The current situation in the Church of England can be viewed as a rather precarious tower of Jenga bricks: falling attendance, giving, and vocations, a massive trust deficit, multiple safeguarding failures. In this context, the LLF story resembles bishops pushing with varying degrees of force at eight Jenga bricks, essential structural elements within the Church of England’s identity and crucial for its cohesion, stability, and unity.

The first brick the bishops decided to push was that of liturgy, proposing Prayers of Love and Faith in GS 2289 in January/February 2023 with the support of Synod. By July, however, it was clear (in GS 2303) that the planned commending of prayers faced major problems, and so authorization was being seriously considered instead. In October the bishops agreed that while they would commend the prayers for use in regular services, in which the prayers would not be the focus, what they now called “standalone services” would need to be approved by General Synod under Canon B2, requiring two-thirds majority in all three houses in order to be authorized. This proposal (GS 2328) was opposed by those wanting change and in November 2023 Synod passed an amendment asking that the House of Bishops “consider whether some standalone services for same-sex couples could be made available for use, possibly on a trial basis” without having to wait for Canon B2.

The bishops then reverted to their original plan and proposed to this July’s Synod that “standalone services” now simply be commended. This was described as being “for a trial period,” but that makes no sense given commendation is an episcopal judgment the prayers are already legal, and it was admitted during the Synod that once commended they were highly unlikely ever to be withdrawn. This is now likely to happen shortly after February 2025, despite this liturgical change being so far from “common worship” that it will require delegated episcopal oversight for parishes that object to their bishop supporting the prayers and for parishes wishing to use them whose bishops oppose them.

The main reason for objection to PLF is that it is now clear that the bishops are also pushing, increasingly strongly, a second brick in the wobbly Jenga tower: doctrine. This is a major development. When the prayers were introduced, it was clearly stated that they were compatible with the church’s doctrine of marriage and there was no intention to even touch this brick. This was passed by Synod in February 2023 (what is known as the Cornes amendment) and restated by the bishops in July (“The bishops are upholding the Doctrine of Marriage and their intention remains that the final version of the Prayers of Love and Faith should not be contrary to or indicative of a departure from the doctrine of the Church of England,” GS 2303, para 20).

By November, however, the bishops acknowledged the prayers did not pass the latter “indicative” test, although they claimed that due to new insight into doctrine they were nevertheless within the canons’ looser doctrinal test (GS 2327, Annex A, Para 17 and para 26). It is now clear that the doctrine brick will probably need to be pushed even further if (as most bishops want) clergy are to be allowed to enter civil same-sex marriages. The July 2024 paper (GS 2358, paras 36-46) and the motion passed by Synod call for theological work “to provide clarity around how doctrine can develop or change within the Church of England,” and the lead bishop acknowledged a number of bishops are now willing to change or develop the church’s marriage doctrine.

This doctrine brick is now being pushed because of another crucial, third brick: the church’s understanding of holy orders. The Church of England has repeatedly been clear that its doctrine of marriage means clergy should not be in any sexual relationship other than marriage between a man and a woman and they should not enter a civil same-sex marriage. The February 2023 motion made clear that the existing Pastoral Guidance (from 1991) would be replaced but not its content and a draft incorporating changes to the current discipline was drawn up last summer. In October 2023 the House of Bishops voted “that further work be done on part 3 (Ministry) of the Guidance for issuing as soon as possible with the intention that it remove all restrictions on clergy entering same-sex marriages, and on bishops ordaining, licencing and granting permissions to officiate to such clergy.”

There has, however, been no further progress due to a growing realization that this creates major problems (set out most fully to the February General Synod in GS 2346 Annex B) given the church’s current doctrine. It’s also clear a significant number of bishops are unwilling to accept this change and likely to refuse to move from the current discipline. A decision by the bishops is now likely to be brought to the next General Synod in February 2025.

These episcopal differences over clergy in same-sex marriage highlight a fourth Jenga brick: episcopal collegiality. The first sign of this brick being moved came early in discernment in October 2022 when, while the bishops sought an agreed path together, the Bishop of Oxford published his proposal in favor of change. Then, in January 2023, the bishops’ decision was leaked to the BBC before it was announced (there have since been several further leaks), the Archbishop of York went far beyond what had been agreed, and a statement defending the received doctrine of marriage was released by 14 bishops.

Despite these developments, in the February 2023 Synod the bishops were almost 90 percent in support of the proposals (voting 36 for, 4 against, with 2 abstentions). Private letters from bishops expressing opposing views were leaked in July and, following a meeting of the House on October 9, 12 of those present issued a dissenting statement. That meeting also overturned — at the request of the Archbishop of Canterbury — the wishes of the majority of the wider College to authorize standalone services experimentally (using Canon B5A) alongside using Canon B2. Shortly afterward a group of 44 bishops from the wider College issued a statement supporting same-sex marriage for clergy. By the November Synod, bishops were proposing competing amendments to the House’s motion, most bishops reversed their October vote to move straight to B2, and in the final vote the House of Bishops was reduced to 70 percent support, with the majority falling from 32 to 13 (23-10-4).

Earlier this year, the bishops were so divided about the proposed “reset” presented to the February Synod that the motion could not come in their name. In June there followed statements expressing concern from 11 mainly evangelical bishops and the bishops of the Society. At Synod, in both questions during the presentation and the debate, the Bishop of Bath and Wells, who had not previously publicly critiqued the process, made clear he was now opposed. In the final vote, the bishops’ support fell below two-thirds to a majority of only 10, with 17 unable to support the House’s motion (22-12-5).

The fifth Jenga brick also relates to episcopacy but is one which, until now, the bishops have been unwilling to apply any pressure to at all, while those pressing for change insist it needs to be moved quite significantly if episcopal pressure on the other bricks is not to lead to total collapse. During the February 2023 Synod debate it was acknowledged (most powerfully by the Archbishop of York) that there would need to be “pastoral reassurance” for those opposed to the changes, and this provision became one of the three key elements (alongside PLF and Pastoral Guidance). It is, however, one the bishops have been most reluctant to consider, and the most recent proposals were resisted by many bishops. The plans were only passed by the House because of changes removing (see para 10) the previously highlighted development of “three spaces, one church.” The Synod paper notes that whether and how much to move this brick will be a major question, with calls for transferred episcopal jurisdiction should clergy enter same-sex marriages (para 27).

