Sunday, 6 December 2009

Church Falls Apart Over US Gay Bishop Vote

This weekend the Anglicans took another step towards the breakup of their communion with the appointment of yet another US lesbian Bishop. I have been following this process with some interest and a lot of laughter over the last few years, and yet even I am still surprised at the willingness of this organisation to rip itself apart, just because a sexual minority group insist on changing the Christians beliefs to justify their sexual inclinations.

I mean, why can't they simply open their own church with their own interpretation of the Bible, or isn't that the point? Is it really just an attempt to take over an established church organisation from the inside? ....... a church traditionalist clergyman, Rev Kendall Harmon of South Carolina, told Associated Press: "This decision represents an intransigent embrace of a pattern of life Christians throughout history and the world have rejected as against biblical teaching". In other words, only the US Episcopalians and UK Anglicans in the whole Jewish, Christian (and Muslim) world, chose to interpret the Torah/Bible in this manner.

I just can't help thinking that the 'tail is wagging the dog', and that the Anglicans are allowing these 'sexual terrorists' to emotionally blackmail them into handing over the church and its establishment.

What are they arguing about?

Well, a small but vociferous gay group within the Anglican Communion claim that the Bible doesn't really condemn homosexuality. That in fact the words of

  • Leviticus 18:22 "Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; it is an abomination" or a bit later in
  • Leviticus 20:13 "If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads".

don't really mean what they appear to clearly say.

Although as I am an atheist, and what a supernatural being called Jehovah (or Odin for that matter) is said to believe about sexuality is at best a moot point to me, apparently the Church 'Liberals' have argued that these, and other Bible / Torah apparent references to homosexuality are not the strict prohibitions against homosexuality that they appear to be, but are in fact apparently just to stop Jews sleeping with Canaanites (who I assume were all homosexuals - no wonder they disappeared).

Another bunch argue that in some convoluted argument, that what it really means is that the verses 'in no way prohibit, nor do they even speak, to loving, caring sexual relationships between people of the same gender' ............ really? I must be looking at the words in a strange way i.e. not squinting, and then ignoring every one of them.

So they are ordaining homosexual clergy, against the wishes of the majority of the Communion in Africa and elsewhere who strongly disapprove.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, a man who appears totally out of his depth on this issue, has said that the move raised "very serious questions" for both the Episcopal Church in the US, and the Anglican Communion as a whole...... Hmm, ah well, if the C of E wants to let itself be hijacked and destroyed, that's their business, but it is funny that PC has so tied their hands, that the majority have to leave the church in splits, with the minority left in charge.
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1 comment:

  1. No PC7 August 2022 at 09:44

    I have had little cause to revisit the subject of the Anglican Church and its inherent contradictions between the bible teachings and western LGBT 'reformers' who have infiltrated the UK/North American wings of the Anglican Communion.

    However, the corpse twitched this week, with a much delayed Lambeth Conference taking place (albeit minus the Archbishops of Nigeria, Rwanda and Uganda - who refused to attend), where once again they tried to resolve the question of homosexuality. Archbishop Welby gave a keynote speech in which fudged the issue by on the one hand reaffirming a resolution passed by the Lambeth Conference in 1998, which said same sex marriage was wrong and "homosexual practices" are incompatible with scripture, while on the other saying that those Anglican churches which moved away from that historical teaching, would not be sanctioned or condemned.

    They are so screwed up that its ridiculous .... you either believe in the great sky father and accept his teachings or you don't .... Leviticus 18 and 20 seem fairly clear on the matter. But hey, I am not trying to change the bible, so I do not try to wiggle out of the bibles accepted teachings.

    For a coherent breakdown of the arguments about what the bible says or doesn't say go here

    It just makes me laugh that this moribund organisation only makes the news at this decadal conference .... otherwise no one cares. Noticeably the Russian Orthodox church suffers none of the Anglican churches wobbles on this subject .... and has grown.

    ReplyDelete

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