CENTRAL AMERICA: PRIMATE SUPPORTS ROBINSON CONSECRATION

An open letter from the Most Reverend Martín Barahona, the Diocesan Bishop of El Salvador and Primate of the Anglican Church of the Central Region of America (IARCA): "To my colleagues, the Primates of the Great Anglican Communion; to my sister and brother bishops of the Episcopal Church of the United States of America; and to the bishops and other clergy and lay leaders of our beloved Province of the Central Region of America, which includes the countries of Guatemala, Panama, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and El Salvador; to all, peace and goodness in the name of the living and true God that surely is among us.

It is my wish to share with you some reflections concerning the election, the subsequent endorsement of this election by the Houses of Deputies and Bishops at the General Convention of the ECUSA in Minneapolis, Minnesota in August of the year of our Lord 2003, and the ordination and consecration of the Rt Revd Gene Robinson as Bishop Coadjutor of New Hampshire on 2 November, 2003.

This was a ceremony I attended, and in which I participated, along with the primate of the ECUSA and other bishops of Canada, the United States and the Bishop Emeritus of the Lutheran Church of Europe.

These events unfortunately have brought about sadness, frustration, and in some cases strong offenses, and we now find ourselves in difficult times that may lead us to regrettable divisions.

The simple event of electing this bishop, who hails from a small diocese of limited financial resources, who is a person very dedicated to his ministry and his community, has provoked a 'scandal' by the mere act of his stating the truth concerning his private life: he is homosexual and lives with his long-time partner.

This duly elected bishop, Gene Robinson, with simplicity and humility, has dared to challenge our understanding of ethics and what is 'moral.'

The impact of this election was great.

On few occasions have the mass media dedicated so much space to the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion in the world.

When a journalist of the BBC of London interviewed me and asked: 'Having been in the House of Bishops of ECUSA, what did you see in the faces of the bishops?'

I responded, 'I saw faces of fear and pain; of fear because if approved there was concern of division in the Church, and of pain because if not approved it would be sad at this moment in time in the 21st century that we are not able to understand human nature.'

Episcopalians, and those of us who were part of ECUSA, have learned from our Mother Church that we have a democratic model of government, with bicameral representation.

Many of us who are bishops have won election by one vote, and the rest have accepted; furthermore, sometimes a motion is raised to declare the election by acclamation, with the goal of smoothing things over.

All of the proper canonical proceedings were carefully taken in the case of the election of the Bishop Coadjutor of New Hampshire; so then, why is there division?

Particularly in the United States, a country that champions democracy, so much so that it is able to invade a country which has a dictatorial regime.

Could it be that we know that while a diocese can call someone to serve as a bishop via a democratic election, we also know that a vocation to a ministry is a call from God, and God calls those whom He wants.

This means He can call those who are not necessarily the best ones from our own human perspective.

On 9 October in Dallas, a good number of bishops who were against the election and consent decided to meet.

Sadly, the result of this gathering was that some offensive documents were issued.

On a personal front, a parish in the United States took away aid for a mission I was developing.

But I ask, 'Whom is this hurting?

Martín Barahona?

No!

It is hurting the mission of Christ!'

So while I understand the hurt and the confusion this election has caused I am praying hard, and I have asked the people of my diocese and province to pray hard for our unity.

I told a priest from New York that we must look for reconciliation, and he told me, 'God cannot reconcile with the devil, God cannot reconcile with sin.'

But I ask myself, 'who is God and who is the devil, and what is the sin at this moment?'

On 15 and 16 October, the Most Revd Dr. Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, called the Primates to an urgent meeting to deal with, not only the subject of the ECUSA election, but also the decision by the diocese of New Westminster of Canada, which approved a resolution to have a rite for the union of people of the same sex.

This meeting was an excellent initiative, and we had the opportunity to convey our feelings with respect, which were then expressed in an official statement of the primates.

At this gathering, we concluded that we do not want a central authority like the 'papal Curia.'

And some noted contradictions in their own provincial authority as the Presiding Bishop of ECUSA, the Most Revd Frank Griswold was asked to do something that he could not do according to his canons.

As a result of our discussions and concerns, the Archbishop of Canterbury, promised to name as soon as possible—and he has already done so—a commission of experts on the Bible, liturgy, and theology to present within 12 months a report on some central subjects, including the authority of the Bible, canonical legislation.

