American
bishops gave their assent to a resolution at Lambeth by which they
should have been morally if not legally bound? What was the force
of 'could not advise'? Did that amount to a prohibition? If the
body of American bishops knew they would not be at liberty to
resist the processes by which a homosexual bishop might be elected
and consecrated, should they ever have agreed to Lambeth resolution
1:10, and if they had given their assent how could they then
reconcile that with the position in which they found themselves at
the General Convention which confirmed Robinson's election? If,
then, a resolution of the Lambeth Conference cannot have the force
to bind bishops who assent to it (let alone those who do not) do
Anglicans have at provincial level the canon law which is necessary
to sustain the Anglican Communion as such? Central to any
discussion about a proposed Covenant for Anglicans must be the
issue to which provinces of the Anglican Communion should be bound
by undertakings made at a supra-provincial, or 'Communion',
level.
[7]
At this point, I think it would be helpful for me to say briefly
how events have unfolded since the consecration of Gene Robinson on
November 2 2003. In response to a request from the Primates, who
met together in October 2003, the Archbishop of Canterbury set up a
Commission to examine the consequences for the future of the
Anglican Communion of this action (and that of the Diocese of New
Westminster, which had authorised services for the blessing of
same-sex unions).
[8]
A year later the Windsor
Report appeared.
The Windsor Report begins with a study of 'healthy discernment
within the Communion' before discussing the current situation in
terms of 'illness'. On the 'Instruments of Unity' (Archbishop of
Canterbury, Lambeth Conference, Anglican Consultative Council,
Primates' Meeting) it does not recommend 'the accumulation of
formal power ... or the establishment of any kind of central
"curia" for the Communion'. It recommends that the Archbishop
should be able 'to speak directly to any provincial situation on
behalf of the Communion where this is deemed advisable' and that
his right to invite or not to invite whomsoever he wishes to the
Lambeth Conference and the Primates' meeting should be clarified.
It commends the development of a Statement of the Principles of
Anglican Law and the creation of 'communion law' by individual
provinces to govern their relations with the rest of the Communion.
Finally, it recommends the adoption by the member churches of the
Anglican Communion of an Anglican Covenant, and in an appendix
provides a model for such a Covenant.
On the specifics of the current crisis, the Episcopal Church
(USA) is invited to express its regret that 'the proper constraints
of the bonds of affection' were breached in the consecration of
Gene Robinson; that pending such expressions of regret those who
took part as consecrators of Gene Robinson 'should withdraw
themselves from representative functions in the Anglican
Communion'; that the Episcopal Church (USA) 'be invited to effect a
moratorium on the election and consent to the consecration of any
candidate to the episcopate who is living in a same gender union
until some new consensus in the Anglican Communion emerges'. On the
blessing of same sex unions, the Commission calls for 'a moratorium
on all such public Rites' and recommends that 'Bishops who have
authorised such rites in the United States and Canada be invited to
express regret that the proper constraints of the bonds of
affection were breached by such authorisation'. Pending such
expression of regret, these bishops are 'invited to consider in all
conscience whether they should withdraw themselves from
representative functions in the Anglican Communion'. There are
similar words of admonition for bishops who have exercised pastoral
care of dissenting groups without the consent of the diocesan
bishop.
[9]
The Windsor Report, is, in effect, a report on the understanding
of communion within the Anglican Communion in the face of an
unprecedented crisis. At the following Primates' Meeting (February
2005)
[10]
the Episcopal Church (USA) and the
Anglican Church of Canada were asked to withdraw their members from
the Anglican Consultative Council in the period leading up to the
next Lambeth Conference (2008); both churches were asked to respond
to questions specifically put to them by the Windsor Report; the
Archbishop of Canterbury was asked to establish a 'panel of
reference' to supervise the adequacy of pastoral provision for
groups in dispute with their bishop'; and the Primates committed
themselves at the same time 'neither to encourage nor to initiate
cross-boundary interventions'. In addition representatives of the
Episcopal Church (USA) and the Anglican Church of Canada were
invited to the next meeting of the Anglican Consultative Council in
June 2005 specifically 'to set out the thinking behind the recent
actions of their Provinces'. The Primates were cautiously
supportive of the notion of an Anglican Covenant, and saw this as a
project to be prepared for the next Lambeth Conference.
The position of ECUSA has now been set out in a paper entitled
To Set Our Hope on Christ.
[11]
This is a
thoughtful and constructive theological essay, which engages with
the key Biblical texts that seem to prohibit same-sex relations,
especially male homosexuality. The governing hermeneutic is that of
Acts 10-15: 'What seems to have convinced the rest of the Church
[that the Gentiles could be baptized] is Peter's credibility as a
witness (on behalf of Cornelius and the rest) that the gifts of the
Holy Spirit were indeed present among them, that they were living
lives of holiness, understood differently, but holy lives
nevertheless.'
