Rev Colin Coward contends that “most gay Anglicans live in the Global South”, while at the same time conceding that “[t]here are no statistics, and there has been no empirical research to demonstrate what percentage of the African population might identify itself as LGBT [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender].” Making a categorical claim about an empirical issue with no supporting evidence is really a neat trick. I wish I could do that. Apparently, Anglican clergy can get away with that sort of thing, but in my line of work as a professional statistician, I’d be subject to deservedly severe professional criticism if I tried that; if I persisted, I would soon have no credibility and probably no job.
So, how does Rev Coward get from “no empirical research” to the certainty that “the majority of LGBT Anglicans live in the global south”?
Several statements of an impressionistic nature are reported supporting the contention that some LGBT persons live in Africa. This is said to be important because the Church of Nigeria, says Rev Coward, has claimed in the past that “homosexuality doesn't exist in Africa.” That is a very silly claim to make because it only takes a single counter-example to disprove. In any case, the issue now becomes how many LGBT persons live in Africa. Rev Coward concludes that Nigeria alone “potentially” has “570,000 LGBT Anglican members”. Well, anything is possible, I suppose, but how credible is that estimate? What evidence does he marshal in support?
Impressionistic observations can substantiate a claim that LGBT persons are to be found in Africa, but they can provide no solid evidence about prevalence of LGBT persons. A well-known saying in my line of work is, “The plural of anecdote is not data”. Setting aside impressionistic assertions that contribute nothing solid to an estimate of the proportion of LGBT persons in a particular society or culture, I see only a few statements with any serviceable statistical or other empirical content. Let’s have a look at them.
Refering to an essay in a book entitled Other Voices, Other Worlds, which I have not read, Rev Coward says,
Renta Nishihara, writing about Japan, uses a statistical range of between three and ten per cent to estimate the number of LGBT people.
Rev Coward makes it sound like that author just pulled percentages out of thin air and tried them on for size. Unless there is some survey or other empirical data behind those percentages (and I know of none), they have no value for generating a credible estimate of the prevalence of LGBT persons in Japan.
At a conservative estimate (and conservative Anglicans will dispute the percentage), if only three per cent of the population of the United Kingdom identifies itself as LGBT, and the active membership of the Church of England is approximately one million, then there are about 30,000 LGBT members of the Church of England.
Here we have multiple unsupported assumptions and presuppositions. First of all, the most authoritative UK survey data of which I am aware found that, in 2000, 2.6% of men and 2.6% of women reported having had a homosexual partner within the previous five years. (Source: National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles, as reported here.) Secondly, Rev Coward assumes that LGBT persons are equally as likely as heterosexual persons to be active members of the C of E. That is an empirical question, but he provides no evidence to support his assertion. So, his conclusion is unsubstantiated.
The percentage of LGBT people is almost certainly similar in every country and society. What changes are the social constructions around identity, and the way individuals express themselves or suppress their desires.
Again, no empirical support for this assertion. Rev Coward believes this “almost certainly” true, but absent evidence, who knows?
There is, however, good empirical evidence regarding prevalence of homosexuality across different social and demographic environments within the United States, which speaks against Rev Coward’s contention. For example, it has been found that homosexuals are significantly more common in urban areas.
9.2% of men in the central cities of the twelve largest urban areas identified themselves as homosexual compared to a mere 1.3% in rural areas, and 2.8% generally. . . . Migration may account for some of this, but cannot explain all, especially since the differences also show up for those aged fourteen and sixteen.
Significant differences in prevalence of homosexuals were also found with respect to educational attainment. Among those who did not go beyond high school, 1.8% of men and 0.4% of women identified as homosexual or bisexual, compared to 3.3% of male and 3.6% of female college graduates. Statistically speaking, those are huge differences—183% for men and 900% for women.
(Source: National Health and Social Life Survey (1992) and General Social Survey (1988), as discussed in Robert A. J. Gagnon, The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics [Nashville: Abingdon, 2001], pp. 416-417.)
I understand that Rev Coward’s formulation leaves open the possibility that these findings can be explained away by saying that urban or educated Americans are, for some reason, more likely to express their LGBT "identity", not that there are any real differences in innate orientation. Absent empirical evidence, however, that remains supposition.
Assuming that the Global South has the same proportion of potentially gay/homosexual/MSM/ lesbian/bisexual/transgender people as the West, then Nigeria, with an Anglican population of 19 million, must potentially have 570,000 LGBT Anglican members.
Yet again, no basis is provided for the assumption. And what is the significance of the newly added qualifier “potentially”?
The reality this figure reveals for the first time is this: the majority of LGBT Anglicans live in the global south.
Now the qualifier “potentially” has disappeared. What was that about? Be that as it may, by now it is abundantly clear that the only “reality” is made up of Rev Coward’s unsupported assertions concerning empirical questions that he is unable or unwilling to confront with pertinent evidence. Based on his column, it must be concluded that his opinion on the prevalence of LGBT persons in Africa utterly lacks empirical support.
At the risk of getting in over my head, I have some further observations of a theological nature.
LGBT people are already worshipping as members in every single province of the Anglican Communion. The Global South leaders who preach and teach against homosexuality are preaching against tens of thousands of their own members.
Never mind Global South leaders, I’ve heard comments critical of homosexual conduct from Anglican pulpits in Canada. And as for “preaching against tens of thousands of their own members,” Anglican priests do that every time they denounce sin of any kind, be it adultery, greed, paedophilia, holding grudges, fraud, hypocrisy, etc., etc.
They are wrong, and history will prove them to be wrong. In my view, this crisis will come to be seen as God's way of breaking through the anxiety about sex which has predominated for 2000 years of church history.
As a Christian, I am deeply troubled to see an ordained Anglican clergyman appeal to “history” as a moral adjudicator of the rightness of his cause. This is, at best, debased Hegelianism. “History” does not determine who is right and who is wrong about anything; the only judgment that counts is from God.
Rev Coward thinks the church has been wrong about sex for 2000 years. So, the Holy Spirit has for two millennia botched his mission to “guide you into all the truth”?
The crisis is God' s way of forcing the heterosexual majority to confront its fears, and learn to integrate sexuality with spirituality.
Ah, yes, the integration of sexuality with spirituality. This, of course, has far more in common with paganism than any Christian tradition. It is, indeed, a positive denigration of the biblical teaching about sex, which has been honoured in various ways throughout church history in all denominations. Nowhere in the Bible is it stated or implied that sexual expression is a necessary condition of a fulfilled human life. Obedience to the Lord is all that is required.
Rev Coward takes a parting shot at the church’s persecution of LGBT persons. In my experience (which, I fully admit, is not an African experience), the church “persecutes” LGBT persons in the same way she “persecutes” thieves, adulterers, and liars: by calling them to repent of their sins, seek the Lord’s forgiveness, and “lead a new life, following the commandments of God”. Who is more loving: one who reproves sins and calls for reformation of character with the help of God, or one who calls “not sin” what is sin and so encourages self-indulgence and disobedience of God’s will?
via e-mail from that busy guy Binks.
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