As well as, 'What does it mean to be in Communion?

What does it mean to be autonomous?'

As all that attended the gathering are doing, I have meditated on these issues, and I want to offer my reflections to the Committee: On the subject of the authority of the Bible, we know that we study the Bible by making use of biblical science.

I would suggest that, as all science advances with new discoveries and interpretations, so does biblical science.

Similarly for the authority of our canonical legislation, as legal systems are equally dynamic, our canon law evolves and changes through experience.

To be in communion, Anglican style, a priest once said, 'is to be united in the essential, to have diversity in the nonessential, and to love one another.'

Here, I would like to refer to an article by L. William Countryman, sent to me via email, entitled 'Treating Conflict as an Anglican.'

The second paragraph reads, 'What do I understand by the classical Anglican tradition?

I mean the broad mainstream of Anglicanism as it was formed in the Reformation, the one that was shaped in the 16th and 17th centuries, in contrast to the other two types of Christianity that believed to know well the mind of God, one the Roman Catholicism of the Counter-Reformation, the other the tradition of Geneva, whose main representatives were the Puritans.

Mainstream Anglicans differentiate ourselves from both, and particularly from their presumption that they know in detail the mind of God.'

What does it mean to be autonomous?

It is the most sublime expression of freedom.

'The truth will set you free.'

It is exactly where ethics can challenge what is considered to be moral in our culture.

Ethics are authentic.

But what is considered to be 'moral' can also be subject to special interests, stereotypes, cultures, and regimes, etc.

We live in a cosmopolitan world, in a pluralistic society, the virtue of which is that we must develop tolerance, another important subject that I would like to further address.

People who are displeased by this decision of ECUSA would shield themselves behind arguments of what they understand as fundamental and orthodox.

Beware of those two concepts (which I would also like to address at greater length in the future).

Orthodoxy and fundamentalism have been the theoretical base of great evils such as the inquisition, crusades, the holocaust, and more recently are the root of terrorism that is the invisible enemy.

Within our Anglican Province of the Central Region of America (IARCA) and the different countries that we comprise, the ordination of the Rt Revd Gene Robinson has elicited diverse reactions.

Each bishop has confronted the situation in his own way, according to his own reality.

The Bishop of Guatemala sent a pastoral letter in which he reaffirmed the doctrine contained in the Bible and the Book of Common Prayer; but at the same time recognized that little is known about human nature and particularly homosexuality, and urged study.

The Bishop of Nicaragua issued an official statement where he expressed pride in belonging to a Communion that had the courage to confront these subjects.

The Bishop of Panama sent a pastoral letter expressing that while he did not approve of the ECUSA action, he urged that more attention be placed on the matter.

The Bishop of Costa Rica did not send a pastoral letter, but invited the Episcopal and non-Episcopal communities relying on mass media for communication to engage in a dialogue on the subject in order for individuals to draw their own conclusions.

The Bishop of El Salvador, author of this letter, did something similar, using print, television and radio to orient the Episcopal community and the general public, asking them to reflect with respect and seriousness and to handle the matter strictly from a human perspective.

He did not enter the matter from a biblical or theological point of view.

We hope to broaden the discussion from this perspective, as much in speculative theology as in practical theology.

A great deal of information was offered, and people continue to reflect seriously and to request more information.

It should be noted that in El Salvador there is an organization of lesbians and gays which in San Salvador, the capital of the Republic, has more than 5,000 members.

The majority of these are professionals, industrialists, and others who are well respected in society.

From the perspective of all the bishops of our province we have set out a declaration as a Province, addressed to all those present at the Lambeth gathering, and distributed to all the bishops.

Regarding the participation of the Primate of IARCA in the consecration of the Rt Revd Gene Robinson, all of the bishops, priests, and laity in congregations knew of my participation.

There were no reactions against this until recently, when on the 3 February I received a statement from the Church of Guatemala, which, after some introduction, declares three points: *The desire to maintain the unity of the IARCA Province *Simultaneously, The Episcopal Church of Guatemala dissociates itself from the actions of the Primate of IARCA for his participation in the consecration and ordination of Gene Robinson and thus provoking deterioration in IARCA.

*It expresses the necessity that the bishops and the provincial council of IARCA remark on the matter, and that corrective measures be taken.

