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Some reflections on A Way Forward,

the report of the Working Group established


by Motion 30 of General Synod 2014 1
Les Brighton

Preliminary considerations
The Working Groups report needs to be considered in the light of the full text of Motion
30 itself. There it was recognised that two strongly-held views on the matter of samegender relationships exist within the Church. The Motion protected the rights of each
group to hold and to practice what they believe to be right on the matter, within the
unity of the one Church. The second half of the Motion dealt with the situation of only
one of those groups: those who wish to have the right to formally bless right-ordered
same-gender relationships. The Working Group was charged with recommending a
process and structure whereby such blessings could be made legal, and to propose a
new liturgy for that purpose. The only responsibility of the Working Group for the other
group, those who believe the blessing of same-gender relationships to be contrary to
Scripture and doctrine, was to protect their legal rights to hold and to teach that view.
It is important for those who hold the Churchs historic view to recognise this. Any
criticism of the Report is criticism of a viewpoint that is by definition different from
ours. Motion 30 is, I believe, Gods gift to the Church. It requires those of diverging views
to recognise and honour the integrity of those who, before God, believe something
different. The Working Groups Report outlines the philosophy and theology lying
behind the normalising approach alone. As such, it exposes those views to comment and
discussion. I suggest that such discussion needs to be conducted with respect and
openness to learn. We might consider the ways in which the historic view might be
articulated in the contemporary situation, and whether the current way in which we
hear it presented would stand up to the kind of scrutiny to which inevitably the Report
exposes the normalising approach. Criticism of the views of others is not enough. We
need also think about how we should be presenting what we in fear and trembling
believe to be Gods word on the matter in a way that is joyful, theologically convincing,
and grace-filled.
What then are we to say about the Report? I think there are a number of things that we
can gratefully affirm. On the other hand, the tendentiousness and shallowness of the
biblical and theological material offered must be pointed out. And, while admittedly the
terms of the Working Party were limited, there are one or more elephants in the room
that are not even mentioned in the Report. One wonders whether the narrowness of
focus in the current Church debate has blinded us to them altogether.

What we need to be grateful for


(1) The report is completely clear that a service of marriage for same-gender couples is
not in question. The Working Party reports that because General Synod upheld the
traditional doctrine of marriage [this] precluded any provision being made for samesex couples to be married in Anglican churches. (p.1) They, not without pastoral
concern, note that this will fall short of some Christians same-sex couples hopes,
because they cannot be married in church. (p.13)
This is a bottom-line fact in any consideration of the Report. What is being proposed is
the recognition of and prayer for blessing upon a civil marriage, that is, a covenant
partnership the formal establishment of which has taken place elsewhere. As such, and
in spite of the problematic theological argumentation in the rest of the report, the actual
outcome is a pastoral provision, not a theological decision. This is a crucial distinction in
the discussion, and one to which we will return.
(2) The one place where the otherwise weak theological Section 5 shines is in the
paragraph on the principle of Covenant, which is excellent. With regard to same-gender
partnerships the Working Party notes a precedent from the missional cross-cultural
situation:
Covenant entails constancy and faithfulness in love, which we know as a blessing
from God and a revelation of Gods self Precisely because the institutional
blessing authorises what is theologically mimetic (that is, it mirrors or
represents the character of God) we can understand that constancy allows, and
even demands, that existing polygamous marriage relationships of converts are
most properly to be honoured, and second and third wives are not sent away.
The Anglican Church was correct when it made this possible, not simply because
it avoided possible pain and persecution of the women in such marriages in
particular, but because it mirrored Gods constancy in love and faithfulness.
Likewise, while it seems irregular to some, to others it may appear that same-sex
couples can manifest a godly constancy through committed life-long
relationships. (p.17)
The discussion in this clause of Section Five feels different in tone and content to things
that are said elsewhere in the report. However that may be, this precedent, and the
theological principle involved, seems to me to be important for those who hold the
historic position to consider before too quickly judging those who seek to meet a
pastoral reality by affirming an already existing covenanted relationship.
(3) Finally, the answer to the question When we speak of two integrities how can we
also speak of the unity of the Church? (p. 6ff.) is also in my view excellent, and worthy
of serious pondering by those who hold a position on single-gender relationships
different from that expressed in the Report. The key issue is whether we are dealing
with a second-order matter (where different views can be held in mutual respect and
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learning) or a first-order one (where there is such a fundamental difference in our


