"LOVE IS STRANGE" - MOVIE

Love Is Strange, directed by Ira Sachs, is a wonderfully tender, bittersweet, and gently humorous love story with very fine acting by all the performers, especially the two principals, John Lithgow, as Ben, and Alfred Molina, as George, two Manhattanites of a certain age who have been together nearly 40 years and are finally able to marry.  Unfortunately, smooth, wedded bliss does not follow as George is fired from his job teaching music in a Roman Catholic school. 

The school authorities knew George was gay and partnered and looked the other way, but his marriage is a whole other matter and costs him his job. Ben is retired, and, with their income reduced to Ben's pension and payments from George's private pupils, the two are forced to sell their apartment and live apart until they find a place they can afford. 

Ben moves in with his nephew, Elliot (Darren Burrows), wife, Kate (Marisa Tomei), and teenage son, Joey (Charlie Tahan), who live in a smallish apartment, where he shares a room and bunk beds with Joey.  George stays in the apartment of his two partying policemen friends, where he sleeps on the sofa, which is difficult when there's often a party going on. 

The two men give perfect performances as long-time lovers who remain quite fond of one another, despite the petty annoyances common to all relationships.  There's no sex in the film, but the actors show affection for one another in what is perhaps the most believable way I have ever seen in a movie.  Marisa Tomei is outstanding as Kate. The film is understated, and the facial expressions and body language of the actors speak as eloquently as words.

Of the three outstanding and memorable movies I've seen recently, I'm sad to say not one was a big money maker at the box office.  I hope the earnings from rentals and streaming are sufficient to encourage the producers and directors to continue with such quality productions.  The other films are Calvary, with Brendan Gleeson, and Locke, with Tom Hardy, which I posted about earlier.

BLESSINGS AND CONGRATULATIONS, RICHARD AND RICARDO

Just to be clear, I knew Richard before he was famous, or, as certain bishops in the Church of England would say, infamous. He and Ricardo look so very happy following the conversion of their civil partnership into marriage.

Mr Haggis believes that his struggle to find employment in the Church is entirely attributable to his decision to write an article for The Guardian in 2005, in which he criticised the Bishops' stance on same-sex relationships among the clergy: specifically, the questions to be asked of those entering civil partnerships. He has suffered a "very long period of depression", but has found solace in celebrating at Fairacres Convent, in Oxford.

Richard and I became Facebook friends through mutual friends some time ago. Last year, when I visited England, I met Richard, who had helped me arrange to stay in a guest room in Christ Church College, Oxford. During my stay of several days in the city, he very kindly showed me around Christ Church College and around the city of Oxford. Since I am, as they say, une femme d'un certain âge, he paced our explorations within the limits of my energy and ability in a most gracious manner. To this day, I remain grateful to him and credit him for my most pleasant stay in the city. 

My friend misses his priestly ministry immensely, and it breaks my heart that the church refuses to allow him to use his pastoral and preaching gifts in active ministry. It is very much the church's loss.

Bishop Alan Wilson is greatly to be admired for his courage in speaking up for justice and compassion, and I am proud to call him friend. He is the model of a pastoral bishop.

SORRY ARCHBISHOP, THIS WILL NOT DO

Thanks to Colin Coward at Changing Attitude for the transcript of an interview with Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby by Sarah Julian for BBC Radio Nottingham.  The interviewer asked questions about the recent civil marriage of Church of England Canon Jeremy Pemberton and Laurence Cunnington, which went against the rules laid out in "House of Bishops Pastoral Guidance on Same Sex Marriage".  The document states in bold type that despite the fact that same sex marriage is legal in England, Church of England clergy are not permitted to enter into civil marriages.

SJ  So what happens to Canon Pemberton?

ABC  “Well, the Bishop of Lincoln .. he’s actually in Lincoln Diocese .. the Bishop of Lincoln has commented on that and I’ve said all I’m going to say on that, really; I’ve commented on that a great deal recently and I don’t intend to add to it.”

SJ  We’ve not spoken to you here on BBC Radio Nottingham, though, and he actually does live in our diocese and does some work in our diocese so I’d appreciate if you could, you know, reiterate that, then …

ABC  “No, as I’ve said, I’ve said on nationally and it’s been in all the press and on the radio and, and I’m just not going to add to it.”

SJ  So you won’t repeat what you’ve said already?

ABC  “Er, no.

SJ  What will happen in future when more and more priests either do this or bless a gay wedding themselves?