I would like to express to all in our great Anglican Communion, and especially to my brothers and sisters in ECUSA and IARCA, that I attended and participated in the consecration and ordination of Gene Robinson for various reasons: *By my own conviction that I was participating in a ceremony that had followed all the legal and canonical processes of ECUSA, just as a week before I had participated in the ordination and consecration of the Bishop of New Jersey.

There was nothing canonically irregular in my participation.

Furthermore, all bishops of IARCA stated their respect for the decision of ECUSA as an autonomous province, with exception of the Bishop of Panama, whose pastoral letter rejected the decision of ECUSA but exhorts to look into it with good eyes.

*I participated with a sense of solidarity with the marginalised, for whom I have fought for many years.

I have fought for the social, economic, political, religious, racial and migratory marginalised; and now for those marginalised by sexual preference.

I am totally convinced that Christ has always stood next to the marginalized, and I try to follow Christ even though I am a sinning man.

I am very clear that God calls us to exercise a ministry, and God knows all of us best.

Who am I to correct the plan of God?

*It was my desire to accompany the Primate of our Mother Church, Presiding Bishop the Most Revd Frank Griswold.

I know that I am a humble servant of God, but when I witnessed Frank's difficult moments I prayed for him and continue praying.

I know that God gave him strength, humility and tolerance.

I admire and am proud of the Primate of ECUSA, for at all times he was understanding, respectful, and firm in defense of the canons of his Church.

I told him, 'Frank, I will be with you in New Hampshire,' and I fulfilled my word.

Thus I can say that I was a witness by sight, sound, and action.

I can confirm that it was a solemn act, serious, and that deep faith was present.

If I am mistaken, may God judge me because His judgments are just and righteous."

GIVE YOURSELF WHOLLY TO THEM – BY J. C. RYLE

The following Sermon was preached in England, in August, 1859.

"Give yourself wholly to them" (1 Timothy 4:15).

I need hardly to remind you, that the Greek expression which we have translated, "give yourself wholly to them," is somewhat remarkable.

It would be more literally rendered, "Be in these things."

We have nothing exactly corresponding to the expression in our language, and the words which our translators have chosen are perhaps as well calculated as any to convey the idea which was put by the Holy Spirit in Paul's mind.

When the Apostle says, "Give yourself wholly to these things," he seems to look at the "things" of which he had been speaking in the preceding verses, beginning with the words "Set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity."

We have here a target set before the ministers of the New Testament, at which we are all to aim, and of which we must all feel we fall short.

Yet it is an old saying, "He that aims high is the most likely to strike high; and he that shoots at the moon will shoot further than the man who shoots at the bush."

The Apostle appears to me to suggest that the minister must be a man of one thing: to use his own words, a "man of God."

We hear of men of business, and men of pleasure, and men of science.

The aim of the minister should be, to be "a man of God;" or to employ a phrase used in some heathen countries, to be "Jesus Christ's man."

An expression is sometimes used with reference to the army, which we may apply to the soldiers of the Great Captain of our salvation.

Some men are said to be "carpet knights."

They are said to have entered the army for the sake of the uniform, and for no other cause.

But there are many of whom public opinion says, such a man is "every inch a soldier."

This should be the aim which we should place before us; we should seek to be "every inch the minister of Jesus Christ."

We should aim to be the same men at all times, in all positions, and places; not on Sunday only, but on week days also; not merely in the pulpit, but everywhere—in our living rooms, and in the house of the poor man.

There are those, of whom their congregations have said, that when they were in the pulpit they never wished them to come out, and when they went out they never wished them to go in.

May God give us all grace to take that to heart!

May we seek so to live, so to preach, so to work, so to give ourselves wholly to the business of our calling, that this bitter remark may never be made about us.

Our profession is a very special one.

Others have their seasons of relaxation, when they can completely lay aside their work.

This can never be done by the faithful minister of Jesus Christ.

Once put on, his office must never be put off.

At home, abroad, relaxing, going to the sea side, he must always carry his business with him.

A great lawyer could say of his official robes, "Lie there, Lord Chancellor."

Such ought never to be the mind of the minister of Christ.

There are some things which the high demand of this text suggests, as needful to be followed after and practiced.

First, it demands entire devotion to the great work to which we are ordained.

When one was commanded by the Savior to follow Him, he replied, "Lord, first let me go and bury my father;" but then there came that solemn saying, "Let the dead bury their own dead, but you go and proclaim the kingdom of God."