formally expressed understanding of God that unity did not in fact exist.) It is my view
that when we are thinking of the recognition within a particular congregation of a
previously contracted covenant relationship as a pastoral response (using that term
without the patronising connotations it could be seen to have; it is hard to find another),
then we are dealing with a second-order matter, something upon which we can agree to
disagree within the unity of the body of Christ. If, however, we are attempting to
construct a doctrine of same-gender marriage along the lines that the theological
section of the Report suggests we might, then we are dealing with a first-order matter,
because what is at issue is the character of God. The theological section goes further, it
seems to me, than support of the Rite of blessing strictly requires. It is an apology for
Christian same-gender marriage, whereas the Rite is explicitly not that. I think the
distinction is important.

The theological justification


With the best will in the world, and recognising the good intentions of those involved,
the way biblical material is used and the theological argumentation in the Report is
often weak and at times deplorable. It is true that this is not a first-order examination of
the issue. A position has already been arrived at, and biblical and theological arguments
are being mustered in order to explain and defend it. One wonders though, whether
even the writers feel completely happy about it. Are they convinced by their own
arguments? Do they feel that clarity and freedom that comes from finding a firm
foundation for thought in obedience to the living God? Or is there, alongside an
undoubtedly sincere belief in their position, a bit of unease about this patchwork of
arguments?
Take the way in which the bible is used, for example. The Report opens on page 1 with
quotations from Galatians 3:28 and John 13:34. Is it responsible to use a quotation from
Paul as a banner over this discussion, when we are fully aware that in the two or three
cases that he discussed issues of human sexuality it is clear that he considered samegender sexual activity to be contrary to the will of God and damaging to persons? We
may agree or disagree with Paul about that, but we cannot be honest and use other
things that he said in support of a proposition that we know he would totally repudiate.
Besides, the context makes clear that the Galatians statement has nothing to do with the
blurring of gender differences, and everything to do with the removal of the cultural
distinctions which had meant some were privileged and others second-class citizens in
Gods sight. Using it in the current context is to misuse it.
The new commandment that Jesus gives in John 13 lays claim upon us all. Yet it is not
without profit to note the context here as well: Judas has just left the company. This is
surely something that should exercise all of our hearts. For all of us there is a fork in the
road. A decision needs to be made. It is possible to choose a different sort of obedience

to the kind that leads to the Upper Room. This call to decision is a note that is evident
everywhere in the gospeland nowhere in the Report.
It is always going to be a risky business for a normalising position to appeal to the
creation narrative in Genesis, for it is there, in chapter 1, that we read:
So God created humankind in his image,
in the image of God he created them:
male and female he created them.
The God-likeness of humanity is represented by our gendered complementarity.2 The
Report doesnt go there, though, instead, in clause 2 (p.14) it concentrates on the second
creation account in Genesis 2, and the aloneness that led to the creation of the woman
as a partner for the man. But then follows some extraordinary sleight of hand. Firstly,
the unity, solidarity, mutuality, and equality (Phyllis Tribles description) of the
relationship between the man and the woman are broken away from that context to
become free-floating virtues in their own right. Once that is done they can be identified
as the goal sought by both the same-sex couple [note the order] and the other-sex
couple. And so we can see that this desire looks beyond the surface of a binary,
heteronormative world [that is, of course, the world which the text is describing, the
only world that it knows]. The search really consists not in finding a partner of the
opposite sex but a partner of the apposite sex. It is to this partner that one cleaves in a
union for all of this life.
I find it hard to avoid the anger that bubbles up in me at this carefully worked out piece
of exegetical subterfuge. Not because of the point of view being served by it, which
needs to be considered on its own terms. But because of the intellectual dishonesty
involved in contriving to make a text say precisely the opposite of what it does.
By the way, is it not illegitimate to quote Phyllis Trible and Pope Pius XI as part of a
theological argument in support of same-gender relationships without acknowledging
that the first makes no mention of these (her discussion is as explicitly gendered as the
text she is interpreting3), and the second would have repudiated such relationships
completely?4 A false impression is being created. Rowan Williamss essay is a different
matter; we will come to that in a moment.

