Church of England reaffirms biblical teaching on sex and marriage—but for how much longer?
by Will Jones, Faith and Politics:
The Church of England’s bishops have issued a pastoral statement responding to the introduction in the UK last month of opposite-sex civil partnerships.
It restates Church of England teaching on marriage and sexual relationships, explaining that:
‘For Christians, marriage – that is the lifelong union between a man and a woman, contracted with the making of vows – remains the proper context for sexual activity… Sexual relationships outside heterosexual marriage are regarded as falling short of God’s purposes for human beings. The introduction of same sex marriage… has not changed the church’s teaching on marriage or same sex relationships.’
More pastorally, it adds:
‘In its approach to civil partnerships the Church seeks to uphold that standard, to affirm the value of committed, sexually abstinent friendships and to minister sensitively and pastorally to those Christians who conscientiously decide to order their lives differently.’
Newspaper coverage and comments on social media have largely been some combination of hostile to this restatement of traditional biblical teaching and incredulous that the Church has not moved with the times.
The timely restatement of the Church’s traditional Christian teaching has been broadly welcomed by biblically faithful believers in the Church of England and outside it.
Liberals have mostly been dismayed by its content and tone, saying it ‘shows little evidence of the “radical new Christian inclusion” that we have been promised’.
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