On being pastorally (ir)responsible — and not waiting for bishops

When I was a curate, I was preaching on the first Sunday after Christmas. The church I was serving in always celebrated ‘The Holy Family’ on this Sunday. I preached on families and the families I had been with during my Christmas so far. I spoke of my Mum and Dad who had been at that time married 40 plus years and were still very much in love, I spoke of my sister and her girlfriend who lived together, my friends — an unmarried heterosexual couple who had two children, deeply committed to each other and who chose not to get married because of what they saw as the oppressive history of the institution. I reflected upon the holiness on all of the commitments to relationship I saw in all these people and asked if it wasn’t time for the church to revisit how it understood relationships at that time at the end of the 20th century.

A committed member of the congregation (a dentist), who travelled from the suburbs into the church which was on a council estate, challenged me about the sermon at the church door. We had a rather unseemly row and he left. A couple of weeks later at the PCC he submitted an agenda item ‘The Curates Sermon on the First Sunday after Christmas’.

He began his introduction to the subject by saying that my sermon was ’theologically unsound, pastorally irresponsible and morally reprehensible!’ (I must admit I have dined out a little on that feedback over the years). My wise vicar, who had been very supportive, had told me to hold my fire and see what came from everyone else. I was not prepared for what took place, as one after another PCC members told THEIR own stories of what they saw as holiness in untraditional relationships, or spoke of the hurt and the confusion of the church’s approach to LGBT+ relationships particularly because of their own experience in their own families and communities. A retired nurse spoke of the experience she had had of nursing a gay man who had died of what was then known as AIDS and the love she witnessed between him and his partner who slept by his side in his room every night. A woman who had been a guider in the parish for many years spoke of her nephew who attempted suicide as a young teenager because he was gay and feared what that meant for him in a homophobic society. Another woman married to a Muslim talked of how she felt like an outsider at church at times and looked down upon and criticised for her decision. People told their stories because I had shared my stories from the ‘pulpit’, it was a liberating and uplifting experience for everyone present as we explored and told stories that had not been spoken of in church before. The dentist was not happy and left the church to go to a suburban church with a different theological perspective soon after.

That was nearly a quarter of a century ago. I reflected upon that memory as I read the latest Bishop’s report on Civil Partnerships and thought how 20 years into the next century little has changed and in fact we have perhaps gone backwards. It was while I was at the same church that Lambeth 98 took place and the trajectory of the Church of England, in its relations to the wider Anglican Communion and sexuality begun in the 1991 document Issues in Human Sexuality (IHS) was set. My first incumbency that began the following year, was in a church that had a significant ministry to the LGBT+ community, and we developed that whilst I was there. This included a significant ministry of the blessing of relationships, this was our interpretation of ‘Pastoral Prayers’ alluded in in IHS which although originally a discussion document took upon it the nature of a House of Bishops pseudo-encyclical as the years went on. The introduction of civil partnerships gave these ceremonies a new dimension in 2005 as people requested the services after a civil partnership. I would often sit down with couples with a blank piece of paper and develop a structure for such a service that always ended up looking remarkably like a wedding! These were always well celebrated community occasions and what surprised me was that a small number of unmarried heterosexual couples close to the church after experiencing these celebrations came forward wanting marriage. Although the blessing services were not official weddings, there was a feeling that the institution of marriage was opened and strengthened by them in a way that allowed heterosexual couples who had resisted what they saw as an oppressive institution to step in. In other words, the institution of marriage was not undermined but in fact strengthened by our inclusivity.

If there was any press attention, I fielded it to my Bishop who was supportive and he stated that what went on at the church was of the nature of ‘Pastoral Prayers’ allowed by IHS. He never asked me about the detail and I never told him.

I left that parish in 2007 and in 2008 began eight years tutoring in a theological college where I witnessed the struggles of LGBT+ ordinands as they navigated the horrendously intrusive process of the church. In my last year at the college a student approached me and asked if I would work with him and his partner on a liturgy to celebrate their civil partnership. I felt privileged and honoured to be asked and under a watchful (but permissive) eye from the tutor in liturgy a service of celebration was constructed drawing upon material from Inclusive Church and elsewhere. 150 people packed the college chapel as we celebrated their relationship with love and joy. No official blessing was offered but at an appropriate moment we all sang ‘Praise God from Whom all Blessings Flow’. One of my more conservative colleagues left after the service saying ‘That has really messed my head. I can’t see any difference between that and a marriage’. He was of course right, there was no difference because despite what the church said the love that was on the hearts of the couple, the expression of that love to - and the knowledge of that love in - the congregation blessed by the Holy Spirit in our worship, made it a wedding whatever the church said. What we had experienced was sacramental an outward sign of an inward grace. As the first epistle of John says

Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. We know that we live in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.

On my return to parish ministry in Wolverhampton a new chapter in engagement with LGBT+ people and the church began as through a member of our congregation Kenny Rogers(who was gay) a growing ministry to sanctuary communities developed. This included a small number of people, particularly — but not exclusively — from African contexts fleeing persecution because of their sexuality. Sadly, Kenny died suddenly but on the night of his death we opened the church for nearly a hundred people, mainly from sanctuary communities to come and light candles and mourn together. At his funeral I shared his story and his journey that he had written for the process he was undergoing to become an authorised lay minister in the church. From this a growing ministry to refugees generally and a small number of LGBT+ refugees has developed and with the help of the Inclusive church ambassador for our area the support group for LGBT+ refugees Emmaus was established. This group now meets at our church and draws people from across our region to support and encourage one another through the hostile asylum process. For some of these people our church has also become their spiritual home. They come from contexts where anti-homosexual legislation introduced in the 19th century by European colonisers is defended by the church and in some cases the church argues for greater prohibition and penalties for LGBT+ people. We often hear about the Bishops of African churches and their negative views on LGBT+ inclusion in the church. At Emmaus we hear from the LGBT+ African Christians their faithfulness in the face of Christian persecution, their love for Jesus and their courage often rooted in a profound knowledge and love of God. Some of these folks rejected the church at home and have (re) embraced the faith here. Its been my experience here and in my previous incumbency that inclusivity (which I prefer to see as true catholicity) leads to growth numerically and spiritually.

I have yet to be asked if I would marry or bless a lesbian or gay relationship at St Chad and St Mark. The guidelines of the church issued in 2014 closed off any ambiguity that some of us felt gave us wiggle room in the noughties to offer blessings. Ironically following the rejection at Synod of ‘The Marriage and same sex relationships’ report in 2017 the bishops claimed they were working towards a ‘radically inclusive church for LGBT+ people’, this latest unnecessary statement shows this not to be the case. And as one non Christian friend commented ‘What’s so radical about NOT discriminating!’

Some of us at the grassroots have been seeking to develop ‘inclusivity’ for years hampered by the pronouncements of the House of Bishops. Perhaps we need to get more radical in our approach and directly and openly flout the guidelines from 2014 and 2020 misdescribed as ‘pastoral’ and make visible the reality of those struggling and in small ways succeeding in creating truly ‘radically inclusive spaces’ at the grassroots — perhaps it’s the only way change will come!