THE story of a man who
underwent exorcisms after confiding, at the age of 13, in the
pastors of his church that he thought he might be gay, was told at
the latest Westminster Faith Debate, on Thursday of last week, by
the Revd Steve Chalke, the Baptist minister whose support for gay
relationships provoked high-profile debate this year (News, 18
January).
Mr Chalke described how
the man, a member of his congregation, was alcoholic with "little
or no self-esteem" by the age of 18, "not because he was gay but
because of a misunderstanding of biblical texts which led to a
condemning".
Speaking on a panel
convened to discuss "Do Christians really oppose gay marriage?", Mr
Chalke said that the Church "is always going to be wrongfooted over
the issue of gay marriage unless it sorts out a deeper and more
profound issue: the issue of how it handles inclusion and
particularly the inclusion of gay people".
A YouGov survey published
to coincide with the debate suggested that people who identified as
Anglicans or Catholics in the UK supported same-sex marriage "by a
small margin". Supported among "active churchgoers" was slightly
lower: 40 per cent of churchgoing Anglicans were in favour, and 47
per cent were opposed. Of the 4437 people surveyed, 1519 identified
as Anglican.
The section of religious
poeple most opposed were those who both "believe in God with
certainty" and "make decisions primarily on the basis of explicit
religious sources".
Lord Deben (the former MP
John Gummer) also on the panel, said that he would support the
Government's same-sex-marriage Bill: "This is a clear distinction
between what I see as marriage as a Catholic and what the State
sees as marriage."
Dr Tina Beattie,
Professor of Theology at Roehampton University, also a Roman
Catholic, said that, "far from undermining the Christian
understanding of marriage", same-sex marriage could be a "very
great gift and grace for our times" to call Christians back to a
"deeper appreciation" of the distinction between the "rather
pared-down understanding of marriage that prevails under secular
law" and the "much richer, thicker description of marriage that can
be derived from the Christian tradition".
John Milbank, Professor
in Religion, Politics and Ethics at the University of Nottingham,
spoke in opposition to same-sex marriage. Marriage had been treated
"casually" by the Government, "as if it were not as important as
something like tax reform". His opposition was "of a radical kind,
not a conservative kind", and was, he said, shared by many gay
people on the Left. The Government was "weakening the basic
mediating institution of marriage. It's allowing to creep in a
direct relationship between the State and the market and children.
By weakening the link between sex and procreation you can go
further down the road of technologising and politicising the
population."
Same-sex marriage would
"undo Christian doctrine" by "getting rid of the idea that sexual
partnership mirrors the partnership between Christ the bridegroom
and the Church as bride".
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