The Anglican Communion’s disputes about homosexual practice seem to boil down to a fundamental issue that splits traditionalists from modernists:
- Is it permissible for us to regard the Bible as our most important written source of moral guidance, but not more than that?
- Or must we go further, and treat Scripture as immutable law that may never be amended and must always be obeyed?
As a polity, the Episcopal Church seems to have been dancing around
this issue for decades. Those days now appear to be over; we will have to come to grips with the issue
Discussion, but not Decision
That’s not to say the scriptural-supremacy issue hasn’t been discussed. It has been, at great length.
Traditionalists at least aren’t afraid to say where they stand on the subject. They pound on the table and thunder that we must always and everywhere be slaves to Scripture.
Many modernists appear to be afraid of the scriptural-supremacy issue. They tiptoe past it as though it were a sleeping tiger, seemingly fearful of what might happen if the tiger were ever to awaken. These modernists argue, in effect, that well, yes, Scripture is to be our supreme moral authority, but there are ways of interpreting it (they say) to get around its explicit prohibitions of homosexual activity.
Ducking an Issue Can Be a Good Thing
As a general rule, we
shouldn’t make hard-and-fast decisions on divisive issues unless and until we have to. There are useful lessons to be had in the practices of the courts in the U.S. judicial system.
American courts engage in issue-ducking all the time. They do so because they have enormous power, in that American society has ceded to them the authority to decide what the law is. As a safeguard against misapplication of that authority, our courts try very hard to decide only those specific issues that must be decided, usually on the narrowest grounds possible. They also ordinarily require that such issues be "ripe" and otherwise
properly before them for decision.
We saw an example of this in the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling about the "under God" phrase in the Pledge of Allegiance. The plaintiff in the case was the father of a student who was being required to say the Pledge of Allegiance in school. The father objected to the under-God phrase and filed suit.
The Supreme Court noted that the father, who was not married to the mother, also did not have custody of the student. Consequently, the Court said, it was up to the mother, not the father, to raise an objection to the student’s having to recite the Pledge. Therefore, the Court concluded, the case was not properly before the courts for a decision in the first place.
The Traditionalists Have Now Forced
the Scriptural-Supremacy Issue Upon Us
Evidently the Episcopal Church can no longer duck the issue of scriptural supremacy. The primates now appear to have forced it upon us: It seems that, if we want to remain "in communion" with the vocal traditionalists in the Global South — for our presiding bishop to take communion with conservative primates, and for our representatives to be able to continue to attend the Anglican Consultative Council — we will have to declare ourselves slaves to Scripture.
OK, let’s debate that issue among ourselves — prayerfully, in charity, and with an openness to truth, whatever truth may turn out to be (paraphrasing the Rev. Barbara Brown Taylor). Let’s make a decision, with due regard to the possible consequences.
And then, collectively and individually, let’s resolutely face those consequences.
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