Re-defining the terms


A feature of the Report that needs to be pointed out is the way that it seeks to change
the terms of the discussion. The discussion of the Genesis 2 passage is paradigmatic of
one of these changes. The question at issue, we are told, is not the nature of any
relationship, but the quality of it. And of course the quality of a relationship is a very
important thing; who could doubt it? Quality in a relationship is however a slippery
thing to define. If there are differences of temperament, tensions and difficulties within
a marriage, for exampleas there are within every marriage at one time or another
does that mean that the relationship is invalid? Would we counsel separation in such
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cases? Or would we not rather see such challenges whether in the marriages of others
or in our own as under God an opportunity for growth; for courage, love and patient
faithfulness to lead people on into something deeper than theyve known up to now?
And what about a relationship such as the one that Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 5?
We dont know all the details but a possible scenario isnt difficult to imagine. A man
dies leaving his young wife, perhaps a second wife, a widow. She is comforted and
supported by the eldest son, for whom she already has a genuine affection. In due time
their feelings for each other develop, until eventually they are living together as man
and wife. How does the criterion of quality help us here? Whatever the unity, solidarity,
mutuality, and equality that their relationship displays; however strong their mutual
desire and tender and self-giving in their intimate relations are, for Paul at least, and
presumably for us as well, it is the nature of the relationship that is the crucial thing. Of
course, such a relationship is prohibited by current New Zealand law. But what if that
were to change? Same-gender marriage itself has been legal for less than three years. A
striking feature of the Report is that it leaves the definition of right-ordered (another
mantra in the discussion) not to the discernment of the Church, but to the law of New
Zealand. Im in two minds over that. Is it not an abdication of responsibility?
However that may be, that is deeply sobering to note that this particular partnership
was something that, before Pauls letter, the Corinthian church had treated as perfectly
natural (), and even rejoiced in. The example (and this is the only reason I
introduce it) shows that, biblically, the nature of the relationship is primary, and the
quality of iteverywhere emphasised as a gospel imperativeis not at all a secondary,
but is a subsequent thing. Paul has much to say elsewhere about the quality of marriage
relationships, as we know. But the move to shift attention away from the nature of a
relationship by replacing it with the criterion of quality is illegitimate.
The second way in which the Report shifts the discussion is more disturbing. In the
section Gift (p.17) we read this:
The giving of oneself and the receiving evidenced in marriage is a particular
instance of the truth that God creates us to receive our lives as gift, both from
God and from the community we inhabit. The intimacy of marriage is an
intense form of this giving and receiving of selves in the interplay of gift and
giving. The nuptial relationship is a life of donation of oneself into the care of
another. The donation (or gift) of self is a bodily gift. Liturgically this is
symbolised by the careful rubrics around the holding of hands at the exchange of
vows in the 1662 Book of, and Prayer. The resonances are obvious This is my
body given for you.
Is this last sentence not a blasphemous statement? Sadly, it is not a slip of the pen. The
Report quotes Rowan Williams:

The whole story of creation, incarnation and our incorporation into the
fellowship of Christ's body tells us that God desires us, as if we were God, as if we
were that unconditional response to God's giving that God's self makes in the life
of the Trinity. We are created so that we may be caught up in this; so that we may
grow into the wholehearted love of God by learning that God loves us as God
loves God.5
This then is the second way in which the Report seeks to alter the terms of the
discussion. The love of God (in Williams and in this section of the Report) becomes the
desire of God, and that desire is described by analogy with sexual intimacy. Gods agape
for us is re-conceptualised as his eros. From there it is a circular argument: God desires
us; in our embodiment as human beings we express desire most potently in terms of
sexual attraction; human sexual experience therefore becomes a window into the
nature of God, including inter-trinitarian relationships.
The implications of this are steadily spelt out. [The] union of love in the nuptial
relationship is one that echoes Gods bodily (incarnate) commitment to the loving of the
worldThere is, then, something almost necessary and divine in the bodily union of a
couple who are bodily committed to each others ultimate good. (Report p.16, my
emphasis.) I have earlier quoted a section of the Report that speaks of faithfulness and
constancy, in any relationship, as being theologically mimetic, that is, mirroring the
character of God. But what this section of the Report is claiming is that intimate sexual
behaviour is also theologically mimetic. The words of Christ at the institution of the Last
Supper and, in a loving and committed relationship, the act of sexual intercourse reflect
different aspects of the same reality. It is difficult to see what in principle distinguishes
this from the ancient fertility cults.
Although these positions have been developed in defence of the blessing of same-gender
marriage, they cannot be isolated within that discussion. Once established, they must
inform our theology of sexuality in every part. And so in a wonderful way we find we
have achieved a seamless congruence of Christian teaching on sex with the values of the
culture. How ironic this is. As Malcolm Muggeridge said years ago, sex is the mysticism
of materialism. In a de-personalised world, where each individual is not chosen and
intended by God, but the product of random and accidental forces, coming out of the
dark and going into the dark, sexuality is the way in which, for a moment at least, one
can feel that one is real.6 The extraordinary overemphasis and value placed upon
sexuality in our culture seems so obvious. Why would the Church uncritically buy into
that that by creating its own Christianised version of it? The cultures fixation upon
sexuality is the sign of a spiritual void and a bondage of both body and spirit. Have we
not been entrusted with good news to speak into that situation? How can we fail people
by not doing so? How can we fail our Lord? Do we have a prophetic voice to speak into
the culture? Or are we content to provide a pious mechanism for affirming what are
essentially pagan cultural values?