Still another said, "I will follow you, Lord; but first let me go back and say good-by to my family;" and to him there came the remarkable sentence, "No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God."

"Do not greet anyone on the road," was Christ's charge to the seventy disciples.

Surely these Scriptural expressions teach us, that in all our dealings in our ministry, we must have a high standard.

We must strive to be men of one thing—that thing being the work of Jesus Christ.

Secondly, it demands a thorough separation from the things of the world.

I hold it to be of the greatest importance to keep the ministerial office, so far as we can, distinct and separate from everything that is secular.

I trust we shall hear every year of fewer and fewer ministers of the Gospel who are magistrates, and fewer and fewer ministers who take part in agricultural meetings, and win prizes for fat pigs, enormous bulls, and large crops of turnips.

There is no apostolical succession in such occupations.

Nor yet is this all.

We should be separated from the pleasures of the world, as well as from its business.

There are many innocent and indifferent amusements, for which the minister of Christ ought to have no time.

He ought to say, "I have no time for these things.

I am doing a great work, and I cannot come down."

Thirdly, it demands a jealous watchfulness over our own social conduct.

We ought not to be always paying morning calls of courtesy and dining out, as others do.

It will not do to say, that our Lord went to a marriage feast, and sat at supper in the Pharisee's house, and therefore we may do the same.

I only reply, Let us go in His spirit, with His faithfulness and boldness, to say a word in season, and to give the conversation a profitable turn, and then we may go with safety.

Unless we do this, we should be careful where we go, with whom we sit down, and where we spend our evenings.

There was a quaint saying of John Wesley to his ministers, which Cecil quotes, as containing the germ of much truth.

"Don't aim at being thought gentlemen; you have no more to do with being gentlemen than with being masters at dancing."

Our aim should be not to be regarded as agreeable persons at the dinner table, but to be known everywhere as faithful, consistent ministers of Jesus Christ.

Fourthly, it demands a diligent redemption of time.

We should give attention to reading, every day that we live.

We should strive to bring all our reading to bear on our work.

We ought to keep our eyes open continually, and be ever picking up ideas for our sermons—as we travel by the way, as we sit by the fireside, as we are standing on the platform at the railway station.

We should be keeping in our mind's eye our Master's business—observing, noting, looking out, gathering up something that will throw fresh light on our work, and enable us to put the truth in a more striking way.

He that looks out for something to learn will always be able to learn something.

Having suggested these things, I will next proceed to ask, What will be the consequence of our giving ourselves wholly to these things?

Remember, we shall not receive the praise of men.

We shall be thought extreme, and ascetic, and righteous.

Those who want to serve God and serve money at the same time, will think our standard too high, our practice too stringent.

They will say, that we are going too far and too fast for a world such as that in which we live.

May we never care what men say of us, so long as we walk in the light of God's Word!

May we strive and pray to be wholly independent of, and indifferent to man's opinion, so long as we please God!

May we remember the woe pronounced by our Master, when He said, "Woe to you when all men speak well of you," and the words of Paul, "If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ."

But though "giving ourselves wholly to these things" we shall not win the praise of men, we shall attain the far more important end of usefulness to souls.

I completely acknowledge the doctrine of the sovereignty of God in the salvation of sinners.

I acknowledge that those who preach best, and live nearest to God, have not always been honored in their lives to the saving of many souls.

But still, the man who is most entirely and wholly Jesus Christ's man—a man of one thing, who lives Sunday and weekday, everywhere, at home and abroad, as a man whose single endeavor is to give himself to the work of Jesus Christ—this is the man, this is the minister, who will generally, in the long run, do the most good.

The case of Mr. Simeon will apply here.

You all know how he was persecuted when he began to testify for Christ, in Cambridge.

You know how many there were who would not speak to him, how the finger of scorn was pointed at him continually.

But we know how he went on persevering in the work, and how, when he died, all Cambridge came forth to give him honor, and how heads of houses, and fellows of colleges, and men who had scoffed at him while he lived, honored him at his death.

They testified, that the life he had lived had had its effect, and that they had seen and known that God was with him.

I once saw in Dundee one who had known much of that godly man, Robert Murray McCheyne.

She told me that those who read his letters and sermons had a very faint idea of what he was.

She said to me, "If you have read all his works, you just know nothing at all about him.

