Posts
The controversy over Anglican Church of Canada Bishop Peter Coffin’s granting a temporary licence to a married lesbian Episcopal priest has re-surfaced. Last February, Bp Coffin gave permission to Linda Privitera to minister in the Diocese of Ottawa. Seven priests in the diocese then wrote open letters criticising Bp Coffin for preempting discussion of same-sex unions after promising to await a decision on the issue from General Synod 2007.
A Canadian Press reporter recently caught up with Ms Privitera. She is very disappointed at the reception she received in Canada. Although Anglican Church of Canada leaders say pleasant things about welcoming homosexuals, she says they’re all talk.
In a recent interview, Archbishop Andrew Hutchison said the church has long been affirming of its gay and lesbian members "as having full access and full membership." He also sees the church making it more comfortable for them to be in the pews. "I sincerely hope so," he said.
"I believe the love of God to be for everybody and that includes those whose sexual inclinations are towards their own gender," said Hutchison.
"It's a nice statement," says Privitera. "But they haven't concretized ways in which the GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered) people have access to power."
OK, wait a minute. Abp Hutchison says the church offers “full access and full membership”, but Ms Privitera wants “access to power”. If she’s really seeking that, she’s in the wrong vocation. For Christian ministers are called to be servants of God and his people, not power-wielders. Jesus spoke to this issue very clearly on more than one occasion. For example, St Matthew 20:25-28.
Jesus called them [the disciples] to him and said, "You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."
(See also St Luke 22:24-27 and St Matthew 18:1-4.) Her stated desire for “access to power” seems to indicate that Ms Privitera wants to exercise authority over others.
Based on those passages, Ms Privitera’s view would appear to embody a serious misapprehension of the purpose and method of Christian pastoral ministry. If she really means what she says, I respectfully suggest she consider another line of work.
Ms Privitera’s partner, Carleton University professor Melissa Haussman, also betrays misunderstanding of what the church is and how it works.
What's been most disappointing, says Haussman, an expert on Canada-U.S. relations who loves her teaching job and plans to stick it out in Ottawa, "is how a very small minority of vocal people continues to influence church policy" in the 77 million member worldwide Anglican communion.
That is a narrow and, in my opinion, fundamentally unChristian way of thinking about the church. For, as the creed says, “I believe in the communion of saints”—that is, all saints from all places and all ages. Contrary to Ms Haussman’s assumption, the church simply does not consist solely of those worshipping Christ on earth today. As G.K. Chesterton put it so memorably:
Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about.
“Small and arrogant oligarchy” indeed. From that perspective, it is in fact those who favour ordaining unrepentant sinners to the pastoral ministry who are in the minority.
h/t: Binks
Previous related post: Dirty tricks in Ottawa
