Rochester – the traditionalist schism fizzles out?

George Pitcher writing in the Telegraph says Michael Nazir-Ali's departure is a totemic event that signals the end of Anglicanism's damaging schism. That’s a pretty bold claim to make. Is it true?

Pitcher says bishop Michael’s departure is emblematic of the decline of the Global South conservative political force in Anglicanism which threatened to tear the Communion apart. Last year they dreamed of overthrowing the authority of Canterbury in favour of an African-led Communion. Michael Nazir-Ali, pitched his tent with the African rebels but now finds that army dispersed and demoralized. How quickly, says Pitcher, has the optimism of last year's rebel schismatics turned to dust. Then there was talk of an end to neo-colonialist rule in the Anglican Church, with a new biblical hegemony that would isolate homosexual bishops and build a new Communion out of Africa.

The bishops, including Dr Nazir-Ali, who boycotted the Lambeth Conference at Canterbury last summer expected the old order to fall, but at the Anglican Primates' meeting in Alexandria, not one primate was absent for doctrinal reasons. The Archbishops of Uganda and Nigeria were present. Type Gafcon into Google News, says George, and practically the only items are from Virtue Online, and David Virtue is interested solely in proclaiming the destruction of the Communion, as I know only too well.

My suspicions about the motives of the six English bishops (Blackburn, Chester, Chichester, Exeter, Rochester and Winchester) who wrote in support of the Bishop of Pittsburgh in September 2008 have not yet been totally allayed.

Is the schism over? Are we now entering a period in which skirmishes continue but the Primates and Provinces of the Communion reluctantly engage with the listening process? I have always predicted this as the most likely outcome, and events such as the recent hearing on the Same Gender Marriage (Prohibition) Bill in Abuja, Nigeria, and the positive effect of equality legislation in the UK confirm my predictions.

The hearings may look like a success for the huge forces arrayed against homosexuality in Nigeria. But one side-effect of introducing the bill and pushing it through the legislative process is that Nigerians are being made more and more conscious of the fact of homosexuality and the presence of LGBT people in their country and their churches.

There has been a second side effect. LGBT Nigerians are far more aware of themselves and the place that they are being denied in society and their confidence and determination is being energised.

Raising awareness and consciousness in the media is the next step on the road to a change of attitude in Nigerian society. They are where we were in the 50s and 60s, when the Church of England first produced a report and gay activism became a public force.

Whether or not bishop Michael becomes active in Gafcon after leaving Rochester won’t ultimately matter. The Communion will return to engaging with homosexuality and the real lives of LGBT people.

Conservatives are astonishing!

The Christian Institute reports Professor Michael King’s research findings as “A significant minority of mental health professionals are attempting to help clients with unwanted homosexual desires.” The Institute’s report accurately says: “There is very little evidence to show that attempting to treat a person’s homosexual feelings is effective and in fact it can actually be harmful.”

That doesn’t fit with conservative needs, however, so instead of continuing to report Michael King’s research, they report work undertaken at Columbia University in 2001 by Professor Robert Spitzer. This shows that homosexuals could become “predominantly” heterosexual through psychotherapy. “Predominantly” heterosexual – what does that mean?

Then they turn to James Parker for support. He has been a client of a Dr Paul Miller who was referred to by Northern Ireland MP Iris Robinson last year when she said therapy can help homosexuals change to become heterosexual.

Homosexuals are homosexual. They can no more change to become heterosexual than a heterosexual can change to become homosexual.

So, 41 year old James Parker praises Dr Miller and says he thinks everyone who wishes to avail of his services should have the freedom to do so. I wouldn’t dispute that. I’d just disagree that Dr Miller is a reputable therapist working with a model accepted by other therapists.

Mr Parker reveals that he: “came out as a young gay man at 17 in London without any hostility from anyone and was very active in the gay lifestyle.” Later he met a group of Christians. “I learnt it was possible to have friendships which were non-sexual”. “I saw this new community which was centred around other people and I noticed the community I was in was narcissistic and self-centred in comparison. I began to question my identity - was it simply my sexual orientation? “Through therapy I began to deal with some traumatic incidents in my past where I had been raped and sexually abused. I had found sexual abuse gave me human attention but in a perverted sort of way.” Mr Parker has now been happily married for two years. “I don’t have homosexual feelings any longer,” he said.

