This is an article from
Theology Wales:
the Church and Homosexuality
Full contents:
Guest Editor's Introduction
- Rev Jenny Wigley
Presidential Address
- Archbishop Barry Morgan
Same-sex relationships
- Bishop Richard Harries
The freeing of Anglican identities - Rev Dr Lorraine Cavanagh
Facing up to our differences
- Rev Jean Mayland
Same-sex unions
- Rev Dr Will Strange
Homosexuality - the biblical evidence
- Rev Prof DP Davies
Engaging with the scriptures
- Canon Robert Paterson
A view from the pews
- Tim Heywood
Engaging with the Scriptures
-
The Sexuality Debate in Anglicanism
Canon Robert M E Paterson
Robert Paterson has been in parish ministry since 1972 and was appointed Principal Officer of the Council for Mission and Ministry in 2000. He is a student of the Reformation and has written on liturgy, preaching and mission. Since 2002 he has been Secretary of a Primates' Working Group, 'Theological Education for the Anglican Communion'. This article is based on a day seminar he led for the Southampton Deanery Chapter. Robert is married to Pauline and they have three grown-up children.
Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.
(Article VI of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion)
Are you persuaded that the holy Scriptures contain sufficiently all doctrine required of necessity for eternal salvation through faith in Jesus Christ? And are you determined out of the said Scriptures to instruct the people committed to your charge, and to teach nothing (as required of necessity to eternal salvation) but that which you shall be persuaded may be concluded and proved by the Scripture?
(The Ordinal, 1662)
we re-affirm our common understanding of the centrality and authority of Scripture in determining the basis of our faith. Whilst we acknowledge a legitimate diversity of interpretation that arises in the Church, this diversity does not mean that some of us take the authority of Scripture more lightly than others.
(the primates of the Anglican Communion, meeting at Lambeth October 2004)
Understanding the Scriptures I
I come to the issue of engagement with the Bible with a basic assumption, that in the post- Karl Barth world we recognise that we have no right to dismiss any part of Holy Scripture, however uncomfortable it may make us feel and for whatever reason, and also that when readers are faithful to and serious in their engagement with the whole of the Bible, they should not accord the same truth-value to each individual scripture. This forces readers to ask themselves basic questions about the major underlying theological principles of the Bible and of the revelation of the Word of God, literary and incarnate. The Church has said that the Scriptures are the word of the Lord, but clearly some parts are more Word than others.
There will always be wide diversity in interpretation based on our reasoned appreciation of Christian tradition and experience. We have traditionally referred to the source of Anglican theology being a three-fold cord of Scripture, Tradition, and Reason. Put another way we might describe this as reading the Bible together in fullest awareness of who we are and where we are; or as reading the Bible together in light of others' readings of Bible in order to hear and obey the word of the Lord today.
Understanding any text of Scripture cannot be done without first coming to terms with what it meant to its original author. This is crucial and is often neglected. For instance, in the fourth Servant Song in Isaiah 52:13 - 53:12, who was the Servant? An individual such as the prophet or someone known to the hearers whom we can't identify, but subsequently identified ( not in the sense of pointed out in an identity parade, that is, not fortune-telling, but seen to reveal profound truths ) by Christians with Jesus Christ (as in Acts 8: 27-35). What did he mean? Well he certainly described someone suffering for others, innocently and silently, even if we know nothing more of the original context than that it is likely to have been delivered towards the end of the Babylonian exile, i.e. after c. 550 BC. It goes without saying that we always need to understand the text as much as we can. One of the failings of some contemporary preachers is that they think they don't need to study the Bible! It is often said that there are four aspects to the technique of understanding of the Scriptures:
- faithfulness to the text,
- humility of approach,
- provisionality in interpretation and
- charity in application.
Understanding Scripture is like setting foundations on the sides of a chasm in order to build a bridge - it must be firmly located on both sides. Bridge-building is our trade - we're all pontifex! One of our primary tasks as preachers and teachers is to build links so that the two-way traffic of ideas, revelation, knowledge and experience can cross in order to enrich and change us all. On the far side, it must be located in careful and honest scholarship, never partisan scholarship - I am always fearful of partisan translations of the Bible, particularly when produced by people who purport to believe in the open book! This, the far end of the bridge moves when Biblical scholarship moves, as it did frequently during the controversies of 19th century.
When that pillar of the bridge is built, the other pillar must be built, the place into which the message of the Scriptures will come - our own context in time, in history, in our own story and in our social context, etc. - where we have come from and where we are now. Some exponents of the Christian Way find the ground on this end of the bridge extremely difficult to survey. And it does tend to shift frequently - some have likened it to building a bridge from land to a boat!
