American Madness

The Episcopal Church in the US is set to go ahead with the controversial ordination of an openly lesbian bishop.

Saturday's ordination comes despite warnings from the Archbishop of Canterbury that it will deepen an already bitter dispute on sexuality.

Canon Mary Glasspool, 56, will become an assistant bishop in Los Angeles, the first openly gay US bishop since Gene Robinson seven years ago.

Since then the Anglican Communion has been on course for a permanent split.

Marginalisation

The election of Mary Glasspool - who has been with her partner Becki for 22 years - represented a snub by the liberal Episcopal Church to other Anglican Churches around the world.

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams had urged the American Church not to proceed with the ordination, warning that it would further alienate traditionalists who believe active homosexuality to be a sin.

It is likely to accelerate the gradual marginalisation of the Episcopal Church within a two-tier Communion and increase tensions between Anglicans elsewhere.

The Communion has never recovered from the crisis prompted by the election in New Hampshire of Gene Robinson as its first openly gay bishop in November 2003.

The Episcopal Church at first agreed to suspend the creation of gay bishops but reversed that decision last July. (Robert Pigott for BBC)

Pope in Fatima

Half a million pilgrims chanting “Viva o Papa” braved the rain to hear Pope Benedict XVI condemn the world’s “petty egoisms” at an overflowing open-air mass at Fatima, the Portuguese Lourdes.

The mass, the highlight of the Pope’s four-day trip to Portugal, marked the anniversary of the day in 1917 when three shepherd children reported seeing visions of the Virgin Mary as the sun “spun” in the sky.

They claimed that the Madonna confided to them three “secrets” foretelling the Second World War, the conversion of Russia to Christianity and the attempt on the life of John Paul II in 1981. John Paul believed that the Virgin Mary saved him from the attempted assassination, which took place on the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima.

In his homily a weary looking Pope Benedict, dressed in white and gold vestments and sounding hoarse, said: “We delude ourselves if we think that the prophetic mission of Fatima has come to an end.”

On the plane from Rome to Lisbon on Tuesday he said that the so-called Third Secret of Fatima referred not only to the attack on John Paul II by a Turkish gunman on 13 May, 1981, but also to the “sufferings of the Church” in general, including the current crisis over clerical sex abuse.

He has not referred directly to the sex abuse scandals in his speeches since arriving in Portugal, where few abuse cases have come to light. However in a policy reversal the Pope acknowledged that the abuse scandals did not come from a conspiracy by the Church’s enemies and the media, as Vatican officials had claimed, but from “sins inside the Church itself”.

At a candlelit evening prayer service on his arrival at Fatima from Lisbon on Wednesday the pontiff said that he was bringing the suffering “of a wounded humanity, of the problems of the world” to the shrine, constructed in the 1950s.

Praying before a statue of the Madonna, the Pope referred to the bullet that his predecessor had placed in the statue’s crown in gratitude for her intervention. “It is a profound consolation to know that you are crowned not only with the silver and gold of our joys and hopes but also with the ‘bullet’ of our anxieties and sufferings,” he said.

The cult of the three shepherd children and their visions was first opposed by the then anti-clerical Portuguese authorities and viewed with scepticism by the Church. However, it flourished later after the miraculous nature of the visions was authenticated by the Vatican.

On a visit to Fatima in 2000, Pope John Paul disclosed the Third Secret and beatified two of the shepherds who had reported apparitions and who died young. The third of the children, Lucia dos Santos, became a nun and died five years ago. She too is headed for beatification, the step before sainthood.

Many Portuguese pilgrims at Fatima had walked more than 100 miles from towns and villages, and some travelled the last few hundred metres on their knees. Others flocked to Fatima from neighbouring Spain.

Eavan O’Donoghue, an English teacher in Valencia, said that she had seen the Pope before “but Fatima holds a special meaning”.

In his homily the Pope, 83, told pilgrims that they would be returning in seven years time to mark the 100th anniversary of the apparitions, but did not say whether he expected to be present.

He said that the “human family” appeared all too ready to “sacrifice its most holy bonds on the altar of the petty egoisms of nation, race and ideology”.

Earlier he told hundreds of priests, nuns and seminarians at the sanctuary that dedication to their calling required “courage and trust”. He told the clergy to be wary of “those situations where there is a certain weakening of priestly ideals or dedication to activities which do not fully accord with what is proper for a minister of Jesus Christ”.