Current proposals for delegated oversight (of an unclear scope and having no secure legal basis) have been rejected as insufficient by those to whom they are being offered. In the words of Helen Lamb in the Synod debate, for them “that the power that the Bishops hold as ordinaries is non-negotiable whereas the doctrine of the Church is negotiable is a hard thing to hear from our bishops.”

There have also been repeatedly raised concerns about a sixth feature: the way bishops have been seemingly willing to disregard constitutional, legal, and other aspects of due process. This has been a central feature of the concerns raised by a new network of networks called the Alliance, whose letters speak of “the illegitimate and unconstitutional nature of the process.” The 12 bishops’ October dissenting statement said “we believe that bishops must have due regard to the obligations of good and proper governance.” At the heart of this is the initial refusal to use the Canon B2 Synodical process, now reinstated after being modified in November.

In February it became clear that legal advice drawn up in September was not shared with the bishops until December, despite meetings of the College, the House, and the Synod during those months making key decisions related to it. Legal and other advice has not been published, with Synod members receiving only the bishops’ selective summaries. Earlier legal advice in 2016 (in Annex to GS 2055), never withdrawn, made clear the constraints on proceeding with the sort of developments now being proposed, and this has made many concerned that legal advice is either being ignored or subtly adapted in order for the bishops to do what they want, on policy and political grounds, to do.

There is also widespread disquiet that it only became clear in February that very significant decisions relating to the process and its intended outcomes (in relation to same-sex civil marriage and clergy) were taken by the House of Bishops in the October 2023 meeting but concealed from General Synod’s November meeting. These process failings, particularly the repeated failure to fulfill promises to treat all three elements of prayers, guidance, and provision together (critiqued in this Synod by Alianore Smith) seem to be endemic even after the “reset,” as shown by the significant criticisms of the process leading to the latest proposals by 11 members of the Working Groups supportive of current teaching and practice.

The relationship between the bishops and General Synod and the lack of a strong consensus is a seventh Jenga brick. General Synod has now three times passed motions relating to LLF/PLF, but those motions have only selectively been implemented (most notably the disregarding of the Cornes amendment) and the majorities have been small among the clergy and laity and diminishing among the bishops. The crucial amendment that became the basis for abandoning the use of Canon B2 was passed by a majority of just one in the House of Laity. Between February and October 2023, the majorities in each House fell by over half (from 32 to 13, 26 to 7, 11 to 4) to be only 51.8 to 48.2 percent among clergy and 51 to 49 percent among laity (compared to 57-43 and 53-47 in February). At this latest Synod, the aim had been to avoid a repetition of these narrow margins by presenting a motion that would gather greater consensus and enable some settlement. Instead, support among bishops fell and the division among clergy and laity remained almost unchanged (52.9 to 47.1% among clergy and 51.1 to 48.9% among laity). Many in Synod asked what bishops would do faced with a cleric continuing to press controversial proposals in a parish when faced with such deep division. They suggested most bishops would be concerned about the lack of wisdom being shown and the real danger of complete pastoral breakdown.

These seven “Jenga bricks,” indisputably significant for securing the cohesion and stability of Church of England structures, whatever one’s views on LLF/PLF, are being pushed about in order to secure the predetermined outcome desired by the Archbishops and a majority of bishops. For most opposing that outcome, the proposals also represent an attempt to remove an even more important and foundational eighth brick in the Anglican tower: Scripture’s authority.

The imagery of the church as a building is biblical: we are “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord” (Eph. 2:20-21). The seriousness of the situation is evident from the fact that the canon at the center of the controversies (Canon B30) is the only one claiming its content is “according to our Lord’s teaching,” making disregarding it in practice or changing its statement as to the teaching of Christ of the highest significance. Much opposition to the changes is based ultimately on the conviction that they can only be viewed as pushing away the foundational brick of the teaching of the apostles and prophets. This inevitably has implications, not only for the Church of England but also for the wider “whole building” to which it is joined, particularly the Anglican Communion.

Many did not know whether to laugh or cry at the title of the latest proposals: “Moving Forward As One Church.” That this was far from the reality became crystal clear when an open letter to the Archbishops from leaders of the Alliance stated that

<Quote>If the further departure from the Church’s doctrine suggested by the Synod papers does go ahead, we will have no choice but rapidly to establish what would in effect be a new de facto “parallel Province” within the Church of England and to seek pastoral oversight from bishops who remain faithful to orthodox teaching on marriage and sexuality. We will encourage all church leaders who are in sympathy with The Alliance to join the parallel Province.</end>

Synod’s voting figures confirm that even if we limit “One Church” to the Church of England, we are very far from moving forward together as one. The serious effects on the wider church were already clear last February, when a dozen Primates stated that “The GSFA [Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches] is no longer able to recognise the present Archbishop of Canterbury, the Rt Hon & Most Revd Justin Welby, as the ‘first among equals’ Leader of the global Communion.” The implications of the latest developments are also clear: after Synod, GSFA signaled its support for the Alliance statement, and so it seems that not only the Church of England but the wider Anglican Communion is being pushed to the brink of total collapse by Church of England bishops, led by the two Archbishops.

The opening session of the LLF Course encouraged reflection on Matthew 7:24-29, with its warning about building on sand rather than rock: “The rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell — and great was its fall!” Many cannot in conscience do anything other than oppose the proposals because they see them as a call to move from building on the rock to build instead on sand. That understanding is, of course, rejected by those supporting the changes. The question the image of episcopal Jenga raises, however, is how anyone can seriously think it wise for the bishops to continue pushing and pulling at each of these major Jenga bricks that contribute to Anglican identity and unity, or believe that doing so can lead to any other outcome than a similar “great fall” for the Church of England and wider Anglican Communion.

Christ is risen, he has conquered
Now to friends he must appear
Those who fled, denied, deserted
Broken men now filled with fear
Through locked doors he makes his entry
Risen body, pierced hands
“Peace be with you” is his greeting
As among them now he stands

Christ is risen, he has conquered
God has gained the victory
Over sin and powers of darkness
Which held captive you and me
Truth o’ercomes the great deceiver
Life defeats death’s lethal sting
Way of peace to us is opened
Through our resurrected King

The Church of England is waiting for the bishops to decide (likely on October 9) the next steps in their discernment concerning Living in Love and Faith (LLF). These will be published shortly after the House of Bishops meets and brought in some form to General Synod (Nov. 13-15). It is, however, becoming increasingly clear that, despite the protestations that there is to be no change in the church’s doctrine of marriage and so no need for those committed to it to be concerned, the whole process is raising deep, wide-ranging, and disturbing questions about the current state and future shape of the Church of England.