[12]
On homosexual relationships,
the document argues, 'It seems very likely that there was no
phenomenon in the time of the biblical writers directly akin to the
phenomenon of Christians of the same gender living together in
faithful and committed lifelong unions as we experience this
today.' Thus the Biblical condemnations of various forms of
homosexuality are taken to be beside the point: the point is rather
that Christ offers, through the cross, the possibility to all in
committed relationships of living a holy life - as many of those in
same-sex relations demonstrate. Defending the legitimacy of the
identification by the local church community of Gene Robison as an
appropriate and worthy person to be Bishop of New Hampshire, the
document argues that 'the particular form in which the holiness of
Christ may be recognized in candidates for ministry is an element
significantly determined by the painstaking discernment of the
local community.'
[13]
The document could hardly be
read as an expression of regret for the actions taken by ECUSA, but
it is a clear and carefully argued apologia for what has
been done. How it is being received elsewhere within the Anglican
Communion, and especially at the Lambeth Conference, is a matter of
current debate.
Why is Homosexuality such a problem for Anglicans?
The fundamental reason that homosexuality has become such a
problem for Anglicans is that, whereas attitudes towards
homosexuality in societies influenced by Christianity have in the
past been uniformly condemnatory, this position has changed
considerably, especially in the developed world. There is now a
substantial body of Christians, particularly but not exclusively in
the developed world, who believe the Church is wrong to sustain its
traditional condemnation of homosexual practice, and that it
should, with repentance and humility, welcome those in committed
homosexual relationships amongst its members and leaders. This is
the position of those in ECUSA who supported the consecration of
Gene Robinson.
There are other Christians who see no reason to change the way
the Church of the East and West have been united in condemnation of
homosexual practice throughout Christian tradition. There is a
substantial and vocal minority within ECUSA who take this position,
which is widely held, especially amongst Evangelicals throughout
the Anglican Communion.
In order better to understand the nature of the disagreement
between these two points of view, both of them passionately held,
we shall have, briefly and sketchily, to review the arguments for
the traditional teaching.
1. The Scriptural evidence. There are a number of relevant texts
and passages, the clearest of which are in Leviticus and Romans. In
Leviticus we read, 'You shall not lie with a male as with a woman;
it is an abomination' (18:22) and 'If a man lies with a male as
with a woman it is an abomination' (20:13). When, in the New
Testament, in lists of unacceptable behaviour, there is mention of
'male prostitutes' (1 Cor 6:9, NRSV) and 'sodomites' (1 Cor 6:9, 1
Tim 1:10 NRSV), the precise meaning of 'male prostitutes'
(malakoi) is unclear,
[14]
but the unusual
Greek word translated 'sodomites' (arsenokoitai) seems to
refer back to the Greek translation of the Hebrew texts in
Leviticus that we have mentioned. Thus the New Testament seems
directly to affirm what is taught in Leviticus.
One crucial narrative passage of the Old Testament which has
been taken to proscribe homosexual practice is Genesis 19: 1-14.
This is usually thought to describe the attempted homosexual rape
of Lot's two angelic visitors by the men of Sodom. If this is
correct, the sin of the men of Sodom would then have been, not the
attempted homosexual act alone, but primarily the violent and
shocking abuse of hospitality. However, it is argued that when the
sin of the men of Sodom is referred to in later texts of the Bible
(Ezek 16:49-50; Jude 7; 2 Peter 2:6-10), there is the suggestion
that it had a homosexual element.
[15]
In the New Testament there is one other passage which refers to
homosexual practice, both male and female. At the beginning of
Romans Paul expounds the ways in which human beings 'by their
wickedness suppress the truth' (Rom 1:18). He argues that certain
things about God - 'his eternal power and divine nature' - are
evident to humans in the creation, but they suppress this
truth:
For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their
women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same
way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were
consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts
with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for
their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God
gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be
done. (Rom 1:24-27)
After this there follows a catalogue of human wrongdoing (which
says nothing further about homosexuality) and then an exploration
of the way in which human beings can be redeemed from wrongdoing by
the Gospel.