You must have seen the man, and heard him, and known him, and have been in company with him, to know what a man of God he was."

Furthermore, giving ourselves wholly to these things will bring happiness and peace to our consciences.

I speak now among friends, and not among worldly people, where I should need to fence and guard and explain what I mean.

I shall not be suspected of holding justification by works by those I see before me.

I speak of such a clear conscience as the Apostle refers to: We trust we have a "clear conscience" (Hebrews 13:18).

To have this clear conscience is clearly bound up with high aims, high motives, a high standard of ministerial life, and practice.

I am quite sure, that the more we give ourselves wholly to the work of the ministry, the more inward happiness, the greater sense of the light of God's countenance, are we likely to enjoy.

The subject is a deeply humbling one.

Who does not feel, "My weakness, my weakness!

my unprofitableness!

How far short I come of this high standard?"

What reason have we, having received mercy, not to faint!

What reason have we, having been spared by God's great patience, to abound in the work of the Lord, and to give ourselves wholly to our business!

The great secret is, to be always looking to Jesus, and living a life of close communion with Him.

At Cambridge, the other day, I saw a picture of Henry Martyn, bequeathed by Mr. Simeon to the public library.

A friend informed me that that picture used to hang in Mr. Simeon's room, and that when he was disposed to trifle in the work of the ministry, he used to stand before it and say, "It seems to say to me, Charles Simeon, don't trifle, don't trifle; Charles Simeon, remember whose you are, and whom you serve."

And then the worthy man, in his own strange way, would bow respectfully, and say, "I will not trifle, I will not trifle; I will not forget."

May we, in conclusion, look to a far higher pattern than any man—Martyn, McCheyne, or any other.

May we look to the Great Chief Shepherd, the great pattern, in whose steps we are to walk!

May we abide in Him, and never trifle!

May we hold on our way, looking to Jesus, keeping clear of the world, its pleasures, and its follies—caring nothing for the world's frowns, and not much moved by the world's smiles—looking forward to that day when the Great Shepherd shall give to all who have done His work, and preached His Gospel, a crown of glory that does not fade away!

The more we have the mind of Christ, the more we shall understand what it is to "give ourselves wholly to these things."

NOT BIG, AND NOT CLEVER...A CRITIQUE OF JEFFREY JOHN'S HOMOSEXUALITY

John Richardson looks at the arguments of Jeffrey John.

In the run-up to its February session, members of the Church of England's General Synod will have received complementary copies of Permanent, Faithful, Stable by Canon Jeffrey John.

This little booklet is described on the back as 'one of the most powerful arguments for the acceptance and blessing of homosexual relationships by the Church'.

However, as any dictionary will tell you, 'argument' in this sense is not just the presentation of a viewpoint but the setting forth of reasons.

And reasoning must stand up to scrutiny.

Doubtless there will be many for whom John's case seems 'reasonable' in the sense that what he asks for seems fair or right.

But in the sense of being 'in accordance with reason', there are serious flaws in his work, particularly in the logic of his arguments but also in his handling of scripture.

Unless I am mistaken, therefore, it would be a serious error for those who would revise the Church's current understanding to take their stand on this work or the arguments it sets forward.

There may be a case for John's position, but this booklet for the most part fails to make it.

Logic.

John summarizes his aim on page 1: Homosexual relationships should be accepted and blessed by the Church, provided that the quality and commitment of the relationship are the same as those expected of a Christian marriage.

Unfortunately, on page 3 he immediately saws off the branch on which he is sitting.

John recognizes that he must first answer those who take their stand on the Bible.

Hence he argues that, 'a faithful homosexual relationship is not "incompatible with scripture", (certainly no more so than the remarriage of the divorced, or the leadership of women).'

The logic is straightforward enough: Some things which are incompatible with the plainest sense of scripture are already accepted by the Church.

A faithful homosexual relationship is no more incompatible with scripture than these other things.

Therefore scripture provides no necessary grounds on which the Church should reject such relationships.

But there are problems.

First, a logically true argument may lead to a factually false conclusion.

The proposition that 'All cats have tails' logically means my cat must have a tail.

However (as any first year Philosophy student knows), what matters is not just the logic of an argument but the truth of its propositions.

There are, in fact, tailless cats (of which my hypothetical cat may be one).

And hence John cannot assume from the mere fact that the Church accepts things which are incompatible with scripture that it is necessarily right to do so.