He also held a 30-minute meeting with Portugal’s Prime Minister Jose Socrates, a supporter of gay marriage legislation recently passed by the Portuguese Parliament and due to be signed into law next week. (Times).

Reply to George

Christianity deserves no protection in law above other faiths and to do so would be “irrational, divisive, capricious and arbitrary”, a senior judge said yesterday.

In the latest clash between the judiciary and Christian believers Lord Justice Laws said that laws could not be used to protect one religion above another.

He also delivered a robust dismissal to Lord Carey of Clifton, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, who had warned that a series of recent court rulings against Christians could lead to civil unrest. He called his idea for a specialist panel of judges to hear cases involving the practice of religious beliefs “deeply inimical to the public interest”.

To give one religion legal protection over any other, “however long its tradition, however rich its culture, is deeply unprincipled”, the judge said. It would give legal force to a subjective opinion and would lead to a “theocracy”.

Lord Justice Laws’s comments came in the High Court as he rejected a marriage guidance counsellor’s attempt to challenge his sacking for refusing to provide sex therapy to gay couples.

Lord Carey had given a witness statement in support of Gary McFarlane, 48, from Bristol, a member of a Pentecostal church. Mr McFarlane was seeking permission to appeal against an Employment Appeal Tribunal ruling that supported his dismissal by Relate Avon in 2008.

Rejecting Mr McFarlane’s application, Lord Justice Laws said: “We do not live in a society where all the people share uniform religious beliefs. The precepts of any one religion — any belief system — cannot, by force of their religious origins, sound any louder in the general law than the precepts of any other. If they did, those out in the cold would be less than citizens and our constitution would be on the way to a theocracy, which is of necessity autocratic.”

The judge said it was right that he should address what the former Archbishop had said because of his seniority in the Church “and the extent to which others may agree with his views, and because of the misunderstanding of the law which his statement reveals”.

Lord Carey and other Christian leaders had expressed concerns after Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury and two other appeal judges ruled last December that Lillian Ladele, a Christian registrar, was breaking discrimination laws by refusing to conduct civil partnership ceremonies.

In his witness statement Lord Carey said: “It is, of course, but a short step from the dismissal of a sincere Christian from employment to a religious bar to any employment by Christians. I believe that further judicial decisions are likely to end up at this point and this is why I believe it is necessary to intervene now.”

The fact that senior clerics of the Church of England and other religions felt compelled to intervene directly in judicial decisions was “illuminative of a future civil unrest”.

Lord Justice Laws said that Lord Carey appeared to be arguing that the courts ought to be ready to uphold and defend Christian beliefs. But the judge drew a distinction “between the law’s protection of the right to hold and express a belief and the law’s protection of that belief’s substance or content”.

The Judaeo-Christian tradition had exerted a profound influence on the judgment of legislators but to confer on it preferential legal protection was deeply unprincipled, he said. It would mean laws being imposed “not to advance the general good on objective grounds, but to give effect to the force of subjective opinion since faith, other than to the believer, was subjective”.

Andrea Williams, the director of the Christian Legal Centre, warned that the judgment would deny Christians a range of jobs because of their beliefs.

“The judge’s comments could lead in effect to a religious bar to employment, in which Christians could be prevented from being registrars, counsellors, teachers, social workers or work on adoption panels,” she said.

“We never attempted to argue that we could impose a Christian law, which the judge seems to suggest. We are simply talking about the principle of marriage, between a man and a woman, which has undergirded society for hundreds of years.”

Gay Marriage

Religious bodies can host gay ceremonies, say peers

by Simon Sarmiento (Church Times today)

LORD ALLI’s amendment to the Equality Bill, which allows civil partnerships to be registered on religious premises, if religious bodies wish to allow it, was approved during the Report Stage in the House of Lords on Tuesday by 95 votes to 21.

The proposed changes to the Civil Partnership Act had been significantly modified since the debate in January (News, 5 February). The scope is narrowed to England and Wales, and the existing rule that “no religious service is to be used while the civil partnership registrar is officiating at the signing of a civil partnership document” is retained.

An additional clause reads: “For the avoidance of doubt, nothing in this Act places an obligation on religious organisations to host civil partnerships if they do not wish to do so.” A further clause states: “Regulations may provide that premises approved for the registration of civil partnerships may differ from those premises approved for the registration of civil marriages.”