One of the great preachers of the twentieth century was Helmut Theilicke, who describes the primacy of preaching (where the active Word becomes Event) over doctrine. He refers to the gospel constantly being "forwarded to a new address because the recipient is repeatedly changing his place of residence". When that is done with integrity, faithfulness, humility, provisionality and charity, the hearer will say,"Why, that has to do with me!" When it is done carelessly, the hearer says, "That is no concern of mine! It has nothing to do with me."
Only when both ends of the Bible-bridge are built can the link, the bridge itself, be put in place, the link between the writing-place and the readingplace, for which we need 'tradition' and 'reason'.
Tradition is not a static concept of a body of precedents but a living handing on of recognitions and understandings, the witness of the on-going Spirit-guided life of the Church by which the Spirit constantly brings the message of the Scriptures to its readers. Reason is not simply thought processes but also and in particular that acute sense of moral awareness which is the painful gift of 'knowledge' to humanity, sin's curse of having to 'be like God' - Genesis 3.
- Do you give equal weight to these four aspects of faithfulness, humility, provisionality and charity when reading Scripture, or does one have priority?
In many issues related to Scriptural interpretation, there is ongoing controversy. Let me illustrate this from the Pastoral Letter of the Bishops of the Church of Ireland (September 2003):
Four main viewpoints may be identified within the Church of Ireland with regard to samesex relationships. They are not so much clearcut, isolated points of view as relative positions on a spectrum:
- The witness of the Scriptures is consonant with a view that rejects homosexual practice of any kind, and that marriage between a man and a woman in life-long union remains the only appropriate place for sexual relations. This must remain the standard for Christian behaviour.
- The witness of the Scriptures is consonant with a more sympathetic attitude to homosexuality than has been traditional, but this would not at present permit any radical change in the Church's existing stance on the question.
- The witness of the Scriptures is consonant with the view that a permanent and committed same-gender relationship which, through its internal mutuality and support brings generosity, creativity and love into the lives of those around, cannot be dismissed by the Church as intrinsically disordered.
- The witness of the Scriptures is consonant with the proposition that, in the light of a developing understanding of the nature of humanity and sexuality, the time has arrived for a change in the Church's traditional position on affirming same-gender relationship
Four positions reflecting four readings of Scripture related to sexuality. I find myself sympathetic with three of them, more attracted to two of them and one of them is a rough approximation of where I think I am! It's my view that this is a helpful analysis of the divergent views. In contrast, the discussion document, Some Issues in Human Sexuality - A guide to the debate (SIHS), is an extremely detailed and helpful piece of analysis, (tough going as a discussion starter, which presumably is why there is a separate booklet to assist discussion), is full of paradoxes and occasionally describes views in a less-than-nuanced way. For example, SIHS defines what it describes as five attitudes regarding Scripture and homosexual relationships, all of which are mutually exclusive; but most of us will find it difficult to find one which describes clearly where we are, unless we are unusually uncomplicated people. It also makes the point that neither pastoral considerations (tending to liberality) nor theological tradition (tending to conservatism) should be allowed to cloud our judgement of Scripture: that is, to my mind, an extraordinarily idealist and facile approach which fails to acknowledge that Christians are what they are. It would be lovely to think that all human experience could be predicted by experimentation in a pure and morally sterile environment - that all car accidents would occur in a crash studio - but life, and humans, just aren't like that!
So I'd like to turn the clock back 200 years to the controversies surrounding the campaign which followed the abolition of the slave trade, that is, the abolition of slavery itself in the territories subject to the British Crown. (An issue which continued in the United States of America until the end of their Civil War.) As an aside, I should explain why I have fixed on the issue of slavery and not whether Christians can eat prawn cocktails (no fins and scales - Leviticus 11: 9-12) or black pudding (blood - Deuteronomy 12: 23, 24), nor whether men should exercise headship over women, because these issues tend either to trivialise or to appear unresolved. The issue of slavery is one which is not trivial, was seriously controversial and has been resolved. One of the most serious issues was how to read the Scriptures.
Slavery in the Bible
The Old Testament clearly sanctioned slavery, albeit exercised in a compassionate manner (Exodus 21, etc.) and with particular restrictions on the ownership of Hebrew slaves. Slavery itself was acceptable but the memory of national slavery in Egypt was to moderate their attitude and practice. The New Testament presents a rather more diverse picture, and slavery is used also as the basis of a number of similes. The Letter to Philemon, in particular, expresses what seems to be the general approach: slaves may be one's Christian brothers and sisters - or one's Christian brothers and sisters may be slaves.
Slaves are not simply disposable property but, on the other hand, there seems to be no serious challenge in the New Testament to the institution of slavery itself. William Wilberforce (a leading evangelical, of course) had an uphill struggle to convince conservative theologians that there were, within the Scriptures themselves, more fundamental principles which had to be applied to one's reading of individual texts.
