Report of the House of Bishops Working Group on Human Sexuality

(The Pilling Report)

Church of England

• Publisher: Church House Publishing
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780715144374
• eBook ISBN: 9780715144381
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christianity

In July 2011, the House of Bishops commissioned a review group to draw together and reflect upon explorations on human sexuality conducted since the 1998 Lambeth Conference, and to offer proposals on how the continuing discussion within the Church of England about these matters might best be shaped. This is the group's report.

Part 1

INTRODUCTION

Introduction

The establishment, membership and work of the Group

1. On 1 July 2011 the House of Bishops announced that alongside a review of its 2005 Pastoral Statement on civil partnerships it intended ‘to draw together and reflect upon biblical, historical and ecumenical explorations on human sexuality and material from the listening process undertaken in the light of the 1998 Lambeth Conference resolution’ and to ‘offer proposals on how the continuing discussion within the Church of England about these matters might best be shaped in the light of the listening process’.⁴¹

2. Following this announcement, the House then set up a Working Group on Human Sexuality to take this work forward. The Chairman of this group was Sir Joseph Pilling and the four other members were the Rt Revd Michael Perham, Bishop of Gloucester, the Rt Revd Keith Sinclair, Bishop of Birkenhead, The Rt Revd Jonathan Baker, Bishop of Ebbsfleet (now the Bishop of Fulham) and the Rt Revd John Stroyan, Bishop of Warwick.

3. With the agreement of the House of Bishops Standing Committee, three advisers were appointed to assist the Group in its work. These were the Revd Dr Jessica Martin, Professor Robert Song and the Venerable Rachel Treweek, the Archdeacon of Hackney. These advisers participated fully in the meetings of the Group.

4. The Group was supported in its work by the Revd Dr Malcolm Brown, the Director of Mission and Public Affairs for the Church of England, and by Dr Martin Davie, the Theological Consultant to the House of Bishops. Administrative support was provided by Mrs Lauren Fenn and Mrs Caroline Kim.

5. The House of Bishops Standing Committee also agreed the following terms of reference for the Working Group:

• To draw together and reflect upon biblical, historical and ecumenical explorations on human sexuality and material from the listening process undertaken in the light of the 1998 Lambeth Conference resolution;⁴²

• To advise the House on what proposals to offer on how the continuing discussion about these matters might best be shaped;

• To offer a draft of the consultation document that the House intends to produce;

• To keep the Standing Committee and the House in touch with its work from time to time; and

• To report to the House through the Standing Committee by October 2013.

6. The timetable of the Group was subsequently amended so that it would report to the House by December 2013.

7. The Working Group held 15 meetings, two of which were residential meetings held at Glenfall House, Cheltenham and Ripon College, Cuddesdon. At five of the meetings there was presentation of oral evidence by individuals and groups who were chosen for their expertise.

8. In addition to this oral evidence the Working Group also issued an invitation to all the bishops of the Church of England and any other interested parties to submit written evidence to the Group.

9. A list of those who provided evidence can be found in Appendix 2.

The listening process and the Group’s participation in it

10. As can be seen from its terms of reference, the work of the Group has been part of a wider process of listening in the area of human sexuality that has taken place across the Anglican Communion and within the Church of England.

The listening process in the Anglican Communion

11. In Resolution I.10 of the 1998 Lambeth Conference the bishops of the Anglican Communion stated: ‘we commit ourselves to listen to the experience of homosexual persons’.

12. This commitment to listening was reiterated in the statement issued by the Primates of the Anglican Communion after their meeting in London in 2003, in the recommendations of the Windsor Report of 2004 and in resolutions passed by the Anglican Consultative Council at its 13th and 14th meetings in 2005 and 2009.

13. This commitment has borne fruit in a number of different ways.

14. First of all, there have been listening processes that have taken place within the various provinces of the Anglican Communion. These have taken a variety of different forms and details about how far they had got by 2007 can be found on the Listening Process pages of the Anglican Communion Website.⁴³

15. Secondly, from 1999 to 2005 there were the ‘International Anglican Conversations on Human Sexuality’ which were established by the Archbishop of Canterbury ‘to move the whole Communion forward from the Lambeth resolution’ and which took the form of three rounds of conversation about sexuality between bishops from across the Anglican Communion with a variety of different views and experiences on the subject.⁴⁴

16. Thirdly, in 2008 there was the publication of The Anglican Communion and Homosexuality,⁴⁵ which was a series of essays which were intended ‘to help bishops, clergy, and lay people in the Anglican Communion to listen to God and to each other on the subject of human sexuality’.

17. In 2008 the Windsor Continuation Group proposed a shift of emphasis to Mutual Listening and this was endorsed by the 2009 Primates Meeting. The Anglican Consultative Council endorsed this shift in emphasis and commissioned the Continuing Indaba Project which is described as ‘a biblically-based and mission-focused project designed to develop and intensify relationships within the Anglican Communion by drawing on cultural models of consensus building for mutual creative action. The hope for the project is that it will produce a package to enable deeper relationships for the sake of mission around the Anglican Communion.’⁴⁶

The listening process in the Church of England

18. Within the Church of England the listening process has taken three forms.

19. Firstly, at the national level there was the publication in 2003 of Some Issues in Human Sexuality.⁴⁷ This was a detailed guide to the debate about human sexuality in the Church of England, the Anglican Communion and the Church as whole that looked at the key issues under discussion and how the debate could be handled in a way that was both theologically rigorous and pastorally sensitive. It contained a number of sections entitled ‘voices from the debate’ which were intended to enable the voices of gay, lesbian and transgendered people to be heard directly.

