Agreeing and Disagreeing with Angus Ritchie, Part Three

In another piece published on ABC , responding to Ian Paul’s critique, Angus Ritchie puts his finger on the institutional hypocrisy of the Church of England. Our official position on same-sex relationships is clear but it is a facade behind which "gay ordinands may well have been encouraged by all of the key authority figures with whom they had to deal - including their Vicar, the staff at theological college and even perhaps their Bishop - to become priests without becoming celibate."

There is therefore "an important dis-analogy between blessing, and allowing clergy to be in, sexually active same-sex relationships and ordaining women to the episcopate." The latter did and could only happen after legal provision for it; the former is happening right now.

“In certain sections of the Church, the official line has been quietly ignored for years. This gentle and genteel form of civil disobedience is endemic in the Church of England. If we are frank, we must recognize that similar forms of rule-breaking go on in all its theological traditions.”

Ritchie’s central point is that the status quo is no longer sustainable because

"The reality today is than an increasing number of clergy, with growing boldness, are defying the official teaching on same-sex relationships."

In short, the genie is out of the bottle. Traditionalists are kidding themselves if they believe that the genie can be bottled up again. The only feasible way forward is to smash the bottle. 

Knowledge of the Church of England's institutional hypocrisy urges compassion in dealing with clergy who had been encouraged to believe that the church's teaching on celibacy can be disregarded; it can hardly be a sufficient reason for changing its teaching. In the ABC piece to which Angus Ritchie responds, Ian Paul had argued that on Scriptural grounds and for practical reasons it will not be possible to agree to disagree on same-sex relationships. 

In his reply Ritchie focuses on Romans 1:26-27 which he interprets with Loveday Alexander (in an essay in Grace and Disagreement) as referring to “a distortion of the default sexual identity, which Paul assumes to be heterosexual.” This means,

“Whereas for St. Paul, homosexual practice was a perversion practiced by people who were understood to have a fundamentally heterosexual identity, Loveday Alexander's claim is that today, ‘we know some people are born gay.’”

In other words, Paul’s reasoning in Romans 1:26-27 proceeds from what we today know to be wrong assumptions and therefore needs to be qualified.[1] For Ritchie this is 

“but another instance of a challenge at least as old as the Galileo affair... Respecting the authority of Scripture is a very different thing from accepting the validity of the scientific worldview of the cultures in which it was written, and to which it was addressed.”

This glosses over the significant hermeneutical difference between Ritchie’s approach and the approach traditionally practiced within the church.[2] Has the church ever declared a theological statement within Scripture or a Biblical prohibition of certain acts no longer valid because she now recognises it to be without foundation, having been based on faulty science?[3]

The departure from traditional Christian hermeneutics is somewhat softened later by the claim that,

“The question which arises for the Church today, and did not arise for St. Paul, is that within its Body there are same-sex couples whose relationships bear these same marks - couples for whom it is also "not good to be alone," but for whom heterosexual marriage is not an option. Theirs are also covenant relationships, where people choose to build a common life, "forsaking all others."

So while Paul held wrong beliefs, he was not wrong (at the time) to condemn sexual activity between partners of the same sex. It seems that Ritchie is committed to the claim that all same-sex relationships within the ancient world were abusive or at least that the apostle in his context was justified in failing to consider the possibility of faithful, loving same-sex relationships.

Ritchie seeks to persuade readers that the view that approves of sexual activity among same-sex couples who are committed to a permanent, faithful and stable relationship is not in fact "outside of Christian moral teaching."

He shows himself puzzled about the practical obstacles Ian Paul outlined. What he seems to overlook is that for “two integrities” to work it is not enough for each side to acknowledge that the other side sincerely believes to be inside Christian moral teaching. What is required is for both sides to be persuaded that both “integrities” are in fact inside Christian moral teaching. But the traditional view is that sexual intimacy outside marriage between a man and a woman is "outside of Christian moral teaching." In other words, traditionalist are asked to abandon the traditional view. It is hard not to see this as an obstacle.

While I do not want to put undue weight on a side comment, the following quotation seems to me to put the finger on a critical issue:

“I remain unconvinced that this can get Dr Paul to his desired conclusion on women's leadership. But that is a debate for another day: we both support the ordination of women, so let us focus instead on the issue where we disagree.”

It illustrates the lack of agreement on where the disagreement lies. Angus Ritchie gives the impression that what really matters is getting to the desired conclusion, never mind how. And he attributes the same thinking to Ian Paul. Because he acknoweldges that we are not likely to agree on this issue, we must agree to disagree. But the crucial issue is not “the issue where we disagree” but our different ways of reasoning. 

Angus Ritchie may genuinely believe that, "It is possible to be affirming of same-sex unions with every bit as high a doctrine of Scripture, every bit as faithful a hermeneutic and every bit as serious an attitude to sexual sin" but he provides little evidence to back this up. It is not altogether clear what "sexual sin" is in his account. (Is there sexual activity that is free of exploitation and abuse and does not obviously harm a third party, i.e. sexual activity which is not wrong for reasons other than those specifically related to sex, which is nevertheless wrong because it is "sexual sin" and on what grounds? Is there a middle ground between sacramental and idolatrous?) 

It is not at all clear that the hermeneutic he assumes is faithful, as none of the precedents suggested here ("Galileo affair") or previously (remarriage of divorcees, the ordination of women) stand up to scrutiny, and claims to a high view of Scripture need to be grounded in exegesis that is humbly and patiently seeking to discern what God is saying to us. It may be unavoidable that much exegesis concerned with the issue at hand looks agenda-driven but Ritchie has done little to dispel this impression, picking up Loveday Alexander's reading of Romans 1:26-27 apparently because Ian Paul has made some appreciative noises about this essay and not necessarily because her understanding of "nature" is the most plausible. Given that Loveday Alexander offers no defence of this reading in the essay in question and Ritchie offers no reflection on the other passages, we do not see the exegesis at work which would warrant the claims made.

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[1] The literature that could be considered here is voluminous. Roy Bowen Ward, "Why Unnatural? The Tradition behind Romans 1:26-27," Harvard Theological Review 90 (1997): 263-84, focuses on contextual background. Theodore de Bruyn, "Ambrosiaster's Interpretations of Romans 1:26-27," Vigiliae Christianae 65 (2011): 463-83, offers insight into how early Christians read the verses.

[2] Margaret Davies, in an essay commended by Loveday Alexander, speaks of Romans 1:26-27 and 1 Corinthians 6:9 as "an anomalous emotional blindspot in an otherwise radical transformation of tradition" ("New Testament Ethics and Ours: Homosexuality and Sexuality in Romans 1:26-27," Biblical Interpretation 3 [1995],  318). This is hardly the language traditionally used in Christian reasoning.

[3] The "Galileo affair," is much misrepresented today and cannot do the work to which Ritchie wants to put it. In the words of Dinesh D'Souza, "The Church's view of heliocentrism was hardly a dogmatic one. When Cardinal Bellarmine met with Galileo he said, “While experience tells us plainly that the earth is standing still, if there were a real proof that the sun is in the center of the universe…and that the sun goes not go round the earth but the earth round the sun, then we should have to proceed with great circumspection in explaining passages of scripture which appear to teach the contrary, and rather admit that we did not understand them than declare an opinion to be false which is proved to be true. But this is not a thing to be done in haste, and as for myself, I shall not believe that there are such proofs until they are shown to me.”"