It would seem that the rules and regulations in the Bible were for the good treatment and well-being of slaves. This carries with it the implication that God's people were to be more compassionate than their contemporaries; it must say something about a Christian approach to 'subordinates' and is likely to say something about our approach to minorities.
What might be the contemporary approaches to the slavery issue?
- A capitalist might point out that freeing slaves without compensation would amount to theft which contradicts the Commandments, which is why there are detailed regulations relating to Jubilee (Leviticus 25).
- The slave trade as it had become by the eighteenth century was indefensible, but there is some justification from history for asking whether slaves would be better off free or remaining as well-treated slaves?
- Those who are temperamentally conservative would be inclined to assert that slavery is a given of the social order which should not be challenged.
- A vital element in thinking of the eighteenth/ nineteenth century context would be a consideration of humanity's progress over the previous centuries from the time that the Scriptures were written.
- What we cannot ignore is the liberating principle, found in scripture, and the principle of social justice as a foundation of biblical theology and ethics.
- What are the parallels between these possible responses to the issues raised by the practice of slavery, and responses to issues of homosexuality?
Understanding the Scriptures II
We looked earlier at the image of bridge-building to help us understand how to engage with the Scriptures. Now I would like to explore another model - that of theatre.
Let's imagine the Bible as a theatrical play. Who are the central characters? Certainly God, and, in particular, Jesus the Word of God, and humankind. Who are the other principal actors? We may list people like Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Mary, the Apostles, and so on. Who are the other characters central to the plot? Perhaps we'd say Eve, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, John the Baptist, etc. What of the scenery and props? Placed centrally would be the cross and empty tomb; next might be the Garden of Eden, the rainbow, the tablets of stone, the promised land, Jerusalem, the Temple, the stable, the River Jordan, etc.
So how far down the cast or props lists do the regulations of the Torah come? If you were to cast every word of the Scriptures in a 'starring' rôle - and to hear some people speak about the Bible, you might think so - how would you explain to the parents of a deceased child what God meant when he said,"I will not fail to punish children and grandchildren to the third and fourth generation for the sins of their parents"? (Exodus 34: 7). It would seem clear from the Sermon on the Mount in particular that Jesus Christ did not hold to a single, simple rule of interpretation of the Scriptures, so how are we supposed to make judgements? And how are we ever going to communicate our judgements in a sound-bite world?
Let's look at Titus 1: 12, 13:
It was a Cretan himself, one of their own prophets, who spoke the truth when he said, 'Cretans are always liars, wicked beasts and lazy gluttons.' For this reason you must rebuke them sharply.
It is possible to exegete ourselves out of the problem: "Well, it's all about .", and these are genuine interpretations, not excuses, but they rarely confront the particular problem here, which is that canonical Scripture refers to the 'truth' that all Cretans are liars, wicked and lazy!
To be honest in our interpretation of Scripture,we need to avoid making excuses for it, finding comforting ways to read uncomfortable texts, and to recognise that we do apply understandings to our reading of the Bible other than a simplistic rule of reading verses in isolation from 'the whole counsel of God'.
Reading each part of the Bible in an awareness of the whole was one of the Reformers' fundamental principles, and it was adhered to by Wilberforce and his contemporaries, who did not try to simplify challenging scriptures but insisted that the Bible taken as a whole itself forced on them more important principles and altered their reading of the plain text.
Given that Titus contains much that is central to the Faith just a few verses away from the text quoted above (eg. 2:11-14; 3: 4-8) we certainly can't write off the letter. So how does this text compare with John 3:16, 17?
God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to be its judge, but to be its saviour.
In saying that "whatsoever is not read therein,
nor may be proved thereby" Article VI
reminds us that the reading of any individual
text must be viewed in the light of the whole.
Because we appreciate the over-arching message
of the whole, we can recognise consonance
in the verses from John and dissonance
in the verses from Titus. We are not making
a fundamental value judgement on any individual
text and we are not writing-off any part
of the Scriptures, but we are saying that one
more closely matches the key message of the
whole Bible.
So, what distinctions of over-arching principle
does this comparison draw our attention to?
- John 3 points us to the love of God not simply for believers, or for the Church but for the world, a costly love which led him to give his only Son as its saviour.
- James 2 reminds us that "mercy triumphs over judgement".
- A number of parables of Jesus highlight the outsider principle - the good Samaritan, the lost coin, sheep and son - and also the call of Matthew and Zacchaeus.
- John 8 draws our attention to Jesus' forgiveness of the woman caught in the act of adultery and also to his injunction, "Do not sin again." - a word not only for the woman but also for readers of the gospel.
- In Romans 15 , Paul urges his readers who risked dividing the Church along Jew/Gentile lines to "welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you".
- In Matthew 7 (as elsewhere in the New Testament) we are told,"Do not judge others, so that God will not judge you."
