Why is this presenting issue Communion-breaking?

The Church of England Primates have met in Northern Ireland and come to their conclusion (see front page).

What we need to ask at this time is why the presenting issue of the consecration of a practising gay bishop in New Hampshire, and the blessing of same-sex unions in the Diocese of New Westminster, is so important. And, granted its importance, is it important enough to break communion about?

Some will have doubts, even among those who take a traditional moral line. After all, we have allowed divorce and remarriage in the Church (to name but one issue), so why is this issue so different and so serious? Is not this an issue, like women’s ministry, about which we can agree to differ? Let me give you some reasons as to why this is so important.

1 It is an authority issue

This is the current presenting issue of biblical authority and whether we, as a Church, are willing to live under the supreme authority of Holy Scripture. The former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, has said rightly that it is not a matter of interpretation but of authority. Will the Church live by the teaching of Scripture? But, you may say, is that not precisely the issue — what does the Bible teach?

This article is not the place to go into that in great detail. (For those who would like to, see R. Gagnon’s brilliant and unanswered book, The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics). Professor Edith Humphrey, who spoke at NEAC 18 months go, summarised the Bible’s teaching well: ‘The Bible speaks with one voice about homoerotic activity — from the story of Sodom to the ‘holiness code’ of Leviticus, to the lists of dark behaviours in the epistles, the word is ‘don’t’! The biblical writers adopt a decisive counter-cultural stand against an activity that Greek and Roman poets valorised. It makes little difference whether such sexual behaviour is directed by nature, by nurture, or by a combination of these two.’

The clear teaching of the Bible is that monogamous marriage is where sexual activity is to take place, ordained by our loving Creator for our good. Special pleading about the meaning of some texts notwithstanding, the position throughout Scripture and upheld by the Lord himself and his apostles is that marriage is the norm for sexual relations and that chaste singleness too has an honourable place. But sexual activity, be it heterosexual or homosexual, outside marriage is not on. Our God is holy and he cares about the holiness of his people.

If this is the case, the issue then is whether the Church is willing to bow in the face of the teaching of God’s written Word, or believe that it must follow the ‘improvements’ of contemporary insight. Are we really sure we know best?

J.I. Packer puts the issue helpfully: ‘What are represented as different interpretations are, in fact, reflections of the way in which on the one view the doctrinal and moral teaching of Scripture is always final and definitive for Christian people, while on the other view it never is.’ The House of Bishop’s report, ‘Some Issues in Human Sexuality’, also states: ‘In the case of disagreement about sexual ethics, the disagreement is about matters that go to the heart of people’s relationship with God, and which cannot therefore be treated as subjects on which we can simply learn to live with diversity’ (p.310).

2 It is a gospel-related issue

This was the apostle Paul’s view. Writing to a church which was set in a pluralistic and permissive environment, Paul says, ‘Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor practising homosexuals nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the Kingdom of God’ (1 Corinthians 6.9-10, TNIV). Along with many other things which all describe habits or lifestyles, homosexual activity needs repenting of. To tell people that what the apostle describes as calling for repentance and forgiveness is alright is a serious matter. It is neither loving nor kind. Fidelity to the gospel here requires that we speak the truth in love.

In another way too, it is the gospel-related issue. Paul goes on, ‘and such were some of you’. Their lives had been changed by the power of the gospel. Do we believe that the gospel and the Spirit have transforming power in people’s lives? Can this and should this affect our sexual behaviour? For Paul there was no doubt. Some of the Corinthian Christians had radically altered their life-styles. We must honour our brothers and sisters who, though homosexual in orientation, live a chaste and obedient life before the Lord. Sometimes that is at considerable cost, but many testify to God’s grace sustaining them. I have known some whose healing has been re-orientation, and many others who know God’s sustaining grace as they struggle to live in a way that honours him. The gospel changes lives and behaviour, and that must not be undermined by too easily agreeing with today’s fashionable views.