How are we to understand all this?


The creation narrative in Genesis does not conclude with chapters 1 and 2. Chapter 3 is
not mentioned in the Report, yet it is here, I believe, that God speaks his word of
warning into the current debate. Perhaps the best discussion of it I know is in Dietrich
Bonhoeffers book Creation and Temptation. Thinking about the serpents question Did
God say, You shall not eat from any tree of the garden? (3:1) Bonhoeffer points out
that
The decisive point is that this question suggests to man [sic, passim] that he
should go behind the Word of God and establish what it is by himself, out of his
understanding of the being of God The serpent claims to know more about God
than man, who depends upon Gods Word alone. The serpent knows of a greater,
nobler God who does not need such a prohibition. The serpent is evil only as
the religious serpent. [its] question is a thoroughly religious oneWhere evil
appears in its godlessness it is powerless, it is a bogey, we do not need to fear
it.[but] here it is wrapped in the garment of religiousness. The wolf in sheeps
clothing, Satan in an angels form of light: this is the shape appropriate to evil.
Did God say? That plainly is the godless question. It appears innocuous but
through it evil wins power in us, through it we become disobedient to God.
If we met this question in its real godlessness we should be able to resist it. But
that is not the way to attack Christians. They must be approached with God
himself, they must be shown a better, prouder God than they seem to have, if
they are to fall. Man is expected to be the judge of Gods word instead of simply
hearing and doing it. This is accomplished as follows. On the basis of an idea, a
principle, some previously gained knowledge about God, man is now to judge
Gods concrete Word. Only because the question is asked in a way that Adam
can understand it as a new possibility of being for God can it lead him to being
against God.7
It is a chilling and prophetic analysis, and written out of the fire of personal experience.
Bonhoeffer recognises that the Genesis story is not about an event in the past, but about
the temptation that comes to us again and again throughout our life, and to the Church
throughout history. The serpents question which he describes represents, I believe, the
question that we are hearing in the theological section of the Report. And indeed, it is
the question that the writers of the Report themselves are responding to, for these ideas
did not originate with them. They are the fruit of a theological construction effort that
has been going on for the last couple of decades in order to bring theology into line with
a passionately held cultural narrative about same-gender sexuality. The practical and
pastoral question about the incorporation and honouring of Christian brothers and
sisters who have made a covenanted same-gender commitment to each other is a real
question. But that has spilled over into a call for the global revision of our theology.

Pastoral response and theological truth: this is a crucial distinction, and it is one which
the theological section of the Report blurs so dismayingly. A pastoral response, in
whatever form it may take, is required. On the other hand, before the living God to
revise our theology in order to accommodate cultural values is a terrifying impossibility.
And dont we need to ask, is it just possible that the Creator God knows more about
human sexuality than we do? Is it just possible that the restriction on same-gender
sexual activity that we find everywhere the matter comes up in scripture is not a
narrow prejudice, but reflects the loving-kindness of the good God towards people? To
return to the Genesis story, the command not to eat of the Tree was not an arbitrary
demand. Nor was it a test. It was a protection.
If you tell me what you think about sex, I will tell you what you think about God.
Nothing could be more true. And this is the problem here. Those who hold the historic
view about same-gender relationships are often scoffed at by those who know better.
We are exploring the theology of marriage, but they are unhealthily fixated on
homosexuality. But everything links to everything else. Ultimately what is at stake here
is the character of God. The Report all too plainly demonstrates that. If agape becomes
eros, if the Incarnation is merely an illustration of the central importance of the body, if
human sexual activity in some way mirrors both Gods love for his creation and
relationships within the Trinity, then we have a pagan god.

