The Bishop of Guildford’s testimony and lessons about unhealthy Christianity

The Bishop of Guildford’s testimony and lessons about unhealthy Christianity

Yesterday, Andrew Watson, the bishop of Guildford, issued a statement stating that he is one of the survivors of John Smyth’s appalling activities in the late 1970s and early 80s. He said this has placed him in a unique and challenging position when it comes to the events of the past few days. He said that survivors of the alleged beatings should not be “used as pawns in some political or religious game. But Christian teaching is responsible for unhealthy constructs of Christianity which directly leads to the abuse of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people.

Iwerne Trust camps, the abuse of LGBTI people in the C of E and the theology of violence

Iwerne Trust camps, the abuse of LGBTI people in the C of E and the theology of violence

The media has reported allegations of abuse by evangelical Christian leader John Smyth who is accused of violent sado-masochistic beatings of teenage boys and young men. The Iwerne camps with which he was involved in the late 70s were designed to bring a Christian influence to this country, a very specific brand of conservative evangelical influence exemplified by Holy Trinity Brompton and marking the impact of Archbishop Justin on the changing culture of the Church of England. Ingredients of this unhealthy and abusive culture are to be found in the present House of Bishops. The “wholesome muscular Christianity” ethos in part explains the addictive conservative evangelical fascination with homosexuality.

David Walker: “the law will not change” - Pete Broadbent: “same sex marriage doesn’t exist”

David Walker: “the law will not change” - Pete Broadbent: “same sex marriage doesn’t exist”

David Walker, Bishop of Manchester, interviewed on BBC Radio 4s Sunday programme last weekend, repeated six times variants of “the law will not change.” He believes that if we work together: “LGBT Christians will work with the rest of the church, we can make that maximum freedom what it ought to be.” But there will not and cannot be maximum freedom until the bishops accept marriage equality. On Facebook, Bishops Pete Broadbent and Alan Wilson had an illuminating exchange about the Canons on marriage law. Bishop Pete claimed that since for the CofE, there is no such thing as same sex marriage, nobody is being prevented from having access to something that doesn't exist.

The dark shadow over the Church of England

The dark shadow over the Church of England

Yesterday the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby wrote to every primate in the Anglican Communion in advance of the next Primates’ Meeting, which takes place in Canterbury in October. The letter reveals the mindset of the Lambeth Palace team, determined to maintain the unequal status of LGBTI people in the Church of England and the Anglican Communion. The letter inflames an already incendiary situation. There is now fury among the Church of England’s LGBTI networks about the content of the report, the way bishops have presented it and the use that is now being made of it. The Archbishop has now ensured LGBTI people and our supporters will approach next week’s Synod debate in a hostile mood.

Three wasted, humiliating years

Three wasted, humiliating years

Why are LGBTI Anglicans so angry about the report from the House of Bishops: Marriage and Same Sex Relationships after the Shared Conversations? A comment made four years ago by someone involved in the development of Pilling’s work struck me. “The Pilling group was an ill-conceived exercise in the first place, ill-conceived in part because formulated by a male only group initially. It was marked by a lack of coherence and incompetence in the Church.” If that was a considered assessment of the value of the Pilling group prior to the Shared Conversations, we should not be surprised that the final outcome has the marks of ill-conceived incompetence. The anger felt by LGBGTI Anglicans about the latest report should come as no surprise. The report comes from the same stable of bishops.

The Bishops’ report – a holistic reaction

The Bishops’ report – a holistic reaction

The House of Bishops report, Marriage and Same Sex Relationships after the Shared Conversations is in serious danger of drawing us back into the unhealthy, addictive world of conservative evangelicals, the HTB-modelled, Renewal and Reform packaged, ignorant-of-the-God-of-unconditional-love mentality now embedded in the minds of the hierarchy. We HAVE to live from a healthier, more holistic, integrated, holy, deeply authentic place of love, justice, creativity, imagination, depth and truth, in our selves, our hearts and souls and bodies, our relationships, our spirituality, our praying - and our engagement with the church.

Sarum College Gathering

Sarum College Gathering

A group of nine people is meeting from lunchtime today for three days at Sarum College in Salisbury. They are all people who are exploring life and faith in radical, unconventional ways. I hope that over the course of the three days, a conversation will develop, woven from our own experience of the holy and our dreams of the divine. We urgently need a new, truthful, healthy, re-imagining of God. I imagine the church as a prophetic agent of transformation for people, revealing how life and creation are infused with love and goodness despite our wounds and the losses and pains that are integral to contingent lives lived with free will. The love is infinitely present, and we are immersed in it, and can become aware that we are infused with love.

Bishops’ Reflection Group on Sexuality – what can we do?

Bishops’ Reflection Group on Sexuality – what can we do?

We LGBTI people have to live into the transformative freedom which comes from being immersed in God’s infinite, unconditional, intimate love. We are not going to transform ourselves or the church unless we embody this divine reality. The tyrannical, abusive God who many still worship has to be condemned to history as the source of prejudiced, toxic opinions and practice. Until we release ourselves from the tyranny of magical thinking, fundamentalism, co-dependence on abusive authority, we are not going to find the freedom, confidence and vision that will release energies to transform the place of LGBTI people in the Church of England and the parts of the Anglican Communion where tyranny reigns.

Time for open conversation leading to good disagreement about the fundamentals

Time for open conversation leading to good disagreement about the fundamentals

We may think that there is just one version of Christianity that we who are Anglicans share with every denomination and all Christians. Not so - we are living with many versions of Christianity, not just within the variety of denominations, but within each denomination and within the Church of England. Within the church there is an invisible, underground, disconnected, boundary-crossing set of people who are letting go of orthodoxy and dogma. In my dreams this group will reach a critical mass as the reality of the ways in which people are reconfiguring faith becomes more widely known. It’s the great secret of the current decade that dare not speak its name, though it has been emerging for decades.

A dream of the future

A dream of the future

I’ve been lamenting for a number of years the loss of quality of life in the Church of England compared with my experience in the 1960s and early 1970s. They were adventurous, exciting, imaginative, creative times. I was introduced to the work of theologians, prophets and mystics that continues to nourish my faith. Where has that energy and risk-taking exploration of faith gone? Because gone it certainly has. The centre of energy is shifting away from the orthodox, traditional patterns of church life and faith. I have a core of friends who are really living, living into God and the future, energised and inspired. I have no doubt they are being inspired by the same teacher and energised by the same Spirit and loved, intensely, gloriously, tenderly, unconditionally loved by the same God.