This has been a strange few weeks in which to be LGBT+ and a member of the Church of England. The bishops of the church have commissioned a process called “Living in Love and Faith”. This will, according to its website, produce “resources that will help bishops” lead others in thinking about “what it means …
Continue reading True LGBT+ inclusion and equality in the Church of England are a long way off
Background The Living in Love and Faith Project of the Church of England is the outcome of the impasse that happened in February 2017 when the General Synod, very unusually, declined to take note of the House of Bishops Report that followed the shared conversations of 2014-16. This meant that the report was effectively dead …
Continue reading Fake Participation: what is wrong with Living in Love and Faith?
Confined as I am to the pews these days I have to listen to a lot of sermons. What I can’t do is what I am called and trained to do, which is preach myself. My estimate of most preaching I hear is that it is of a very poor quality indeed. When I was …
Continue reading The Bible and the Newspaper – Thoughts on Preaching
This is a reply to Neil Patterson's blog on Via Media News: https://viamedia.news/2018/09/14/sex-lies-voting-records/ Dear Neil, Thank you for your Via Media contribution. You rightly identify some dishonesties amongst gay men that greatly hinder a grown-up discussion about sex and sexuality. But it is not a gay male problem only, as you rightly hint. I want …
James Alison: http://jamesalison.co.uk/texts/were-in-for-a-rough-ride/ Richard Peers: https://educationpriest.wordpress.com/2018/09/04/sex-lies-and-honesty-in-the-church-an-anglican-response-to-james-alison/ I don't think that a single day goes by when I am not genuinely thankful for the way God has led, guided and kept me in my life. Being very much on the downward slope I hope that I can continue to offer myself as I am for God's …
Continue reading Honest to God: responding to James Alison and Richard Peers
When I was a young man, some forty plus years ago now, the evangelicals of the Church of England were, as a tribe, rather abstemious when it came to alcohol. My training incumbent was teetotal. He wasn't unusual. Lots of evangelicals might have had a half pint of shandy on a very hot day, or …
From The Quire 