The Church of England is at a crossroads in her calling to bring hope and transformation to our nation. The presenting issue is that of human sexuality, in particular whether or not the Church is able to affirm sexual relationships beyond opposite sex marriage. But the tectonic issues beneath, and driving, this specific question include what it means to be faithful to our apostolic inheritance, the Church’s relationship with wider culture, and the nature of the biblical call to holiness in the 21st Century. ”¦
We do not believe ”¦ that it is within our gift to consider human sexual relationships and what constitutes and enables our flourishing as sexual beings to be of ”˜secondary importance’. What is at stake goes far beyond the immediate pastoral challenges of human bisexual and same-sex sexual behaviour: it is a choice between alternative and radically different visions of what it means to be human, to honour God in our bodies, and to order our lives in line with God’s holy will.
At this crucial juncture, as our bishops pray and discern together regarding how the Church of England should walk forward at this time, we urge them not to depart from the apostolic inheritance with which they have been entrusted. ”¦”
“Depart from the faith”? Whose word choice is that?
The first time I read it I thought it meant the Evanglicals were saying they were leaving. Now I realize it’s talking about the bishops departing from the faith and the Evanglicals response to that… It’s a poorly worded title…
It is what it is.
Ian Paul points out the wide spread of opinion represented by writers of the letter:
“Thirdly, it is striking that the signatories come from the whole range of the evangelical constituency, including ‘open’, ‘charismatic’ and ‘conservative’ evangelicals”.
Nobody from Holy Trinity Brompton appears to have signed. It would be interesting to know why not.
I frankly doubt that the CofE hierarchy will take any practical notice of this, although I hope I am proved wrong. It may have had an effect if this unified approach had manifested two years ago or more.
The complementarian (i.e. male headship) evangelicals are already preparing for such episcopal indifference, with their recent declaration that they intend to plant many new Anglican congregations outside the Church of England, as well as protecting their existing congregations inside CofE.