The Task Force makes the following recommendations to the Bishop, the Diocesan Convention, and to clergy and parishes of the Diocese of San Diego:
1. We encourage individual parishes and missions to study and discuss this report and to advise the Bishop of the character and outcome of their efforts.
2. We encourage our 2009 General Convention deputation to support measures that allow the exercise of an “option” to perform blessings of same-sex relationships, rather than measures that would direct such blessings to be performed or direct such blessings to be prohibited.
3. Should an “option” approach to the blessing of same-sex relationships be enacted by General Convention, we encourage our Bishop to put into place a process by which a church can discern if the blessing of same-sex relationships is appropriate to occur within its community….
Long document. One problem I see with it is that competing arguments, pro and con, on homosexuality in Scripture are give equal weight. For example the pro and con arguments, for example as to whether Jonathan and David are in a homosexual relationship, are given equal weight. You get an “is, no it isn’t” dynamic. And that leads to the conclusion that there are two different equally valid interpretations of Scripture.
Yet not all interpretations of Scripture are equally valid. On a basic level you could argue that a stop sign can be interpreted to mean “go” as well as “stop”. What are we to do? We must leave it up to local option at each intersection to decide.
So how is the matter to be decided? By vote I guess.
Br. Michael, at least that is an improvement over the propaganda that comes out of the national church which would have you believe that there is only one side to the argument–Integrity’s and theirs.
And at least this allows the parish priest to lead the people into a discernment as to which is the “valid interpretation” and why that is so. This may be a mixed blessing, given the poor formation of TEC clergy these days, but its better than Crew’s crew and 815 knows best.
But it being California, probably the salt air has addled the brains.
Also, depends on what the discernment process includes. If it is just pray and see what happens, i.e. individual “feelings,” that is inadequate discernment in my opinion. If it is only equal interpretations of pro and con Bible passages, that is also inadequate. Scripture, tradition and reason, as well as prayer have to all enter the picture. That’s why the idea of undefined “discernment” is always a concern to me, irrespective of which ox is being gored.
Bishop Mathes has already ordained a man living in a relationship with another man. What good is this document if it’s already happening?
It’s so Episcopal – “Let’s have a meeting and discuss it!”
This report is better than most in that it gives space to both sides, but it’s still clearly biased in favor of same-sex unions. Most of the Scriptural arguments given by reappraisers are roughly three times longer than those given by reasserters. Furthermore, the reasserter arguments are very repetitive (more so than the reappraiser arguments) and not only surprisingly short, but simple to (in my estimation) a fault, as much more detail could have been given. For the most part, the reappraisers provide more arguments on the basis of the Greek or Hebrew text than the reasserters. The reader is left wondering whether the reasserter arguments were heavily chopped in length or just inadequate for the task at hand.
And while it’s wonderful to see church tradition addressed (the section on TEC’s marriage rite is one of the better parts of the document), never once is this issue examined in the context of the larger body of Christ and church history. Given this omission, there’s naturally no discussion of the critical question as to why the Christian Church historically has taken the position it has and has not changed its teaching on this matter. There’s also no thought whatsoever as to how the change in stances on the part of (to date) TEC and the UCC will impact the entire body of Christ worldwide.
Other problems are more editorial in nature. In the section on Scriptural passages speaking against SSBs and “full inclusion,†both views are given headings to mark them off after almost every passage. (There are one or two exceptions.) But in the section on Scriptural passages used to support these two issues, reappraiser views consistently lack headings and are allowed to run immediately after the Scriptural passages without any notice (possibly leading the unfamiliar reader to conclude that the reappraiser views are objective statements of fact), while reasserter views are still given headings. This inconsistency may be due to sloppy editing or document structure (most likely due to the fact that different sections were written by different groups), but it should have been caught before the final document was released.
The upshot: If you’re a reasserter, the reappraiser arguments won’t convince you (and undoubtedly vice versa as well). Sadly, however, someone coming to this document outside of either camp will find a document more weighted toward “full inclusion†and SSBs than against them. It’s unclear as to whether that’s ultimately due to the editing/focus of the final document or the quantity and/or quality of the material submitted.