Open Table Network trustees respond to Church Of England's Living In Love & Faith project
THE OPEN TABLE NETWORK trustees have prayerfully reflected on the publication of the Church of England’s Living in Love and Faith resources on identity, sexuality, relationships and marriage, and offer this response:
The Open Table Network is a partnership of Christian worship communities which affirm and empower Christians who are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, Queer or Questioning, Intersex, and Asexual (LGBTQIA+).
We believe our lives, our identities and our relationships are precious gifts from God, which we are called to live out with integrity. Our desire is to continue to build communities where this is evident, which equip others to go out and do the same. Our mission is to create safe spaces for all people to encounter the infinite, unconditional, intimate love of God, especially all who identify as LGBTQIA+, their family and friends, and all who seek an inclusive church.
The Open Table Network has become a truly ecumenical movement, not just welcoming people of many Christian traditions to worship together, but also a partnership of inclusive churches from different traditions - Church of England, Church In Wales, Baptist, Methodist and United Reformed Churches - offering radical welcome and hospitality for all. We have witnessed examples of good practice from two of our ecumenical partners, the Methodist and United Reformed Churches, which have enabled dialogue and potential for positive change. While Living In Love And Faith (LLF) is a Church of England process, the nature and size of the Church of England and the media’s response to it means it's likely to have some kind of impact on many LGBTQIA+ Christians in England whether or not they're part of the Anglican Church.
We welcome the publication of the LLF resources, as part of an ongoing process that seeks to listen to LGBTQIA+ voices. We want to encourage members of the Open Table Network within the Church of England to offer constructively critical engagement with the process, but only if it feels safe enough to do so.
Although the LLF resources recommend the use of the Church of England’s Pastoral Principles For Living Well Together, these do not go far enough to ensure safe and open conversations on identity, sexuality, relationships and marriage in local churches. The LLF process has already been hugely painful for some, and will continue to be so unless more is done to safeguard a highly sensitive process. We will support those who feel able to engage to do so, but we also recognise that, for some of us, this may not be a personal battle we can fight.
We know that the LLF Next Steps Group must be aware of the St Michael’s House Protocols [SMHP], as the Bishop of Coventry, the Right Reverend Christopher Cocksworth led the LLF Coordinating Group. These Protocols are part of Coventry Cathedral’s commitment to be ‘a place where people come to address difficult and contested issues through honest, open and informed conversation and dialogue’ [SMHP para 1] . They recognise that ‘How we occupy shared space with those who differ from us is as important as the matter under discussion’ [SMHP para 2]. They underpinned the process of Shared Conversations within the College of Bishops, across the Dioceses, and with members of General Synod, between 2014 and 2016. We propose that this excellent resource is also used to safeguard the small groups exploring the core questions of the LLF course in local churches, and we encourage LGBTQIA+ Christians to propose this to their church leadership. They are available on the Church of England website.
We want to encourage everyone who engages with the LLF resources to recognise that many of us are probably at the very edge of what we can stand, as we are asked to trust yet another process of discussion about our lives, with the promise of something better to come. What gives us hope is the theological promise that is held within this process. At the heart of LLF is a recognition, perhaps for the first time in the Church of England, that there are multiple, legitimate and authentic ways of reading Scripture, which we pray is a revolutionary moment in the life of the Church. This promise could lead, with sufficient goodwill from as many perspectives as possible, to actual, practical change within the next three years.
The Open Table Network supports communities to gather around Jesus’ table in the central act of hospitality of our faith - Holy Communion. This is particularly important in the context of the LLF process, as we talk about the Body of Christ, which we share at an open table, of which we are all, each one of us, a part.
Jesus calls us to be one, in sharing one bread and one cup, but not to be one and the same. This really matters when we are facing unhelpful rhetoric about the primacy of unity. Some clearly feel that the full inclusion of LGBTQIA+ people in church life would cause a fracture in the Body of Christ. We know, from the lived experience of our community members, that when we are excluded, the Body of Christ is already fractured.
For some, participating in the LLF process is simply a restatement of pre-existing positions. This will be a barrier to the meaningful engagement, learning and praying together which is the hope of the LLF project. We must acknowledge that, for the Church of England to fulfil the Archbishop of Canterbury’s call for ‘a radical new Christian inclusion’, we may lose some people. This saddens us. But, we are puzzled by those, on all ‘sides’ of the conversation, who claim a commitment to unity, but say they will leave ‘if things don’t go my way’. Surely it's the ones who stay and talk who take unity most seriously?
When we all sit around Christ’s table together, there is disagreement, even the desire for some to be excluded from the table. But the act of being together around Christ’s table has the potential to begin to change things. Mutual and radical transformation is possible through proximity, dialogue, and the development of friendship, but it requires goodwill on all sides. As Christ is our host, He is challenging us all. Not merely to sit at the table for the sake of appearing to be united, but to sit there because that is where we hear the Word of Life, where we share the Bread of Life, and where together we hope.
We need Christ’s open table now more than ever.
On behalf of the Open Table Network:
Revd Alex Clare-Young
Co-Chair of Trustees
Sarah Hobbs
Co-Chair of Trustees
Kieran Bohan
Network Co-ordinator