ABC  “Well, the Church is heavily involved at the moment in discussions about policy, organised discussions which will take, er, involving loads and loads of people from all over the world and, er, all kinds of activities and that’s going to take quite a long time to do and as I say, I don’t want to preempt those discussion so I’m not going to comment further on that.”

SJ  But you must have an idea of what the Church should do in these instances ‘cus it’s already happening, you must have had a plan for what will happen to priests who do this.

ABC  “Well, that’s been announced publicly, it’s on the record, erm, but errrr, as I say, I’m not intending to add to what I’ve said previously.”

SJ  And if priests do break the rules, are they going to be kicked out of the Church of England?

ABC  “There’s processes for, errr, what happens and it’s very much down to local bishops and umm, yeah, that’s, err, you need to ask the relevant bishop about that.”

SJ  But you’re the head of the Church of England, they must come to you and ask you those questions, what do you tell them?

ABC  “Well, actually the Church of England doesn’t work that way, we don’t have an Anglican Pope, we operate on a collegial, collective basis and errrr, it’s very much shared, errr, decision making, and there was a paper published at the end of errr January on that.”

SJ  How do you think God feels about gay marriage?

ABC  “Well as I’ve said I’ve commented an awful lot about it, I’m not going to add further to what I’ve said already.”

SJ  But how do you feel about the current situation and the turmoil that this is in and how this looks to the rest of society?

ABC  “One of the things … there’s always disagreements in Church, there’s always been disagreements in Church, it’s, it’s varied over the centuries on different issues; there’s always been disagreement. One of the key things in the Church is that the Church is a family, it’s not an institution, it’s not a political party, erm, it.. it.. the way we operate is that we are bound together by the love of Christ, and in the way we disagree we have to express that love to each other.”

SJ  We have two women here in Nottinghamshire who we’ve spoken to, they are planning to get married, the two of them. One of them actually works for the Church and she wants to become a priest. She feels that she’s had to choose between getting married and her calling to the Church. Is there any hope for her, or how does that make you feel?

ABC  “Well, I can only repeat what I’ve said before, that we’re, there’s a lot of discussion going on, err, we’re listening very, very carefully to people, but I don’t want to preempt that by adding further to the numerous things I’ve said on all kinds of media, including the BBC before.”

SJ  But not here in Nottinghamshire, and these are Nottinghamshire people who …

ABC  “I rather suspect that the BBC does reach in Nottingham, not only through the local radio.”

Kudos to Sarah Julian for not letting the - err - ABC get away with his - err - avoidance tactics. Most interviewers do.  The ABC's responses are beyond pathetic.  What message does Justin send when he refuses even to repeat his own words?  Not everyone in England pays attention each time he speaks.  Is he embarrassed by his words?  If this is the best he can do, perhaps he might consider refusing to grant interviews.

You may wonder about my excessive interest in the affairs of the Church of England and the Archbishop of Canterbury, and you may even call it an obsession if you like, but I have friends in England whose lives are already gravely and adversely affected by the words and direction of the leadership of the English church.  As a fellow Anglican, I care about them and all the others who pay the price for the delay of justice and equality for all members of the church, clergy and laity - the delay seemingly without end.

JUSTIN WELBY'S NON-EXPLANATORY EXPLANATION

Archbishop Justin Welby's non-explanatory explanation of his commentary on LBC radio in England during his visit to Canada.  See my previous post, but only if you want to know more.

Q: Were you in fact blaming the death of Christians in parts of Africa on the acceptance of gay marriage in America?

A: I was careful not to be too specific because that would pin down where that happened and that would put the community back at risk. I wouldn't use the word “blame”— that's a misuse of words in the context. One of the things that's most depressing about the response to that interview is that almost nobody listened to what I said; they mostly imagined what they thought I said...It was not only imagination, it was a million miles away from what I said.

Many of us heard and understood what Justin said, but we want to know why. If he's going to lay a certain responsibility for violence in Africa on Americans (though he won't call it blame), he needs to provide a better explanation to Americans than what he's said thus far.

Q: So what exactly were you saying?

A: What I was saying is that when we take actions in one part of the church, particularly actions that are controversial, that they are heard and felt not only in that part of the church but around the world...And, this is not mere consequentialism; I'm not saying that because there will be consequences to taking action, that we shouldn't take action. What I'm saying is that love for our neighbour, love for one another, compels us to consider carefully how that love is expressed, both in our own context and globally. We never speak the essential point that, as a church, we never speak only in our local situation. Our voice carries around the world. Now that will be more true in some places than in others. It depends on your links. We need to learn to live as a global church in a local context and never to imagine that we're just a local church. There is no such thing.