3 It is a pastoral issue

Compassion and care are needed. Homosexual people should be warmly welcomed in our churches. God loves us, whatever our orientation. We need to talk with them and listen to their concerns and experience. But for the Church to seem uncertain in what it teaches is simply to raise a false hope that cannot be fulfilled. It is at a deep level either to abandon the clear teaching of Scripture, or to appear to sanction what cannot be. It is to give up on the challenge of all of us to live pure and holy lives, whether homosexual or heterosexual. We are all sinners who struggle with our prevailing sins, and we need clear teaching, loving support and the Holy Spirit’s help.

4 It is a witness issue

It is not always understood why church leaders in the two-thirds world feel so strongly about this issue. Many who live in Islamic countries find reports in Western newspapers about what liberal bishops think and do deeply damaging to their witness. The integrity of the Christian faith and its moral clarity is questioned. Christians are more easily persecuted when their faith is ridiculed, so this is of very great importance to the Church, especially in Muslim countries.

5. It is a Church-functioning issue

The Windsor Report has made much of the unilateral action of New Westminster and New Hampshire and the Episcopal Church of the USA in general. In issues so important and divisive, no novel view in the history of the Church can or should be pursued without a clear account of the theological reasons being argued first, and the goodwill of the whole communion to pursue the idea being forthcoming. No such consensus exists to change the Church’s teaching on practising homosexuality. And indeed the Anglican Communion’s official position, affirmed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Primates, as well as by the Windsor Report, is that of the 1998 Lambeth Conference (resolution 1.10) which, among other things, clearly states, ‘homosexual practice is incompatible with Scripture’. That was passed by a huge majority, and churches unwilling to live by that agreement need to be disciplined. Otherwise, as a Communion we lack credibility and cohesion, not to mention effective communion.

This is, then, ‘a watershed decision for world Anglicanism’. Its outcome will reveal whether we can travel together as a Communion, or not. It is only to be hoped, therefore, that the Primates will take action to uphold the requirements of the Windsor Report, for without compliance to those requests there can be no communion. The Primates may give ECUSA some limited time to comply, but unless action is taken soon, our Communion will rupture and the inevitable following effect on the Church of England will be disastrous. It is unfaithfulness to biblical teaching that breaks communion.

The Archbishop and the Primates need our prayers. We need to pray that our Church will return to a confident belief in the doctrinal and moral teaching of the Bible, faithfully interpreted, apart from which the Church will be unhealthy and continually given to fracture. May that not be so!

Wallace Benn is President of the Church of England Evangelical Council.
This article first appeared in The Church of England Newspaper and is used with Bishop Benn’s permission.

Additional note

Since Wallace Benn wrote this article, the Primates have met. He comments: ‘We have much reason to give thanks to God for the outcome of their meeting in Northern Ireland:
¥ The Primates affirmed the biblically-based Lambeth Conference 1.10 resolution as the position of the Anglican Communion on human sexuality.
¥ The Primates have effectively suspended ECUSA and the Canadian Church from the Communion and have given them three years till the next Lambeth Conference to show repentance in line with the request of the Windsor Report. That involves holding to moratoria on the appointment of bishops who are in a sexual relationship outside heterosexual marriage and on the introduction of services of blessing of same-sex unions.
¥ A Panel of Reference is to be appointed by the Archbishop of Canterbury ‘to supervise the pastoral provisions’ for churches that are orthodox and out of communion with their unorthodox liberal bishop.
However, there are some questions that have not been tied up, for example:
¥ Will ECUSA and the Canadian Church voluntarily step down from the Communion as they have been asked? If they don’t, what then?
¥ Who will be invited to the next Lambeth Conference?
We ought to rejoice in the good news that faithful biblical leaders have won the day. We ought also to be vigilant and prayerful that this crisis may be worked through and completely resolved in a way that honours God and his Word, and unites the Church in fidelity to apostolic faith and life.’