Disagreement about the teaching of marriage and sexual intimacy is arguably more serious than, e.g., the disagreements between Presbyterians and Anglicans. It is therefore not one more disagreement which we can add to the list of secondary matters on which we "agree to disagree" and move on. If a revised understanding of what it means to be chaste is embedded in pastoral guidance and/or official prayers, it cannot but do substantial harm to our unity.
The Bishop of London believes that God is calling us to live with our current disagreements. The reasoning she offered to General Synod in February for having reached this conclusion seemed specious to me but here I want to make the point that believing that God calls us to live with our disagreements does not yet resolve the question how we are to live with these disagreements. There are perhaps three options for the moment, none of whom especially attractive:
(1) continuing as before, namely tolerating the revisionist teaching and (unofficial) practice of blessing same-sex couples without changing our doctrine or the prayers we commend or the moral requirements we put on clergy and others,
(2) creating structural space for "two integrities" with different approaches to Scripture and different understandings of sin and repentance, the Gospel and the Christian life,
(3) welcoming revisionist views as consonant with Anglican teaching and making liturgical space for these new understandings of living out our sexuality while keeping, for now, the marriage canon in place in the hope that the relevant parties are prepared to make the required sacrifices (revisionists foregoing "marriage equality" for now, traditionalists accepting that revisionism is properly Anglican too).
Sarah Mullally favours the last option but this is deeply problematic because very many who hold to the traditional view of marriage feel unable to bring the sacrifice asked of them. My preference is for the second option in the form of creating a separate legal space for those who want to promote a changed understanding of marriage and sexuality. This would be challenging because numerous legal issues would need to be resolved but it has the advantage of preserving integrity. It is not a refusal to live with our current disagreements but rather a (better) way to live with them. Alas, the discussion seems to be cut short by the insinuation that being called to live with our disagreements necessarily means to walk in the way the Bishops lead us, abandoning the normativity of previous teaching.