There most certainly is such a thing as the local church within the Anglican Communion. Contrary to  Justin's words, there is no such entity as a global Anglican church.  The AC is rather a fellowship of churches or provinces with roots in Anglicanism. Each church is autonomous, with its own form of governance and canons.  Though he may wish to be, the Archbishop of Canterbury is not the Anglican pope. He doesn't even speak for everyone in the Church of England, much less for other churches in the AC.

H/T to Kurt Weisner at The Lead.

ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY JUSTIN WELBY ON THE RADIO

CHRISTIANS are being killed in Africa as a consequence of liberal attitudes towards homosexuality in the United States and Britain, the Archbishop of Canterbury suggested on Friday.

Speaking on LBC radio about his opposition to same-sex marriage, he said: "I've stood by gravesides in Africa of a group of Christians who had been attacked because of something that had happened far, far away in America."

Good grief! I find the archbishop's words astonishing. Is Justin Welby saying that Americans with "liberal attitudes" about gay sexuality are complicit in murder?

Clarifying his comments on the mass grave, he said: "What was said was that 'If we leave a Christian community in this area' - I am quoting them - 'we will all be made to become homosexual, so we are going to kill the Christians.' The mass grave had 369 bodies in it, and I was standing with the relatives. That burns itself into your soul - as does the suffering of gay people in this country."

A deep tragedy, indeed and a sight surely never to be forgotten.  Where was the mass grave?  Do the murderers speak truthfully about the reason for the mass killing?  Is it right to take the words of murderers on the reason for the killings and, on that basis, refuse justice and equality to the LGTB members of the Church of England?

"I was in the South Sudan a few weeks ago and the church leaders there were saying: 'Please do not change what you are doing because then we could not accept your help. And we need your help desperately.' And we have to listen to that."

I have news for the archbishop: Diocese to diocese and parish to parish relationships continue between Episcopal churches and African Anglican churches, despite the rants of homophobic African bishops about the practices of the Episcopal Church.  Policies of justice and equality for LGTB Episcopalians have been implemented, even as TEC and African churches continue to work together. The ABC seems to think "bash the Americans" is good church policy. I don't know. Maybe it works for him.

"What was said was that 'If we leave a Christian community in this area' - I am quoting them - 'we will all be made to become homosexual, so we are going to kill the Christians.' The mass grave had 369 bodies in it, and I was standing with the relatives. That burns itself into your soul - as does the suffering of gay people in this country."

Why not lay the blame squarely where it belongs, on the murderers and leaders who pass and implement draconian laws that cause great suffering and even death for LGTB people in their countries?  Why  blame Americans with "liberal attitudes"?

Asked whether he could imagine a day when two people of the same sex married in the Church of England, he said: "I look at the scriptures, I look at the teaching of the Church, I listen to Christians round the world, and I have real hestitations [sic] about that. "

He added, however: "I am incredibly uncomfortable about saying that. I really don't want to say no to people who love each other, but you have to have a sense of following what the teaching of the Church is. We can't just make sudden changes."

"Sudden changes?" Where has he been for the last 20 years?

More from Archbishop Welby on the broadcast, which runs for nearly an hour.

Rev Welby’s callers included former Tory MP Ann Widdecombe, who asked him whether the Church does or does not approve of homosexuality. The Archbishop told her drily: “How unsurprised I am by that question, I can't imagine.

“I just said the Church is quite clear that sex outside marriage is wrong, and marriage has been understood as a man and woman. That seems to be a fairly clear statement.

“I'm not going to pull my punches on that. I think I'm right, you think I'm wrong. We differ.”

Where's the love in saying no to marriage or a blessing to two people of the same sex who love each other? Where's the love in saying to gay priests that they can never marry and must always remain celibate?

It seems to me that unless and until the office of Archbishop of Canterbury is separate from the office of "primus inter pares" of the Anglican Communion, LGTB members of the Church of England will continue to be held hostage without justice and equality because of homophobic attitudes of certain African bishops.

