Religion and homosexuality

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The worldwide Anglican
Communion & homosexuality

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Overview:

The Anglican Communion is a world-wide faith. It is often considered to be a separate branch of Christianity, along with Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, and Eastern Orthodoxy. Some consider it to be a part of Protestantism.

This section discusses disagreements within the Anglican Communion concerning equal rights for homosexuals, and bisexuals in loving, committed relationships -- including the right to be considered for ordination as a priest, for consecration as a bishop, and to have their relationships formally recognized by church ritual.

The fundamental cause of the conflict is a difference in belief among different provinces concerning the relative importance of three factors in what is called the "three-legged stool" of Anglicanism:

On sexual matters, conservatives within the Anglican Communion tend to stress the first two factors; liberals tend to stress the last one.

To complicate matters, liberals and conservatives interpret the Bible very differently. They generally agree on what the Bible says, but cannot agree on what the Bible means. In fact, to many conservatives, the core problem is not whether homosexuals should be treated equally in the Church, but how to interpret the Bible's authority.

As stated by an editorial in the Times Online:

"At the heart of Anglicanism lies a terrible dilemma. ... the Anglican Communion is not a single Church demanding adherence to a disciplined codex of canon law. It is a fellowship of 38 provinces, each with its own prayer book, traditions and legal structure, bound together only by bonds of trust and fellowship. When any one of those provinces takes a step considered by others to be morally or theologically unacceptable, there is no legal or institutional method for dealing with the breach. Tolerance and compromise -- loving or begrudging -- are the only way that the communion can be preserved. The alternative is schism."

"The communion now stands on the brink of schism. The pretext, which has racked the Church for more than a decade, is the split over ordaining gay priests. But the issue now goes far deeper. It has become a test of whether the Episcopal Church [,USA], the small but influential American branch of Anglicanism, has broken the bonds of fellowship with other churches, especially the conservative African and Asian provinces in the “Global South”, in ordaining [sic] a homosexual bishop" who is in a committed same-sex relationship. ₁

Not mentioned in the editorial is the friction between both the North American provinces -- the Episcopal Church, USA and the Anglican Church of Canada -- and the rest of the Anglican Communication in holding rituals that recognize the unions of loving, committed same-sex couples.

Complicating the situation is the absolute certainty with which most conservatives and liberals hold their beliefs. Everyone is totally convinced that they have assessed the will of God with precision.

Still another complication was the Episcopal Church, USA's election of Bishop Jefferts Schori as the first female primate in the Communion's history. This happened at a time when only a handful of provinces allow women to become bishops and only a slim majority allow women to be ordained as priests.

Topics discussed in this section:

Related sections on homosexuality:

and perhaps most importantly of all:

Reference used:

1. Bitter Fudge: Anglicans have come close to an open split but baulk at schism," Times Online, 2007-FEB-19, at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/

Copyright © 1997 to 20087 by Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance
Latest update: 2008-JUL-22
Author: B.A. Robinson