Unadulterated Love was launched as a website and blog seven years ago. This week I have launched a Vlog, Unadulterated Love. Over the past year I’ve wanted to communicate with a wider range of people and in a more immediate way - through videos. Following the publication of the Living in Love and Faith book two years ago and the launch of the national LLF process, after consulting with friends I decided to re-launched Changing Attitude England, campaigning for the full equality of LGBTQIA+ people in the Church of England.
The bishops have now published their proposals and they will be discussed at General Synod in two weeks time. Last Sunday morning I did consecutive interviews for twenty BBC local radio stations in two and a half hours, all of them energised and engaged. They helped strengthen my own convictions about where I am now, where the bishops are, and where the progressive groups are in relation to General Synod and the future. I'm more confident about where I am as a married gay priest without a licence. I'm less confident about the progressive groups. The very good news is that over the past two years the groups have worked more and more closely with each other and are meeting at intervals to explore together strategy and goals. I suspect it may become more difficult for all of us to maintain momentum over the next 5 years during which time Synod will "invite the House of Bishops to monitor the Church’s use of and response to the Prayers of Love and Faith, once they have been commended and published, and to report back to Synod in five years’ time." What happens at General Synod in two week’s time will, I hope, generate a more positive energy committed to a transformative path.
What became obvious to me in the course of the interviews is that the key problem is what the Church thinks about God - is God prejudiced, abusive, misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic and abusive or is God unconditional, infinite, intimate love. This is the dramatic division in the Church that underpins divisions over gender and sexuality, and about which the Church is not having a conversation. I’ve launched the Unadulterated Love Vlog, to explore exactly this - what kind of God do I and we and the Christian Church believe in - what kind of God do you believe in.