The Church of England clergy wish to see monks allowed to marry homosexual {couples}, homosexual monks to wed, and see the Anglican teachings towards homosexuality modified at an upcoming Common Synod, in keeping with a survey by The Instances. The vast majority of virtually 1,200 respondents would additionally welcome a feminine chief and imagine Britain is not a Christian nation.
The survey, revealed on Tuesday, is the primary of its sort since 2014, when the UK legalized same-sex civil unions. On the time, 51% of Anglican clergy mentioned same-sex marriage was “unsuitable” whereas 39% supported it.
Lower than a decade later, 59% would bless same-sex {couples}, whereas 32% wouldn’t, and 63% assume the Church of England ought to enable gay clergy to enter same-sex civil unions. In keeping with The Instances, 53.4% of the monks favor altering the legislation to permit them to marry homosexual {couples}, whereas 36.5% are towards it. Nonetheless, solely 49.2% can be prepared to officiate at same-sex weddings, whereas 41% wouldn’t.
EXCLUSIVE: The Instances has surveyed 1,200 Church of England priestsHears views of front-line clergy in unprecedented detail- Majority again same-sex marriage + need church to simply accept premarital and homosexual intercourse for first timePlus 4 different main findings:https://t.co/5yhFW5DRNr
— Kaya Burgess (@kayaburgess) August 29, 2023
Nearly two thirds of the clergy surveyed help altering the present Anglican doctrine that “gay apply is incompatible with scripture,” whereas solely 29.7% favor maintaining it. The church is nominally against any intercourse exterior of marriage, however 37.2% of respondents would settle for it in “dedicated” same-sex relationships and 27.3% wish to see the opposition dropped outright.
The Instances extrapolated the outcomes to imply that “greater than 10,600 of the church’s 20,000 monks” would again same-sex marriage throughout the church. Nonetheless, the survey was based mostly on the responses of 1,185 serving clergy, after The Instances reached out to five,000 monks with addresses in England, randomly chosen from the Crockford’s Clerical Listing of Anglican clergy.
The survey pattern amounted to six% of lively clergy, outlined as vicars, rectors, curates, chaplains, and retired monks who can nonetheless rejoice sacraments equivalent to Holy Communion.
Along with the ocean change on the LGBTQ difficulty, the survey additionally confirmed 80% of the clergy in favor of getting a feminine Archbishop of Canterbury. Likewise, 64.2% mentioned Britain could possibly be described as a Christian nation “solely traditionally, not at the moment,” 9.2% mentioned no outright, and solely 24.2% mentioned sure.
“That is completely large,” the Reverend Andrew Foreshew-Cain, who runs the Marketing campaign for Equal Marriage within the Church, advised The Instances. The survey confirmed “actually clear proof of the path of change the church must pursue,” mentioned Foreshew-Cain, who married his accomplice in defiance of church guidelines.
“The church is the church, and, as such, not a membership. It has a definite vocation that doesn’t embrace searching for reputation,” mentioned the Bishop of Leeds, the Proper Reverend Nick Baines, talking on behalf of the C of E. “Repentance means being open to altering our thoughts so that society ought to encounter each love and justice. And this implies generally going towards the circulation of fashionable tradition, nevertheless uncomfortable that is likely to be.”
The Church of England is a Protestant denomination created in 1534, when King Henry VIII rejected the authority of the Roman Catholic Pope in a divorce dispute. Its titular head is the British monarch, whereas the Archbishop of Canterbury acts as its primate.
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