Reports of intemperate language at the Lambeth Commission http://www.everyvoice.net/
and their complaints about it amongst those involved in the “gay debate http://mcj.bloghorn.com
brought this response from the Revd Richard Kirker general secretary of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement today (17th March
“This is not a Sunday afternoon chat between friends on the Vicarage lawn over tea and sandwiches. Lesbian and gay Anglican Christians in the so called “orthodox Global South” are not engaged in any argument, acrimonious or not, about being priests or bishops of the Church – they are struggling for liberty and sometimes for their lives
“This is the real problem. When at the Lambeth Conference in 1998 I was forced to the ground by an African bishop to be “exorcised of my evil spirit of homosexuality” this was not just comical it was a taste of the humiliation and contempt we have to face in so many parts of the world.
“When we raise our voices it is not in support of ourselves here in England, nor is it in support of Gay American bishops, we can enjoy the freedoms of a liberal civil society no matter how much we are attacked by Christians with a different view.
“We become strident and shrill because for most people in the world this is not a theological debate, it is still a matter of life or death.
“Our voices are not angry because a bishop calls us “beasts” or “evil”, it may hurt my feelings, but as an Eastender that’s all – we are angry because in his home diocese this means approval for the brutalisation, torture and murder of people like us.
“Sadly, I am not exaggerating. It’s hardly surprising then that any meeting of Primates or Anglican Commission is going to find itself trying to bridge a huge gap in perception of homosexual people.
“It is said that the Primates of the Anglican Communion avoided too much discussion of homosexuality in past years because they “could not find a way of talking to each other that was not abusive”. Homosexual people know just how that abusive language translates into violent action in the streets of Nairobi and
Kampala.”
Ends