Far more, though, than focusing on isolated proscriptions of
certain types of sexual behaviour, as we try to assess why
Scriptural teaching has been taken to be so strongly against
homosexuality, we should note the positive teaching in the Bible
about the complementarity of male and female, and the blessings of
sexual union in marriage and of procreation. Issues in Human
Sexuality, the Statement by the House of Bishops made in 1991,
speaks of 'an evolving convergence on the ideal of lifelong,
monogamous, heterosexual union as the setting intended by God for
the proper development of men and women as sexual beings', so that
'sexual activity of any kind outside marriage comes to be seen as
sinful, and homosexual practice as especially
dishonourable'.
[16]
In response to the traditional reading of Scripture on
homosexuality, a number of points are often made:
First, and perhaps most telling: those who wrote the Bible had
no conception of homosexual orientation as it is understood today.
The texts we have noted present homosexuality in terms of sexual
acts, not in terms of homosexual commitment, personality,
orientation or relationship. The Bible, it is often argued, has no
conception of the homophile person, who looks for the love
of a person of their own sex, and for the sexual expression of that
love in the context of mutual commitment.
What the Bible does have is a powerful stress on the blessings
of mutual commitment in relationship, which links with the
fundamental theme of the covenant-commitment in love between Israel
and God. In the Biblical context it is simply presupposed that for
human beings this is a heterosexual commitment. It is an
unquestioned assumption that the concern with heterosexuality is a
concern for the boundaries that God has established in the natural
world. Commentators on the prohibitions in Leviticus against 'a man
lying with a male as with a woman' sometimes point out that this is
in the context of other prohibitions against what are seen as the
breach of God-given boundaries or patterns within nature: 'You
shall keep my statutes. You shall not let your animals breed with a
different kind; you shall not sow your seed with two kinds of seed;
nor shall you put on a garment made of two different kinds of
materials' (Lev 19:19). If Christians see these laws as
inapplicable to them, why should they not see similar teaching in
Leviticus about sexual boundaries as similarly superseded?
Further, it is argued that on other major issues, Christians
have come to read the Bible very differently from the way it has
been read in the past. One obvious example is slavery: until the
eighteenth century it was widely accepted that because the Bible
let assumptions about slavery in its text go unchallenged and even
told believers how to be 'good slaves', Christians could and should
accept the institution of slavery. Few Christians anywhere would
now defend this interpretation of Biblical teaching. Another
example would be the use of the Bible to defend the death penalty;
another the changing understanding of what the Bible has to teach
about the equality of women and men and the proper place for women
in ministerial leadership, especially as bishops.
In each of these cases, Christians have appealed to an array of
texts to support teaching that has been accepted for many hundreds
of years. Only gradually have other readers of the Bible begun to
prioritise other texts and other Biblical principles which resonate
with new concerns and offer new responses to old questions. Thus,
when people began seriously to ask whether slaves really were
people in the fullest sense, the theme of the image of God, as seen
in all humans, came to the fore, and with that a new understanding
of the dignity with which any being made in the image of God should
be treated. Once doubt has been raised about the right of human
beings to impose the death penalty on other humans, the theme of
life as the gift of God, and the prerogative of God alone to take
life, comes to the fore. Once there has been a deep realization of
the equality of women and men in Christ, the texts which enjoin
that women should remain silent in church must be contextualized
and re-read. The questions which change attitudes on questions such
as these (all of which are about how we view other human beings)
usually come from outside the Christian tradition; they challenge
the Church as to whether there is a new, God-given insight in what
is being argued, an insight which resonates with hitherto subdued
Biblical themes, or whether the Bible cannot responsibly be aligned
with the proffered insight, and Christians must reject it.
In the case of teaching about sexuality, the key question is
obviously, in what ways the Bible itself supports a critical
'bracketing' of teaching that the Church has hitherto accepted. For
example, we could point to the example of the committed friendship
between David and Jonathan (cf. 2 Sam. 1:26: 'Your love to me was
wonderful, passing the love of women'), but there is nothing to
indicate that the friendship is one that involves sexual activity.
We could argue that the fact that there is no recorded comment or
teaching from Jesus in the Gospels that homosexual practice was not
an issue for him - but it is far more likely he did not wish to
challenge the assumptions and attitudes of his time. We could point
to Jesus' welcome for the marginalised and the oppressed and the
relevance of what has been called the 'Nazareth manifesto' for all
such groups, including homosexual and bisexual people:
'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour.'
(Luke 4:18-21)
However, this falls far short of a proclamation that homosexual
commitment is now to be affirmed.
2. The evidence from tradition. What recent study of the
tradition has shown is the extent to which homosexual attraction,
and even homosexual commitment has been accommodated within the
Western Christian tradition, though not with the explicit
endorsement of sexual activity. Recent studies have raised the
question of the extent to which committed same-sex friendships were
recognised and even blessed by the Church. The claim is made that
though the Church was ostensibly hostile to homosexuality, both
male and female, its pastoral practice has been far more
accommodating and affirmative of committed homosexual
relations.