What Has Happened?

It now appears from recent statements that both archbishops no longer believe the received teaching of the church, summed up in Canon B30. This claims the authority of Jesus and condenses the teaching of the Book of Common Prayer, stating that marriage is between one man and one woman and is given, among other reasons, “for the hallowing and right direction of the natural instincts and affections.” They now reject what they and the other bishops reaffirmed as recently as 2019: “the Church of England teaches that ‘sexual intercourse, as an expression of faithful intimacy, properly belongs within marriage exclusively’” (“Pastoral Statement on Civil Partnerships,” para 9; quoting from “Marriage: A Teaching Document” [1999]).

Reviewing developments in the last year, it is becoming increasingly clear that the archbishops, with the public or private support of many bishops, have been determined to use the LLF discernment process to shift the church away from this teaching that they promised to uphold in their ordination and consecration vows. The Archbishop of York has been most open about his position and few have been surprised that he believes “physical and sexual intimacy belongs in committed, stable, faithful relationships.” The Archbishop of Canterbury has been less public, but no longer denies or hides that he has shifted away from his previous clear and strong commitment to the church’s teaching.

As Andrew Atherstone has shown in his biography, Justin Welby in the past regularly expressed his support for traditional teaching concerning sex being for marriage. In 1999 he wrote in his parish church news that “Throughout the bible it is clear that the right place for sex is only within a committed, heterosexual marriage” (p. 94). Four years later (around the time of the Jeffrey John crisis in Reading) he was again clear that, though pastorally difficult, “sexual practice is for marriage, and marriage is between men and women, and that’s the biblical position” (p. 125). Ten years later — a decade ago — as he became Archbishop of Canterbury he spoke of the commitment seen in non-marital relationships but told Dominic Lawson in  The Sunday Times that “My understanding of sexual ethics has been that, regardless of whether it’s gay or straight, sex outside marriage is wrong” (p. 218). A year later, in the context of debates about same-sex marriage, he had an exchange on LBC with Ann Widdecombe and stressed that this was also the teaching of the Church of England:

[Quote]I just said the Church is quite clear that sex outside marriage is wrong and marriage is being understood as a man and a woman. That seems a fairly clear statement. The House of Bishops has just issued a pretty clear statement which has got me a lot of stick about our behavior on issues of sexuality … My position is the historic position of the church, which is in our Canons, which says that sexual relations … should be within marriage and marriage is between a man and a woman. … I’ve just quoted to you clearly what the Canons of the Church of England say, what the law of the Church of England says, and I think that was reasonably clear.[/end]

He similarly told nearly a thousand people in St. Edmundsbury Cathedral around this time that Scriptures and the church teach that “sexual activity should be within marriage and marriage is between a man and a woman, and to change our understanding of that is not something we can do quickly and casually.”

In contrast, in June this year in answer to a question, he said, “sexual activity should be within permanent, stable, and faithful relationships of marriage, as that is understood in each society.”

We previously had, in Rowan Williams, an Archbishop of Canterbury who had publicly questioned the church’s teaching before appointment but during his tenure upheld it in his role as archbishop, offered a clear theological rationale for his approach, and challenged those who led their churches to depart from the teaching within the life of the wider Communion. We now appear to have an Archbishop of Canterbury who, having previously upheld the church’s teaching, has privately changed his mind, is now publicly questioning it as archbishop, and rather than offering a theological rationale for this change is using his position to undermine it within the Church of England and wider Communion.

It is important to recognize there is no agreed alternative sexual ethics. Some of those wishing to change church teaching would wish to redefine marriage to include same-sex unions and to approve of sex outside marriage. Others would keep the restriction of sex to marriage but redefine it. Yet others are more cautious about redefining marriage in this way but wish to affirm non-marital sexual unions. Everyone, including those committed to church teaching, faces the challenge that marriage has been redefined in law and wider social understanding and is now viewed as a union between two persons irrespective of their sex.

In this context, the bishops’ discernment focused attention on the practical question of how to implement any changes. It soon became clear that it would be impossible to argue that a change in the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples would only need a simple majority (rather than two-thirds) in each house of the synod. There was also certainly not 66 percent and perhaps not even 50 percent support for such a change in all three houses, even if there was among the bishops. The obvious proper synodical route to bring about this change was therefore blocked.

Faced with this reality, the bishops’ initial focus turned to what new liturgical developments to introduce. This resulted in the proposed draft Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF) brought to, and welcomed by, the February General Synod. These, it was insisted and as required by canon, were not even indicative of a departure from the church’s doctrine. A significant minority of the synod was, however, wholly unconvinced by this claim and the synod as a whole passed an amendment stating that “the final version of the Prayers of Love and Faith should not be contrary to or indicative of a departure from the doctrine of the Church of England.”

Only after this did the bishops turn to consider — in what they called Pastoral Guidance — how to state that doctrine for today and what developments, if any, they would also introduce to the church’s discipline. This was particularly focused on clergy disciplines. Clergy are currently expected to conform their life to the church’s teaching and so not permitted to enter same-sex marriages. In terms of sexual conduct, they should live faithfully within marriage or be sexually abstinent (as also summed up in Lambeth I.10). The new Pastoral Guidance has not been published but has been drafted and circulated confidentially to bishops and some others for discussion and revision.

Those wishing to implement changes to what is required of ordained ministers not only face the problem of the definition of marriage in the church’s liturgy and Canon B30. There is also the fact that the church successfully defended its current stance forbidding clergy same-sex marriage on the basis of its doctrine of marriage, and had this upheld in the judgment of a secular court in the Pemberton case. The church’s Legal Office offered this solution:

1. To reverse all its past legal advice and
2. to propose separating civil marriage (at least for couples of the same-sex) from holy matrimony,
3. so as to argue that the church’s doctrine related solely to the latter institution
4. and that therefore a same-sex couple entering a civil marriage were not in fact in any way departing from the church’s doctrine as, in effect, it had no doctrine that related to civil marriage (just as it has no doctrine of civil partnerships).