The elephant in the room


It seems to me that the Church discussion on this issue is wholly predicated upon the
situation of more mature people, who have come to the point of a committed and
faithful relationship after, in the case of males at least, a previous sexual history.8 We
honour that commitment; it is a pastoral situation. But when we espouse, as the Report
does, some kind of theological justification for same-gender marriage, the question
arises, what are we to tell our young people? Of all the books and articles from the
normalising position that I have read, not a one even raises this question. This seems
extraordinary.
But perhaps it is an unnecessary question to address. If this is the same as that, then
what is the issue? A young man meets another young man whom he identifies as of
similar orientation and complementary love-making role.9 Friendship grows, to the
point where they wish to publicly commit themselves to each other in life-long
marriage. Sexual intimacy follows, as a sign and seal of the relationship.
In these days some may consider this a naive scenario even for opposite-gender
couples. But I assume that it is what we would nonetheless preach and teach as Gods
joyful good will for how a marriage relationship should develop. But for same-gender
males at any rate, to expect that this is how it might be seems naive, even ludicrous.
There is no chaste pathway. Sexual activity is the means by which ones identity is
explored and discovered. As far as I am aware there is no proven way, for males at least,
from the here of acknowledged same-gender attraction to the there of a long-term
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faithful life commitment. But if we are to teach that this is the same as that, then we
must be able to demonstrate such a way. Nothing like the normalising model has been
done so far in the history of the world.
Without such a way, we abandon people to the realities of the subculture, and to the
emotional and physical perils of that. Are we aware that the sexual partners of young
passive role males are commonly decades older than they are? Are we aware of the
vulnerability and need that drives the behaviours of both active and passive partners,
and how compulsive such behaviour often is? Have we no indications at all from our
own experience that same-gender attraction is for many people a burden to be borne,
and that homosexual behaviour can be damaging to the self?
It is often asserted that the biblical material is spoken into a cultural situation different
from our own, which is true enough.10 But the biblical exegetes who favour a
normalising position go further than that: they argue that the bible says nothing
negative about same-gender sexual behaviour in itself. What it is really talking about is
the preservation of cultural norms, the avoidance of promiscuity, and the evils of
dominance of the weak by the powerful. Of course the biblical material does speak
about those things. But it seems to me that those who assert that that is all it says
perhaps do not have a very wide life experience. Is it possible that where the biblical
material speaks about same-gender sexual relations it does so not for the restriction but
for the protection of persons? The Church carries huge responsibility before God for the
people under its care. Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, said Jesus on one
occasion, but woe to anyone by whom they come! It would be better for you if a
millstone were hung around your neck and you were thrown into the sea than for you to
cause one of these little ones to stumble.11 My heart is in my mouth when I read this.
But what other kind of thing might he have been talking about?
I have spoken about exegetes, but I sometimes think that many of us Christian people,
and even Christian clergy, live a fairly sheltered life. The very circumstances of our
being identified as Christian constitutes a filter as to the kinds of people who come to us,
and what they tell us about their lives. Given the limitations of our situation we need
therefore to be better informed, and need to be far more critical of the cultural
mythology. We are told that sexual orientation is like blue eyes or brown eyes: it is a
biological fact, something that cannot be changed. It is true that subjectively that is often
how it feels, and for many how it plays out over the course of a life. Objectively,
however, there is much research that demonstrates the opposite.12 Nonetheless the
proportion of opposite-gender oriented people in the society remains stable.13 Why? If
we dont have some ideas about the answer to that question then we really do live a
sheltered life. In the light of these things, what do we teach our young people?
Behind the attempt to patch together a theological justification for same-gender
marriage in the theological section of the Report lies a genuine and earnest desire to
welcome and affirm. We should honour that, and learn from it. The pastoral recognition
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of a covenanted relationship of any kind seems to me to be unproblematic. But there can


be no theology of same-gender marriage without buying into the serpents question.
Theology is not of course ours to construct. It can only be the result of our seeking and
listening to what God might reveal to us about himself. And, while we must not be naive
in handling the biblical material, we must at least take it seriously as a guide to that. In
this case that means taking seriously its consistent rejection of same-gender sexual
behaviour, recognising that to be not a prohibition but a protection. How easy to
change what he said, sang Garth Hewitt about an incident in the gospels to shuffle the
words till theyre dead/how easy to pull out the sting/leaving a saccharine saviour
whos wearing a grin. I am certain that this is an outcome that none of us desire.