[17]
The hostility of the Church towards homosexuality has been
explicitly based on the understanding that there is something
intrinsically 'disordered' about such activity and commitment: it
does not fit within the order of male and female that God has
created. More than that, is a subversion of that order and is
therefore to be seen as sinful. But where society, and Christians,
as members of that society, no longer share the perception and the
assumption that there is an obvious inbuilt 'order' (whether
hierarchical, or 'structural') in nature and society the
presupposition upon which much traditional hostility to
homosexuality is based falls away. Thus, the changes in the
contemporary world (predominantly, of course the wealthy, western
world), where traditional ideas of an obvious 'order' in nature and
society are now widely questioned or rejected, have led to the
widespread rejection - and incomprehension - of the traditional
teaching.
3. The contemporary world. This is the point at which many
Christians, thinking about these issues, would wish to start - not
with the negative words of Scripture, which have become so deeply
embedded in Christian tradition, but with the positive discovery of
homosexual commitment as something to be celebrated. This has been
central to the self-presentation of Gene Robinson and of ECUSA.
Behind this lies a huge relief and joy at being able to confront,
and to begin to move beyond, the negative and damaging attitudes
towards homosexual people which have been prevalent in much of
Christian history. The change in public attitudes in Britain has
been evidenced by the popularity of civil partnerships, which, if
not 'gay marriages', are certainly perceived as such in the popular
media. It is this public legitimation of committed gay
relationships, more than any other factor, which is changing public
attitudes. Increasingly, in a society of ever-increasing diversity,
people do not see why there is a problem here for the churches or
for anyone else; why, if people choose such a partnership, the
church should not accept this as do others in society. And of
course there are those within the churches who enter into civil
partnerships and those within the churches who ask not only why the
church should have a problem with civil partnerships but why it
should not bless such partnerships. Conversely, there are those,
both within the developed and developing world, who are taken
aback, surprised, or puzzled by such suggestions and who see in
them a call to move away from the moral teaching of the Christian
faith, which has been faithfully communicated over many
generations.
The Problem of Unity: Ways Forward for the Anglican Communion
I hope that in this lecture I have been able to show why this is
such a troubling and difficult issue for the Anglican Communion. It
is not that teaching about sex is the most important area to
Christians: the Bible has far more to say about justice than is
does about sex. However, the convictions on this issue are so
deeply held on both sides of this debate that it is it is extremely
difficult to see where there can be any middle ground. Those who
oppose a change in the church's teaching on homosexuality sometimes
speak in the strongest terms. To quote one of the most respected,
John Stott: 'Ultimately, it is a crisis of faith: whom shall we
believe? God or the world? Shall we submit to the Lordship of
Jesus, or succumb to the pressures of prevailing culture?'
[18]
Words like these show why this is an issue on which
Anglicans cannot simply agree to differ. Many defenders of the
traditional teaching see this as an issue about the integrity of
their whole Christian commitment - as do those on those on the
opposite side of the debate. This is why there are new alignments
emerging within Anglicanism of those who are making traditional
teaching on sexual discipline a yardstick of orthodoxy in a way it
has never been before.
What then, faced by the beginning of what may be a very serious
'Parting of Friends,' is there to hope for? Not a simple agreement
to 'live and let live', as this would be to cease to wrestle with
the underlying issues of truth and fidelity to the Gospel that I
have tried to illuminate. Certainly: to have learnt much about the
failings of the Church in its ministry to all people in their
sexuality, and particularly to those of a homosexual orientation.
Certainly: a commitment to continue the 'listening process' which
came out of the Lambeth Conference 1998, in which the churches
committed themselves to listen attentively and humbly to the
experience of homosexual people. Certainly: a sustained commitment
to our shared Anglican inheritance as a way of learning what is to
be the Body of Christ, and individually disciples of Jesus. And a
readiness to acknowledge that we have much to learn from each other
about new ways of reading the Bible and interpreting Christian
tradition. I suspect that despite all this, we shall see the shape
and nature of the Anglican Communion change so that it becomes more
like a federation of churches with an Anglican lineage - but not, I
trust, churches that have given up on the hope of visible,
eucharistic unity with one another and with Christians of other
traditions. Above all, if, faced by the prospect of parting, we
discover afresh how much our Anglican inheritance means to us,
perhaps we shall discover even more how much we need one
another, regardless of gender, sexuality or race. We are told that,
'Those who say, ìI love God", and hate their brothers or
sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister
whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen.' (1
John 4:20). Friends, we should take heed.
Footnotes
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