by Tim Wyatt, The Critical Friend
Living in Love and Faith claims another episcopal victim, while more bishops demand a bigger slice of the church’s billions be given back to them
The bishop leading the Church of England’s tortuous gay blessings process resigned suddenly last week. The Bishop of Leicester Martyn Snow announced in a very brief statement that he was stepping down as the lead bishop for Living in Love and Faith (LLF), without giving any reason. He wrote:
‘With a very heavy heart, I have decided to step down from my role as Lead Bishop for Living in Love and Faith. I am hugely grateful to the staff team that I have worked with over the last 18 months and similarly the Working Group members who have given hours of their time to seek an agreed way forward in the Church of England on matters of sexuality, relationships, and marriage. I hope it may yet be possible to reach such an agreement, but I don’t think that can happen under my leadership. I will not be making any further comments.’
Snow took on the poisoned chalice of LLF lead bishop back at the start of last year. At the time there had just been the two epic and bruising synod debates on the principle of offering blessings to gay couples in February and November 2023. Both votes were passed narrowly in favour of the Prayers of Love and Faith (PLF). The Bishop of London Sarah Mullally, who had been leading LLF for several years, decided this was a good time to hand on the baton, and the gig passed to Snow and the Bishop of Newcastle, Helen-Ann Hartley.
This was a deliberate choice to try and drain some of the factional poison from the debate. Hartley was a liberal, but Snow was a conservative, who had in fact abstained on the PLF motion in November’s synod. He was open that he was unpersuaded of the theological case for same-sex marriage, but believed it was right to honour the wishes of the synod and implement blessings for gay couples nevertheless. Hartley and Snow’s job was to lead the next phase of the PLF journey as an evenly balanced double act: we have now decided once and for all the C of E will offer gay couples blessings, but what will we give conservatives in return (and what on earth will we do with gay vicars who want to marry their partners now)?