In a very moving and tearful final presentation, our Primate, the Most Rev. Fred Hiltz, said as he closed General Synod: "I don’t want to exaggerate this, but I think our church has truly been renewed in the spirit of God … reborn in love."

Our Primate named something that each one of us felt as we left the Halifax gathering of 350 delegates from across this country and began our return home—we knew we had been part of something monumental, something that marked a new beginning. As Bishop Coffin of Newfoundland said: "Synod 2010 had made history in its decisions and in the tenor of its debate."

So what was such a big deal for this General Synod and for the church?

Well, for the first time we were able to sit together and speak to each other civilly and lovingly and listen and speak honestly about a topic that has divided the church and is usually accompanied with much division, distrust and acrimony, that is human sexuality and same-sex blessings. I have to tell you, this has not been the case for the past 20 years as we have addressed this issue. I do not want to go through our dirty laundry, but suffice it to say that over the past 20 years there has been nasty and unbecoming behaviour on all sides of this debate. But not this time, as young, old, bishop, priest, lay person, gay, straight, aboriginal, non-aboriginal, black and white, we sat together and spoke with each other.

Not only were we able to sincerely and openly listen and speak to each other from the head and the heart, we found a way to move forward, out of entrenchment and into a sense of new life for our church.

As I said last week, we did not pass a resolution, a law dictating how we were going to behave. Instead, we met in mixed groups and openly spoke with each other and our conversations were recorded and then formed the basis of a pastoral statement. This pastoral statement was then presented back to synod which was all but unanimously passed.

However, since we didn’t duke-it-out in front of media cameras and recorders, you won’t read much about what happened at Synod in the national newspapers and the little you do read won’t be very accurate.

So what did we say? What did we agree on?

• We affirmed our commitment to be in unity and to stay together as a church.
• We affirmed the full inclusion of gay and lesbians as members in our churches.
• We affirmed our desire to be mutually accountable to each other.
• We acknowledged that no one should be forced to do something they don’t want to.
• We acknowledged that different local contexts call at times for different local discernment, decision and action.

So what happened to bring this about?

I also think the strong message from the under 40 demographic was heard loud and clear. Sexual orientation is an irrelevant issue for them. Like it or not, the generation coming up does not see this as a moral issue for spiritual leadership. Do you know that the largest evangelical church in the US is declining at an extraordinary rate and a very strong reason is that they have alienated themselves from their young people by continuing to be so strident about this issue.

Is this listening to our young people pandering to popularity? Or is it safe to say that the Holy Spirit is not moving our young people in and outside of the church to see this issue as significant?

There has been some deep maturing of all sides of the debate with respect to biblical interpretation. In the early years of this debate some framed their argument from a justice perspective while others framed their argument from a scriptural perspective. One side would say, "I don’t care what the bible says, this is a justice issue!" Others would simplistically say, "Here it is in black and white". Well this was no longer the case. All sides of the argument have done their homework and have a credible biblical perspective. We are now, more than ever, appreciating that there are many ways to interpret scripture and many of these interpretations are well thought out and defensible. So we are now beginning to be in a place where we are desiring to live together in unity while respecting our diverse perspectives.

Interestingly, our first reading today is one of those passages which comes up in the debate.  Galatians 3: 28: "In Christ's family there can be no division into Jew and non-Jew, slave and free, male and female. Among us you are all equal. That is, we are all in a common relationship with Jesus Christ." The Message

In the early church there was a dispute raging about who is was in and who is was out of the church. Peter’s followers thought that the new believers should act like Jews and be circumcised while Paul believed that Jesus brought in a new law that went way beyond the Jewish community and therefore circumcision was no longer needed. Paul’s argument prevailed and because of it, Christianity and God’s love has been accessible to us. Later, this passage was used to help us with the slave issue and then later still, the ordination of women. With each successive age, the borders that mark who is in and who is out are stretched as we are asked to include more widely.

I realize for some of you the church’s handling of this has been a difficult topic. Some of you have had this issue brought very closely to you as you have children, relatives and loved ones who are homosexual. I most definitely want to affirm, at Trinity, all people, Jew, non-Jew, male, female, young, old, black, white, aboriginal, non-aboriginal, all cultures, gay, lesbian and straight, have a home here at Trinity and are welcomed here as full members.
(Congregational applause)

In the gospel reading we heard today, Jesus restores a man suffering severe mental challenges. The healed man wants to drop everything and follow Jesus but Jesus sends him back to his family and home.

To close, let me pass on a story from one of our aboriginal speakers from General Synod. A politically difficult dynamic in our discussions was the tension that existed between the English-background culture non-aboriginal and the aboriginal peoples. Since residential schools, the church has been vigilant to make efforts to bring about healing and reconciliation. However, our conversations about homosexuality seemed to be causing further division. Generally, the aboriginal peoples were not particularly receptive to this discussion about homosexuality. As they repeatedly told us that they were taught by white missionaries that this was wrong.

Near the end of our proceedings, an aboriginal woman came to the mike and told us her story. She told us that her brother was gay and because of that he could not live in their community and so he left and went to one of the big cities where he lived a life of risk and was murdered. To this day, her mother grieves that because of his sexual orientation he could not come home, he could not belong to his community, and that he died so far away from those who loved him. …And then she sat down.

All of us are of Christ's family, all of us, and because of that we are heirs of his covenant promises and of his profound love.

See also

Sexuality Discernment Pastoral Statement
http://www.anglican.ca/gs2010/atsynod/sdr-june-9-2010/
 

General Synod 2010
http://www.anglican.ca/gs2010/