General Synod of the Scottish Episcopal Church

2015 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 95-98
Author(s):  
Frank Cranmer

The General Synod met in St Paul's and St George's Church in Edinburgh from 11 to 13 June. In his charge, the Primus, the Most Revd David Chillingworth, told Synod that the most significant challenge before it was same-sex marriage; and he believed that the time had come when that fundamental issue had to be addressed. It had been an extraordinary experience to be in Dublin, the city of his birth, just after the Constitutional Referendum on Same-Sex Marriage, when the most Catholic country in Europe decided to make the change. Just because society changed, the Church did not have to change as well – but it clearly had to consider the possibility of change. And that is what Synod would do.

2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-28
Author(s):  
Benoît Laplante ◽  
Teresa Castro-Martín ◽  
Clara Cortina ◽  
Ana Fostik

Ireland was known for being conservative in family matters. The 2015 referendum that allowed same-sex marriage and the 2018 one that allowed abortion showed this is no longer true. This article aims at better understanding recent family change in Ireland by looking at changes in values on topics related with family behaviour and change in behaviour related with family formation–the rise of unmarried cohabitation, and childbearing within unmarried cohabitation–with a focus on the Catholic dogma and its role in the Irish society. We use data from the 2008 European Value Survey and from the five censuses conducted between 1991 and 2011. We find that the young have been moving away from the teachings of the Church on unmarried cohabitation, but that a few years before the 2018 referendum, they were still close to it on abortion. There is no clear negative relationship between cohabitation or fertility within cohabitation and education, but the use of cohabitation seems to vary according to education. The most enduring legacy of the Church doctrine seems to be the late development of family policies that make motherhood hard to reconcile with work and might explain why cohabiting women have few children.


2018 ◽  
Vol 74 (4) ◽  
pp. 396-408
Author(s):  
Daniel Ude Asue

This essay discusses Same-Sex Marriage Prohibition Bill in Nigeria, with a focus on the contribution of the Nigerian Catholic Church to the law. Though the Catholic Church in Nigeria did not actively contribute towards the public debates about homosexuality that resulted into the Same-Sex Marriage Prohibition Bill it nevertheless welcomed the bill. However, the official teachings of the Catholic Church and elucidations from the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria could potentially contribute to creating an inclusive society. In what way can we potentially utilize the principles of Catholic Social Teaching to make room for an inclusion of homosexual persons in the life of the church and in society?


2019 ◽  
pp. 168-193
Author(s):  
Thomas Hennessey ◽  
Máire Braniff ◽  
James W. McAuley ◽  
Jonathan Tonge ◽  
Sophie A. Whiting

This chapter examines the importance of the Protestant Faith and Church and of the Orange Order to UUP members. Whilst overwhelmingly Protestant, the UUP has always rejected the overtly fundamentalist, Free Presbyterian brand with which the DUP was associated for many years. The chapter analyses whether the Church of Ireland or Presbyterian Church provide most UUP members. The chapter then discusses the religiously conservative attitudes of members, assessing the extent of support for, or opposition to, the legalization of same-sex marriage and abortion, currently still prohibited (other than in exceptional cases for abortion) in Northern Ireland. The extent to which members offer support for ‘mixed’ (Protestant–Catholic) marriages and for unfettered marching rights for the Orange Order, will also be examined. Are older members, politically socialized in an era of fraternal Orange–UUP relations, still more sympathetic to the Orange Order? The survey data allow direct comparisons with the DUP.


2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charlotte Smith

Some scholars, faced with the apparent conflict between the Church of England's teaching on marriage and the idea of equal marriage embraced by the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013, have focused on the implications of that Act for the constitutional relationship between Church, State and nation. More frequently, noting the position of the Church of England under that Act, academics have critiqued the legislation as an exercise in balancing competing human rights. This article by contrast, leaving behind a tendency to treat religion as a monolithic ‘other’, and leaving behind the neat binaries of rights-based analyses, interrogates the internal agonies of the Church of England as it has striven to negotiate an institutional response to the secular legalisation of same-sex marriage. It explores the struggles of the Church to do so in a manner which holds in balance a wide array of doctrinal positions and the demands of mission, pastoral care and the continued apostolic identity of the Church of England.