This has been widely critiqued both legally and theologically. Partly in response to this, the bishops have in the last few months asked the Faith and Order Advisory Commission (FAOC) to subject this novel argument to theological scrutiny. It appears unlikely that many (even if supportive of developing church teaching and practice) believe this is a theologically credible and coherent way of arguing for change. Even if this argument is maintained and found convincing, it still remains unclear what the bishops are saying about the nature and legitimacy of a decision to enter a same-sex civil marriage (rather than, say, a civil partnership, which is open to clergy). What cannot be denied, however, is that this argument separating civil marriage from holy matrimony is an essential element in both (a) the case for the legality of the prayers as not indicative of a departure from the church’s doctrine, even when used for couples in same-sex marriages and (b) any argument in support of opening same-sex civil marriage to the clergy without changing law or doctrine.

After February’s synod, many in episcopal leadership were determined to complete the prayers in time for the July synod, but this proved unrealistic for two main reasons. First, there was increasing confusion about how to introduce the prayers legally. Second, it become more and more clear that the prayers could not be separated from the Pastoral Guidance and that developments in both these areas also raised significant ecclesiological questions (which the bishops described as “Pastoral Reassurance”) for those who remain committed to the historic teaching and practice of the church. This latter point had already been conceded by the Archbishop of York when, perhaps in order to encourage wavering voters in synod (the motion eventually scraped through by just 11 votes among the laity), he made a public commitment during the February debate that “I won’t be able to support commending these prayers until we have the pastoral guidance and pastoral provision.” At the July synod, the Bishop of London therefore made clear that it was now recognized there was a need “to focus on bringing the work of the three workstreams [Prayers, Guidance, Reassurance] together” (Q96, p. 39).

What Is Really Going On?

If we lift our eyes from these details and the current focus on the prayers and instead set all these developments of the last nine months in a wider chronological and ecclesial context, then the significance of what is underway becomes clearer. The bishops are, in fact, claiming to maintain as unchanged two of the central elements of their earlier proposal back in 2017 that was defeated by the clergy in synod (who wished them to go further) and led to LLF. They summed up their position then (GS 2055, para 22, italics added) as

Interpreting the existing law and guidance to permit maximum freedom within it, without changes to the law, or the doctrine of the Church.

This meant (para 26):

proposing no change to ecclesiastical law or to the Church of England’s existing doctrinal position on marriage and sexual relationships.

This is exactly what the bishops say remains the situation. What is different now is that on this basis in 2017 they drew back from offering liturgical material because of these constraints. In contrast, they now are proposing PLF, but are increasingly realizing (given the legal and political problems that have arisen since February concerning how to introduce either Authorized or Commended liturgies) why they did not take such a step in 2017. They may also be about to revise existing guidance — in relation to clergy in same-sex marriages and sexual relationships outside marriage — rather than simply interpret it to permit maximum freedom within it. Nevertheless, they claim that they can now (unlike six years ago) do all this while still “proposing no change to ecclesiastical law or to the Church of England’s existing doctrinal position on marriage and sexual relationships.”

They are not proposing such a change because they know that they are highly unlikely to secure the necessary majorities, given the composition of the synod (which is more conservative now than it was in 2017). They are therefore as bishops changing liturgy and perhaps guidance while claiming to be working within the existing law and doctrine. In so doing, and particularly in the way they are proceeding, the bishops (with some notable exceptions such as those arguing for the use of Canon B2) are raising a number of serious questions. These relate to the implications of their actions for Anglican identity, the use of episcopal power, and the future well-being and unity of the Church of England. Six in particular stand out.

First, there has been no serious theological defense offered for the liturgy or to show that the liturgy is not indicative of a departure from the doctrine of the church. It is clear that a significant proportion of the church (including, I suspect, many — if they are being honest — who want to change the doctrine) and most of the Anglican Communion believes that the prayers are indicative of such departure. Given the quotations I’ve cited, Justin Welby himself would very likely have reached this conclusion in the past. As both archbishops and other bishops have openly contradicted the doctrine, there are good grounds for concern that their proposed liturgy is no longer conformed to it and that they are not the best judges of its conformity. All this strikes a major blow — in relation to the most contentious doctrinal issue of our day — to the fundamental Anglican principle of lex orandi, lex credendi that ties together our doctrine and our liturgy.

Second, the bishops are doing all they can to prevent proper scrutiny of the liturgy and the established normal means of testing whether any proposed new liturgy is conformed to doctrine. This requires full synodical processes under Canon B2 and ultimately approval by two-thirds of all three houses of synod (unlikely for current proposals). They began by wishing to commend the prayers on their own authority rather than authorize them, but then recognized the problems this could create and the novelty of introducing such contentious material by this means.

Next, for a time they seriously considered authorization by non-synodical means under Canon B4. They even signaled to the July synod a preference for authorization simply by the two archbishops, leading someone to comment to me, “Who would have predicted that LLF would lead to the triumph of a form of anglo-Papalism?” (For more details on these options, see my summary and longer discussion).

Now it appears they are looking at experimental authorization — again by the archbishops —under Canon B5A. This has the merit of ultimately requiring wider authorization by synod under Canon B2, but is again unprecedented for new and controversial liturgy and likely to be implemented in a way that radically breaks with all past practice in the limited use of this canon (see more details here). No answer has ever been offered to why they have not simply used Canon B2 — the most legally and theologically secure route. This leads many to conclude the only reason is they are fairly sure that it will not give them the outcome they want.

Third, the bishops first sidelined the Faith and Order Advisory Commission (FAOC) through the early stages of discernment and then, bowing to pressure for theological work, expected FAOC to deliver responses to key questions on an unworkable timetable that enables the process to continue at speed. It is sometimes claimed that LLF has already done the theological work. It has done so only in terms of setting out the received teaching and the challenges to it. It neither presented different internally coherent theological options nor offered an evaluative, let alone a definitive, judgment on the competing and contradictory theologies it identified as present in the church’s debate.

In addition, there are key elements in the bishops’ proposals that were not considered at all in all the LLF work. There is now a real likelihood that developments will take place driven by secret episcopal votes and with no theological rationale offered for the outcomes or made subject to synodical debate and approval. This represents the marginalization and diminution of serious theological reasoning by the bishops, in stark contrast to how the Church of England has addressed contentious questions in the past.

