Okay, I am prepared to make myself unpopular to just about everybody here, if only so that I can set out my thoughts in a way that makes sense to me.
First, there are some who say that the whole issue of the rights and roles of gay people in Church and world is a minor distraction, and maybe one wilfully put about in the media, by government or by bishops, to stop us thinking about poverty, war and all the rest of it. Hmm. I think that there are already plenty of mechanisms to stop us thinking about poverty, war and all the rest of it, and some of these are internal (our own fear of these). If the whole Church had embraced gay weddings from day one, I don't think we'd necessarily have an answer to Syria, or economic meltdown. Alas.
What is more, sometimes the same people insist that the matter is one of human rights and dignity. Well, if so, whatever it is, it is no small matter. Whenever and wherever human rights and dignity are challenged, something outrageous has happened, and all discussions and deliberations which seek to restore human rights and dignity are time well spent. In short, we can say we are talking about the smallest tweaking of the Church's views on sexuality, gender and partnerships, which should not be controversial, or we can say it's about justice, pure and simple, but it's a real struggle (I am not saying logically impossible, just rhetorically compromising) to say it's both.
There are many, many who say that any matter of expressions of sexuality between consenting adults is small, trivial even, and not the sort of thing the Church should be bothering about. People's bedrooms, etc etc, even the 'what goes where' school of sexual ethics.
I am none of the above. I am old enough to note how quickly the views of the world have changed. I remember a time when the Church was accused by mainstream media of being a shameful hiding-place, for 'poofs' and 'perverts', far too lenient on what was - it was claimed - an obviously deviant and harmful lifestyle. I do not believe the world has intrinsically become a nicer or more tolerant place since the early 90s (for such were the mores then). I think that societal and economic forces have embraced all lifestyles which encourage us to be a 'flexible labour force', and so there is not the same need for unpaid homeworkers as there was. All metrosexual lifestyles are now equally useful. Sorry to be so Marxistically cynical about things. It would be wonderful to believe that people were genuinely now free of homophobia, as they present as free from racism. But I see all of this as skin-deep. I just get about a bit more than you might think I do.
It is certainly true that, within those conditions, capitalism is going to want to encourage us to think of sex as just another recreational activity. The normalisation of pornography is not some freakish side-issue in all of this. It is of the essence. As are all those would-be humorous advertisements, where the person leaves their partner for the sake of the product. Ho, ho? No, no. That's deadly serious stuff. Sex is a recreational activity. Recreational activities can be bought and sold. The buying and selling of sex is not as such yet normal. But the trajectory is clear.
Now, if you think that's paranoid stuff (and, I confess, it sounds a little that way to me as I type it), just ask yourself this: How much time does our society afford to those who would start from a different place - those who would say that sex is, oh, I don't know, a sacred bond, a powerful locus of self-transcendence, a place of unique vulnerability-making, an activity not accidentally closely connected to creating human life, something reserved for unique commitment, not because it is nasty/taboo, but precisely because it is a form of extreme fun, capital-F-Flippin';-Fun, where God's name can be evoked? Is it possible for such arguments (which may well need all kinds of nuancing) even to be heard? I suggest: probably not.
So, deep breath: I am not hostile to my own Church (of England), that it wants to offer a serious critique of our society's 'default' views of sex, sexuality and gender. I do not see that as a sinister turning-away from the issues that really matter. I do not see that as being necessarily about denying human rights (though it might be). I am even grateful that my Church (and others) are trying to stake out some ground that says: whenever there is a sexual encounter, something is at stake, and the persons involved can be enriched and 'formed' into being those who they are meant to be, or impoverished and damaged. Something is at stake, and if you want to call us 'conservatives' or even 'reactionaries' for saying so, we will bear that.
Perhaps I've said enough to make it clear that I am not even hostile to an argument which says: if 'marriage' is now to be extended to gay couples, then something radical is being proposed. It may be radically right, or radically wrong. But it is of the same order of thing (not that the analogy in all ways holds) as a proposal to allow polygamy, or marriages which expire after ten years. So there should be a serious consultation, and the outcome should not be predetermined. All those who believe that gay partnerships have the same degree of fidelity-in-delight as straight marriages (and all the failings and shadow sides too) need not fear such deliberations. That will be shown to be the case, and so gay marriages will indeed then be shown to be different from the other cases. It's just that to argue that it must be so because it must be so, because it must, is not an impressive way to proceed. At least, it isn't, once it is allowed that something is at stake when sex is involved (and so we all have a voice - even, heavens, those who are not sexually active).
But! But, I barely know how to say this, but again I have to speak plainly. I mean that some of this can be read as an apology for the establishment position, and that of the writers of the C of E contribution to the consultation on gay marriages. But I have to disassociate myself from all of that, because of the gross, crude, and I-struggle-to-interpret-as-not-deliberate untruth, that goes along with their argumentation. I mean the arguments that the Church or the bishops 'supported civil partnerships' at their inception. There is enough material out there to demonstrate how untrue this is. Some bishops in the House of Lords did. Most did not. Most supported a wrecking amendment. There was no support from the House of Bishops outside the Lords. And, I am sorry, but you cannot have it both ways. You cannot both say (at one point) you are against civil partnerships because they're too like gay marriages, and then (a bit later, and without any repentance/change of heart) be against gay marriages because they're too different from safe civil partnerships, and move things in a dangerous new direction. And that is, precisely, the mess my own Church establishment has got itself into at this point. They've been called on it.
I do further think that there's been some scaremongering from the same establishment, when it says it may not in law be able to refuse the liturgies of marriage to gay couples if they are able lawfully to marry in a civil ceremony. There is a clear and relevant precedent. Divorced people have the right to marry in civil ceremonies. They have no formal 'right' to marry in Church. I do not think this has been challenged in law, has it? It is understood that civil and canon law are starting in different places, and that is right and proper. (The fact that many divorced persons do marry in church does not alter that fact that they do not have a univocal 'right' so to do.) Again, any couple with the right to marry in their parish have no right to amend the liturgy (because they are Hindu, atheist, non-English-speaking, infertile, or whatever). So the Preface to the Marriage service would in law remain what it is, with its reference to one man and one woman. There are undoubtedly complicated legal questions involved here. But to say that we are looking at a processs which will compel the disestablishment of the Church or the withdrawal of the role for priests as registrars of the Crown is hyperbole. It is fair enough for those who have suffered from the Church's position to this point to be suspicious of this hyperbole.
So, here is where I come in from the cold, and join with others. There is a way ahead. The Church can own that it was far too timid, fearful, muddled and bizarre about civil partnerships. It should have welcomed them, as giving dignity to gay persons in their real-life commitments, and the substantial benefits of legal backing in times of crisis. Further, the Church should acknowledge that some of those who seek (what we now all acknowledge as) the positive good of a civil partnership will seek prayers and blessings from the Church and their friends. Priests and communities should be free to develop ad-hoc liturgies that meet this real, incarnate need. The wider Church (Liturgical Commission) can be consulted on the viability of an authorised liturgy that meets this need. If the Church does this, it has some credibility if (IF!) it also says it cannot at this stage in its reflection offer 'gay marriage'. Because that would require a whole other layer of reflection and insight, about the symbolism of gender difference, within the creation-ordinance of marriage and (many would add) the sacrament too. Of course it needs then so to deliberate, in an open-ended way. And... the Church might have had a hearing on the secular/civil discussion about what constitutes a marriage. It is one of the stakeholders. But it has blown that. The only way to re-enter those deliberations is through the medium of repentance. That is of course available. Deo gratias!
I feel I have the greater part off my chest!
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