There is a piece in the Herald on and apparent leak of the report of the Church of Scotland’s Special Commission. This was the commission that was set up after the debate about whether a presbytery could induct a minister who is living in a civil partnership.
The exact remit was this:
“A Special Commission composed of nine persons, representative of the breadth and unity of the Church, to consult with all Presbyteries and Kirk Sessions and to prepare a study on Ordination and Induction to the Ministry of the Church of Scotland in the light of the issues (a) addressed in a Report welcomed by the General Assembly of 2007: “A challenge to unity: same-sex relationships as an issue in theology and human sexualityâ€, and (b) raised by the case of Aitken et al v the Presbytery of Aberdeen, and to report to the General Assembly of 2011.â€
If the Herald is to be believed, then I was not far wrong in what I predicted at New Year. At that time, I said that:
The Church of Scotland will have a rocky General Assembly with a moderately conservative report from their Special Commission. (No more gay ministers, no questions to be asked about sexuality of office bearers but also no removing anyone currently in any post on the grounds of their sexuality).
It is said in the Herald that they will recommend a new commission for a couple of years, a ban on further inductions of partnered gay clerics, a ban on training for gay candidates in same-sex partnerships and also a renewed ban on C of S people talking about it in public. (This last ban in the so-called moratorium, which is and always was madness, if you ask me). Oh, and no removing people already in post.
There is a lot of discussion in the Herald about who would leave the Kirk if different policy decisions were made. If I understood the report correctly, just over 20% of session members said they would leave the church if gay clergy were allowed to proceed to ministry whilst just under 10% would leave if the opposite held true. This leads to the schism-alert headlines that we’ve come to know very well within Anglicanism.
The trouble with this approach to the issue is that it makes doctrine the captive of the bully. It also creates false “extreme” wings and an equally false central position which tries to play off each side. It also fails to capture the reality which is that good hearted liberals slip away in the wars of attrition – leaving because they simply cannot stomach what they perceive as the intolerance of a church which does not represent their values and ethics. How many gay folk have left the C of S already? How many family members? How may young people? People like that slip away. In my experience, those who take a less tolerant view of gay people in the church are more likely to work together to make the big threats about taking their money or members away en bloc.
What will be most interesting will be to read the report in full – it is reported to be 50 pages worth and the Church of Scotland tend to do that kind of theological reporting better than anyone else.
The figures we have so far are really only figures that can generate hysterical headlines. What will be really interesting will be to see the breakdown, if it is published, from one presbytery to another.
The really shocking headline that the Herald might have run with today is that if gay clergy were allowed to be appointed unimpeded then 80% of the kirk elders would stay loyally in place living the gospel in their parishes. That would not always have been so and represents an astonishing period of change over the last 20 years or so, the time that I have known the Church of Scotland.
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