To build an argument on this basis could simply lead us into greater error.

Indeed that is (arguably) why we had the Reformation!

Secondly, John's appeal to the Church's revised attitude to divorce actually undermines his definition of an acceptable gay relationship.

If the qualities of such relationships should be 'the same as those expected of a Christian marriage' (see above), the word 'permanent' becomes superfluous.

It may be more appealing to talk about 'permanent, faithful, stable' relationships, but John's argument relies on a decision by the Synod that permanence is no longer a requirement of marriage.

Thus the most that could be required is that such relationships be faithful and stable, and even that requirement cannot be regarded as fixed on this line of reasoning.

Similarly, John argues on page 4 that his proposals will uphold 'the traditional, biblical theology of sex and marriage'.

But since his argument rests precisely on a partial rejection of the 'traditional, biblical theology', a further step in the same direction would scarcely 'uphold' it!

On the contrary, it is surely those who remain faithful in difficult marriages or who, feeling an erotic desire for members of the same sex, nevertheless resist it, who truly uphold 'traditional' theology and practice.

Scripture.

These weaknesses continue when John addresses the question 'Is it scriptural?'

Thus after acknowledging that Jesus plainly condemns the remarriage of divorced people, John asks how it is that Anglican bishops 'in the case of the great majority, are willing to bless remarried couples, and in some cases are divorced and remarried themselves?' (p8).

We must be grateful for the candidness of John's challenge.

But to conclude, as he does, that we should therefore embrace same-sex relationships is like arguing that because I speed down the motorway I may speed up a residential side street.

The argument is simply fallacious.

A similar problem affects John's handling of the biblical material on women.

It is true that even in some Conservative Evangelical contexts, women without hats may be found conducting meetings.

But John falls into the well-known 'tu quoque' fallacy—'You do as I do, hence I can't be wrong.'

Thus on page 9 he claims that 'biblical conservatives will employ exactly the sort of arguments [on this issue] which on other matters they condemn as "getting round the plain meaning of Scripture".'

But just as two wrongs don't make a right, so one misuse of scripture (if that is what is involved) doesn't make for two misuses.

In point of fact, I believe John oversimplifies the biblical material.

But if the Bible actually did teach that women should wear hats in church, then we should surely do likewise, not use our failure in this regard to justify abandoning other aspects of biblical teaching.

Meanwhile, the fact that John takes this approach suggests he realizes the Bible actually opposes what he himself advocates.

Law.

Space precludes addressing John's handling of the story of Sodom.

I can only draw the diligent reader's attention to the relevant cautions in Robert Gagnon's The Bible and Homosexual Practice.

John's treatment of the Old Testament law, however, is woeful, in particular his infamous comment on page 12: The next time you see a clean-shaven fundamentalist wearing a poly-cotton shirt and eating a shrimp, remember to shout 'Abomination'!

If John really believes this is an adequate response to those who quote the Old Testament on moral issues, he should give up his title as Canon Theologian.

For my own part, I believe I have addressed this adequately in my own What God has Made Clean (Good Book Company, 2003), and would refer readers who are still unclear to that publication.

Paul.

John is just as weak, however, in his handling of Paul, resting his case largely on unsustainable and unprovable assumptions.

John asserts that 'the model of Paul's condemnation was . [male] prostitution or pederasty.'

Yet Paul begins his own condemnation of homosexual acts in Romans 1.26 with a reference to women, which demonstrates an entirely different starting point to the one John proposes.

Again, John claims that 'neither Paul nor his Jewish antecedents considered the case of a homosexually oriented person', yet such persons were known in the Gentile culture with which Paul was familiar.

Ultimately, therefore, although John rejects Paul's 'assumptions' as 'quite false' (p16), it his own assumptions which are questionable.

John is similarly cavalier with Paul's arguments from nature, preferring to focus on the difficulties he perceives in applying Paul's teaching on women, rather than engaging with his comments on sexuality.

John is quite happy to affirm Paul when it suits (pp18, 37 etc), but where it does not, he adopts his own line, justifying this by claiming he is only doing what others do.

Yet there is a vast difference between those who ultimately sit under the authority of Paul's writings as scripture, and those who really do 'cherry pick', treating as scripture only those teachings which accord with their own viewpoint.

