What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Benediction

    A couple of people have asked me to give details of the service of Benediction which can be used in the Scottish Episcopal Church where a couple conduct a marriage which is a legal marriage but one which is irregular under canon law.

    The form of service that we are talking about is this one:

    A FORM OF BENEDICTION OF MARRIED PERSONS

    The canon that governs marriage in the Scottish Episcopal Church includes this clause:

    5. A cleric may use the form of Benediction provided in the Scottish Book of Common Prayer (1929) to meet the case of those who ask for the benediction of the Church after an irregular marriage has been contracted or after a civil marriage has been legally entered into, provided only that the cleric be satisfied that the marriage is not contrary to Sections 3 and 4 of this Canon.

    Here’s the whole thing if you want chapter and verse.

    Now, the reason this is interesting at the moment is that the Scottish Government is keen to introduce the possibility of marriage for same-sex couples. I’m very much in favour and hope that the Scottish Episcopal Church enjoys a fruitful discussion about these matters over the next months and hope that the result of those discussions is that we can opt into whatever means the government chooses in order the enable those marriages to happen.  Now, obviously, one matter that will need some attention is the marriage liturgy. There will need to be some work put in to ensure that it can be used for all marriages. This won’t be too much trouble though as we’ve plenty of experience of rewriting liturgies in inclusive language. (Not least the fairly recent rewrite of the ordinal to ensure that it did not use male pronouns all the way through the liturgy for making someone a bishop).

    One little detail which seems to have passed most people by is that the Canon which governs marriage in the Scottish Episcopal Church explicitly authorises an old form of words, the Service of Benediction from the Scottish Prayer Book for use for a couple whose marriage is legal but cannot for some reason be regarded as having been regularly conducted according to the canons of the Scottish Episcopal Church. For a long time, this was the mechanism by which divorced people could have a blessed (ie a benediction) in church after a civil marriage.

    Nowadays, most couples where one person or other has been divorced can have a marriage in church anyway, by going through a pastoral procedure involving the bishop.

    However, the clause permitting Benediction still exists. Its only stipulation (and it uses the word “only” quite explicitly) is that the marriage is a legitimate one and that the couple have not been refused a marriage by a bishop if they have gone through the pastoral process pertaining to divorce.

    The consequence of all this is that once the Scottish Government legalises marriage for same-sex couples, the Scottish Episcopal Church has on its hands a piece of Canon Law which permits those couples to be blessed in church using an authorised liturgy.

    The liturgy itself would need some very minor modifications to be modified for inclusive language of course, but clergy do that all the time.

    Here are two versions of the text to show how easily that can be done:

    A FORM OF BENEDICTION OF MARRIED PERSONS for gay men

    A FORM OF BENEDICTION OF MARRIED PERSONS for lesbians

    Now, someone might want to argue that section 1 of Canon 31 (which is a doctrinal statement) prohibits this. But the point it, Canon 31 has a number of clauses which all have the same validity. Section 5 was explicitly put into the canon to deal with situations where a couple’s marriage did not fit within the boundaries of Section 1.

    Anyone attempting to argue that Section 5 does not apply if a couple’s marriage falls outwith the doctrinal boundary of Section 1 risks casting a slur upon those divorced persons blessed in church under the canon thus far. Such an argument would undermine the position of the Faith and Order Board’s recent first submission to the Scottish Government. It would also undermine the Grosvenor Essay produced last year by the Doctrine Committee. (You can’t argue that Section 1 of the canon means what it literally says amidst fast changing circumstances without also applying the same standards to Section 5).

    Without taking any actions, the Scottish Episcopal Church is going to find itself in the interesting position of having a service, albeit an archaic one, of blessing for gay couples authorised because of the actions of the Scottish Parliament.

    Now, wouldn’t it be much more sensible for us to have some discussions about this in the synod instead to ensure that there are appropriate resources for everyone who is engaged in ministry with engaged couples in our church?

    , , , , , ,

7 responses to “Whither the Kirk?”

  1. Pausing Place Avatar
    Pausing Place

    I missed last night’s programme, but I thought your comments were interesting.

    In a sense, perhaps it’s unsurprising if the SEC is inwardly more positive about itself than the CofS. My take is that in the recent past, at least, the SEC started from a lower common denominator, not being the “local” church in the same way as the Kirk, and so it doesn’t have to contend with others saying of it “look how the mighty have fallen” in quite the same way.

    As to the health of the Kirk (and the SEC for that matter), I think we need to reflect on our self-perception and to consider carefully the points and places in which a dying church (congregation or denomination) should be allowed to die gracefully, and the ways in which we might see new life emerge from the rubble.

    As a young(ish!), relatively new Christian I have seen examples of (both urban and rural) SEC and Kirk congregations where there are few signs of new growth, little to draw in younger (under 50 year olds, to pick a random-ish number) new folk, and much to sustain negative preconceptions of church as boring, irrelevant and so forth.

    We as a faith community need to get much better at stepping up to the mark in our creativity and engagement with our society. The sad truth is that most young adults do not know and have not heard about Jesus Christ, and unless we engage with them in ways culturally relevant to them, and which do not presuppose previous knowledge (too often taken for granted) they never will.

