Gay marriage talk notes.. please comment/tear to bits

ok, so I've been convinced that we need to do this at church.
This are my initial thoughts. Just scribbles, stealing mostly from O'Donovans fulcrum sermon 'Good news for Gays' and Hauerwas' 'Sex in public'

The issue has been presented as though there is one group of people who wants everyone to be treated equally, and another small group of people who think they can define marriage.
This is true, but not in the way you think.

(Christians can't help but argue from Christianity.. which we think is the best for everybody)

Christians want people to be treated equally
The churches position is that all people find their true identity in Christ. There is one christ and one gospel.
That gospel is a word of comfort and a word of challenging transformation. You can't have one without the other. The comfort is that God is powerful to transform us.
The desires of all disciples of Jesus are challenged when they truly walk after him.
We are all equally challenged by the gospel, sometimes to suffer for the sake of the kingdom.
Yet this is worked out in different ways. Something which has traditionally been called 'vocation'.
The one gospel is preached to a banker, a politician and a soldier. But when they recieve it, there are different aspects of their lives that are impacted in different ways. The banker needs to know (and obey!) God's attitude to money, the politician about power, the soldier about just war etc...
One gospel, different vocations.
No different to a homosexually oriented person. one gospel, perhaps a different calling and vocation

Go to marriage and singleness in 1 Cor 7.
    Let's remember that the calling to heterosexual marriage is more morally compromised than the call to celibacy.
    That is, Paul thinks it is harder to be devoted to Jesus if you are married than if you are single and trying to avoid sex. (because of the cares of this world). (The homosexually oriented person may ironically have an advantage here, though I'm sure it does not feel like it!)

Christians need to apologise to the gay community for when we have made out they need a different gospel
1. When we treat them as worse sinners, beyond the love of Jesus and outside the need for our care
2. When the church has treated the gay community as a seperate group that does not need to be challenged to discipleship, even suffering for the sake of the gospel

The gay marriage lobby (arrogantly) thinks it can define marriage.

In this debate, people think they completely know what marriage is.
It is when 2 people love each other. So if 2 people love each other they should be able to get married (The romantic fallacy)
It is about having children. Modern technology allows gays to  have children, therefore they should be able to get married (The realist fallacy)
It is about sex/ companionship/ tax avoidance......
Eph 4- one flesh as a mystery
Even for Paul, marriage may be all the things above, but it is more. It is a mystery
It is a mystery closely tied to Christ's love for the church. An ordered love and care and submission between man and woman, that is mysterious.

But, it might be replied, surely a heterosexual marriage isn't the only place this happens??
Well, did you notice what it is a mystery of? The church.
The whole church are meant to submit to each other
The whole church are meant to care foreach other financially
The whole church are meant to have close committed relationships
THe whole church is meant to be involved in raising children (baptism)
The whole church is meant to love each other.

We have failed the gay community by failing to be the church
(We have failed heterosexual single people too!!)
When we restrict our submission, commitment, money love, children to marriages and blood family, when we reduce the basis of our marriages to romance, (or entertain the idea of secret marriages.. ie, we have had sex so we are married).....we are like the world around us,
but our good news is (should be) that in the community of disciples, these things are opened up beyond the exclusive sexual relationship of marriage.




Ok , so it needs a lot of fleshing out, but I think it is a different (stealing O'Donovan and Hauerwas) to the question, that ultimately says we respond by preaching the gospel and being the church.

Thoughts?

"Because it is better for mission"

The overriding justification for changes within churches in the Sydney Diocese is the claim that these changes will be better for reaching people with the gospel of Jesus. Hallelujah! Praise God that we have churches and church leaders who love Jesus so much, who want his Gospel spread to every ear, who want his grace to fill every portion of our country and world.