John's position can thus only be called 'scriptural' in a sense that depends on demolishing what the Church traditionally understands by this.

Morality.

John's discomfort with Paul's view of 'nature' is understandable, however, considering his approach to the question 'Is it Moral?'

Over against the objection based on the 'natural' complementarity of male and female bodies and personalities, John simply asserts that same-sex relationships can be fulfilling in every comparable regard bar that of bearing children.

Moreover, there cannot be anything morally reprehensible about homosexual acts per se: Those who claim to be repelled and disgusted by homosexual forms of intercourse might ask why they are not disgusted by a painter who expresses his creativity by painting with his feet (p21).

But John plays down the fact that something is nevertheless clearly wrong if someone has to paint with their feet.

And he similarly fails to acknowledge that the 'make do' of homosexual acts shows homosexuality to be technically a form of sexual dis-orientation.

John's problems, however, do not stop there, for he also wants to refute calls within the gay community for a radicalizing of sexual relationships.

But in the face of this, John can only fall back on a position he has already subverted: Christian theology is an attempt to understand 'what happens' in relation to profound truths about human nature revealed in Scripture and Christian tradition (pp35-36, emphasis added).

However, that revelation, and even John's own understanding of 'acceptable' relationships, would (for example) create great difficulties for bisexuals who want their relationships blessed by the Church.

Yet it is surely only a real traditionalist who can resist such demands, whereas John (who oddly says nothing about bisexuality—see p59) will ultimately appear to be just as 'selective' as the conservatives he so often attacks.

John wishes to show both traditionalists and radicals that 'human sexuality is intended to express a covenant commitment between two people which is holy because it reflects God's covenanted love for us, and gives us a framework for learning to love in his image' (p4).

But there is already far too much reliance on scripture and revelation in these ideas for them to find an expression outside the scriptural context of marriage—namely between one man and one woman for life.

Sacrifice the latter, as John does, and eventually you will inevitably lose the former.

Achievable.

This brings us, finally, to John's third question, 'Is it Achievable?' by which he means 'Could lifelong, monogamous homosexual relationships become normalized within the Church?'

Here, John must face first the question of homosexual 'promiscuity' (his term)—an area of considerable controversy.

Stephen Goldstone, himself a gay doctor, admits candidly in The Ins and Outs of Gay Sex, 'Even under the shadow of AIDS, many of us still have sexual histories numbering in the hundreds or even thousands' (p 212).

By contrast, John claims, 'There is no reason to believe that homosexual men are naturally more inclined to promiscuity than heterosexual men' (p40), though the fact that he devotes six of his own fifty-five pages to this issue may suggest 'he doth protest too much'.

John suggests that whatever promiscuity exists amongst gay men would diminish if only they were allowed to enter into recognized stable relationships.

But this can only be conjecture, especially since promiscuity has measurably and dramatically increased amongst heterosexuals (who can, of course, marry) in the last ten years (see the National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles).

Standing in the way of John's programme, however, is the Church of England generally and her bishops in particular for their inconsistency and failure to fulfil their teaching office (pp47-48).

Not surprisingly, John vents considerable spleen on them: They continue to supply the ideology which undergirds prejudice, and continue to bear the heaviest responsibility for it (p55).

Yet once again we must ask whether the course John urges on the bishops indeed follows from their current failures.

Would they best redeem themselves by standing up to '"difficult" conservative Evangelicals', or by recovering the biblical and traditionalist theology John has attacked?

Trinity.

John cannot, however, avoid one final error before he finishes.

Marriage is, he concludes, 'a "mystery" or sacrament of God because it potentially reflects the mystery of self-giving love which is at the heart of the Trinity' (p 52).

Thus 'because homosexual people are no less made in God's image than heterosexuals' they too can (in words quoted from Eugene Rogers), 'represent the Trinity' (p53).

Yet of course marriage is not a reflection of the love within the Trinity, but a model of the love between Creator and creation, between Redeemer and redeemed.

It is the love between Christ and the Church, not the love between the Father, the Son and the Spirit.

It is, that is to say, love within a framework of difference rather than of likeness, of heteros rather than homoios.

Of course, love for that which is 'the same' exists and is legitimate.

But sexuality, by its very nature, has no place in that love.

Sexuality remains, literally, 'wedded' to the male-female paradigm.

That has, until now, been the Church's understanding, and John has yet to prove it should be otherwise.