Why I Continue to Hold to the "Official" Anglican Communion Position on Human Sexuality

(This is an expansion on a short essay I recently wrote)

It is an interesting time to be a Christian worshipping and serving in the Worldwide Anglican Communion. It is interesting because there is an amazing realignment taking place where many Anglicans who desire to remain faithful to the “faith once delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3) are finding and creating new ecclesiastical structures. These new ecclesiastical structures – such as the Anglican Church of North America (ACNA) of which the Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC) is a founding member – are, in fact, not new at all in a theological sense. Sure they are new charitable societies, in that the Episcopal Church USA (TEC) and the Anglican Church of Canada (ACoC) continue to function as they always have from a legal perspective. However, it can be convincingly argued that ACNA and ANiC (and the other bodies like them) are “old” – or “original” or “continuing” – since they continue to hold to what Anglican Christians have always held on matters of essential doctrine and ethics.

Of course the battleground is currently on issues of human sexuality. Before I go any further, what does the Anglican Communion officially believe about human sexuality? In 1998 the bishops of the Anglican Communion met for their decennial Lambeth Conference and passed Resolution I.10 by 526 votes to 70:

This Conference:
a. commends to the Church the subsection report on human sexuality;

b. in view of the teaching of Scripture, upholds faithfulness in marriage between a man and a woman in lifelong union, and believes that abstinence is right for those who are not called to marriage;

c. recognises that there are among us persons who experience themselves as having a homosexual orientation. Many of these are members of the Church and are seeking the pastoral care, moral direction of the Church, and God's transforming power for the living of their lives and the ordering of relationships. We commit ourselves to listen to the experience of homosexual persons and we wish to assure them that they are loved by God and that all baptised, believing and faithful persons, regardless of sexual orientation, are full members of the Body of Christ;

d. while rejecting homosexual practice as incompatible with Scripture, calls on all our people to minister pastorally and sensitively to all irrespective of sexual orientation and to condemn irrational fear of homosexuals, violence within marriage and any trivialisation and commercialisation of sex;

e. cannot advise the legitimising or blessing of same sex unions nor ordaining those involved in same gender unions.

And yet despite the clear language of these and similar statements (1, endnote below) the ACoC and TEC have continued unabated to teach and practice a revisioned sexual ethic where homosexuality is a legitimate and “blessable” (to invent words) lifestyle for Christians. The blessing of same-sex unions and the ordination of practicing homosexuals to each of the three apostolic orders – i.e. bishops, priests, and deacons – has been the straw that has broken the proverbial camel’s back as far as unity is concerned. Many biblically faithful Anglicans have concluded that the ACoC and TEC have departed theologically and ethically from the Anglican Communion and have therefore realigned themselves in these new structures. However, as this realignment takes place, one of the great slurs thrown at these “new-yet-truly-old” bodies is that this is all about homosexuality.

It is terribly unfortunate that much of what the average person hears (skewed by much of the media and by revisionists) about the current realignment within Anglicanism is that it is only about divergent opinions on homosexuality. In fact, I would go so far as to say that this is an intentional strategy of satan and those whom he has deceived. Instead of having an open debate about the primary heresies being promoted by much of the ACoC and TEC– doctrines of Scriptural authority, the reality of sin, the need for repentance, the uniqueness of Christ, the bodily resurrection of Jesus, to mention just a few – the revisionists continue to claim that this realignment is only about “either accepting or rejecting homosexuals.” As a result, most of culture, and many biblically uninformed Christians find it intolerable and unthinkable for the Church to call homosexuals to repent and embrace a lifestyle of abstinence (or to seek transformation of their orientation). Recently we saw the vilification of Rochester Bishop Dr Michael Nazir-Ali for simply stating the biblical and “official” Anglican standard:

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. (2)

Though this orthodox position will continue to draw fire from the world, it is still the means by which God is redeeming people lost in sexual brokenness. It is an understatement of enormous proportions to say that this call to abstinence or change for Christians with homosexual orientations (3) will be “difficult.” I suppose that as a former stage actor, I have had more close friendships with gay people than the average priest. At one time in my life, I prided myself on the fact that I was therefore more adequately qualified to speak into the homosexual crisis in our Church. However, regardless of the number of gay friends I have had over the years, I have never had to face a requirement of life-long sexual abstinence because of my orientation. No doubt, this is an enormous challenge for Christians with homosexual orientations, and yet this is the biblical call that the Church must uphold in love. In Richard Hay book, The Moral Vision of the New Testament, Richard’s gay Christian friend, Gary, puts it this way,

“Are homosexuals to be excluded from the community of faith? Certainly not. But anyone who joins such a community should know that it is a place of transformation, of discipline, of learning, and not merely a place to be comforted or indulged.” (4)

One only needs to read the testimonies of Christians who, in the power of the Holy Spirit, are overcoming their same-sex attractions to be reminded of why the Church cannot cease its witness about Godly sexuality. As I began composing this essay, I read through Zaccheus Fellowship’s website (5) and was moved to tears more than once to read about the freedom that these brothers and sisters in Christ have come to know. Some have been transformed from their homosexual inclinations to faithful heterosexual marriages, while others have found a faithful home in sexual abstinence. I will close with the words of these courageous witnesses:
If the Church is to be effective in this day and age, it must be a voice of hope in the world – a voice which seeks to give hope to a people living in a world where there seems to be only hopelessness. The Zacchaeus Fellowship exists to bring hope to the homosexual/lesbian, and to the Church. It is our hope that the Church may see the Good News that the Gospel holds for all of us in our brokenness, and particularly how that Good News of God's grace and mercy contains a message of hope for those affected by same-sex attractions. Each of us here today has experienced that lifestyle, and now understands that hope and faith in Jesus Christ brings wholeness and freedom. The person living the homosexual life of brokenness can realize victory and a fullness of life, one which God created for each and every one of us. (6)

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ENDNOTES

1 Some notable examples are the 1979 Canadian House of Bishops Guidelines; 1994 Montreal Declaration; 1997 Canadian House of Bishops Statement on Human Sexuality; 1998 Lambeth Resolution 1.10; 2003 Primates’ Meeting at Lambeth; 2005 Primates' Meeting in Dromantine, Ireland; and 2007 Primates’ Meeting in Dar es Salaam.

2 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/5744559/Change-and-repent-bishop-tells-gays.html

3 About Christians with homosexual orientations, Richard B. Hays writes, “Can homosexual persons be members of the Christian Church? This is rather like asking, ‘Can envious persons be members of the church? (cf. Rom 1:29) or ‘Can alcoholics be members of the church?’ De facto, they are.” The Moral Vision of the New Testament, p.400.

4 Richard B. Hays, The Moral Vision of the New Testament, p.401

5 A ministry of healing and transformation to homosexuals by men and women who have overcome their same-sex attractions in the power of the Holy Spirit. http://www.zacchaeus.ca, see also http://www.newdirection.ca for New Direction Ministries Canada’s site.

6 2005 Presentation to the House of Bishops, “Conclusion” http://www.zacchaeus.ca/HOB.HTML