The Archbishop, Grace and Sex

I can't help but post after reading this article in the Atlantic Magazine. Being a member of the Church of England, or the Anglican Church, I am concerned, and a bit amused by the situation/crisis/bugaboo that surrounds my archbishop. This article by Paul Elie does a fantastic job of setting the tense scene that the bishop enters each and every day. I can't imagine being the head of a group that has so many differing opinions on one issue. He is constantly being pulled and tugged each and every way.

But, Mr. Elie reveals the Archbishop's real stance on the issue even though he (the Archbishop) has ridden the fence since he took office. In this section, Elie is addressing the issue of grace, but not grace as most Christians would know it. He is speaking of sexual grace: "Gay people, too, deserve to be wanted sexually-deserve the body's grace."

He is responding to Rowan Williams'(the Archbishop) own statement about grace: "It is this (sexual) discovery which most clearly shows why we might want to talk about grace here. Grace, for the Christian believer, is a transformation that depends in large part on knowing yourself to be seen in a certain way: as significant, as wanted."

Mr. Elie goes further to explain that "sexual fidelity is akin to religious fidelity...For the church to stand in the way of such relationships, straight or gay, is to stand in the way of God's grace." Since when was sex so important that it merited the attention and devotion of the faithful? Hasn't sex been abused, used and lowered enough that people have used it as a tool to get what they want out of life? Why is this author (and others) putting sex on a pedastal? It doesn't deserve the attention we give it. Plain and simple.

I once heard someone say that the downfall of the gay rights movement is the fact that they are defining themselves by who they have sex with. That's it. There is nothing else that defines them. Most likely they feel persecuted (even if they haven't experienced it themselves) and they feel abandoned by the church (even if they've never tried to enter one). Some just assume that Christians will reject them based on their own stereotypes.

Mr. Elie concludes his argument for the ordination of gay bishops by saying: "the ordination of openly gay people as bishops was not only permissible, but full of grace." Again, Mr. Elie is using sex as a tool to get what he wants. He, and others are creating new definitions of grace (now including sex, which I don't think the authors of the Bible intended) so as to usher in a new age in Anglican Church.

He also insulted the African church by saying that their opposition to the ordination of gay bishops was not their own agenda, but was imported from the US, in a new form of "imperialism against the global south". In other words, the global south can't think for itself yet. Again, very typical behavior and language from the liberal left against their own African brothers and sisters.

As of now, the Anglican church will split. Conservative churches like mine have aligned with Africa and are forming our own diocese here in America apart from the Episcopal Church. This debate is no longer a "wedge" issue for us. But, I still feel for the church as a whole as this issue continues to split it apart. I hope that people will stop reinterpreting the Bible and theology to suit their own needs.