Love in a Time of Impasse

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is the latest to make news in the sexuality wars, and I am quite happy to let them have the limelight for a while. It was a little eerie to follow the story, as they were meeting at the Minneapolis Convention Center, where General Convention pulled the switch on Anglicanland's ongoing roller-coaster ride in 2003. I was there then, so I could picture the environment in my mind's eye. It is also eerie to read first reports of how the ELCA's decision is playing among those Lutherans who dissent from the majority position of their Churchwide Assembly. The refrains are all too familiar.

We are at an impasse. At certain levels, of course, the majority has spoken clearly and, as they say, "elections have consequences." But if we either zoom in or zoom out from either the Churhwide Assembly or the General Convention, the picture is murkier. One of the "consequences" of General Convention's "election" looks increasingly likely to be some degree of marginalization for the Episcopal Church in the councils of Anglicanism--the Archbishop's two-tier/two-track scenario--and an attendant effort by the minority within TEC to remain in Tier/Track One even while the church as a whole is consigned to Tier/Track Two. These consquences may strike many as abstract, far-removed and slow-moving. But they are quite real, and their effects at the level of "here and now" are already being felt. Communities of Christians--Episcopalians--who have an investment in one another--a history together, networks of deep friendships, shared joys and sorrows, godparents to one another's children--find themselves riven, on opposite sides of the Great Divide. They don't have the luxury, in any sense--nor, frankly, the desire, the stomach for it--of going separate ways. Yet, convictions are held very deeply, and whatever capacity there may once have been for pretending that the differences don't exist is evaporating very quickly.

To complicate matters even further, there is another dimension of disagreement that cuts obliquely and jaggedly across the scene. Is the Issue at Hand--i.e. the place of same-sex relationships in the discipline and sacramental life of the Church--an appropriate "ditch" in which to "die"? This is not a liberal-conservative split, but a question that divides liberals from liberals and conservatives from conservatives. We have seen this so far most clearly and painfully among conservatives ("reasserters," to use Kendall Harmon's helpful taxonomy). The Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) is filled with reasserters who answer the "ditch" question in the affirmative; anyone who advocates for anything other than heterosexual marriage as an acceptable ethical context for sexual activity has stepped out of bounds, and there is no imperative to remain in communion with such people. The Communion Partners (bishops and rectors) represent those reasserters who do not believe it is necessarily a church-dividng issue, and who thus seek to stay in relationship (albeit a differentiated one) with the Episcopal Church, fully within the structure of its constitution and canons.

But the self-styled "progressives" ("reappraisers" in Harmon's parlance), are not immune from this dimension of the conflict. There are those within dioceses and/or parishes that tilt in a reasserter direction who are immensely troubled, and who wonder whether they are providing "aid and comfort to the enemy"--cooperating with the purveyors of injustice and bigotry--by their mere continued presence and participation in ministry and mission. Some have withdrawn altogether; others have pulled back from positions of leadership. Still other reppraisers who are at odds with their parochial and diocesan contexts have found themselves able to "suck it up and soldier on," believing that there is still more that unites us than there is that divides us.

Of course, both reasserters who remain in TEC and reappraisers who remain in cooperative relationships with reasserting leaders do so at the cost of some credibility among those with whom they are in fundamental agreement on The Issue.

So we are at an impasse. How then shall we live?

I suppose I have to acknowledge at the outset that any answers I might propose to this question are addressed only to those on either side of the Great Divide who have decided that it is neither necessary nor desirable to unchurch (or unchurch themselves from) those with whom they disagree. I'm not going to argue that prior question here. I'm speaking to that set of Episcopalians who want to keep the bridges in good repair even in the midst of our profound disagreements over issues that skirt perilously close to the boundary between adiaphora ("matter indifferent") and core doctrine.

No one likes to be at an impasse. But the first step in the direction of getting us out of this undesirable place is counterintuitive, and that is to accept it; indeed, to make friends with it, to learn to see this time of tension as a channel of grace. This means, of course, laying aside any expectation of persuading "them" to accept "our" correct point of view. Reappraisers tend to assume that time and momentum are on their side, and that if they're just patient, reasserters will quit reasserting what is demonstrably false and "come around" in due course. This attitude is, as a British diplomat might say, "unhelpful." But so any corresponding expectation among reasserters that any honest and thorough appraisal of scriptural and theological evidence can only lead to a conclusion that affirms the traditional understanding of sexual morality, and that we should therefore drop the question entirely. So I'm not suggesting that we should stop the converssation about sexuality; quite the opposite, we should keep talking. But "progress in negotiations" should not be an implicit condition for continued sacramental and ecclesial communion.

Thinking at the same time more tactically and more spiritually (ascetically?), I’m increasingly aware of our need to cultivate the habit of mutual generosity. This means, among other things, bending over backwards to give one another the benefit of the doubt as to motives and intentions, to resolve to jump to the best possible conclusion about another’s words and actions, rather than the worst. It means forgiving our brother or sister, not seven times, but, per Jesus, seventy times seven. It means learning to ask ourselves what in our “opponent’s” position we can learn from? How are they are gift to the whole? How are we all richer and more blessed because they and their views are among us? How are we challenged and called to stretch?

The key to this attitude of generosity is that it is indeed mutual—reciprocal, working both ways. It can’t just be something that we expect “them” to do. Times of conflict can turn into great opportunities for growth—indeed, times of blessing—if we can abandon a Win-Lose mentality. For what it’s worth, I am persuaded that, generations from now, neither “side” in the present conflict over sexuality will be proven “right.” Rather, I suspect that both sides will have been shown to be wrong. What our descendants will recognize as “right” will probably be something we are not now imagining. If we are who we say we are as the Church of Jesus Christ, and if the Gospel is what we believe it to be, we will persevere in humble generosity in anticipation of that day.