EGN NEWS DESK
Yesterday the Bishop of Leicester, Martyn Snow, tried to reset the continuing Living in Love and Faith (LLF) debate, asking the General Synod of the Church of England “to be reconciled with God and present this by being reconciled to at least one one other”.
He talked of the missionary crucial of the Church discovering a strategy to ‘comply with disagree’ and pleaded for Synod to keep away from “a collection of speeches merely saying, ‘Synod must agree with me’, or others simply want to vary their thoughts”.
But the issue dealing with the Church is, as Ed Shaw stated, “We don’t all imagine the identical issues with regards to id, sexuality, relationships and marriage.”
He moved an modification that requested the General Synod to recognise that for a lot of of their quantity, “Some of the problems raised usually are not issues on which they will merely comply with disagree,”
He defined the issue: “We have been implicitly and explicitly informed that we are able to comply with disagree; that these points don’t matter an excessive amount of; that they don’t seem to be problems with main significance; that they don’t impression the gospel; that we don’t want to vary our doctrine or constructions.
“But they’re problems with main significance for therefore many people, from a spread of various views; they do impression our understanding of the gospel; they’re main to vary in our doctrine and our constructions will, I’m afraid, have to observe.
“My modification merely seeks to be sincere in regards to the depth of our present division.”
In a weird flip of occasions, Synod proceeded to vote in opposition to the modification – in impact denying the existence of the very Synod members who moments earlier than had stood earlier than them and defined why they might not comply with disagree. Twenty of the thirty-four bishops current voted this manner.
Despite all his discuss of not utilizing speeches to name on others to vary their thoughts, Bishop Snow led the cost in opposition to Shaw’s modification.
In his response, the bishop defined that whereas he acknowledged the reality it contained, he couldn’t assist it as a result of he “feared that enshrining this within the movement is moderately a counsel of despair, of claiming there are not any new and imaginative methods for us”.
Synod member, Rev Graham Kirk-Spriggs, went additional, describing any type of differentiation that recognised that this was a difficulty on which individuals couldn’t in conscience comply with disagree as “a disturbing improvement”, “structural prejudice” and “completely un-Anglican”.
He went on to problem the orthodox bishops, saying, “Bishops, you may have a alternative, when you placed on that purple shirt, as soon as you might be given a mitre and employees, you may both catch the attention of unity or factionalism – not each.”
It appears that the one acceptable “new and imaginative” methods ahead are these which depend on folks agreeing to disagree. This locations conservative members of General Synod, whether or not bishops, clergy or laity, in a really tough place as the talk resumes this morning.
Susie Leafe is director of Anglican Futures, which helps orthodox Anglicans within the UK.