- Matthew 12 provides us with a practical test of principle: "A tree is known by the fruit it bears."
What do we mean by the 'inspiration' of Scripture?
At the writing end of 'the bridge', when we say the Bible is inspired, we mean that in the power of the Holy Spirit a person wrote (or edited) a work, and that the Spirit guided the Church to receive this writing as authoritative in faith and life. We do not mean that the Scriptures were "dictated by the Holy Spirit" [from the Council of Trent, 1543-53, and quoted in Providentissimus Deus, 1893]. There is also a measure of inspiration at the reading end, as some have suggested, like sunshine illuminating a stained glass window. It is worth analysing how we have come to the conclusions above and what part reason, tradition and the understanding of context have in our thinking.
- Think about the theatrical image - what for you are the "principals" in the Scriptures? Are they people or events? Are they stories or rules?
Are they themes, or particular books? - Are there parts of the Bible you know by heart or that you quote/refer to often? Does this give another clue as to what are your "principals"?
As preachers and teachers,we reckon not to throw the Bible at people, nor to use the Bible as a series of pretexts for our own reading of the Guardian or the Telegraph, but we seek to place ourselves and our Christian communities into the Bible, to help them and us to find our way around it, and to think Christianly.
The importance of this way of handling the Bible can be seen in the approach taken by the infant Christian Church on the issue of Gentile believers. Clearly, Jesus was a Jew, the fulfilment of Jewish messianic hopes; though he criticised the way in which the Hebrew religion was practised and moved forward to a new way in his teaching, nonetheless it was perfectly natural for the first Christians in Judea to assume - no, to believe - that being a Jew would be bound up with being a Christian. In Acts 10 & 11, we read of Peter's introduction to the concept in the conversion of Cornelius and his household: being a Gentile does not make a person spiritually unclean. Paul, particularly in the dispute referred to in Galatians, takes this a step further and asserts that since Jesus is for all humanity and all come to him equally in need of forgiveness and new life, so the old religious order is gone and the new has come. The shocking impact of that approach is almost entirely cushioned by two millennia of gentile conversion, including our own, but it was clearly Paul's conviction that this gospel-for-all is implicit in the promise to Abraham (Galatians 3:6-9).
We are reminded by this important controversy that in the Christian faith every generation in each place must receive the Bible and struggle with its interpretation, not just in the light of when and where it was written but also in the light of when and where it is being read.
Turning to the issue of human sexuality, and in particular to same-sex relations we will want to be committed to integrity in our understanding and compassion to all in our application.
- The remarkably few key individual texts which
appear in both testaments are:
- Genesis 19: 1-14
- Leviticus 18: 22; 20: 13
- Deuteronomy 23: 17, 18
- Romans 1: 24-27
- 1 Corinthians 6: 9, 10
- 1 Timothy 1: 9, 10.
SIHS neatly summarises the commentators on the various texts and comes to the conclusion that these individual texts in their various ways are not favourable to homosexual acts. For example, you can excuse Romans 1 in terms of perversion but you must also ask what the text reveals of the Apostle's attitude. It would be very difficult (and, I am convinced, also unfair) on the basis of the evidence of Paul's writings to conclude that his view of gay sex was then or would be today sympathetic!
Thus, we need to secure the far end of the 'bridge' and it is a varied picture, but the very least we can say is that it does not sanction same-sex unions. Of course, the key texts do not deal with the matter of sexual orientation or the vexed question of 'nature versus nurture'; this was something of which the writers would all have been completely unaware.
Now we need to decide the weight we are going to give to these Scriptures - and don't let anyone tell you that this need not be influenced, at least in part, by your subjective judgement, because inevitably it will: there is no escape! Reverting to the metaphor of a play, it is about deciding what rôle the texts play in the drama: do they have starring roles (which may, for instance, lead to refusing the baptism of a gay couple), are they supporting actors, or just incidental props? This takes us back to the search to discover whether there are fundamental biblical principles which need to be applied to one's reading of specific texts and what those principles are.
Finally,we need to connect this side of the bridge, to evaluate the context into which we bring the message and all our thinking about it. This is immensely tricky, for it can be too easy to dismiss problem texts by stamping them, 'Not applicable today'! If this is true, it needs to be proved by bringing past and present contexts and text together and, in a sense, letting them wrestle with each other.
None of this is easy. Taking the Bible seriously, at face value and as a whole is what we are called to do.
Two other books well worth reading:
- A very interesting package of essays, ' The Way Forward? - Christian Voices on Homosexuality and the Church', edited by Timothy Bradshaw, [Hodder & Stoughton, 1997, enlarged and reprinted 2003].
- The Church of England's Doctrine Commission report, ' Being Human - A Christian understanding of personhood', [CHP, 2003].