The present situation


All of what is said above relates to the theological section 5 of the Report. Those of us
who find the argument there alarming need to remember that (1) we are dealing with a
report that is to be discussed and debated at General Synod, and later at parish and
diocesan level as well. Nothing in it is final, or the opinion of the Church as a whole, nor
will it ever be the latter, given Motion 30s protection for those who believe samegender marriage is not Gods good will and any circumstances. What the opinion and
determination of the Church is to be is still an open question. The final outcome is highly
likely to include a form for the blessing of already contracted marriages, and, in my
view, unlikely to be phrased or presented in exactly the form in which it is currently in
the Report. We are in the midst of a process. (2) The comments above relate to the
theological underpinning in the report, not the Rite itself. While there is some spill-over
into the wording of the Rite,14 in my opinion the former goes well beyond what is
necessary to justify the latter, assuming that it is understood as a pastoral response to
individual situations.
I should also say (perhaps too late, but nonetheless quite genuinely) that none of the
criticisms of the Report in this paper are directed at individual Christians who may be in
a committed, faithful same-gender relationship. I honour you, recognise you as brothers
and sisters in Christ as I hope you do me, and wish you well with all my heart. But this is
an issue that impacts many individuals, many of whom are very different situations to
your own. At stake is the truth of God, honesty and integrity in seeking that, and the
protection of the vulnerableall of which I am sure you value as much as I do, even as
we differ on how that is expressed.
I said at the beginning that we need to treat the opinions of those who differ from us
with respect in their sincerity, and in their genuine desire to be obedient Christ. But that
respectful approach must not hinder us from appealing to our brothers and sisters in
Christ to think again, to consider what it is that they do. I hope that for those reading
this who hold a theologically normalising position this paper constitutes such an appeal.
Too much of the framing of this discussion characterises those who hold the historic
view as those who need to learn, grow up, become more sophisticated about the use of
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the bible, and more mature about sexuality. Those who come from that historic position
can characterise those who disagree in similarly superficial ways. But we need to grow
beyond that, and, respecting each other, seek to learn from each other, and especially,
especially, discern what the Lord is saying to the Church on this matter. This paper is
offered as a contribution to that discernment.

An urgent task
In conclusion can I return to the comment I made at the beginning about how easy it is
to criticise someone elses theological arguments when we are not required to put our
own out into the same discussion space. I hope that those who hold to the historic view
have also learned something through this discussion. As a bare minimum we have, I
trust, recognised that for most people the phenomenon of same-gender attraction is an
unsought burden, and in itself innocent. We have learned that we have godly brothers
and sisters who are same-gender attracted and have chosen to commit themselves in a
faithful covenanted relationship. Whether that is something we would ourselves have
counselled, in fear and trembling for ourselves we must grant them the integrity of their
choices before God. We have learned, too, I hope, to be more nuanced and sophisticated
about the way in which we treat the biblical material, even as we continue to urge that it
be taken seriously.
But especially, what we need to tackle with urgency is the way in which the good news
of Christ is articulated into the area of need that this issue identifies. To return for a
moment to one of the authorities quoted in the Report, there is no sin in the world of
Rowan Williamss The Bodys Grace paper. There is no struggle for holiness, no battle
for our humanity, no putting to death the impulses of the body by means of the spirit
(Romans 7 & 8). There is no Saviour in such a world, for there is nothing for a Saviour to
do. But if we know we need rescue; if we know about that battle and indeed fight it
ourselves day by day; if we know in our own experience the power to change and grow
that flows from the Resurrection, then that message constrains us, and its crystal clear
proclamation as good news must be a constant preoccupation.
The problem is not merely with same-gender attraction; our whole current cultural
attitude to sexuality has created a nuclear fallout zone into which the gospel of Jesus
comes for young and old as good news indeed. We help people to understand it as such,
not just to trot out the phrase. Barbara Hughes remembers someone saying that one
ought always to preach as if a Holocaust survivor were sitting in the first row. Noting a
report from the US Department of Justice in 1994 that one in four girls and one in five
boys experience sexual abuse during childhood, she says that the chances are that they
are.15 This is not to mention the sexual wasteland in which many of our teenagers,
including the members of our youth groups, wander; and the pressures and temptations
being faced by young adults and older adults on a daily basis. Pious platitudes and
general talk about sin and forgiveness will not cut it in their real daily world. And all
that we do whether we are pastors, or preachers, or counsellors, or simply friends must
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be informed by the tenderness and toughness of Jesus himself. Even as we strive for that
it doesnt do any harm to remember how often his toughness was directed towards the
good, pious bible-believing people of his day, who tied up heavy burdens, hard to bear,
and laid them on the shoulders of others; but were themselves unwilling to lift a finger
to move them. (Matt 23:4)
May the good Lord lead us on as a Church as we seek his way ahead.