Fourth, the bishops have also failed to engage with FAOC’s past theological work on communion and disagreement. This, and the way it was taken up in LLF, including in the widely used course, makes clear that we need as a church to think theologically, and not only about our disagreements on marriage and sexuality. We also need to think seriously about the theological significance of these disagreements, and their ecclesial implications. The bishops appear to assume — without providing any justification and despite experience in other churches — that the matters are to be considered of minimal theological significance, or adiaphora. They have refused to engage with the theological arguments and deep concerns of those who see the matters as of much greater significance. They, as explored in LLF, raise questions concerning the authority of Scripture, the nature of God’s ordering of creation, including his human creatures, the effects of the fall and sin, the pattern of transformation God works in redemption, and the content of the call to holiness. These in turn have implications for the degree of communion that can be maintained if the church departs from current teaching.

There appears to be no episcopal acknowledgment that, while the proposals have the support of those who have rejected current teaching, there is practically nobody who is committed to that teaching and welcomes these developments. In fact, the majority of those supporting current teaching believe it cannot be treated as adiaphora and that the bishops’ actions (particularly if pressed further in relation to clergy in same-sex marriage) represent a significant departure from it. Despite this, it looks like those wishing to continue to uphold that teaching in their ministries are going to be offered minimal “reassurance,” which provides less secure protection than that currently offered to opponents of women priests and bishops, despite being a much larger proportion of the church and this question being widely acknowledged as of much greater significance.

Fifth, the bishops are failing to involve synod as they should in relation to the prayers by using the processes of canon B2. It is also rumored that the synod will not be able to scrutinize and vote on the proposed guidance. The argument used here is that previous guidance (Issues in Human Sexuality and subsequent pastoral statements on civil partnership and civil same-sex marriage) was all issued on the authority of the House of Bishops alone and not brought to synod for debate and approval.

What this fails to recognize, however, is that all these episcopal statements represented the articulation and application of received catholic doctrine that was supported by the General Synod in 1987 and reaffirmed by the wider Anglican Communion in 1998 (supported by the General Synod in 2007). Were the bishops to produce guidance that went against those synodical votes and undermined or changed doctrine, then they should ensure they have synodical approval for such changes. To fail to do so is to undermine the fundamental Anglican principle of government by bishops in synod and the Church of England’s legal position that

General Synod is the only authority within the Church of England competent to alter the legally approved doctrines: no doctrinal development may occur unless the three Houses of General Synod consent to it. Indeed, it has been understood judicially that General Synod possesses in law an unlimited power to change the church’s fundamental doctrines, provided the required procedures are followed. The procedures are rigorous and, by requiring the participation of the whole church as represented in General Synod, they give juridical expression to the theological principle that doctrines ought to be derived from a consensus fidelium. (Legal Framework of the Church of England, p. 258)

Sixth, the bishops, including the archbishops, have given little or no attention to the mind of the wider Communion and the implications of their actions for its unity and the place of the Church of England and the Archbishop of Canterbury within it. The 2007 Synod motion was clear that synod did not want the Church of England to do “anything that could be perceived as the Church of England qualifying its commitment to the entirety of the relevant Lambeth Conference Resolutions (1978: 10; 1988: 64; 1998: 1.10).”

There can be no doubt that the prayers are widely perceived as much more than qualifying the church’s commitment. Were the disciplines expected of clergy to be changed by the bishops, it would be impossible to argue we remained committed to this synod motion. Although one of the central arguments put forward for these changes is the need to preserve unity, this is ultimately set within a “little England” attitude, with a seemingly total disregard for the unity of the Communion. Instead, the bishops are leading the Church of England to embrace a doctrine of radical provincial autonomy that has proved so disastrous when followed by other provinces.

Conclusion: On Paying Attention to Power

The final of the six Pastoral Principles developed in the course of LLF was “pay attention to power.” The card produced for this says that “inequalities of power have led to abuses in the past and will continue to do so unless all who exercise pastoral care reflect continuously on the power that they hold. Power must always be acknowledged.”

The way in which the bishops have undertaken their discernment and are proceeding is arguably at least as important as the substance of what they discern. In 2017 the bishops recognized they were constrained in what they could do if they were genuinely not going to attempt to change the law or doctrine of the church. The current college, led by the archbishops, while not proposing legal changes and claiming not to change doctrine, are showing little regard for such constraints or for longstanding principles of good Anglican governance and Anglican ecclesial identity.

We have archbishops openly rejecting the teaching they vowed to uphold. The bishops are showing a lack of respect for a clear, recognizable link between liturgy and doctrine, refusing to follow the proper synodical processes for introducing new (particularly controversial) liturgy in the life of the church, sidelining public theological reasoning and the work of FAOC, and possibly seeking to introduce new guidance contrary to existing doctrine without the proper synodical process that respects the principle of bishops not acting on their own but always as bishops in synod. Alongside this they are also effectively tearing the Church of England away from the Anglican Communion and wider church catholic.

These are not minor technical matters. These actions threaten to dissolve part of the glue that holds the church together and enables bishops to act as a focus of unity. The bishops appear to be abandoning precious gifts that have helped preserve, structure, and cultivate our often fragile common life together across our differences. They are disregarding and undermining well-established, tried and tested, theologically and pastorally (not simply legally) founded principles and practices that enable “good disagreement.” It is, however, only by living within their constraints that bishops will nurture trust and embody integrity, especially as we navigate contentious proposed changes in our teaching and practice.

It is a serious matter for the church to err on marriage and sexuality. That, however, is a problem in one specific, albeit vitally important, area. These developments, and how episcopal and archepiscopal power is being used — on the sole basis, it seems, that these means are necessary to reach the desired end goal — are much more serious. They go beyond a single, possibly reversible, error of judgment, to weaken and potentially destroy core features of Anglican identity and essential characteristics of any healthy ecclesial body.

One of Simon’s first breakthroughs came when he was a folk singer touring English clubs back in 1965 and his friend Judith Piepe, a High Anglican involved in pioneering work with London’s homeless based at St. Anne’s, Soho, got him a slot on the BBC’s religious program Five to Ten, on which she was a presenter. One of the songs he sang — “Bleeker Street” — was already drawing on biblical (“hides the shepherd from the sheep,” “thirty dollars pays your rent,” “It’s a long road to Canaan”) and ecclesial (“holy, holy is his sacrament”) imagery. Another popular early song, “A Church is Burning,” had similar features (“Like hands that are praying, the fire is saying, ‘You can burn down my churches but I shall be free’”) as it protested against the KKK’s torching of Black churches.

