Not about Sex (Dutton-Gillett)

It's Really Not About Sex
by the Rev. Matthew Dutton-Gillett

Just recently, the Anglican Communion website published a rather lengthy essay, "What is Anglicanism?," by the Most Rev. Henry Luke Orombi, Archbishop of Uganda. [The complete text is now only available at First Things.] The essay is mainly a history lesson, in which the archbishop recounts the arrival of Anglican Christianity in his country, and the very real sacrifices made by many of those missionaries and by the newly Anglicanized Ugandans . (Indeed, the martyrs of Uganda are remembered in our calendar.)

In sharing some details of the founding of the Anglican Church of Uganda and its subsequent growth, the archbishop also weaves in another story, about what he understands to be the centrality of Scripture in the life of the church. Near the end of his essay, the archbishop makes what appears to be his central point:

In the Church of Uganda, Anglicanism has been built on three pillars: martyrs, revival, and the historic episcopate. Yet each of these refers back to the Word of God, the ground on which all is built: The faith of the martyrs was maintained by the Word of God, the East African revival brought to the people the Word of God, and the historic ordering of ministry was designed to advance the Word of God.

And that Word, the archbishop concludes, must be "reassert[ed]" in the Anglican Communion. The essay makes clear the archbishop's sense that the North American and European expressions of Anglicanism (which the Archbishop of York has called North Atlantic Anglicanism) have lost their understanding of the Word of God, and seems to believe – as many in the Global South seem to – that this is the root of the Communion's current situation.

Reading his remarks, I was struck powerfully by his assumption that the way he understands the Word of God is the only correct way. Indeed, while he acknowledges a place for modern biblical criticism, he nevertheless seems to regard the Bible as self-interpreting, as quite obvious in what it means, and he seems genuinely alarmed that anyone could possibly reach an understanding of Scripture that is in any way different from his own. From such a perspective, it is easy to understand why he would reach the conclusion that we in the North Atlantic provinces have lost both our minds and our faith.

Of course, the Archbishop of Uganda and many of his fellow Global South bishops are not the only ones who assume that their way of reading the Bible is the only correct way of doing so. Plenty of us in the North Atlantic provinces share in that error. Many of us assume that the way we read Scripture is surely better and more faithful, and we become genuinely alarmed that anyone would read the Bible from what seems to be such a literal mind-set. From that perspective, it is equally easy to see why many of "us" would regard "them" with the same skepticism and bewilderment with which "they" regard "us."

I believe the archbishop's essay underscores what really is going on within the Anglican Communion and beyond. Debate about sexuality, or more precisely, homosexuality, is not really the issue; it is, rather, a very significant symptom. The real issue is this divide about how the Bible is to be interpreted and understood, and its place in the life of the church. Human sexuality is the current favorite battleground for this more significant debate about Scripture. And it is no surprise that in setting forth his views about the Bible and its place in the church, Archbishop Orombi indicates that he feels much more kinship with the evangelical manifestations of the Christian faith than he does with most Anglicans in the North Atlantic provinces. I am quite sure that, if the archbishop visited my town, he would feel more at home at the huge Baptist church down the street than in our parish. And realizing this leads me to feel rather less hopeful about re-establishing unity within the Anglican Communion.

If we are to restore unity amidst our differences, I don't think we will find it in the Bible. After all, the expression of the Word of God par excellence for Christian people is not the Bible. It is, rather, Jesus himself – the Word made flesh. At the heart of our faith, we see Jesus as the most sublime expression of the Word of God, and we are convinced that Jesus as the Christ is not locked into a particular period of history, but is a living presence in the life of the church today and in the life of each of us who seek to be his followers. The Bible is a tool – and an indispensable one – in coming to know the Christ, as are tradition and reason. But the tools can ever only be tools – none of them can ever replace the One whom they help us to find.

St. Paul has been much maligned over the years. He is regarded by many as a misogynistic conservative. But it is closer to the truth, I think, to acknowledge that whatever else St. Paul was or might have been, at heart, he was a mystic whose own conversion to the Christian faith was rooted in an encounter with the Risen Christ that was difficult to put into words. As Paul himself says, when it happened, he couldn't tell whether or not he was in his own body, and after it was over, he had seen things that were impossible to describe. But the result of this encounter with the Risen Christ for Paul was radical transformation – the kind of transformation that made Paul, the observant Jew, able to say – quite astonishingly – that in Christ, there is "neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female." This leads me to conclude that in Christ, there is also neither conservative nor liberal, Global South or Global North, straight or gay. Rather, there are only human beings made in the image of God, baptized into the Body of Christ, each seeking to be transformed through our own encounter with the Risen Christ. Our life in Christ lies exactly there: in Christ. Not in the Bible, nor even in our tradition. And Jesus reminded his followers many times that life in Christ was often an unpredictable and personally crucifying experience.

The parts of Archbishop Orombi's essay that I found most moving were the stories he told of how Ugandan tribal culture was transformed in various ways through encounter with Christ. The archbishop's recognition of this transformation should remind both his Ugandan church and ours that our transformation in Christ is never completed in this life, and thus there is likely more in both his culture and ours that still longs to be touched by the healing and life-changing power of the Risen Christ. It would be a grave error for the archbishop and his church if they were to assume that no further transformation in their lives and in the life of their church and culture were needed. But it would be an equally grave error for me, or for us in the Episcopal Church, to make that same assumption, or to assume that we are somehow advanced beyond the world's other Anglicans in that process of transformation. Jesus is not done with any of us. We are all, in our own ways, incomplete. Perhaps this is where our true unity lies.

Wouldn't it be a remarkable thing if all the Anglican bishops were to gather together at Canterbury next year fully aware of their own incompleteness, and seeking their completion in Christ and in one another? That would be by far the most powerful witness I could imagine, both to the church and to the world.

About the Author: The Rev. Matthew Dutton-Gillett is a graduate of Michigan State University's James Madison College and the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He served churches in the dioceses of Missouri and Chicago prior to becoming rector of St. Elizabeth's Church in Knoxville, Tennessee in 1999. Matthew participated in the 2006 General Convention as the First Alternate Clergy Deputy from the Diocese of East Tennessee.