England’s College of Bishops respond to The Pilling Report
“The College of Bishops met on 27th January, 2014 to begin a process of reflection on the issues raised by the Pilling Report…
We are united in welcoming and affirming the presence and ministry within the Church of gay and lesbian people, both lay and ordained. We are united in acknowledging the need for the Church to repent for the homophobic attitudes it has sometimes failed to rebuke and affirming the need to stand firmly against homophobia wherever and whenever it is to be found. …”
And from Anglican Mainstream’s Andrew Symes –
“This re-states an important recommendation of the Pilling Report. Its major weakness is that “affirming the ministry of gay people” is not explained or qualified. It suggests that the church does not distinguish between welcoming someone’s presence within the church, endorsement of their lifestyle, an assumption of Christian fellowship, and affirming their ministry. “
The Pilling Report can be found here (PDF).
‘Work of ARCIC irrelevant to most Christians, says Lord Carey’
“Catholics and Anglicans involved in formal ecumenical dialogue might as well be ‘talking on the moon’ because no one is listening to them, a former Anglican leader has said.
Lord Carey of Clifton said the work of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC) was ‘irrelevant’ to most Christians…”
– from The Catholic Herald (UK).
Crossway article on The Pilling Report
“The easy thing for us to do, in the current climate, would be to respond to our culture’s normalising of homosexual practice by re-thinking the Church’s historic opposition to it. Many people, and especially the younger generation, now feel that there is nothing wrong with same-sex attraction or behaviour, so it seems obvious to many that to attract them we must soften our stance on this issue at some level.
The riskier, more radical and more difficult thing to do is to hold on to what the Holy Spirit teaches us in his word about what it means to be holy, and what kind of lifestyle is pleasing to him. Will we take that risk, and pay the cost of discipleship, for the sake of Jesus and the clarity of his gospel call to ‘Repent and believe the good news’?”
– In the latest issue of Crossway, Church Society Director Lee Gatiss responds to The Pilling Report. PDF file.
An Alternative Baptismal Liturgy
John Richardson in the UK proposes an alternative Baptismal liturgy for the Church of England. It has a bit more substance.
‘Is the Church of England ashamed to preach Christ crucified?’
“It must be the ultimate irony in liturgical development that the Church of England becomes ashamed of the exhortation not to be ashamed to confess the faith of Christ crucified …”
– UK blogger ‘Archbishop Cranmer’ on the CofE trial Baptism service.
Anglican church accused of ‘dumbing down’ baptism service
“The Church of England has been accused of ‘dumbing down’ the baptism service by changing its wording so parents and godparents no longer have to ‘repent sins’ and ‘reject the devil’.…”
– story from The Guardian.
‘Emulate Mandela’ says Abp of Canterbury
“People should pledge this new year to try and emulate Nelson Mandela and change the world around them, the Archbishop of Canterbury has said.”
– Report from BBC News.
Kirsty Birkett on The Pilling Report
Dr Kirsty Birkett, at Oak Hill College in London, takes a look at The Pilling Report’s approach to Scripture –
“The majority of those writing the Pilling report felt unable to articulate what scripture actually says on the issue of homosexual activity.”
2. What if scripture really is unclear?
“‘But we do not all believe that the evidence of scripture points to only one set of ethical conclusions. In short, Christians who share an equal commitment to scripture do not agree on the implications of scripture for same sex relationships’ (The Pilling Report, 235).
This is one of many statements that the Pilling Report makes to the effect that it was impossible for the group to come to one mind on the meaning of scripture as regards homosexual relationships.”
Mike Ovey on The Pilling Report
Principal of Oak Hill College, Dr Mike Ovey, has now posted eight responses to the Pilling Report (“the Report of the House of Bishops Working Group on Human Sexuality’).
1. God’s work versus God’s will?
“ultimately in practice, it prefers our judgment of what we think good to God’s judgment expressed in the scriptures of what is good.”
2. Does sincerity grant a veto?
“This creates the bizarre situation of an explicit submission to the authority of scripture, while not in fact applying what scripture says, either against same-sex marriages, or in favour.”
3. Groundhog Day: ‘scripture’s lack of clarity’
“As we have seen, judgments about the obscurity of scripture have been made before, notably in Roman Catholic responses to the Reformation.”
4. How common is the common ground?
“Like an iceberg, the most significant parts of the Pilling Report lie beneath the surface.”
“They have talked at length, listened at length and have had both clerical and expert help in all their deliberations. They have listened both to each other and to a wide range of witnesses. But this process has not enabled them to reach a collective conclusion as to whether or not same-sex sexual relations in the context of a faithful long-term commitment are right or wrong.”
6. Common grace and stolen fruit
“After noting that the tradition of the church for 2,000 years and indeed worldwide at the moment is against recognition of same-sex marriages and relationships, the report nevertheless goes on to speak in laudatory terms about the same-sex couples who have testified before it.”
“If we want a biblical precedent for a hermeneutics of suspicion where the hermeneutics of suspicion is wrongly placed, then we need look no further than Genesis 3:1ff.”
“Churches can get things wrong. One of the more disturbing moments in the Thirty-Nine Articles comes in Article 19 which deals with the doctrine of the church.”