Lord Alli stressed that the issue was one of religious freedom. “Religious freedom means letting the Quakers, the liberal Jews, and others host civil partnerships. It means accepting that the Church of England and the Catholic Church should not host civil partnerships if they do not wish to do so.”

Lady Butler-Sloss supported Lord Alli. “Same-sex couples can have strong and devoted relationships equal to, but different from, marriage, and they may wish to have those relationships sanctified by a religious ceremony.”

The Rt Revd Lord Harries of Pentregarth said: “Religious freedom is indivisible. If the Church of England claims it for itself, it ought to allow it for others. Some people have suggested that it undermines marriage, but, on the contrary, it strengthens marriage. The real enemy in our society is promiscuity, not permanent, stable, faithful relationships. These strengthen marriage.”

The Bishop of Bradford, Dr David James, warned of “unintended consequences” if the amendment was passed. “At the moment, however, civil partnerships are not in substance or in form same-sex marriages. There are some countries that have already introduced the possibility of marriage between people of the same sex, and no doubt some of those sympathetic to the amendment . . . favour that direction of travel. I do not, and neither do the majority of Churches and faiths in this country.”

Lady Morris of Bolton, for the Con servatives, did not think it was “the appropriate time to delve into the myriad complexities” that this issue raised. She noted that “it would automatically lead to increased pressure to change the civil marriage cere mony.” Lady Royall, for the Government, also resisted the amendment, which, she said, “would break the carefully established and maintained link between civil partnerships and civil marriages — the foundation of the civil partnership regime. That would lead to the anomalous position where civil partnerships could take place in religious premises but civil marriages could not.”

All parties were allowed a free vote. Dr James voted against the motion, and the Bishop of Newcastle, the Rt Revd Martin Wharton, voted in favour. The Bill awaits a Third Reading in the House of Lords.

Professor Iain McLean, author of last week’s letter to The Times (News, 26 February), said: “To have achieved this result despite the opposition of both front benches and the bench of bishops is remarkable. I hope that the Conservatives in the House of Commons will also support it.”

An Englishman in New York

(I watched this today)

An Englishman in New York is a 2009 biographical drama film that chronicles the English gay writer Quentin Crisp's later years spent in New York City. It is a follow-up to the 1975 TV movieThe Naked Civil Servant with John Hurt reprising his role as Crisp.

"Englishman in New York" is a song by Sting, from his 1987 album ...Nothing Like the Sun. The "Englishman" in question is the famous eccentric Quentin Crisp. Sting wrote the song not long after Crisp moved from London to an apartment in New York's Bowery.

John Hurt re-visits his iconic role as Quentin Crisp in a single film for ITV1

JOHN HURT will reprise his role as English eccentric Quentin Crisp in AN ENGLISHMAN IN NEW YORK, a funny and moving film from Leopardrama which picks up where the 1970's classic The Naked Civil Servant left off.

Sex in the City star Cynthia Nixon also joins the cast on location in the Big Apple. No stranger to the streets of Manhattan, Nixon will take the role of Penny Arcade, the performance artist and playwright who formed a close bond with Crisp in his latter years. The two created the long-running performance/interview piece, The Last Will and Testament of Quentin Crisp.

Further casting announcements include up and coming American actor Jonathan Tucker (Veronica Must Die, The Black Donnellys,) who stars as Patrick Angus, the young artist who befriended the English eccentric, Denis O’Hare (Brother’s and Sisters, Charlie Wilson’s War, Michael Clayton) as magazine editor, Phillip Steele and Pushing Daisies’ Swoozie Kurtz, as Crisp’s American agent, Connie Clausen.

Out-spoken dandy Quentin Crisp sets off on the journey of a lifetime to the Big Apple. New Yorkers immediately embrace Quentin and his witty waspish ways, and before long he is being wined and dined by celebrities in every corner of Manhattan.

A shining light of the chattering classes, Quentin befriends Patrick, a young artist who opens his eyes to the possibility that intimate human relationships - something Quentin has spent his life running away from - can work. But, as is so often the case with the maverick gay writer, Quentin cannot help but shock and, at a public event, he quips that the burgeoning AIDS crisis is "a fad". Quentin is suddenly dropped from high society.

Multi-award winning actor John Hurt counts numerous classic film and TV shows among his credits, including The Elephant Man, Midnight Express, Alien, Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, The Alan Clark Diaries, Scandal and I, Claudius. Among his many award wins and nominations, John won a Best Actor BAFTA for his role in The Naked Civil Servant.

