I’ve just read an article from Professor Gordon Wenham & Revd Dr John Nolland, of Trinity College, Bristol, which is an excellent response.  Essentially they argue that, although the Guardian had overemphasised one aspect of what Bishop James had written, he has failed to take the Bible seriously enough.

James Jones says that his change of mind came because of considering the differing contexts of Christians in Africa and America.  “He says he now sees the African rejection of homosexuality as determined by their context and the American acceptance of homosexuality as determined by theirs. Nigerians oppose homosexual activity because it is illegal and disapproved by Muslims. African Christians do not want to be seen by Muslims as taking the path of Western moral decadence. American Episcopalians however see the question of homosexual rights as a question of civil rights.”

Wenham and Nolland’s response is a great read.  They conclude (emphasis mine):

All this evidence points in the same direction, that the biblical writers cannot be affirming the legitimacy of homosexual practice when they describe same-sex friendship. They clearly approved of the latter, while rejecting the former. It is a pity that Bishop Jones did not pay as much attention to the context in which the Bible was written as he did to that of the contemporary American and Nigerian churches. Would-be preachers are often told that ‘a text out of context is a pretext’. It seems to us that Bishop Jones has by ignoring the context of the biblical writers found a way to keep on the table views that are quite contrary to Scripture.

The article points to a very problematic trend within evangelicalism, certainly in the Anglican church.  The Bible is minimised in an attempt to keep people together.  No one is prepared to say “that teaching is wrong”.  That’s what Rowan Williams consistently fails to do.  It’s why many evangelicals are driven crazy by Fulcrum.  It’s why we have so little confidence that our Bishops have any backbone.

An essential part of the pastoral ministry (whatever words you use: minister, vicar, Bishop, Bible-teacher, etc) is protecting the flock from wolves.  But that means recognising some people are wolves, or at least that their teaching is wolf-flavoured.  And very few people are prepared to do this.

There’s a good chance this could be the next “big” thing to a) get some charismatics very very excited, b) confirm conservative evangelicals in their anti-charismatic prejudice.  Oh, and make us look weird in the eyes of the media.  If you want a heads up, go see this page for a criticial look from a charismatic blogger.  And while you’re there, look here and here for more wise comment from one charismatic to others.

For something far more edifying, the same author wrote this list of 100 reflections based on 30 years of being a Christian.  Some fantastic and provoking thoughts to be read. Here’s a few good ones to do with Family and Youth Work:

• We do a great disservice to families in our churches when we split them up the second they hit the lobby.
• A youth minister’s primary responsibility isn’t to teens directly but to their parents. A good youth minister teaches parents how to teach their own teens, leaving the bulk of the responsibility to them.
• We make an idol of the nuclear family if we raise it above the needs of the household of Faith.
• We spend too much time trying to keep our youth from sleeping with each other and not enough time teaching them to be husbands and wives.

Update – here’s another report from Lakeland, the sad story of a family who went with their autistic child and the abuse of religion they experienced.

I still haven’t decided, but I’m tempted by John Piper’s biographical-sermon of William Wilberforce. You may have seen the film “Amazing Grace” but that won’t have told you just how evangelical Wilberforce was. While he is famous (rightly so) for fighting against slavery, he knew full well that only the gospel of Christ crucified and justification-by-faith could change the country.

I think one problem is that conservative evangelicalism tends to define itself by what it’s not: we’re not liberal, we’re not anglo-catholic, we’re not charismatic, and we’re not those liberals-in-disguise open evangelicals (a tongue in cheek comment, BTW!). So if we’re not all those wrong people, we must de facto be right. By definition, we are the true preservers of the gospel. So we’re not particularly good at listening to our critics.

NB I first encountered John Richardson (the Ugley Vicar) on a Cornhill ‘London Week’ which aims to give students a week’s insight into church leadership. His first comment was ‘there is no such thing as a full-time Bible teaching ministry – after all, Paul wasn’t one!’ – which seemed to worry a few but was very refreshing!