Bishop Gene Robinson, interviewed by the Guardian, criticized the way the Church of England treats their gay and lesbian clergy, the idea of two-tier Anglican Communion and go-slow approach of the Archbishop Rowan Williams.
Alluding to the significant number of clergy who are gay, he said: “I think gay clergy in the Church of England are thought of as a problem to be solved or at least lived with, rather than a gift from God.”
Robinson, who is in Britain to speak at the Greenbelt festival at Cheltenham Racecourse this weekend, added that he could not accept the archbishop’s recent comments that if the Episcopal church refused to uphold the current moratorium on consecrating actively gay bishops or blessing civil unions, the communion might have to be reorganised into a two-tier, or “two-track” model. “I can’t imagine anything that would be more abhorrent to Jesus than a two-tier church,” he said. “Either we are children of God and brothers and sisters in Christ, or we aren’t. There are not preferred children and second-class children. There are just children of God.”
Asked whether Williams’s softly, softly approach might in the end be more successful in persuading the communion than unilateral action by one church, he pointed out that the very nature of the communion — a loose agglomeration of equals — meant that national churches were always acting autonomously. Furthermore, someone had to make the first move.
“We [Episcopalians] virtually led the way in terms of the ordination of women. And I believe had we not done that the ordination of women in the Church of England perhaps would not have occurred when it did. And the discussion around the ordination of women bishops would not be occurring.”
He compared the archbishop’s strategy, unfavourably, with the church’s dithering over the civil rights movement in America.
Read the rest here. Full interview tomorrow.