Laura Mackie, Director of Drama at ITV, said:

“We are delighted to be making another film about Quentin Crisp given The Naked Civil Servant was such a landmark film for ITV. It’s a real thrill and honour to be bringing an actor of John Hurt's stature back to the channel to reprise such an iconic role. This is largely down to the quality of Brian Fillis' wonderful script, which completely captures the extraordinary and outrageous character of Quentin Crisp.”

Executive Producer James Burstall of Leopardrama said:

"This is Leopardrama's most ambitious project to date. A period piece set in the 1970's and 1980's, it picks up where The Naked Civil Servant left off. It is a great honour for us to be working with John Hurt in one of his most seminal roles."

AN ENGLISHMAN IN NEW YORK will be produced by Amanda Jenks (The Grey Man, Mysterious Creatures) and directed by Richard Laxton (Hancock & Joan, Grow Your Own). It is written by Brian Fillis (Curse of Steptoe, Fear of Fanny).

Now a lesbian bishop

The future of the worldwide Anglican Communion was in jeopardy last night after the Archbishop of Canterbury said that the election of a lesbian bishop in the United States raised “very serious questions”.

Dr Rowan Williams added that the choice of Canon Mary Glasspool to be a suffragan bishop in Los Angeles had “important implications”. The election of Canon Glasspool, who has lived with the same female partner since 1988, is the second appointment of an openly homosexual bishop in the US Episcopal Church. It confirmed fears among evangelicals in the Anglican Communion of more than 70 million people that crucial votes at last summer’s General Convention of the Episcopal Church had in effect ended the moratorium on gay bishops.

Dr Williams said: “The election of Mary Glasspool by the Diocese of Los Angeles as suffragan bishop-elect raises very serious questions not just for the Episcopal Church and its place in the Anglican Communion but for the Communion as a whole. The process of selection, however, is only part complete. The election has to be confirmed, or could be rejected, by diocesan bishops and diocesan standing committees. That decision will have very important implications.

“The bishops of the Communion have collectively acknowledged that a period of gracious restraint in respect of actions which are contrary to the mind of the Communion is necessary if our bonds of mutual affection are to hold.”

he consecration of Bishop Gene Robinson in New Hampshire in 2003 threatened a schism within the Church and led to the foundation of several conservative groups.

The Archbishop of Canterbury and a majority of the other 38 Anglican primates had requested a moratorium on gay bishops and same-sex blessings in an attempt to prevent the Communion from splitting between evangelicals and liberals.

The influential American Anglican Council was among the first of the conservative bodies to condemn the latest election, accusing the Episcopal Church of a further departure from biblical teaching.

“Unfortunately, this election provides further clarity to the rest of the Anglican Communion,” said Bishop David Anderson, its president. “Should the rest of the Episcopal Church consent to this election, there can be no more pretending that the Episcopal Church holds to Anglican Communion doctrine. Not only has it elected another non-celibate homosexual bishop, but it repeatedly defies the moratorium on same-sex blessings.”

These concerns were echoed by the leading UK conservative body, Anglican Mainstream, which was set up to oppose the consecration of Dr Jeffrey John, a homosexual, as Bishop of Reading — a battle that it won. Dr Philip Giddings, its convenor, said: “We are saddened but not surprised by this announcement.”

The Rev Rod Thomas, of the conservative evangelical group Reform, said that he was “deeply ashamed” that Canon Glasspool had been elected. He added that a schism was “absolutely inevitable”.

Liberals in England are increasingly frustrated that Dr Williams, who was elected for his supposedly liberal views, has embraced conservative Christian values in the name of unity.

Pope Benedict XVI’s offer of a home in the Roman Catholic Church to Anglo-Catholics, many of whom are opposed to the ordination of women bishops in England, has further jeopardised the unity that Dr Williams has made the central plank of his leadership.

However, it is almost certain that Canon Glasspool’s consecration will go ahead. She said: “Any group of people who have been oppressed because of any one isolated aspect of their persons yearns for justice and equal rights.” She was elected on a seventh ballot that included two other candidates, winning 153 clergy votes and 203 lay votes, just enough to emerge as the winner.

Campaigners for equality for lesbian and gay Christians welcomed the election result. The Very Rev Mark Kowalewski, Dean of St John’s Cathedral in Los Angeles, said: “I don’t think it’s a referendum on electing a woman or a gay person. Those are secondary characteristics.”