His first album with Art Garfunkel (Wednesday Morning, 3AM, 1964) included “Benedictus” and the old classic “Go Tell It on the Mountain.” Their later albums also often had at least one song with some explicit religious reference, whether Simon’s reworking of the Sermon on the Mount and the cry of desolation in “Blessed” on Sounds of Silence (1966) or their version of “Silent Night” on Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme (1966). These songs are less-known, but “Mrs. Robinson” from the soundtrack of The Graduate and on Bookends (1968) not only throws in the line “Heaven holds a place for those who pray” but is said to have been the first pop song to include “Jesus” in the lyric (“Jesus loves you more than will you know,” a line that Simon included “for no particular reason, I had nothing in mind”), leading some radio stations to refuse to play it and Frank Sinatra to replace “Jesus” with “Jilly” in his cover version.

The title of Simon and Garfunkel’s greatest hit, “Bridge Over Troubled Water” (1970), came from Simon listening to the old spiritual “Oh Mary Don’t You Weep” (based on John 11 and the Exodus) as sung by the Swan Silvertones in 1959, in which Claude Jeter improvised “I’ll be your bridge over deep water if you trust in my name.” Its music is inspired by that gospel music tradition and draws on a chorale in Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion known to many as the setting for “O Sacred Head Now Wounded.”

Simon would return to this much more extensively near the start of his solo career in his classic “American Tune” (on There Goes Rhymin’ Simon, 1973). Stunningly revisited recently by African American singer Rhiannon Giddens (including changing the words fittingly to “We didn’t come here on the Mayflower, / We came on a ship in a blood-red moon”), this was a lament over the state of his home country, originally in the context of Vietnam and Nixon. Much less-known is another powerful haunting lament, this time over Jerusalem (“Silent Eyes”) found on his next solo album, Still Crazy After All These Years (1975). On that album he also directly addresses God in “Some Folks’ Lives Roll Easy” when he sings

Here I am, Lord
I’m knocking at Your place of business
And I know, I ain’t got no business here
But You said if I ever got so low
I was busted
You could be trusted

Here his reflections on loss (“most folks’ lives, / Oh, they stumble, Lord, they fall”), which recur throughout his writing, are joined to signs of faith and hope as expressed in “Bridge” and in the title song of his most famous album — Graceland (1986) — which includes the line: “I’ve reason to believe / We all will be received / in Graceland.” In “Born at the Right Time” on his next album, The Rhythm of the Saints (1990), he opens by alluding to Moses (“Down among the reeds and rushes / a baby boy was found”) while the regularly repeated hope-filled title line — despite a world of loneliness, lies, fear, and violence — is connected to the life of the church and a global message (“Born at the instant / the church bells chime / And the whole world whispering / Born at the right time”), which for Christian listeners may also whisper Galatians 4:4 — “But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law.”

It was with his So Beautiful or So What, released in 2011, that more people began to really focus on Simon’s engagement with questions of faith and spirituality. He acknowledged in its promotional video that

There seems to be a theme in the album. Not intentional. I noticed it after like the first five or six songs. That God seemed to be in like four or five of them. And it’s funny, because for somebody who’s not a religious person, God comes up a lot in my songs. In fact, after a show I did, about a year and a half ago, and Paul McCartney was there and he came back after the show and he said “Aren’t you Jewish?”

One of its songs, “Getting Ready for Christmas Day,” draws its title from a 1941 sermon of the preacher and gospel singer, the Reverend J.M. Gates, parts of which are heard in the song. Other tracks include “Love Is Eternal Sacred Light” and “The Afterlife,” of which he commented, as if schooled by Job or Romans 3:19, “By the time you get up to speak to God and you actually get there, there’s no question that you could possibly have that could have any relevance.”

As Simon noted in another interview around this time, “I wondered whether there was a subconscious theme that I was tapping into. I have used Christian symbols and imagery before in songs. It’s very strongly evocative, so it may just be coincidence — but it may not be.” Unsurprisingly, a number of (particularly but not only Christian) reviewers (such as Cathleen Falsani, Jonathan Fitzgerald, Kristin Garrett in Christianity Today, Kim Lawton in The Christian Century and Christian Today, quoting evangelical New Testament scholar Ben Witherington) and interviewers (e.g., Paul Zollo and Religion and Ethics News Weekly) explored these themes, as did others subsequently, such as Marc Barnes.

It was also at this time that Paul Simon talked about speaking with the Dalai Lama (back in 2005 and later publicized further in 2016) and revealed how in 2004, after reading David Brooks’s New York Times profile of leading English evangelical Anglican John Stott, he decided he wanted to meet Stott. A friend connected them and Simon offered to take Stott out for dinner when he was in London, but was instead invited by him to his flat for tea and biscuits. Speaking of the meeting, Simon recalled (6:09 in video):

I’d say we spent two or three hours there. I talked about everything that was on my mind about things that seemed illogical, and he talked about why he had come to his conclusions. I think both of us enjoyed the conversation immensely. I left there feeling that I had a greater understanding of where belief comes from when it doesn’t have an agenda.

He explained,

It didn’t change my way of thinking, but what I liked about it was that we were able to talk and have a dialogue. I was interested in speaking to the John Stotts of the world and other evangelicals because my instinct was that the animosity is not as deep as being depicted in the media, and anecdotally speaking, I have found that that’s the truth.

It is against the backdrop of elements such as these in his biography that, in a dream on January 15 in 2019, the anniversary of his father’s death, Simon was told, much to his surprise and puzzlement, “You’re working on a piece called Seven Psalms.” He has described how he got up and wrote this down: “I wasn’t writing anything at the time, nor was I thinking about writing anything.” He thought,

I’m not sure I even know what a psalm is. So I went to the Bible, and I looked at Psalms, and said ‘well since I don’t know what it is, and it’s not really my idea — something in a dream, or somebody in a dream, said “you’re going to do this” — well then, bring it on.

Over the next year the music came to him (he regularly writes lyrics after the music) and then, several times a week, he found he was again being woken in the early hours of the morning, this time with words and phrases that he would also write down. Over time, working with his wife, Edie Brickell, and the group VOCES8, and struggling with his sudden hearing loss, these words were woven together with the earlier music and led to the creation of the album that was released in May and is available at no cost here. There is also a film, In Restless Dreams, telling more of the story of the album’s creation in the context of Simon’s career, which will premiere in September at the Toronto Film Festival. Oscar-winning Christian artist, Charlie Mackesy, who has worked in the past with Alpha, has also created “seven original sketches — one for each “psalm” — presenting the album as re-imagined through his art” which will be exhibited in London in September.