Global South Statement in response to the Pilling Report
“The Global South considers forward movement on the Pilling Report’s recommendations as equal to what the North American churches did ten years ago which caused much confusion in the Communion.
This reminds us of Eli the High Priest who turned a blind eye to the wrongdoings of his sons which led to a period of spiritual dryness when the Spirit of God departed from the midst of His people (Ichabod).”
– Archbishop Dr. Mouneer Hanna Anis, Chairman of the Global South of the Anglican Communion, and Archbishop Ian Ernest, Hon. General Secretary, have issued this Statement – read it via Anglican Mainstream (PDF file).
Mike Ovey responds to the Pilling Report
“We humans have to live with grey. Sometimes we must weigh whether an action or life-choice is right or wrong. But so often, actions and life-choices are shades of grey rather than simply black or white. …”
– Oak Hill’s Principal, Dr Mike Ovey, responds to the Pilling Report –
Part 1 – God’s work versus God’s will?
Part 2 – Does sincerity grant a veto?
Reform’s ReNew Conference 2013 audio files
Reform’s “ReNew conference met Nov 26th to 27th, 2013. The conference was predominantly for church leaders and for women in paid positions of ministry in the Church of England. The purpose of the conference was to establish the basis on which Anglican evangelicals can work together and to begin to chart a way ahead.”
– Audio files of the talks are currently being added to the Reform website. The audio is a little over-compressed, but is quite audible and the talks are well worth hearing.
So far they have the talks by –
- Hugh Palmer – Proclaiming the gospel – the urgency of the hour
– 1 Corinthians 15:1-11, - Alasdair Paine – Defending and contending for the gospel – Romans 16:17-20,
- and Vaughan Roberts – JC Ryle – an Anglican Evangelical role model.
The Church of England facing ‘officially sanctioned apostasy’?
The Rev. Andrew Symes, Executive Secretary of Anglican Mainstream, works through The Pilling Report (PDF) to see the huge impact if its recommendations were to be adopted in The Church of England.
From his conclusions:
“This is why we are faced with officially sanctioned apostasy in our own church. It has finally happened. What do we do? The first thing to say is that the report has not yet been endorsed by the house of Bishops. We must pray for them and lobby them as politely but intensively as we can before their meeting to discuss the document.”
– Be sure to take the time to read his analysis in full here.
Anglican Mainstream also has a comprehensive list of links to reactions to the Report.
And some essential background:
The Anglican Debacle: Roots and Patterns – Mark Thompson (from The Sydney Lambeth Decision Briefing – 16 March 2008)
The Limits of Fellowship – Phillip Jensen (from The Sydney Lambeth Decision Briefing – 16 March 2008)
Are we stronger than He? (PDF) – David Short (January 2005)
Some questions for the new Archbishop of Canterbury – by Mark Thompson (09 November 2012)
‘Tearing the Fabric’ — 2012 edition – American Anglican Council (PDF)
Reform’s Chairman ‘deeply ashamed’ of the ‘very divisive’ Pilling Report
“Reform Chairman Prebendary Rod Thomas said today that he was “deeply ashamed” that the Pilling Report was opening up divisive discussions about the church’s stance on human sexuality.
He said: “Anglican evangelicals want to encourage the best possible provision of pastoral care for everyone involved in parish life. The calling of Christians is to a transformed life. True pastoral care in the case of those experiencing same-sex attraction will be to help them live Christianly. The report does not do this in its recommendations for “pastoral accommodation”. Reform profoundly regrets this insensitivity to real pastoral need.
Speaking at the close of the pan-evangelical ReNew conference, attended by over 250 senior Anglican leaders, Rod Thomas said that the report’s proposals were “very divisive and distressing”. He warmly endorsed the Bishop of Birkenhead’s dissenting statement with its understanding that the trajectory of the report “…undermined the discipleship and pastoral care of many faithful Christians”.
The Reform Council gave initial consideration to the report today. It concluded that the inevitable result of the report’s recommendations would be that pressure will increase for changes to the church’s understanding of marriage and of God’s purposes for human flourishing as outlined in the Bible. The Council reiterated its belief that the Anglican approach to doctrine and ethics can only be based on Scripture and therefore was not open to negotiation in facilitated conversations.”
– Source: Reform.
See also: The Bishop of Birkenhead’s dissenting statement.
Anglican Mainstream statement.
Church Society responds to the Pilling Report on sexuality
“Church Society welcomes the publication of the Report of the House of Bishops Working Group on Human Sexuality, so that it can be discussed openly and publicly by the whole church.
Like the apostle Jude, in the Bible, we would prefer to discuss the good news of Jesus Christ and the salvation he offers to all, but feel constrained to respond to the teaching of those who are changing the gospel into an affirmation of immoral behaviour.
We call on the church to read the report prayerfully, and to weigh its teaching and recommendations carefully in the light of scripture’s very clear teaching on sexuality, to which the Church of England is committed in its canons, doctrinal formularies, Synodical statements, and the resolutions of the Lambeth Conference. We particularly commend to people the “dissenting statement” in the report from the Bishop of Birkenhead, and thank him for its clarity and care. A further statement will be made in due course.” – Lee Gatiss, Director of Church Society.
Click here for full Pilling Report and CofE statement (CofE website).”
– from Church Society’s EV news.
What we believe
The message at the heart of Christianity is really quite simple…