Canon Glasspool was ordained in 1981 and has led parishes in Annapolis in Maryland, Boston and Philadelphia. Bishop Jon Bruno, who leads the Los Angeles diocese, urged Episcopal dioceses to approve her election.

Informed Catholic View

I doubt that Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali of Rochester is bothered by the fact that his latest denunciation of homosexuality - “repent!” - coincided with the Gay Pride marches. Judging by the homely leather queens, shirtless pretty boys and beaming lesbians dancing down Oxford Street, repentance was the last thing on their minds. Sunday morning, on the other hand, could be a de profundis moment, depending on how many pints they sank, or what was in those pills.

No: Bishop Michael has his eyes on the General Synod, which is meeting in York next weekend. And, with fiendish cunning (his enemies would say) he has pulled the ultimate weapon out of his arsenal: the clear verdict of the Bible that homosexual acts are wrong, presented in the context of 2,000 unbroken years of Christian teaching.

Now, you can try to get round this awkward fact by setting aside the teaching: that was the route taken by Dr Rowan Williams on more than one occasion when he speculated that same-sex relationships were acceptable to God. And the Anglicans of the semi-schismatic “provinces” and “coalitions” that oppose gay relations remember this very well. (If you want some homework done on an opponent, ask a born-again Christian.)

Rowan’s withdrawal of support for gay ordination is also a sore issue in the semi-schismatic, semi-skimmed latte “Episcopal Church” of the United States (TEC), which reckons that the Bible was just plain wrong about homosexuality. Nearly every liberal Episcopal theologian has produced an unreadable tome on the subject, plus a picture book for a multi-ethnic playgroup.

I’m so tired of all this. There was a time, 15 years ago, when I knew the name of every Anglican faction, but that was before the C of E threw itself at the mercy of an international “Communion” in the advanced stages of theological schizophrenia.

My colleague Jonathan Wynne-Jones does a grand job of explaining what’s going on, but my basic reaction is: this is so over. The Anglican Communion does not have the structures, the consensus, the money or the guts to police the boundaries of doctrinal diversity. Soon, it will become - at best- a federation of independent Churches.

And the C of E? Yes, I think it will survive, but in a stripped-down, protestantised form: the great Anglo-Catholic parishes are collapsing like a souffle, letting out exotic but slightly stale smells as they sink. If the Church of England is lucky, an Archbishop will emerge who will proclaim striking evangelical teachings and concentrate his energies on fighting anti-Christian Islam, not some nebulous secularism. That will play well with the public, who are not even aware of the existence of a few (often saintly) diehards who perform self-taught liturgies, episcopi vagantes-style, in big empty churches.

Mark my words, in five years’ time, many of the Gothic revival parish churches of our inner cities won’t be offering Anglican Sung Mass at 11 on Sunday mornings. Nope, Friday will be their busy day. And they won’t be called churches any more. (Damian Thompson blog)

Liberal Alternative View

There's no pride in bashing gays, Bishop

Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali's campaign against homosexuality worries George Pitcher.

If you're reading, Bishop Michael, I really didn't want to have another pop at you about your trenchant and sometimes bizarre views about what constitutes Christian truth. As to the rest of you reading this, I'm sorry if it looks as if whenever Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, who retires as Bishop of Rochester in September, makes a public statement I launch an attack on him. Believe me, the routine is tiresome for me, too.

But his comments in yesterday's Sunday Telegraph, which he is expected to repeat today, that homosexuals should "repent and be changed" cannot pass unchallenged. Or rather, they should not go challenged only by homosexual rights campaigners, such as Peter Tatchell, who you would expect to be somewhat antipathetic to the expressed view.

Because Dr Nazir-Ali is wrong in the eyes of a broad swath of kind and tolerant people of differing sexualities, social mores and of the Christian faith, other faiths and no faith at all. Badly, badly wrong.

I say that I didn't want to have another fight with him because such fights polarise Anglicans, and we're at our best when we're talking. I went to a private lunch recently, to which Dr Nazir-Ali was also invited. He didn't show. The seat next to me went empty. I do hope he didn't bottle it; it's important that religious leaders don't just inhabit comfort zones with friends who share their views.

Dr Nazir-Ali's friends are the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (Foca), who this week will try to get the Anglican schism over homosexuality going again, while denying that they are doing any such thing. Had he turned up to our lunch, I would have asked him why he and Foca are so convinced that they know the mind of God better than those who disagree with them and that their interpretation of scripture is with absolute certainty the one and only true one.