Rather than a standard album comprising a collection of songs, Seven Psalms is a single piece of music in seven movements. It is Simon and his guitar (so similar to his first 1965 album, The Paul Simon Songbook), no band, but the carefully, often subtly, placed and powerfully emotive use of chimes, bells, gongs, etc. It is meant to be listened to as a whole (Simon has not permitted Spotify or other services to separate each track) and lasts 33 minutes, a length that Simon has explained, in an interview with MOJO, has religious significance as the traditional age of Christ at his death and the number of uses of God in the first creation account. (It also reflects the speed of vinyl LPs.)

It is, he insists, not primarily about approaching death, as some have thought, given its creation as he entered his ninth decade. Rather, it is “an argument I’m having with myself about belief or not.” This argument has drawn in many reviewers, such as Amanda Petrusich in The New Yorker and John Lewis in Uncut (“He’s the secular Jew who has made some of the greatest pieces of Christian pop music; the non-believer whose lyrics are obsessed with faith”) as well as writers for a Christian audience, such as Derek Walker, Nathan Allen, and Andrew Rycroft. The power of that argument can really only be understood by immersing oneself in the evocative music. Simon has spoken about how “the spirituality is mostly expressed in the music, even though the words are on the same subject. But the unspoken … the conversation without words is the deeper spirituality for me … something that I hear and feel,” and words and their movement as a whole. Nevertheless, focusing on the lyrics, some of the key theological themes and reflections on spirituality found in the album can be highlighted.

The opening piece draws us immediately to the subject of the biblical psalms — “The Lord.” Translating the language of the best-known of all the Psalms (Psalm 23) to his own vocation, Simon sings of the Lord not as his Shepherd (although the opening words speak of him thinking about “the great migration, / Noon and night they leave the flock”) but as “my engineer.” The Lord is also identified with aspects of creation (“the earth I ride on,” “a virgin forest”) and those who care for it (“a forest ranger”), as well as, in one of his many powerful images, “a meal for the poorest of the poor, a welcome door to the stranger.” This is not, however, an all-positive and comforting picture of the Lord. Simon also (like the biblical psalm-writers) has the sense of God as judge, one who can be dangerous, one to be feared. Shockingly, his identification of God extends to the global threats we face (“The COVID virus is the Lord, / The Lord is the ocean rising”) and, echoing “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” itself echoing Isaiah 27:1, we are reminded that “The Lord is a terrible swift sword” (not, as an early internet attempt to reproduce the lyrics claimed, “a Taylor Swift song”).

Simon then turns — in “Love Is Like a Braid” — to focus on the greatest of the three theological virtues, which his earlier songs also often explored and which “The Lord” has already spoken of in its declaration that “nothing dies of too much love.” The argument about whether to believe is powerfully captured when, as so often in life, it arises not so much in response to an intellectual problem but to an existential crisis. Drawing on Isaianic and other biblical language, and echoing his earlier line in “Silent Eyes” when weeping Jerusalem “calls my name,” Simon sings:

I lived a life of pleasant sorrows
Until the real deal came
Broke me like a twig in a winter gale
Called me by my name
And in that time of prayer and waiting
Where doubt and reason dwell
A jury sat deliberating
All is lost or all is well

Concluding with the recognition of the world’s beauty and pain (“The garden keeps a rose and a thorn”) and the observation that “Once the choice is made / All that’s left is / Mending what was torn / Love is like a braid,” this leads, with a change in tempo, into the humorous and playful “My Professional Opinion.” Although Simon confesses “I’m not a doctor or a preacher,” in quasi-baptismal imagery, he describes how “everyone’s naked / there’s nothing to hide” and repeats how he’s “Gonna carry my grievances / down to the shore / Wash them away in the tumbling tide.” It ends, before his first reprise of “The Lord,” with a seeming Christological confession that

All that really matters
Is the one who became us
Anointed and gained [or is it, “gamed”?] us
With his opinions

The central song of the seven turns, at last, to address God directly. It is simply and significantly titled “Your Forgiveness.” Here, in that argument with himself about “belief or not,” and facing his own mortality, we have the honest confession “I, I have my reasons to doubt.” But this uncertainty appears alongside another, humble confession concerning himself: “I, the last in the line / Hoping the gates won’t be closed / Before your forgiveness.” And ultimately it would seem it is that hope and faith, faced with the recognition of the need for forgiveness, that win out. Rather than concluding it is simply “two billion heartbeats and out,” he adds the question “Or does it all begin again?” before closing the song on its repeated refrain, inviting us to reach out for the water of life: “Dip your hand in heaven’s waters / God’s imagination / Dip your hand in heaven’s waters / All of life’s abundance in a / Drop of condensation.” Numerologists may find it of interest that the call to “dip” appears seven times and the references to “God’s imagination” and “life’s abundance” three times.

The eschatological imagery of the line at heaven’s gate hoping for God’s forgiveness is reworked in the shortest piece, “Trail of Volcanoes.” Here, contrasting his youthful travels with the current migrant crisis, Simon captures the universality of the human condition — “We’re all walking down / The same road / To wherever it ends” — and sums up its tragedy and our inability to secure redemption because “The pity is / The damage that’s done / Leaves so little time / For amends.”

The penultimate movement (“The Sacred Harp”) is Simon’s favorite from the album, and he told Malcolm Gladwell that he would “get a lot of pleasure” if somebody turned it into a hymn and it was sung in a church. It sees him joined, for the first time on an album, by his wife, Edie Brickell. As in many of his classic songs, from “Homeward Bound” and “America” with Art Garfunkel to his solo recordings of Hearts and Bones and Graceland, he vividly narrates characters on a journey. Here it is a woman and her boy with “voices in his head,” both “refugees of sorts” escaping a hostile home town (“They don’t like different there / They would have mowed us down”).

Simon has described them as people who “appear to be broken” but “really they are seekers of spiritual bliss.” The “Sacred Harp” of the title is, of course, yet another biblical reference: the harp that could ease even King Saul’s troubled mind. It is the one “that David played to make his songs of praise” and, in the midst of the challenges and pains of our journey through life, we too yearn for more: “We long to hear those strings / That set his heart ablaze / The ringing strings / The thought that God turns music / Into bliss.”

