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SUNDAY SPECTATOR
December 22, 2002
Playing with schism
Prefatory remark: This is not the sort of column one enjoys writing; one wishes issues like this would just go away. I can already hear the screams of outrage from what Auden called the "homintern"; & those more personal from dear friends. One must stand up for the truth however as clearly as one can see it; & in the end you just take your lumps. * * * * * Something rather painful I want to get off my chest before Christmas -- which I interpret as a twelve-day festival of Christian unity. The subject is homosexuals (flinch). The worldwide Anglican church under the symbolic leadership of a new Archbishop of Canterbury could be about to face the worst crisis in its long history. After years of decline in its native England and in such old "Anglo" provinces as Canada Australia New Zealand United States -- it may finally be ready to fall apart. This is because the newly-confirmed archbishop Dr. Rowan Williams -- now "Rowan Cantuar" -- may at any moment before or after his formal enthronement on February 27th act to allow the ordination of practising homosexual priests in his see. Alternatively he will not and thereby disappoint homosexual pressure groups who are under the impression he has promised them action. Either decision will present an unpleasant scene but the former would most likely provoke a schism in which most of the world's Anglican communions sever themselves from their historic centre. His Grace's own most promiscuous remark on the issue was made just before his confirmation as archbishop but after he had given vague assurances to the church's most powerful evangelical groups that he would uphold the resolution of the 1998 Lambeth Conference. This is the once-in-decade congregation of all the world's Anglican bishops and they voted 526 to 70 (with 45 abstentions) to affirm that "homosexual activity is incompatible with Scripture" (Dr. Williams then being among the 70 dissenters). He chose in other words the most conspicuous moment to say: "If the Bible is very clear -- as I think it is -- that a heterosexual indulging in homosexual activity for the sake of variety and gratification is not following the will of God does that automatically say that that is the only sort of homosexual activity there could ever be?" What is wrong with this sentence? The Bible as should be clear to anyone who has read it has and could have nothing whatever to say about "heterosexuals" taking a walk on the wild side. The whole concept of "heterosexuality" is alien to the Bible for the word itself implies equality and comparability with its opposite. The Bible does however spare a few choice words for the practice of "sodomy" both in the Old Testament (which calls down air strikes) and in the New (a little gentler). The practice is condemned as an abomination -- without hesitation qualification or ambiguity -- wherever it appears. Now the reader may not agree with the Bible. She may in fact be out of harmony with the whole tone of the Book of Leviticus or with Paul's various epistles to Romans Corinthians Timothy. This is a free country we have effective separation between Church and State and dissent is allowed. And notwithstanding the formal establishment of the Church of England in England the same is essentially true over there. No one has to agree with the Bible. The question becomes more vexed when the disagreement is from a professed Christian. The vexation increases when that professed Christian is ascending to the throne of Canterbury. And it becomes downright provoking when he formulates his position with the piece of cheap sophistry I quoted above. I have glanced through two books written by the new archbishop without reading them. Life is too short to read everything that arrives. The word "erudite" is frequently employed by his more fawning reviewers. The patches I read reinforced my sense of a sophist a careerist and very likely a man with a chip on his shoulder that would require a pneumatic drill to chisel off. The wrong kind of man to appoint to the position he now occupies in a time of crisis. Worse and despite the impression left by that very revealing quotation he is quite intelligent. Intelligent people in positions of power who are insecure in their own minds and bodies have a long history of doing terrible damage. In fear of the worst a large group of traditionalist Anglicans from around the world convened on All Souls Day (Nov. 2) to draft a declaration affirming The Biblical norm of lifelong heterosexual marriage and abstinence outside of it. It is signed by among others prominent Anglican bishops from throughout the "Third World". It is worth noting the overwhelming conservatism of the quickly growing Anglican as well as most other Christian churches in Africa and Asia. It may also be worth noting that there are more Anglicans today in Nigeria alone than in Britain Canada and the U.S. put together. The "traditionalists" quite naturally wished to make their statement before the new archbishop had done something irretrievable rather than after it was too late. My information is that the archbishop received the declaration quite gracelessly when it was presented to him making remarks to confirm he had taken it personally and wondering "how this will look in the press". So be it: some things are too important to spare people's feelings. The problem as the "All Souls" group signatories and many millions of faithful instinctively grasp is that the ordination of self-declared practising homosexuals must necessarily overthrow the Christian doctrine of chastity. For this doctrine presented plainly in the Bible and affirmed by every orthodox Christian church through the intervening 20 centuries permits sex only between consenting adults of opposite sex who are permanently married to one another. We may forgive those who lapse into sin; and Christ is in the business of forgiving sinners. We cannot however change the definition of sin. Now make no mistake. Over the same 20 centuries huge numbers of homosexuals have served the Church as priests deacons monks nuns and in every other station. It is inconceivable that the capacious monasteries of the Middle Ages didn't take in people who were homosexual. But like those with heterosexual tendencies each had to make and keep a vow of chastity consecrating and sacrificing their sexuality to God. (The Anglicans already had lower standards for a Roman priest may not even marry a woman.) It is most certainly a sacrifice. And sacrifices must most certainly be made. The question before all Anglicans today and those in many other mainstream Protestant confessions is what will be sacrificed. Our errant sexuality to God or our Church to the zeitgeist? David Warren
© Ottawa Citizen
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