20. This report was debated in General Synod in February 2004 and there was a further General Synod debate in February 2007 on the House of Bishops statement on civil partnerships. In both of these debates gay and lesbian members of Synod spoke openly about their experiences and concerns.

21. In 2006, people from across the Church of England with a wide spectrum of views on human sexuality met together at St George’s Windsor in order to build relationships and to enable us to understand one another’s opinions. This was followed by a further meeting in 2008 at the Royal Foundation of St Katherine, London, attended by some of the same people and some new to the group. The second process was designed by a group of people in co-operation with the Facilitator for the Listening Process for the Anglican Communion. The group included gay Christians, and drew upon experience of listening from the wider Anglican Communion.

22. Thirdly, there have been various initiatives in many, though not all, of the Church of England’s dioceses. In some dioceses this has taken the form of informal discussions, whereas in other dioceses there has been the production of study material, debates at Diocesan Synod and the holding of conferences, workshops, or study days on sexuality.

23. From the evidence received by the Group it appears that the listening process across the Church of England has been uneven, with the amount of listening and the form that it has taken being dependent on local initiatives and local enthusiasm. There has been no systematic process of listening involving the Church of England as a whole.

The listening exercise undertaken by the Working Group

24. The Working Group heard directly from gay and lesbian people during the evidence days in which a variety of different groups and individuals were invited to give evidence in person to the Working Group. These respondents spoke from a variety of different theological and personal perspectives and included both those who were in sexually active gay and lesbian relationships and those who had same sex attraction but chose not to embrace a gay identity or a same sex relationship and were either single or married.

25. The group felt that, although what it heard during the evidence days was extremely valuable and informative, it wanted to engage in a more extensive process of listening in which the members of the Working Group would go to different parts of the country and simply listen to people’s experiences, as distinct from receiving prepared evidence and responding with questions.

26. This process of wider listening was designed by a group including those who could draw upon the experience of the 2008 listening process at the Royal Foundation of St Katherine and one member of our working group. It established norms, processes of invitation, and rules of confidentiality based upon the Chatham House Rule. The design team did not include any who had presented to our group’s meetings – they were not chosen from among the lobby groups – and represented a diversity of people, lay and ordained.

27. The process took the form of ten meetings, nine of which were attended by two people from the Working Group and one of which was attended by one person.

28. These meetings were held in various venues across the country. Sometimes they took place in people’s homes and sometimes they took place in suitable neutral venues. Some of the meetings were facilitated, but in others those from the Working Group simply met the people concerned.

29. At these meetings those from the Working Group met people in a wide variety of different situations. They included people who were gay, lesbian and transgendered and someone who had same sex attraction but out of fidelity to his reading of Scripture chose to resist it, and was married. There were both Christians and non-Christians and both clergy and laity. Some of them were single, some had been married but were now divorced, some were in civil partnerships and some were in informal long-term same sex relationships. A number of the people had children, some of whom were adopted, some of whom were from previous marriages and some of whom had been conceived through artificial insemination.

30. It would be impossible, without a very long report, to encompass all the beliefs and opinions that were expressed by those we met through this process. As we shared our experiences of the listening process within our working group, the most significant and telling points were the following:

• Opposition to gay and lesbian relationships was a generational matter. It simply was not an issue for most young people.

• The Church of England’s current teaching and practice were deeply off-putting to those outside the Church and therefore a serious impediment to mission.

• A key issue was the different ways in which Scripture was read and the harm done to people by some ways of reading it.

• It could be as difficult, if not more difficult, to be a Christian in a gay or lesbian environment as to be gay and lesbian in the Church.

• Not all gay and lesbian Christians felt comfortable with aspects of the current gay and lesbian culture in this country.

• The Church needed to learn to live with diversity over sexual practice and theological understandings of sexuality.

• It was important for gay and lesbian Christians to receive affirmation from the Church. The lack of such affirmation was a contributory factor to the bullying and lack of self-worth experienced by many gay and lesbian people, especially teenagers.

• Not all gay and lesbian Christians wanted to enter into civil partnerships. Some wanted to be single and others wanted some form of recognition (preferably blessing) from the Church and not just legal recognition from the State. Many gay and lesbian Christians would opt for marriage when this became available.

• The Church’s current discipline, with regard to ordinands and clergy, was inconsistently applied, encouraged a culture of dishonesty within the Church, and was particularly difficult for the partners of the people concerned. Some clergy in committed relationships chose not to be in civil partnerships so as not to be asked questions about their sexuality.

• Gay and lesbian clergy still found some difficulty in securing appointments and this compared unfavourably with the positive support for diversity among secular organizations. The Church authorities were prevented from doing more in this area because of the views of conservative groups and congregation members.

• The Church of England’s current teaching and practice was helpful to those with same sex attraction who be...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Foreword
• Prologue
• Part 1: Introduction
• Part 2: Summarizing the Evidence
• Part 3: Reflecting on the Evidence
• Part 4: Findings and Recommendations
• Appendix 1
• Appendix 2
• Appendix 3
• Appendix4
• Notes