In the work that bears his name, Gilbert and Sullivan’s wonderfully imagined Mikado purports “To let the punishment fit the crime, the punishment fit the crime.” In their guest opinion column in the Anglican Journal (May 2010, p. 5), Catherine Sider-Hamilton and Dean Mercer have, on the other hand, already decided the punishment”“ “a second-tier status in the larger Anglican Communion.” It remains only to conjure up the requisite crime….
…the writers imply that the current conflict pits those who love and faithfully receive scripture against those who despise it, who find its teaching “oppressive and outdated.” But we know that those who support the blessing of committed monogamous same-sex relationships include many who know and love the Bible as living witness to the living God. And we know that as we receive and interpret scripture, the truth that emerges is often contested truth”“as for example, we come to divergent conclusions about the response that the God revealed in scripture invites to a question of sexual ethics and Kingdom ethos in the 21st century. Conflict and contested truth are not unfamiliar to Jesus’ disciples, and need not tear apart the foundational covenant of our common baptism into one body. We could renew a healthier and more faithful discourse by acknowledging contested truth and engaging in honest and charitable conversation about the practices, values and contextual realities that shape our reception and interpretation of scripture.
Jesus is presented here like a hippy love guru as though he had nothing to say in his life about sin and it’s consequences and as if he stands totally apart from scripture and tradition. E- this is lousy theology
I am truly tired of of these arguments which claim that Scripture is authoritative and then eviscerates it by claiming that it’s all open to interpretation which just happens to support their agenda.
The Rev. Thompson is here purportedly responding to a short piece by Dean Mercer and Catherine Sider-Hamilton regarding what it might mean to adopt the Covenant with integrity. Their piece deserves a look, because it very precisely explains why the Canadian Church is not in a position to adopt with any kind of consistency of purpose. Alas, Thompson simply ignores the point of the piece altogether, and addresses a series of issues never mentioned in the original. This kind of changing-the-topic in ecclesial debate is so common that it wouldn’t bear noticing, except that in this case the issue does affect certain choices before the North American churches: why go forward with something (adopting the Covenant) if you know that it will mess everything up that the project is designed to achieve (some measure of commonly founded mutual recognition)? Either through ignorance or thorugh malice. If Thompson thinks that various Canadian-Global South relationships signify that all is well in the Communion, such that Canada adopting the Covenant at this stage would be unprolematic, he is simply misinformed; if he thinks it doesn’t matter to many other Anglican churches, he misunderstands; if he doesn’t care, well, I guess he doesn’t care.
[blockquote] And we know that as we receive and interpret scripture, the truth that emerges is often contested truth–as for example, we come to divergent conclusions about the response that the God revealed in scripture invites to a question of sexual ethics and Kingdom ethos in the 21st century. Conflict and contested truth are not unfamiliar to Jesus’ disciples, and need not tear apart the foundational covenant of our common baptism into one body.[/blockquote]
“Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” — Satan
“What is truth?” — Pontius Pilate
Dr. Radner (#3),
As always, thanks for chiming in here. And as always, you’ve been most charitable toward the other side.
Excessively charitable perhaps. I don’t know the author personally, but I’ve come across his ilk often in TEC. While it’s of course possible that he’s merely misinformed (or guilty of wishful thinking) about how problematic it would be for an unrepentant ACoC to sign the Covenant, I strongly suspect that the problem is worse than that. It unfortunately smacks of being deliberate spin and propaganda, an intentional falsification for rhetorical purposes.
But thanks anyway, Dr. Radner, for standing up for the integrity of the Covenant you’ve worked so long and hard to help produce. And you’re totally right that Michael Thompson completely evades and sidesteps the powerful points made by Dean Mercer and your colleague at Wycliffe, Catherine Sider Hamilton.
David Handy+
This article is based on a false premise. Christianity is not punitive. There have always been incidents of heresy in the Church. Severing communion (which is the correct response to blatant heresy) is not so much a sanction as a declaration that two or more entities no longer share the same faith. I am not a fan of this two tiered nonsense. Either one is orthodox (small ‘o’) or one is not. If one is then communion can be maintained. If not then it should be severed.
Severing communion does not mean you are condemning the other side to perdition. It just means that grave differences of faith on non-negotiable points of doctrine exist. God alone has the true power of punitive sanction.
As an example I have great respect for my brothers and sisters in the Roman Church. But we refuse communion with them because, in our view, they have departed from Orthodoxy. They doubtless disagree. Schism is always tragic. But false communion is far more serious than schism.
In ICXC
John
Jim the Puritan (#4),
Your biblical allusions are apt. The [i]”Did God say?”[/i] line from Gen. 3:1 often comes to mind when embroiled in heated discussions with liberal friends and colleagues in ministry. But in a rather imaginative fashion (perhaps similar to some Jewish midrash), I picture the Almighty watching our debates and shaking his head in puzzlement and disbelief as he turns to an archangel or cherub and mutters, “What part of [b]’Thou shalt not'[/b] don’t they understand?”
But I’ll add another text, Jim, that comes up frequently in these frustrating conversations with advocates of relativist morality and postmodernists who deny that there’s any such thing as reasonably objective interpretation of the Scriptures. And the text I have in mind is the familiar call to [i]”speak the truth in love”[/i] (Eph. 4:15). All too often, that well-known maxim is taken out of context and understood merely as an admonition to speak truthfully (in the sense of honestly), but with love and respect. However, the preceding verse, which speaks of people being “blown about by every wind of DOCTRINE” (Eph. 4:14) makes it quite clear that a specific kind of truthful speech is being called for, and that’s the need for speaking the true gospel, the Pauline one, to each other in love.
Or to invoke yet another biblical text, Michael Thompson’s article strikes me as a prime example of the “smooth talk” and deceptive words we’re warned about in Rom. 16:17-18. And we’re told to AVOID such misleading charlatans:
“I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the DOCTRINE you have been taught, [b]AVOID THEM.[/b] For such people do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the simple-minded.”
I recognize, of course, that it’s entirely possible that Michael Thompson is among those so deceived himself. But this kind of highly misleading article seems expressly designed to deceive the naive. That sort of charge is harsh and polarizing, and it’s naturally offensive to many of my friends and colleagues, but it may still be true nonetheless.
David Handy+
Committed monogamous relationships? Are these are to be found where? We read here just a little while ago two reports from a homosexual in California who explained that monogamous meant little for “committed” homosexual couples. Such evidence is hard to contradict or deny. This creature, “the committed monogamous homosexual” is, I suspect, a fabricated creature, whose persistence relies entirely on a liberal society’s willingness to believe what it want to believe. It is a Madison Avenue image, constructed out of mylar and makeup, and quite unrelated to the real world. Larry
#8 Larry,
In an Episcopal Church in Rochester NY, I had an extensive conversation with our female Rector after the GC 2003 approval of the consecration of VGR as Bishop. One of the reasons which she gave for supporting the GC2003 vote was the example of a close friend of the family who was living in a committed monogamous homosexual relationship. The relationship was onging and had lasted for many years. She informed me that the relationship between these two gay men was a model of a committed relationship. She said that the relationship of most heterosexual married couples she knew fell far short by comparison.
She asked me what my side (the orthodox, traditionalist side) would suggest about that couple. I said that the relationship was sinful and that we would have to say that the two men would need to be faithful to God’s command and remain celibate until God brought healing to their disordered sexual desires.
Given the testimony of my former Rector, I would have to say that not all the references to “the committed monogamous homosexual†are fabricated.