    It troubles me, but I do think it’s true to say that in the SEC and in the Kirk we have a church sustained by the traditions and cultural reference points taught to a previous generation. Culture has shifted radically, with the result that the same will not be able to be said in 20 years time.

    Our challenge is clear. Whether the Kirk and the SEC can step up to the mark to address what it means to live out the Great Commission in the 21st century is less so.

    Reply
  2. Cal Avatar
    Cal

    I didn’t really understand who this programme was aimed at, or even what its aim was.

    Yes, numbers have fallen, but perhaps the small number of people who remain are there because they actually want to be, not because it’s the done thing on a Sunday morning.

    And personally, I rather like the idea of a church “sustained by traditions”. Clearly the church has to be relevant to modern society, but in abandoning the traditions of worship then you lose the centre of why the church exists in the first place.

    There was something very Presbyterian about the programme with its “we’re doomed” mentality. I find the SEC generally more positive in outlook.

    Reply
  3. John Avatar
    John

    The only book the presenter seemed to have used in his research was ‘The Death of Christian Britain: Understanding Secularisation 1800-2000’ By Callum G Brown – indeed Callum Brown was one of the speakers. The thesis of this well argued sociological study is that “quite suddenly in 1963 something very profound ruptured the character of the nation and its people sending organised Christianity on a downward spiral to the margins of social significance”. That something he identifies as new media, new gender roles and a moral revolution which has dramatically ended people’s conception that they lived Christian lives.” It could be said to have happened as “sex began” between the end of the Chatterly ban and the Beatles first LP as the poet Philip Larkin so famously put it.”
    To balance this statistical decline the programme flagged up some of the “church without walls ” iniatives in a lame sort of way. All in all a most unsatisfactory programme that only told half the story.

    Reply
  4. Kenny Avatar
    Kenny

    Good crit Kelvin. My reflection at the end of the programme was, “Lord, we visited this stuff over 30 years ago, and have come out of it stronger and better Church in the SEC.” Hopefully, we stopped longing for ‘the good old days’ a long time ago!

    Reply
  5. MartinRitchie Avatar
    MartinRitchie

    I thinking “Pausing Place” makes a good point about needing to creatively engage with society. From my own experience of working with a CofS congregation, this creative engagement is a weak spot for many.

    As a counterpoint to the programme, interesting to note in the latest “Life and Work” a very positive article about a growing CofS congregation in Stornoway – and I mean really growing! So not all doom and gloom, and I’m sure there are many more examples of bright spots, just as there are in the SEC!

    Reply
  6. Graham Vahey Avatar
    Graham Vahey

    If the C of S disappeared completely we would be at a loss. During the dark and bleak years of Thatcher’s reign she refused to visit Scotland for 5 years. When she did she expressed shock that we had Royal Regalia and ordered it to be removed immediately for safe-keeping to England. Her ‘Sermon on the Mound’ is now historical for its condescension to the Scots. She was none too pleased to be handed two reports on poverty in Scotland by the powerful Church and Nation Committee. Indeed, it was to this Committee that the population turned to for a moral lead during Thatcherism. When James VI (‘Jamie the Saxt’) became James I in England, the population turned to senior Scottish earls for a moral lead. Unfortunately, the Piskie Church does not give a moral lead in Scotland, apart from the work of the Scottish Constitutional Convention in the recent past. The RC Church does pronounce on moral issues. Could it not be conceivable that all the major Churches could unite in a Committee to pronounce for Scotland on moral issues as the Church & Nation Committee once did?

    Reply
  7. Aldous N. Gaiters Avatar
    Aldous N. Gaiters

    Speaking as a Nonjuror myself I am sure the SEC has a right to a moral voice in Scotland. Taking the US daughter church of the SEC as a model you could see where the fissures would appear. There is room for a modern liberal Christian voice, but even I an old Liberal myself, would have to fear that such a voice might appeal to only a select few.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Previous Posts

  • Flower Festival – 2

    This rather fine camel appears between the Christmas and Epiphany displays of the Flower festival, leading the way to the manger.Her gorgeous necklace started off as the Star of Bethlehem, but owing to trouble locating the star over the Place Where Jesus Lay, it transformed itself into a very fine camel adornment.She looks pretty pleased with…

  • Flower Festival – 1

    There is a flower festival in St Saviour's starting tomorrow. The centrepiece is a carpet of flowers symbolising Corpus Christi.Jan Watson and Mollie Orchard are shown here putting the finishing touches to the display.For Corpus Christi itself, I'm planning o­n going to St Michael and All Saints in Edinburgh for their evening liturgy which starts…

  • Synod Papers

    One of the things which is keeping me occupied this week is reading the General Synod papers. Synod is not for a couple of weeks, but the book of papers is pretty thick and needs some work. There is a whole collection of collects in traditional language which this diocese is putting forward for consideration…

  • Preaching today

    I was not preaching today as the bishop was visiting. However, some notes from his sermon appear on the church website. One throwaway remark that he (the bishop) made to me was that it is interesting how important preaching is to a lot of liberal catholic churches. I think this is true. I don’t think…