Before the final song, Simon once again reprises “The Lord.” This time he opens not with a threefold naming of the Lord, as in every other of the album’s total of 12 (is that number an accident?), but with multiple professions of the Lord’s identity. Here there are only two references to “the Lord,” both connected to more ephemeral and frivolous images (“The Lord is a puff of smoke … / The Lord is my personal joke / My reflection in the window”). He then places these depictions of divinity (are they an articulation more of the unbelief with which he wrestles?) alongside a vision of humanity and some of our challenging ultimate questions as we wrestle with faith and doubt and the complexity of who we are as human beings — “I’ve been thinking about our troubled nature, our benediction and our curse. Are we all just trial and error, one of a billion in the universe?” — before concluding with new descriptors. The Lord is no longer only “my engineer” but, relating him even more to Simon’s gifts and lifelong vocation, The Lord is also “my record producer” and “the music I hear.” And, finally, repeating the engineer image but moving from sound to travel and introducing new metaphors, “The Lord is my engineer. The Lord is the train I ride on. The Lord is the coast, the coast is clear. The path I slip and I slide on.” Might this final triad even be alluding, for those with ears to hear, to his three songs “Train in the Distance” (“Everybody loves the sound of a train in the distance, everybody thinks it’s true”), “The Coast” (“This is a lonely life, sorrows everywhere you turn … If I have weaknesses don’t let them blind me now”) and “Slip Slidin’ Away” (“God only knows. God makes his plan. The information’s unavailable to the mortal man”)?

Finally, as we approach the end, we arrive at “Wait,” a five-times recurring plea throughout the seventh psalm, recalling the earlier reference to a time of “prayer and waiting” but now in the face not of tragedy but of death. “Wait” because “I’m not ready,” even though “I want to believe in a dreamless transition” and “I don’t want to be near my dark intuition.” But, rather than the repeated request to delay being granted, in the haunting voice of Brickell, the chorus and conclusion offer a fresh perspective on temporal life and an enticing invitation to venture beyond it to where we ultimately belong:

Life is a meteor
Let your eyes roam
Heaven is beautiful
It’s almost like home
Children, get ready
It’s time to come home.

Having begun not knowing what a Psalm was, Simon has crafted an astounding album of seven contemporary psalms. Like the biblical psalms, these wrestle with suffering, death, and doubt, speak to people who (like him) are “not religious,” present sometimes challenging metaphors and images of the Lord as they open theological questions, look for forgiveness, and lift our eyes beyond the immediate to something transcendent. They will also, as Simon acknowledges and welcomes, doubtless generate multiple interpretations over coming years. Fittingly, the album ends with Simon and his wife beautifully and movingly harmonizing a final, heartfelt “Amen.”

I am grateful to Ben Ealovega for conversations and insights that helped shape these reflections.

Looking towards the House of Bishops bringing proposals relating to marriage and sexuality to the CofE’s General Synod in February, several bishops have called for change, breaking a polite silence that has prevailed among the church’s senior leaders, and eliciting responses from prominent evangelicals.

The College of Bishops’ gathering on October 31 to November 2 was informed by the Living in Love and Faith (LLF) curriculum published two years ago, and two follow-up texts, Listening with Love and Faith and Friendship and the Body of Christ.

For many years now, throughout the production and engagement phases of LLF, most bishops have said little about its subject matter. Many expected this to continue now that the bishops are focusing so much time and attention on what direction the Church of England should take. This has, however, not proved to be the case.

The Bishop of Oxford, Steven Croft, published a 52-page essay, Together in Love and Faith, two days after the college met. Croft recounted his journey from what he previously described as “orthodox and generous to those who took a different view” (p. 5) to now affirming same-sex marriage. He calls on the Church of England (pp. 23-24) to allow public services that bless same-sex civil partnerships and solemnize same-sex marriage, and to remove current restrictions on clergy and ordinands (whose civil partnerships are expected to be celibate and who cannot enter same-sex marriages).

Croft is also clear that those holding traditional views must have freedom of conscience and “a legitimate and honorable position,” and that this will require “differentiation of provision and oversight,” perhaps in the form of “an alternative province and structure within the Church of England or a system of oversight from a neighboring diocese” (p. 47). He favors this over a new compromise that falls short of same-sex marriage.

All three area bishops in Oxford diocese expressed their support of his proposals on marriage (though not on visible differentiation), as did the bishops in Worcester (John Inge and his suffragan, Martin Gorick, a former archdeacon in the Diocese of Oxford) and the Bishop of Portsmouth.

It is unclear whether there will be more public statements from bishops, particularly evangelicals and others supportive of traditional teaching and discipline, in coming weeks. Those holding such views in the wider church are concerned that episcopal silence will create anxiety and a momentum for change.

Theologian Ian Paul, on his weblog Psephizo, and the Rev. Joshua Penduck, writing for Fulcrum, have offered strong critiques. But no Church of England bishops have publicly taken issue with the Bishop of Oxford’s essay, and it seems likely that most bishops want to avoid bringing episcopal divisions into the public spotlight.

Among the factors driving the Bishop of Oxford appears to be his sense he should have been clearer about his changed position earlier, and his concerns about the gap between the established church and English culture. This is already leading to some calls for Parliament to act if the church will not change. Also important, though, have been his discussions with those who disagree with him, including about their need for structural changes should the church change its position.

The Rev. Vaughan Roberts has issued a response of similar length to Croft’s document. Roberts is a leading evangelical, rector of St. Ebbe’s in Oxford, and a founding member of Living Out, which encourages Christians — “especially those who experience same-sex attraction — to flourish through faithfulness to biblical teaching on sexuality and identity.”

In a promising sign, Roberts and Croft had clearly consulted about their respective contributions. The tone of Roberts’s response is conciliatory and respectful, while robust in its rejection of the arguments Croft advances for change. It is much more supportive of the Church of England’s need to address structural questions to resolve its deep disagreements.

Roberts says he believes that elements of Bishop Croft’s acceptance of differentiation of ministry and oversight offer “a hopeful basis for a potential way forward for the Church of England out of the present unsatisfactory situation” (p. 1-2) and wholeheartedly agrees that any solution “‘must be founded on love and respect’ for all, whatever view they take on these contentious issues” (p. 37).

This tone and desire to find a consensus settlement, rather than a confrontational debate in which winner takes all, is the fruit of both LLF and a sustained period of private conversations. It is a hopeful sign that, as recently advocated in a video by the Church of England Evangelical Council, a better way may be found through “learning from elsewhere.” But the chances of reaching an agreed teaching and discipline on marriage and sexual ethics (I have traced some of the options at Psephizo) still seem slim.