Mr Parker’s experience is extremely atypical. He was raped and sexually abused. His earlier life was perverted and abusive. He was in a narcissistic community.

Conservative evangelicals often produce this kind of evidence, as if it proves that this is typical gay experience. It isn’t. It certainly isn’t true to the experience of the majority of Changing Attitude supporters or of lesbian and gay Christians I know well.

Then he met a group of Christians who were person centred and as a result of that began to question his identity. He no longer has homosexual feelings. Perhaps he never was homosexual. Who knows?

His own report and the intervention by Dr Miller are not going to reveal whether he was homosexual and still is but has successfully repressed his same-sex desires or has always been heterosexual but for complex reasons indulged in a very unhealthy environment when he was younger.

Christian therapists still damage their gay patients

Two months ago I met Michael King of University College London for the first time and was impressed by the authority of the research he has carried out.

He has just published research in the BMC Psychiatry journal which attracted interest yesterday – Premier Radio recorded a quick interview with me. The study surveyed 1,400 medical professionals. It revealed that a sixth of registered British therapists and psychiatrists have attempted to "cure" patients of homosexuality. It also found that there is very little evidence that therapy can really help change whether a person is lesbian, gay or bisexual.

I trained as a psychotherapist, and what the 16% are doing is in my view unprofessional and abusive. A therapist should never have an agenda for the client nor allow him or herself to collude with a client’s perspective simply because it coincides with their own.

Reparative therapy is based on the belief that to be gay or lesbian is wrong, or to act on emotional and sexual desires is in all circumstances wrong for a Christian. If a client feels guilty about being gay or having had sexual encounters with another man, then it is the client’s feelings and experience and reactions that are the content of the therapy, not helping them suppress or deny their own sexuality. Reparative therapy, or colluding with a client who has internalized guilt about homosexuality from church teaching, is always wrong and can be abuse and very damaging to a person’s well being and healing.

As Professor King says, there is nothing whatever pathological about being lesbian or gay. Christians are wrong if they believe that to be homosexual is contrary to the will of God, full stop.

Professor King’s work is of great help to the work and message of Changing Attitude and contributes to the resources available to us in Changing Church attitudes.

Davis Mac-Iyalla, the Director of Changing Attitude Nigeria, has published his thoughts about Archbishop Peter Akinola’s Pastoral Letter in an article on Comment is free: No change in attitudes

One of the two Changing Attitude Nigeria group leaders who was present at the public hearing in Abuja on the Same Gender Marriage (Prohibition) Act has posted his thoughts on Archbishop Akinola’s letter to the group. He writes:

“It still surprises me that people refuse to see the truth when they can now see very clearly the presence of LGBT people in Nigeria. Why don’t people ask themselves why there are gay people in our society? Don’t they understand that there are some things about a person, like our sexuality, that cannot be changed?

“Where has the large sum of money come from that Archbishop Akinola refers to? Changing Attitude is a way of changing people's thinking about us lesbian and gay people and not a way of making money. We don’t need money to make is what we already are.

“They should understand that we are not possessed people as they have labelled us. Whatever deliverance ministry or teaching anyone thinks they can use to change our personality will be a waste of time. Being lesbian or gay has to do with God's creation and is natural. It is only possessed people that need and seek deliverance, not gay people. We are not possessed, we are Godly people.

“I was at the hearing where there was much talk about gays being evil, demonic and ungodly. It is because of the way people talk about us that some gay people see themselves as evil and sinners. As a result they continue to fight within themselves and cannot accept who they are.

“Now the Church of Nigeria is trying to make it look as if homosexuality is a western thing and that we are influenced by money sent from the west to bribe and corrupt us. I can never be influenced over my sexuality, not by anything in this world. We gay Nigerians can never be lured into being something that we already are by God's creation. I am sure the leaders already know the truth. We are here to let them know the truth that they have refused to accept.

“I also want to say to those who are not gay, meet us and get to know us and you will see that we are normal humans just like you. You must learn to accept us as we are. That is God’s wish for us all.”