Endnotes
The Report can be downloaded from here: http://www.anglicantaonga.org.nz/Features/Extra/WayForward.
2 The Old Testament celebrates that complementarity, the Song of Songs bringing to a particular focus
what is everywhere taken for granted, while the prohibitions against cross-dressing (Deut 22:5) and
(male) same-gender sexual activity (Lev 18:22 & 19:11) guard against the blurring of gender boundaries.
3 It is worth reading the context of the two isolated sentences from Trible which the report quotes. The
one on p.15:
But no ambiguity clouds the words i and i. One is female, the other male. The creation is
simultaneous, not sequential. One does not precede the other, even though the timeline of this
story introduces the woman first (2:22). Moreover, one is not the opposite of the other. In the
very act of distinguishing female from male the earth creature describes her as "bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh" (2:23). These words speak unity, solidarity, mutuality, and equality. (God
and the Rhetoric of Sexuality, p.98, my emphasis; the final sentence is the one cited in the Report.)
Not only is the quotation set in a radically gendered setting, the word 'opposite' is used here in a quite
different way from the way in which the Report uses it a sentence or two later. On p. 16 the Report
correctly notes that Trible translates the phrase in Gen 2:18 as a companion corresponding to it' (p.90).
But when Trible comes to speak of that act of creation she describes it in this way:
If no companion for the earth creature is found among the animals, there is another possibility:
the creation of human sexuality. This divine act will alter radically the nature of h-dm and
bring about new creatures so that female and male together become the one flesh that is wholeness
rather than isolation. (ibid, p.94, my emphasis.)
The Reports use of Trible is misuse; it muddies and maligns her fine scholarship.
4 Pope Pius XIs encyclical (1930) can be found here:
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius11/P11CASTI.HTM
5 Williamss essay can be found here: http://www.igreens.org.uk/bodys_grace.htm; a thoughtful critique
here: http://blog.wouldbetheologian.com/2008/07/bodys-grace.html.
6 This is precisely what Rowan Williams affirms in the essay that the Report describes approvingly as the
best 10 pages written about sexuality in the 20 th century. Williams re-tells the story of a character in a
novel who is seduced by a cad and then abandoned. Some hours later, on the train journey back to her
family, she looks in the mirror and sees that "she had entered her body's grace" (The phrase supplies the
title of the essay). What might this mean? asks Williams:
The phrase recurs more than once in the pages that follow, but it is starkly clear that there is no
lasting joy for Sarah. There is a pregnancy and an abortion; a continuing loneliness. But it is still
grace, a filling of the void, an entry into some different kind of identity. There may be little love,
even little generosity, in Clark's bedding of Sarah, but Sarah has discovered that her body can be
the cause of happiness to her and to another. It is this discovery which most clearly shows why
we might want to talk about grace here. Grace, for the Christian believer, is a transformation that
depends in large part on knowing yourself to be seen in a certain way: as significant, as wanted.
The blurring of boundaries in the final sentence is extraordinary. It is also deeply sad. Instead of the love
of God, that reveals to us with pride and wonder who it is that we really are, Williams suggests that the
way we discover who we really are is through sexual intercourseeven though it is loveless, and leaves
us facing an abortion and continued loneliness. Most of Williams's texts come from novels, from
Shakespeare, and from philosophy; the Christian terms that are dropped in here and there (gracea
1