When I write about the Church and homosexuality, inevitably I receive messages that read simply "Romans 1:26-27" or "1 Corinthians 6:9", as if that settles something. We can argue scripture until we're at the pearly gates. But the essential difference between Dr Nazir-Ali and me is this: I accept, disappointing as I would find it in my fiery furnace, that he might be right. By contrast, he and his friends cannot accept that I might be right, claim that I can't be a proper Christian, and some of them go so far as to suggest that I'll burn in hell for all eternity.

And there's the real problem: it's an issue of intolerance. Anglicanism has long been characterised by a broad tolerance. But my tolerance of Dr Nazir-Ali and his friends, that they are Anglicans with whom I happen vehemently to disagree, doesn't seem to be reciprocated.

Dr Nazir-Ali is leaving his bishopric, it is said, to develop his ministry among persecuted Christians. That is admirable. Persecution of Christians is a very bad thing. But persecution of homosexuals is a pretty bad thing, too, as is persecution of any part of humanity, all of which he will agree is made in God's image.

Now, let me say right away that Dr Nazir-Ali does not condone persecution of homosexuals. But persecuted factions of Christianity in some parts of Africa, such as Nigeria, are themselves persecutors of homosexuals. I trust Dr Nazir-Ali doesn't offer succour unwittingly to persecutors wherever they are to be found.

I have said before that Dr Nazir‑Ali is reported to be a devout and thoughtful man, a scholar of depth and breadth. People whose opinion I respect say that his critical analysis of Sharia-compliant financial services by Western banks is cogent and rigorous. He is a compelling prophetic voice, they say, when it comes to creeping Islamification of Western culture.

But he is in danger, in his bold agenda of resisting the march of Muslim fundamentalism, of allowing a concurrent Protestant fundamentalism to prosper. For that is what much of the Christian anti-homosexual and homophobic Right-wing consists. What we need is continued debate in the big Anglican tent, not edicts from those who have unilaterally taken possession of scripture.

It is a long time since the Church of England has been described as the Conservative Party at prayer. Today's Conservative Party, in the wake of last Saturday's Gay Pride event in London, is in a contest with Labour for who can appear more gay-friendly.

It is a mark of how far the Tories have travelled on social issues in the past decade or two. Dr Nazir-Ali may well argue that it is no role of the Church to reflect society. But the world can teach the Church, as well as the other way round.

So come on, Bishop Michael, let's talk this through. Because this idea that you can ask homosexuals to say they're sorry and that they'll try to stop being who they are is not, frankly, going to work, and I suspect you know it. It just makes for a bad climate. And if that's all you're offering, it might as well rain until September.

Repent and be changed

In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, The Bishop of Rochester, Dr Michael Nazir-Ali, said people who stray from traditional Bible teachings "do not share the same faith".

Dr Nazir-Ali spoke after more than half a million people, including the Prime Minister's wife Sarah Brown, took to the streets of London to celebrate gay culture at the annual Pride festival.

His controversial comments also come ahead of the launch in the UK and Ireland of the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans, a coalition of conservative parishes from around the world.

The evangelical group, which campaigns against active homosexuality in the Anglican communion, counts Dr Nazir-Ali among its supporters.

The bishop, who is stepping down from his post in September, told the newspaper: "We want to uphold the traditional teaching of the Bible. We believe that God has revealed his purpose about how we are made.

"People who depart from this don't share the same faith. They are acting in a way that is not normative according to what God has revealed in the Bible.

"The Bible's teaching shows that marriage is between a man and a woman. That is the way to express our sexual nature.

"We welcome homosexuals, we don't want to exclude people, but we want them to repent and be changed."

He added: "We want to hold on to the traditional teaching of the Church. We don't want to be rolled over by culture and trends in the Church. We want a movement for renewal. We need a reformation of the Church and the life of the Communion."

Obama and the church

THE Rt Revd Gene Robinson, the Bishop of New Hampshire, who is openly gay, has been invited at a late stage to take part in President-elect Obama’s inauguration celebrations. The invitation comes a month after it was announced that the Revd Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church, an Evangelical megachurch in California, would give the invocation at the swearing-in ceremony on Tuesday.

In an earlier interview, Bishop Robinson described the choice of the conservative Evangelical Mr Warren as “a slap in the face”, but denies that his invitation to take part is as a balance to Mr Warren. Bishop Robinson will give the invocation at the opening event of the inaugura tion celebrations at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington on Sunday, which will include performances from the singers Bruce Springsteen and Bono.

