The Rise of the BINO

Nov 17, 2022 by

English Churchman Editorial:

Former evangelical and current Bishop of Oxford, Dr Steven Croft, has published a fifty-two-page essay in which he advocates change to Church of England doctrine and practice on marriage to allow same-sex weddings to be conducted.

His views were welcomed by his suffragan episcopal colleagues within the Diocese of Oxford, and the Bishops of Worcester and of Dudley.

This is another example of what we have often seen in church life, the rise of the BINO (Bishop in Name Only). These ecclesiastical figureheads have kept the title of bishop with associated dress, stipend and all social and legal niceties, but hallowed out the substance in terms of believing, teaching and defending sound biblical doctrine.

Would Dr Croft’s episcopal supporters be so admiring when they realise that he has probably let their cat out of the bag? He has exposed the hand of the BINOs. While Croft’s essay admitted that the “obvious interpretation of key biblical passages” seemed to support the view that gay relationships were sinful, it was his ‘pastoral instincts’ that led him to seek a way to interpret the scriptures to allow the blessing of same-sex partnerships.

“If the common understanding of our faith, our ethics and our pastoral practice can change and evolve because of our increased knowledge and experience, derived from the sciences and the human sciences in all these areas, why should it not evolve and develop in similar, careful and considered ways in our response to questions of human sexuality?”

While Dr Croft writes about the importance of the Bible and tradition, his real difficulty was that they stood against what he really wanted. Would his outlook conform to the Scriptures or might they be used to affirm his outlook?

Despite paragraphs and pages of the usual tortuous reading of key texts, surely this part of his essay underscores that the whole debate was not really about the Bible after all. If the Bible stands in the way, then other sources of authority (special pleading, social sciences, pastoral instincts) must be asserted in its place.

Dear Bishop, thank you for your honesty as this point, but we knew it all the time. We noticed it so often when your fellow-bishops sounded forth on all manner of topics, such as Brexit, the environment or immigration, and confidently added a biblical proof-text as a garnish. We noticed then that bishops suddenly found it difficult to understand the Bible when it came to the single issue of human sexuality. We noticed how a fog of obscurity descended upon the Bible so freely cited elsewhere, thereby rendering certain texts mysterious and therefore unquotable to today’s generation. These verses and passages alone were evidently so confusing that they required endless papers, conferences, indabas and listening processes. It was not a fog of obscurity that descended, but a smokescreen that was erected. Rest assured, we noticed, and we were not fooled.

Read here

 

Related Posts

Tags

Share This