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language of creation and redemption' and so on) are, in the context of the essay, empty of any but obvious
content. Not all that Williams says is without interest. But the Christian terminology seems to me to be
merely a veneer over what, however sophisticated and urbane, is essentially a pagan philosophy. We
know that Williams is a good and godly man; it is puzzling. A poignant commentary can be found in the
experience of another good and godly leader trying to sanctify the spirit of the age in Exodus 32:1-6.
7 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Creation and Temptation, SCM 1966 p.66-8.
8 We tend not to differentiate between males and females in this discussion. This is problematic, for it is
clear that both the dynamic and the experience of men and women are quite different, making it
misleading to argue from one to the other. This might be the place to remind ourselves that there is only
one explicit mention of female same-gender behaviour in the biblical material.
9 I understand that the situation in practice is more complex than this; others will know more about the
matter than I do.
10 We should also note that Romans 1:26,27 are part of Paul's homiletical sting operation, designed to
bring his pious and self-righteous audience to the confrontation in 2:1-11. For a model compare 2 Samuel
12:1-7 and Amos 1 & 2.
11 Luke 17:1,2 & parallels.
12 To take just one example, a longitudinal study completed in 1998 involving 12,000 students in 80
separate US communities found that even of those in their mid-teens who had engaged in same-gender
sexual behaviour, more than half reported themselves to be exclusively opposite-gender just one year
later. Six years later three out of four were exclusively opposite gender (R. C. Savin-Williams & G. L. Ream,
Prevalence and Stability of Sexual Orientation Components During Adolescence and Young Adulthood,
Archives of Sexual Behavior (2007) vol 36 p. 386.) Those without access to an academic library database
can find a summary of the paper in Whiteheard & Whitehead, My Genes Made Me Do It, available on line at
http://www.mygenes.co.nz./index.html, chapter 12, p.231ff. The Whiteheads take only one category of
the three in the paper as standing for all, but, given that, their summary seems a fair one. (For those
confused by the layout of table 2 in the original paper they have also confirmed with the authors that this
was a misprint. Table 3 gives the correct layout for the table 2 data.) A particularly helpful feature of the
Savin-Williams & Ream study is the distinction that is made between (1) romantic attraction to someone
of the same gender [noting the challenges inherent in the word romantic] (2) same-gender sexual
experience (though the authors note that the background definition provided in the first two waves of the
survey was somewhat unsatisfactory), and (3) self-identification as gay, lesbian or bisexual. The lack of
such distinctions goes far to explain the extraordinary confusion over statistics in the literature.
13 Longitudinal studies of adults also show a regression towards the norm over time. (While a scientist
will always approach any statement as a hypothesis and never an absolute truth, to date all the available
evidence.confirms a view of sexual orientation as a trait whose instability has a direction, namely, it
tends in general toward normative heterosexuality over the course of life. Jeffrey B. Satinover The
"Trojan Couch": How the Mental Health Associations Misrepresent Science, online here:
https://www.scribd.com/doc/69609293/The-Trojan-Couch-Satin-Over). Despite this movement, the
overall proportion of practising same-gender adults does not vary much. Are we aware how common it is
for men, including married men, to move into a same-gender lifestyle in middle age? Or that a nonnegligible number of women move into a same-gender relationship, at least for a time, after a divorce?
While for a significant number of people same-gender orientation has the force of destiny, we cannot
blind ourselves to the fact that for some older people curiosity and experimentation are major factors,
and that for women in particular same-gender orientation may be response to bitter hurt, or a political
statement. How do we discern, how do we challenge and guide, how do we deal with these situations if
we have a theology of same-gender marriage?
14 For example it is not acceptable to include David and Jonathan, Naomi and Ruth as models, when we
know quite clearly that they are not models of the kind of relationship we are seeking to honour. Why
would we do such a thing?
15 Barbara Hughes Where Was God? Spiritual Questions of Sexually Abused Children, Sewanee Theological
Review 48:1 (Christmas 2004), available on line at https://cctheo.org/node/34. This is a powerful,
illuminating and moving article, which I would recommend to any counsellor or pastor, or someone who
knows a person in the situation it describes.

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