A SPEECH, A LETTER, AND A LETTER

From Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby's address to General Synod:

We all know that perfect love casts out fear. We know it although we don’t often apply it. We mostly know that perfect fear casts out love. In any institution or organisation, the moment that suspicion reigns and the assumption that everything is zero sum becomes dominant (that is to say that some else’s gain must be my loss, we can’t both flourish) that institution will be increasingly dominated by fear. It is an old problem in game theory. The moment at which something is zero sum, players stop looking so much at their objectives and increasingly look at each other. The more they look at each other, the more they are dominated by fear and the less they are able to focus on their objectives.

The Church of England is not a closed system, nor is the Anglican Communion and most certainly nor is the Church catholic and universal. It is not a closed system because God is involved and where he is involved there is no limit to what can happen, and no limit to human flourishing. His abundant love overwhelms us when we make space to flood into our own lives, into institutions and systems.

From the Church of England House of Bishops Pastoral Guidance on Same Sex Marriage:

20. The 2005 pastoral statement said that it would not be right to produce an authorized public liturgy in connection with the registering of civil partnerships and that clergy should not provide services of blessing for those who registered civil partnerships. The House did not wish, however,  to interfere with the clergy's pastoral discretion about when more informal kind of prayer, at the request of the couple, might be appropriate in the light of the circumstances.   The College made clear on 27 January that, just as the Church of England's doctrine of marriage remains the same, so its pastoral and liturgical practice also remains unchanged.

21. The same approach as commended in the 2005 statement should therefore apply to couples who enter same-sex marriage, on the assumption that any prayer will be accompanied by pastoral discussion of the church's teaching and their reasons for departing from it. Services of blessing should not be provided. Clergy should respond pastorally and sensitively in other ways.

The letter from the House of Bishops is the kind of doublespeak that is soul-destroying to LGBT church members and to those who support their full inclusion in the life of the church. As a fellow Anglican, I read the letter with shock and dismay.  I can only imagine the scope of the fear within the House of Bishops that would lead them to approve sending out such a letter. 

Not only will same sex marriages services be banned in the Church of England, but clergy will not be allowed to "provide services of blessing" to same sex couples who marry but will rather be restricted to "an informal kind of prayer", preceded by a pastoral discussion about why they must follow the church's teaching and settle for something less.  Like Tina Turner, I ask, "What's love got to do with it?"  How will the rules allow for flourishing of LGBT persons in the church?

But, as Archbishop Welby says in his address, "... because God is involved and where he is involved there is no limit to what can happen...", who knows but that when the prayers are said, God will do as God chooses and - Gasp! - provide a blessing, despite the ban by the church.  The phrase itself, "an informal kind of prayer", is a shriveled manner of speaking about invoking the God of abundant and overflowing love. It seems to me idolatrous to attempt to limit the blessings of God for those the House of Bishops deems not quite worthy to receive the full blessing.
 
Episcopal priest, Tobias Haller, wonders why the English bishops did not include a reference to Article XXXII of the Articles of Religion of the Church of England, rather than The Lambeth Conference of 1998.

Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, are not commanded by God's Law, either to vow the estate of single life, or to abstain from marriage: therefore it is lawful for them, as for all other Christian men, to marry at their own discretion, as they shall judge the same to serve better to godliness.

In 2005, The Guardian published an article titled "Stop the Denial"  by Richard Haggis, a priest serving in a London parish:

Many of us long for the sort of union that could be marked by a public ceremony and decent and proper civil rights (from which the bishops have sought to exempt us for too long through their powerful position in the House of Lords). I very much hope to use the new law. I shall not ask permission and I shall not promise to be celibate. If they want to sack me they can, but they must own up to the kind of people they are.
....

To grow up as a church we need to stop pretending and stop lying. There are hundreds of gay priests, archdeacons and bishops. This is a fact. Those who can't accept it need to leave. Those gay clergy do far more for the Good News of God than the ranting nutters who would reject them. But we need help and support. We need to be looked after. And that has not been happening for a very long time. Until we learn to do so, we have no right to be taken seriously by thoughtful people.

And sacked he was, and Richard has not served as a priest in the church in the eight years since he wrote the article.  What has changed since 2005?  Same sex marriage will be legal in England, but the church will not ordain persons in same sex marriages, and clergy in same sex relationships are forbidden, in bold text, to contract a civil marriage. 

27.  The House is not, therefore, willing for those who are in a same sex marriage to be ordained to any of the three orders of ministry. In addition it considers that it would not be appropriate conduct for someone in holy orders to enter into a same sex marriage, given the need for clergy to model the Church's teaching in their lives.

How long will the blatant hypocrisy continue? Whom do the bishop's believe they are fooling?