Priest in same-sex marriage loses legal challenge to bishop’s ‘discriminatory’ response

Posted Mar 22, 2018

[Anglican Communion News Service] The Church of England did not unlawfully discriminate against a priest by refusing to grant a license after he entered a same-sex marriage, London’s Court of Appeal said March 22. The Rev. Jeremy Pemberton married his partner, Laurence Cunnington, in 2014 shortly after same-sex civil marriages were legalized in England and Wales.

Read the full article here.


Comments (5)

  1. James Graham says:
    March 22, 2018 at 9:56 pm

    Clearly the hierarchy of the Church of England are still living with a twisted mindset rooted in the worst nightmares of the Middle Ages. I suppose if they had really had their way, they would have flayed, drawn and quartered, and burned this LGBT priest at the stake. Please know, all of you psychologically and morally deranged power brokers in the Church of England who support this stance against same-sex marriage for clergy, and others–your time, and your power, is running out. Thankfully, however long you may hang onto your wicked and pernicious practices, the evil, hurtful sickness in your hearts will die with you.

  2. Robert Walker says:
    March 23, 2018 at 8:32 pm

    And the Church of England wonders why their Churches are nearly empty on Sundays with the possible exception of folks on vacation looking at the architecture. There is no hope for improvement until a younger generation is in charge.

  3. Bob Scruggs says:
    March 23, 2018 at 10:13 pm

    Decisions to punish an individual often punish many others. And so the Church of England, in disallowing a priest who is in a same-sex marriage, simply removed an individual from giving priestly services to those who request it. It administratively has wasted a resource that took money, time, and effort to develop. What intangible difference is there between the services of a same-sex married priest and an opposite-sex married priest. Does the former priest bring an invisible abomination with him when performing priestly services? If his same-sex status is noncompliant with the Scriptures, then are priests in opposite-sex marriages simply without sin? It seems the gender issue is the only sin that elicits drastic action by the highest leadership of the Church of England. The Bible leads us to believe that we “all sin and fall short ….”, so presumably ‘straight’ priests sin also, but apparently their sins are ignored. Prohibiting the priest in a same-sex marriage is hypocrisy at its most powerful destructive front-row seat. Denominations have neither record-breaking attendance nor new-member numbers, so it would behoove churches to keep what they have and not run off qualified clergy. Sadly, the priest in a same-sex marriage is part of a Church Suicide Process which is authored by the princes of the Church who explain the effect in elegant and beautifully literate language, empowered by having, along with His Holiness, The Bishop of Rome, their own license of ‘ex cathedra.’

  4. Matthew Craig says:
    March 25, 2018 at 10:43 pm

    Robert Walker notes that CofE “Churches are nearly empty on Sundays.” That’s not due to the church’s stance on same-sex marriage. The growing churches in the UK are the ones that oppose same-sex marriage and other elements of the new sexual morality. If anything, the CofE’s growing liberalization, such as that found in TEC, is driving people from the pews rather than to them.

    Bob Scruggs poses the question “What intangible difference is there between the services of a same-sex married priest and an opposite-sex married priest?” While there may or may not be differences in services rendered, it bears noting that a same-sex married priest is not qualified for the office. Read I Timothy 3 for information on that.

    [edit: inclusion of full name rather than just first name]

  5. Dallas Baxter says:
    March 27, 2018 at 6:53 pm

    We in the American Diocese of the Rio Grande are blessed by the ministries of same-gender married deacons and priests whose gifts are manifold and whose insights go deep into discrimination that many of us have not felt. It is a gift of God to have them in our midst to teach us and love us, and we welcome them without reservation.

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