Responding to the invitation, he said it would be “an enormous honour to offer prayers for the country and the new President, standing on the holy ground where the ‘I have a dream’ speech was delivered by Dr King. . . It will be my great honour to be there represent ing the Episcopal Church, the people of New Hampshire, and all of us in the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community.”

Bishop Robinson said he was “very clear” that what he would say at the event “would not be a Chris­tian prayer, and I won’t be quoting scripture or anything like that. The texts that I hold as sacred are not sacred texts for all Americans, and I want all people to feel that this is their prayer.”

He said he might address the prayer to “the God of our many understandings” — language that he said he learned from the 12-step programme he attended for his alcohol addiction.

Jim Naughton, Canon for Communications and Advancement in the Episcopal diocese of Washington, said it seemed likely that Bishop Robinson’s appointment was an attempt to even things up.

“It sure looks that way, even though [the Obama team] denies it. I do think that the noise that was made after Rick Warren was initially chosen has made this happen. But Gene Robinson has been on Obama’s radar for at least a year, after the Bishop endorsed his campaign. And they do have a real relationship.”

Anglican bedfellows

The Church of England along with the three other Anglican churches of these isles is in full communion with the Church of Sweden, which is about to debate and probably approve a proposed rite of same-sex marriage. And there is no Anglican-English-style fudge here, over 'when is a blessing a wedding and when is it just a blessing'. This comes as the Lutheran Church in Britain prepares to consecrate this country's first woman bishop. The church said: 'The Lutheran Church in Great Britain will consecrate its first woman bishop, the Right Rev Jana Jeruma-Grinberga, on Saturday 17th January 2009, in the historic Wren church of St Anne & St Agnes on Gresham Street, in the City of London. Her predecessor, the Right Rev Walter Jagucki, will preside at the service, and bishops and other clergy from Nordic and European Lutheran churches will participate in the consecration.'

"As far as the new Lutheran rite is concerned, these are real, one-flesh-and-all-that same-sex marriages we are talking about here. The Swedish church already has two women bishops and we've remained in communion with them through that one, so I don't suppose this will make any difference. It just seems a bit unfair that The Episcopal Church should get it in the neck for Gene Robinson, and Canada for New Westminster, while another church, albeit Lutheran not Anglican, gets away with it. Poorvoo but not pour vous, it seems, if you are a gay Anglican in England or TEC." (Ruth Gledhill)

How to save the world

homosexuality

The Pope has said that "saving" humanity from homosexual

 or transsexual behaviour is just as important as saving the

 rainforests.

 

By Nick Allen 

Pope Benedict XVI sparked a furious reaction from other Christian 

groups as he also suggested that a blurring of the distinction between 

male and female could lead to the "self-destruction" of the human race.

The pontiff was delivering his end-of-year address to senior Vatican 

staff and his words were later released to the media.

The Roman Catholic Church teaches that, while homosexuality is not 

sinful, homosexual acts are.

It opposes gay marriage and, in October, one leading Vatican official 

described homosexuality as "a deviation, an irregularity, a wound".

In his address to the Curia, the Vatican's central administration, the 

Pope himself described behaviour beyond traditional heterosexual 

relations as "a destruction of God's work".

He said the Roman Catholic Church had a duty to "protect man from 

the destruction of himself" and urged respect for the "nature of the 

human being as man and woman."

The pontiff added: "The tropical forests do deserve our protection. 

But man, as a creature, does not deserve any less."

His remarks were immediately denounced as "totally irresponsible 

and unacceptable in any shape or form" by the Lesbian and Gay 

Christian Movement.

Its chief executive, the Rev Sharon Ferguson, said: "It is more the 

case that we need to be saved from his comments. It is comments 

like this that justify homophobic bullying that goes on in schools 

and it is comments like this that justify gay bashing.

"There are still so many instances of people being killed around 

the world, including in western society, purely and simply because 

of their sexual orientation or their gender identity.

"When you have religious leaders like that making that sort of 

statement then followers feel they are justified in behaving in an 

aggressive and violent way because they feel that they are doing 

God's work in ridding the world of these people."

The Rev Dr Giles Fraser, Vicar of Putney and president of Inclusive 

Church, the pro-gay Anglican movement, said: "I thought the 

Christmas angels said 'Fear not'.

