Leander S. Harding: Redefining Marriage?

Tuesday, March 27, 2012

There are things to commend in “I Will Bless You, and You Will Be a Blessing,” the draft report released March 7 by the Episcopal Church’s Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music. The work of the commission is evidently grounded in genuine pastoral concern. An attempt is made to counter scriptural objections. The commission also makes a case for the toleration of disagreement. The report is honest that the ultimate goal is a major change in our understanding of Christian marriage for heterosexual couples and a reappraisal of the significance of the biological family in God’s plan for humanity.

There are four sections in the theological introduction to the proposed rite: “The Church’s Call: A Focus on Mission,” “The Church’s Joy: A Theology of Blessing,” “The Church’s Life: Covenantal Relationship,” and “The Church’s Challenge: Christian Unity and Biblical Interpretation.”

The vision of mission outlined in the document centers on the concept of blessing. God wants to bless the children of Abraham so that through them he may bless all the people of the world. The blessing of same-sex relationships is presented as an appropriate next step in extending the blessing of God to the world. I miss in this part of the report any sense of the drama of salvation. Jesus is said to pour his life out in order to bless us but there is little sense of the atonement as a remedy for sin and evil. There is little sense of the mission of the Church as presenting a blessing which is available only through an encounter with God’s judgment and a response of repentance and faith in Christ.
the rest

This report envisions far more than a pastoral provision for same-sex couples. It represents an official turning point in the debate via an entirely new teaching about the nature and significance of marriage and the biological family, according to which not only procreation but male and female themselves are made optional and accidental ingredients. If such a redefinition of Christian marriage is accepted, it will represent a stunning victory for a Gnostic — and Pelagian — version of Christianity, that can only further damage the already fragile unity of our church.