Davis and Uche both issue a challenge to Archbishop Akinola in fulfilment of his commitment to listen to homosexual people – meet us and listen to us. This challenge will never go away because LGBT people will always be present in Nigerian society and churches. One day, the Archbishop or one of his successors will fulfil the pledge to listen.

Can gay couples share a room in a Christian B&B?

The new laws on sexual discrimination continue to make their presence felt. What do you do if you’re a gay couple on holiday looking for a B&B? I’ve done it – ring the bell, ask for a double room, wonder what kind of reaction we will get. A couple holidaying in Cornwall who had pre-booked got the ‘Christian’ response.

Martin Hall and Steven Paddy, a gay couple who are civil partners booked a double room in the Chymorvah Private Hotel in Marazion near Penzance in November 2008. When they arrived they were told that the hotel could not honour the booking. Peter and Hazelmary Bull, the owners, both Christians, refused to allow them to stay in a room together. (Pictures of the double rooms gay couples are not allowed to sleep in accompany this blog.)

Martin and Steven have launched a county court claim seeking up to £5,000 in damages alleging "direct discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation".

The owners defended the ban saying that they have always barred unmarried couples, whether gay or straight, from sharing a bed. Mrs Bull said: "In 26 years we have never really had a problem with it. I have found people to be very good and understanding. They realise that they are pursuing one lifestyle while we are pursuing another. "I suppose we knew there would be problems with the new law, but I can't change my beliefs and faith because of that."

Well, times and the law have changed. You could do things in business 26 years ago that you can’t do now, and for lesbian and gay couples, that’s real progress.

The hotel's website states: “Here at Chymorvah we have few rules, but please note that as Christians we have a deep regard for marriage (being the union of one man to one woman for life to the exclusion of all others). Therefore, although we extend to all a warm welcome to our home, our double bedded accommodation is not available to unmarried couples – Thank you.”

Mr and Mrs Bull think they are entitled to police the morality of other people. If they had couples to stay in their private house, friends who they thought shouldn’t share a bed, then their might be an uncomfortable conversation and the couple might agree and sleep separately or walk out in a huff. But the Bulls are running a business and the laws of this country apply to them.

The Bulls' solicitor, Tom Ellis, has said he will argue that the Equality Act infringes their human rights as Christians. He said: "Under the European Convention on Human Rights, people are able to hold a religious belief and manifest it in the way they act."

The increasingly familiar argument appears, that it is Christians who need protection of their human rights to enable them to hold their religious beliefs and act accordingly. No-one is preventing them from doing that, only of not infringing inappropriately on the lives of others.

All this will change when the churches let go of their sexual prejudices against LGBT people. Christians do not have a human right to be prejudiced.

Why aren't conservatives reporting the Nigerian church position paper?

Do the various organisations which are connected with the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) support in its entirety the position paper presented in the name of Archbishop Peter Akinola at the hearing on Wednesday?

None of their websites or blogs has reported the hearing or reproduced the paper. Anglican Mainstream as usual has a comprehensive range of reports with a focus on secular and religious news in North America and the UK but nothing on Nigeria. There’s nothing on CANA, VirtueOnline, T19 or Stand Firm.

Failure to report the hearing shows that these groups are only interested in what happens in the wealthy, primarily white, North American and European spheres of interest. Or is the position paper just too embarrassing to report?

Toby Forward comments on Thinking Anglicans: “The prose of this document bears very little similarity to the prose of other documents from this source.” There is a difference in linguistic style between the position paper and previous reports issued by Archbishop Akinola. That’s because previous reports were primarily written by Canon Chris Sugden or Bishop Martyn Minns.

I would like to know whether other Global South leaders, and in particular, Chris Sugden and Martyn Minns, agree with the content of the position paper and the attitudes expressed about LGBT Anglicans.

The position paper was written in Nigeria, not Truro or Oxford. This confirms something I have heard from other sources, that the Africans are distancing themselves from their North American and British colleagues. They are not supporting ACNA as the North Americans hoped they would.

Further divisions are opening between those who have formed alliances of convenience based around hostility to a single issue. Further conflict and fragmentation will occur. Left to his own devices, free from the moderating laptop of Chris Sugden and Martyn Minns, Archbishop Peter Akinola and his advisers will be freed to express their uncensored ideas, theology and ambition, as they have done this week.