"Instead, the Pope is spreading fear that gay people somehow 

threaten the planet. And that's just absurd.

"As always, this sort of religious homophobia will be an alibi 

for all those who would do gay people harm. Can't he think of 

something better to say at Christmas?"

An Unholy Alliance

Obama and the Gay Bishop: 'Three Private Meetings'

Today I had the chance to discuss the US election with Bishop Gene Robinson, who is briefly in London for the annual Stonewall awards where he won 'Hero of the Year'.

But he was actually most interesting on his private meetings with President-elect Barack Obama. Bishop Gene said: 'I had the great honour of having three private conversations with him.' These took place in May and June last year and were not initiated by Robinson.

'I was actually sought out by his campaign. He had quite an extraordinary outreach to the religious community. By that I mean all religious communities. And through those contacts I had the opportunity to speak to him. And I must say I don't know if it is an expression here in England or not but he is the genuine article. I think he is exactly who he says he is. And I serve on the church pension fund board at the national level and  I serve with someone who has been his friend since Barack was in college and says what you see is exactly who he has been for as long as I've known him.

'He is impressive, he's smart, he is an amazing listener. For someone who's called on to speak all the time when he asks you a question it is not for show, he is actually wanting to know what you think and listens, or at least gives you that impression. I think we've had eight years of someone who has listened to almost no-one. So the thought of having a president who gathers the best people around him and then listens to what they have to say to him, especially the things he doesn't want to hear I think he will be open to, that is very refreshing. So I'm absolutely delighted about him.

They did not discuss Anglican issues in great depth. 'He certainly indicated his broad and deep support for the full civil rights for gay and lesbian people. 

They discussed what it was like to be 'first' in something - first gay bishop, potentially first black president.

Bishop Gene said: 'One of the things Barack and I did talk about when we were together was just  the experience of being first and the danger of that and we talked about being demonised by one side and, I don't know if the word is angelicised, by the other. Expectations are laid on you both negative and positive and neither are true. And the importance of remaining centred and grounded in the middle of that so that you don't begin to believe either your negative press or your positive press.'

'We did not talk about assassination specifically but we did talk about the physical risks to ploughing new territory. I don't think anyone can have observed life in America in the last century without noting that we tend to be a more violent society than most and that the availability of weapons and the willingness of some people to use them present enormous challenges. At the end of the day you have to decide whether or not you are going to be paralysed by threats and by violent possibilities  or whether you are just move on and do what you feel called to do despite the risks. (Ruth Gledhill)

Earlier Report from CEN last September

The Bishop of New Hampshire has broken with tradition and endorsed a candidate for political office. In a letter published on “LGBT for Obama,” a website that states it serves as the “lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community’s online campaign to educate voters on John McCain’s anti-gay policies” Bishop Gene Robinson called on all LGBT voters to “put our differences and disappointments aside, and get behind the one candidate who has our interests at heart.”

On Sept 4 Bishop Robinson wrote LGBT voters were “faced with the most stark choice in recent memory, with ramifications for our community like no other. If nothing else convinces you to vote for Barack Obama, surely the likelihood of the next president appointing one, two, or possibly even three Supreme Court justices should do it.”

While endorsing specific issues and or programmes is not uncommon, lending the support of the episcopal office to a single candidate is uncommon. It also skirts US tax laws, as clergy or church endorsements are prohibited by a 1954 amendment to the Internal Revenue Code. Nonprofit, tax-exempt entities may not “participate in, or intervene in . . . any political campaign on behalf of any candidate for public office.”

Past challenges to the law have so far failed, with the Courts holding that while clergy are free to speak out on religious, moral and political issues they cannot use tax-exempt resources to support or oppose candidates for public office, which includes statements from the pulpit by church officials and other indications of campaign intervention.

In May of 2000, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia unanimously held that the IRS properly revoked the tax exemption of the Church at Pierce Creek, a congregation near Binghamton, N.Y., that bought newspaper ads in 1992 opposing presidential candidate Bill Clinton.

Bishop Robinson said that the election of John McCain would lead to the packing of the US Supreme Court with justices that would rule against the recognition of gay marriages. “With Barack Obama, we have someone who is utterly sympathetic to our full and equal rights as citizens.”

He added that while Senator Obama “won’t say he’s for equal marriage rights” Bishop Robinson knew from his “own private conversations with him that he is totally in our court. I believe him, and I trust him, not to throw us under the bus when the election is over.”