The working group on human sexuality which
published the
Pilling Report “met with many respondents across the spectrum of viewpoints
who radiated great certainty on many aspects of the subject.” But, the authors
observe, “wherever we have turned – whether to Scripture, theology, science, or
social trends – we have encountered divided views, sincerely and prayerfully
held. Any suggestion, therefore, that the arguments are so conclusive that
further discussion of the issues is no longer necessary does not do justice to
the integrity of the theological convictions that are held or to the
significant areas of scientific uncertainty that persist” (par. 68).
The dissenting statement by the Bishop of
Birkenhead rightly observes that this “leaves the impression that the Church
has no reason to believe the Church’s traditional teaching” (par. 449).
Where does this uncertainty come from? It may be related to different views of Scripture and particularly its relation to “tradition”
and “reason” and specifically with different definitions of “reason”. The
Report quotes Richard Hooker at two critical points and helps us to appreciate the difference between his take on the relationship between Scripture, tradition and reason and the one frequently
promoted in the Church of England under the banner of the three-legged stool.
When Hooker speaks of “reason” he refers “to
the human capacity for rational thought” exercised “in order to understand and
apply the teaching of the Scriptures” (using the Report’s words in par. 296).
Not only is this different from the way “reason” is appealed to today but, as I
have hinted in the previous post, the very idea that one might decide on the
validity of different readings by way of appeal to reason in this sense is
threatened by a tendency to privilege sincerity over evidence and logic.
What is meant by “reason” today? “Reason
also refers to the moral awareness that human beings possess because of their
creation in the image and likeness of God and the way that this awareness is
expressed in the moral convictions of particular cultures” (par. 297).
This does not merely take into account that
reason is more “tradition constituted” (Alasdair MacIntyre, quoted in par. 298)
than Hooker likely recognised but transforms “reason” from an instrument
which is necessary for understanding Scripture to an alternative source
of insight.
Is this a matter of allowing our growing understanding
of God’s world to inform our understanding of God’s Word? If so, this would
hardly be controversial in the Church of England. It is the proposal to put the
strand of Reason understood as scientific knowledge and community
consciousness “alongside” Scripture which has greater potential to set apart
one view of Scripture from the other.
The use of “alongside” in the Pilling Report may signal a departure from Hooker. Nevertheless, the Report counsels against treating strands
in isolation and recommends that “we are to exercise reason in order to illuminate
God’s self-revelation to which Scripture bears primary witness, in order that
it may be rendered the more deeply intelligible and received afresh in every
generation. Tradition assists us to see how the Church, the community of faith,
has read, received and understood the texts; thus it enables us to hear the
Living Word speaking through the written word” (par. 301).
Even so, “the three elements of Scripture,
Tradition and Reason are emphasized differently by distinct traditions within
the Church itself” (par. 302) and this is one source of disagreement. “The
current travails within Anglicanism on the subject of sexuality can be
understood in part as a fundamental struggle to allow Scripture, tradition and
reason to take their proper place in the quest to formulate a viable ethic.
This is taking place in a Church which does not agree what the proper place of
each of the three elements should be and in a wider culture where notions of
sexuality and sexual behaviour are changing rapidly and are also hotly
contested” (par. 304).
Paragraph 317 hints that one disagreement
relates to whether Scripture is primary in the sense of being the first source
of authority or whether it is also “the final source of authority to which both
tradition and reason must be subordinated.” But the Report is not sufficiently
clear to conclude with confidence that the authors discern a difference between
“first” and “first and final” authority. There is a hint of such a difference
in the earlier use of “starting point” (par. 301) and the preference for the
qualifier “primary” over “final” whenever the authority of Scripture is in view
but ambiguities remain.
While the majority apparently wants to
distance itself from the view that “tradition and reason must be subordinated”
to Scripture, it also seems offended by the suggestion that if one does not subordinate
tradition and reason to Scripture, “Scripture is being treated as an equal
dialogue partner with other perspectives.” What a co-ordinated inequality of the
dialogue partners Scripture, Tradition, and Reason would look like remains
unclear.
The working group accuses Keith
Sinclair of reading Scripture “independently of the Church’s traditions and of
human reason” (par. 318). I found this such a bizarre and unlikely claim
that I had to read the paragraph several times to establish that this claim must lie
behind the phrases “a single view of Scripture” and “this single perspective of Scripture”.
Keith Sinclair’s later denial of this as a fair characterisation of his view
(par. 462) confirms that the working
group had indeed come to this conclusion about the view presented by the Bishop
of Birkenhead.
This appears to offer the grounds for the fears that following Keith Sinclair’s argument “would, in effect, make one
wing of the Anglican family the sole arbiter of Anglican ethics and bring an
end to the conciliar approach which has for so long characterized Anglicanism”
(par. 318).
Now, the Bishop of Birkenhead clearly does not
ignore tradition, nor the use of reason in the sense in which Richard Hooker
understood it. Furthermore, I see no reason to conclude that he would distance
himself from the process outlined in par. 334 for engaging “Reason” (in the
second definition), maybe with the exception of the final two sentences. I
exclude these because I do not find their meaning perfectly clear. Maybe they
are stating the obvious, that the Church must pay attention to more than
scientific evidence, in which case Keith Sinclair would surely agree. But maybe
they hint at “an encounter with the Holy Spirit” through cultural trends (cf.
par. 337-344) with which Keith Sinclair would likely not agree.
The working group tries hard to differentiate
between hearing the Holy Spirit speak to us “through the shifts in popular culture”
(par. 344) and simply conforming to the dominant culture of our time and place,
albeit without offering much help for distinguishing between the work of the
Spirit and human sinfulness. This would seem to be pretty important, given that
most of us can testify in our own lives to the co-existence of both right next
to each other.
The fact that we can discern the work of the
Spirit in our lives obviously does not mean that all we do and say is holy. The
fact that we are still tainted by sin does not mean that the Holy Spirit is not
at work in us. What is true for us individually, is surely true for our
society.