And yet.
Have we actually done any better with mission.
In some circumstances, those who have opposed various changes have been seen as suspicious. Often it is the elderly "Oh they just need to be changed, to have a gospel heart".
"They love tradition more than people"
"They aren't on board with the mission"

Yet the stats don't lie. We aren't really doing all that well with the converting and reaching people.
 And our churches are probably over represented with spiritual adolescents. (For eg. "I want the church to be a loving community, that is all about relationships, but I only want to turn up half the time").
This can all be put down to the sovereignty of God , of course. Our changes were good, necessary, better for mission, but God decided not to bless them.

Or possibly we were wrong on some things (like the dumbing down (ie abandonment) of our liturgy).
Just putting it out there. 

Missing Mass

Yesterday I ate and drank bread and wine at church.
I'm pretty comfortable with calling this the Lord's Supper. This is Jesus' table
I'm ok with calling this Holy Communion. We are united with Jesus and so united to each other.
I'm even fine with calling it the Eucharist. Take a look at the prayer book. It is one big prayer of thanks.

But personally, I'm uncomfortable with the word 'Mass'. Firstly, it sounds rather Catholic. And secondly, I don't really know what it means.
But perhaps we have lost something by losing the word  'Mass'

"The term "Mass" is derived from the Late Latin word missa (dismissal), a word used in the concluding formula of Mass in Latin: "Ite, missa est" ("Go; it is the dismissal")" .
Thankyou Wikipedia.

So essentially, to call church 'Mass' is to call church 'leave'.
Which sounds rather strange, but perhaps there is something to this.

A few weeks ago Rory Shiner had a post about forgotten ministry models. He traces how churches, under the impulse of the 'priesthood of all believers' have made the Sunday meeting the epicentre of christian ministry and service, rather than seeing the Sunday service as a resource that equips the saints for their ministry through the week.
The post is titled 'Go in peace to love and serve the Lord'. That is the anglican dismissal.(Not in the communion service, but in the other ones) It defines our missio. Now I don't know about you, but the dismissal in many churches I have been in is 'there is some morning tea/supper, please hang around'.
Combined with this is the sense that if you are going to love and serve the Lord, it will involve some Sunday commitment, or at least involvement in one of the churches programs.

In a similar vein, JKA Smith suggest that the constant tinkering with the Sunday service distracts us from getting on with the business of innovative mission. I don't know whether he has the figures to back it up, but the idea that there is one stream of evangelicalism hammering away at making the Sunday service new, fresh and contemporary; and another that is being refreshed by rich liturgy and getting on with serving people through the week rings true in my experience.


I lead a fortnightly bible study with a bunch of men. The bible study is held at another fellows house.
In his words "I love having you guys over, but I have a life" So, at a certain point in the evening, as we all stand around chatting, he will call out "Orright, everybody, get lost".
May we all learn from him

Devouring the Psalms

One of my great pleasures this year has been meeting with one of the young men from our evening service each week.
We choose a Psalm that may be helpful as a response to the reading and sermon, and then rework it as a corporate prayer for the congregation (often doesn't require that much in the way of rework)
This fella is a very enthusiatic, emotional guy, and has just devoured the Psalms. A few weeks in he said ' These are great! I just want to read the whole Psalms so I know which one to choose'. So he now has read through the whole of Psalms and is starting again.
The congregation seems to be enjoying it too.
This year, Moore College's School of Theology (September 12 and 13) is on the Psalms.
Perhaps I'll drag along my young friend

I am very happy to be in a church system that is Reformed, but generally thoughtful and historically aware.
Peter Leithart points out the terrible results when a particular stream of Reformed theology claims it is the only one that is truly reformed.
So, so, so glad that I don't live in America

An interesting proposal for Archbishop of Sydney

A good friend had a fascinating proposal for the next Anglican Archbishop of Sydney.
Keith Condie
Think about it.
Gentle but firm. Affectionately known at College as the smiling assasin.
Very well thought through
An appreciation for Anglican history.
Well respected.
I reckon he would be a good media player too.
Hmm...