wfn.org | Episcopalians: South African report urges church not to avoid same-sex blessing issue

[dmack@episcopalchurch.org]

April 16, 2003

2003-082

Episcopalians: South African report urges church not to avoid 
same-sex blessing issue

by Jan Nunley

(ENS) A report prepared for the Church of the Province of South 
Africa (CPSA), released this month, cites examples of same-sex 
unions in traditional indigenous African societies and the South 
African constitution's sexual orientation non-discrimination 
clause in arguing for a new approach by the church to the 
blessing of same-sex relationships. 

The Archbishop's Committee on Same-Sex Unions, chaired by 
Professor Joan Church of the Diocese of Pretoria and consisting 
of senior lay and clerical members of the church, produced the 
report in response to a Provincial Synod resolution requiring 
the CPSA to clarify its position with regard to same sex unions. 
The committee directed its findings to the South African 
Anglican Theological Commission. 

"The issue of same sex unions strikes at the heart of the 
Anglican church, which has fought long and hard for justice and 
inclusivity, but a definitive stand is likely to lead to 
polarization rather than unity unless all debaters are treated 
with respect and dignity," said Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane, 
in summarizing the report for a press release. 

"Besides commissioning the committee, I have also widely 
distributed a discussion document within the Anglican Church and 
I am calling on Southern Africa's 10 million baptized Anglicans 
at all levels to urgently address homosexuality and to do so in 
a manner that will generate mutual understanding and bring 
people out of their 'corners of conviction,'" Ndungane said. He 
cited a statement in the report that the unity of the church 
must be upheld but must not be used as "a delaying tactic or as 
an excuse to avoid the issue."

Centrality of love

The report briefly outlines an approach to developing a theology 
of marriage that takes into account varying understandings of 
sexuality (as genitality or as "all-pervasive energy force") and 
spirituality (as religiosity or as "touching all of life"). The 
centrality of love in Jesus' portrait of God as the "Divine 
Lover," resulting in the effect that "sexuality seems to have 
something of the numinous about it," and the shift in the focus 
of marriage from procreation to manifesting the love of God, are 
recommended as topics for "reexamination" by an ongoing CPSA 
dialogue. 

A model of biblical interpretation that moves beyond the 
"largely fundamentalist" mode of "absolutist, ahistorical" 
prooftexting is needed, the report said, to engage the issue of 
sexuality seriously. "The model adopted affects the meaning 
extracted," the committee said, recommending a "conversational 
model" which "accepts that the Bible is God's Word, but argues 
that it operates dynamically, in interaction with everyday 
life." Such a conversational model would be "Christocentric, 
dialogical, canonical, and narrative." 

Imported--or indigenous?

Many African Anglican leaders view homosexuality as a Western 
cultural import. "The Anglican Church in Africa is deeply 
shocked by the very idea of blessing the gay relationship and 
having a liturgy for such a service in Church," retired Kenyan 
archbishop David Gitari told Anglican Media Sydney shortly after 
a decision by the Canadian diocese of New Westminster in 2002 to 
permit parishes to bless same-sex relationships. "We are shocked 
because when missionaries from the West came to the darkest 
continent we were told that homosexuality was a sin. Now people 
from the West are telling us it is not a sin despite Paul's 
words in Romans 1:24-27." The Archbishop of Nigeria, Peter 
Akinola, called the Canadian decision "an act of new 
imperialism" by churches in the global North.

But according to the South African report, same-sex 
relationships are not unknown in traditional African culture, 
although in different forms than is common in the United States 
and other Western countries. Traditional woman-to-woman 
marriages "occur all over Africa," the report stated. In South 
Africa such marriages have been recorded among the Venda, 
Lovedu, Pedi, Zulu and Narene peoples, among others. The report 
cites "two main motivations" for such unions: because of the 
powerful position of one of the women, as in the traditional 
tribal institution of the Rain Queen, or because one of the 
women is childless. In the latter case, a male relative of the 
"female husband" may be enlisted to impregnate the "bride," 
though he is considered to have no legal or biological rights to 
the child. 

"While these marriages are infrequent they are considered far 
from abnormal," the report stated. Such unions may be protected 
under South Africa's Recognition of Customary Marriages Act, 
which came into effect in 2000, as well as under Act 108 of the 
1996 South African constitution, which prohibits discrimination 
on the basis of sexual orientation. That presents a pastoral 
dilemma for churches, said the committee.

Another dilemma is presented by a 1998 Lambeth Conference 
resolution on human sexuality rejecting homosexual practice as 
incompatible with Scripture and declaring that the bishops of 
the Anglican Communion "cannot advise the legitimizing or 
blessing of same sex unions nor ordaining those involved in same 
gender unions." A separate discussion document on human 
sexuality, sent by Ndungane in January to the bishops, clergy 
and lay leadership of the CPSA, acknowledged that "the Lambeth 
Conference is a significant and solemn part of this process. At 
the same time however it is also not possible to assert that the 
matter was closed for all time in 1998 by the views of the 
majority of Bishops at Lambeth at that time. In the past the 
Lambeth Conference has 'moved' on a decision taken at a previous 
gathering, for example on the use of contraception."

'A theological nightmare'?

Reviewing the legal history and cultural differences regarding 
same-sex unions in South Africa and in other countries, the 
report noted that although same-sex marriage has not yet been 
legally recognized, "it is clear that in less than a decade 
there have been major policy changes in South Africa regarding 
homosexuals and homosexual conduct...recognizing certain 
marriage-like rights of partners in same-sex unions."

Nevertheless, "We are in danger of creating a theological 
nightmare," wrote one of the committee's gay members, in a 
separate section entitled "A Gay Perspective." Arguing that 
opposing a service of "blessing" to a service of marriage 
creates confusion, he asked, "What exactly is the difference 
between seeking a public recognition by the church of a 
permanent relationship through marriage and seeking the blessing 
of a permanent relationship?"

The committee recommended that the CPSA "set in motion a 
pastoral process to help the church engage, at all levels, with 
homosexuality," including consultation with non-governmental 
organizations (NGOs), ecumenical partners and other stakeholders 
in the issue in what is called an "indaba," a Zulu concept 
meaning a council or meeting to discuss an important matter. The 
committee recommends that the process should result in a report 
for the next Provincial Synod.

Members of the committee included Professor Church; Judge 
Thollie Madala; the Very Rev. Peter Lenkoe; Canon Godfrey 
Henwood; the Revs. Michelle Pilet, Tim Long, Douglas Torr and 
Lynda Wyngaard; and Sr. Maureen (OHP).

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--The Rev. Jan Nunley is deputy director of Episcopal News 
Service.