Same Gender Marriage (Prohibition) Act and the Church of Nigeria’s position paper

The Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) presented a position paper on the Bill for an Act to Prohibit Marriage between persons of the same gender at the public hearing on 11th March. Below are extracts from the paper interspersed with my comments.

“The present trend in certain quarters to cast the bible aside and foist on the world a religion that does not have God and the bible at the centre…”

The oft repeated myth that the Episcopal Church has abandoned Christianity and has invented a new religion. The North American and UK churches are still bible-based and place God at the centre, despite the false witness made again and again by conservatives.

“… the Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON), which dwelt extensively on human sexual orientation…”

I thought GAFCON was not obsessed with sexuality but here we are told it was dwelt on extensively.

“The introduction of this bill at this stage of national development is one of the best things that have happened to us as a nation.”

My knowledge of Nigeria suggests there might be other more pressing things to introduce that would benefit the nation. These include policies to deal with the rampant corruption and devastation caused by the oil industry in the Delta region; the violence and killings being perpetrated by cult gangs; and the corruption which is widespread at all levels in Nigerian society. These have a far more corrosive effect than same gender relationships and love.

“Genesis 19: 1-29 “It was because of the sin of homosexuality that the city of Sodom and Gomorroah was completely wiped out from the face of the earth.”

I’m not sure which verse, if any, this claims to be a translation of. There is no word or phrase in the bible that can appropriately be translated ‘homosexual’. Dishonest use of scripture doesn’t rate highly for me.

“Same sex marriage is a violation of this divine injunction and will only endanger human existence.”

The now familiar lie, that allowing gay people to exist, form relationships and marry endangers the very future of human existence. Why do these Nigerian so lack confidence in the ability of heterosexuals to remain dominant and continue to give birth and sustain the human race?

“The presence of gay churches, fellowships and clubs in Nigeria is not only embarrassing but also very unhealthy.”

It’s good to note that the ability to be honest about LGBT people has developed further in Nigeria. When Changing Attitude Nigeria was founded 4 years ago the church denied that gay people existed. Two years later the church admitted that gay people do indeed exist. Then they denied that Changing Attitude Nigeria existed or that there could be any gay churches or clubs in Nigeria. Now they concede that such things exist.

“The family is the nucleus of any society and its destruction will lead inevitably to the destruction of society. Same sex marriage is out to foist on the world a false sense of the family which will bring disastrous consequences to mankind.”

What disastrous consequences has the presence of gay people in society brought to humankind throughout history, and what consequences have resulted in those countries that now recognise gay marriage or civil partnerships?

“One of the Corollaries of same sex marriage is the introduction of male prostitution. If male prostitution is added to the social problem of Nigeria at this stage of our national development the effect will be very catastrophic particularly to our youth.”

Male prostitution is almost certainly more prevalent now under the present penal code in Nigeria. When you punish something which is natural for a percentage of the human race, as in the case of sexual activity, prostitution is one of the results. Legalising same gender relationships is more likely to lead to a reduction of prostitution and of relationships which are clandestine and unhealthy.

“Same sex marriage apart from being ungodly is also unscriptural, unnatural, unprofitable, unhealthy, uncultural, un-African and un-Nigerian. It is a perversion, a deviation and an aberration that is capable of engendering moral and social holocaust in this country. It is also capable of existincting (sic) mankind and as such should never be allowed to take root in Nigeria.”

Well, that’s quite a list of nasty things. The nastiest is the reference to the holocaust, given that homosexuals were one of the groups incarcerated by the Nazis. Homosexuals were threatened with extinction by the Nazis but the Church of Nigeria now alleges that we are threatening the extinction of humankind.

It would be too easy to make fun of such laughable claims, but they could have a tragic effect, reinforcing the deep prejudice against LGBT people in Nigerian society and leading to an increase in violent attacks. It is a scandal that the Church of Nigeria makes such blatantly false allegations. Canon Philip Groves’ book ‘The Anglican Communion and Homosexuality’ should be compulsory reading for every Nigerian bishop.

Where is the integrity in the position of the Church of Nigeria and their conservative friends in North America towards LGBT Christians?