2014 ◽  
Vol 74 (3) ◽  
pp. 193-202
Author(s):  
Isolde Karle

Abstract The guidelines on family life published by the EKD (Evangelical Church in Germany) has triggered an intensive debate, especially regarding the understanding of marriage. The author demonstrates that the objections against same-sex marriage are not substantial. Instead the church should rather have an interest in opening up marriage because it highly values the concept of lasting love. On the other hand, the author points to the fact that, despite high divorce rates, the integrative force of marriage as an institution should not be underestimated. She discusses from a sociological, juridical and theological perspective how marriage provides stability, relief, confirmation, and strength. The essay concludes with a plea for marriage - of hetero- and homosexuals alike.


2021 ◽  
Vol 66 (2) ◽  
pp. 267-281
Author(s):  
Elżbieta Kużelewska ◽  
Marta Michalczuk-Wlizło

Abstract There is room for everyone in the Catholic Church, but there is no consent for same-sex marriage in that Church as marriage only between a baptized man and a woman is a sacrament. Same-sex marriage is inconsistent with the Holy Scripture where marriage is based on God’s natural law. This official Scripture’s interpretation results in lack of possibility to reconciliate the official teaching of the Church with the recognition of same-sex marriage. The world is moving forward and so are the opinions of Christians and their growing support for same-sex marriage. Such marriage is recognized in thirty states worldwide, including states with dominant Catholic religion. Regardless the official teaching, the Catholic Church’s position is not uniform. The paper discusses the official interpretation of the Scripture concerning homosexuals, analyses the position of the Catholic Church toward same-sex marriage and indicates differences in Christians’ attitudes with respect to same-sex couples in Western and Eastern Europe.


Author(s):  
Mark Hill QC

This chapter focuses on worship and liturgy in the Church of England. It first considers the form of liturgy used by the Church of England before discussing the performance of regular services in the Church. It then examines Church practice with regard to baptism, confirmation, confession, and holy communion including reservation of the sacrament. It also explains the Church policy with respect to holy matrimony, with particular emphasis on marriage by banns and by licence, superintendent registrar's certificates as a means of authorising a wedding, solemnisation of marriage, marriages in chapels, further marriage of divorced persons, and same-sex marriage. The chapter concludes by analysing how the Church conducts burials and funerals and looking at other church services such as daily offices, visitation of the sick, and exorcism.


2019 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
pp. 62-74
Author(s):  
Marie Balas ◽  
Josselin Tricou

The debate about the same sex marriage bill in France has launched a significant sequence of politicization and assertion in the streets for the conservative Catholics. Though mobilization declined after the law was passed, these initiatives still arouse differentiated appropriation of public urban space. Relying on ethnographic work, this article analyses two logics of action emerging complementarily and organizing these post-‘Mariage pour tous’ demonstrations in Paris. In both cases there is a real ‘place-taking/place-making’ at work. Extending the study of recent Catholic mobilizations to the different activists still active after ‘La Manif Pour Tous’ makes it possible to understand how central the issue of drop in status seems in order to analyze these protest repertoires and their evolutionary inscription in the city, especially in the direction of the ‘peripheries’.


2013 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-86
Author(s):  
Philip Morris

In his April Presidential Address the Archbishop focused on two issues: the Report of the Review Group chaired by Lord Harries and same-sex marriage. His concern with the Review is that ‘it is possible to get so bogged down or hung up on some of the details of the Provincial Review that there is a danger in dismissing all of it because one disagrees with some of the points it makes’. He regretted that churches with ordained clergy ‘have been tempted to assume that all ministry is vested in an omnicompetent professional minister’ and reminded his listeners that the basic sacrament of the Church was not ordination but baptism. His concern with the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill was that clergy who would not conduct same-sex marriages needed protection, yet the Church itself needed to be allowed to conduct such marriages if it decided to do so in future. He felt that the Church ‘needed to have a discussion as to whether we want to continue having this special status in law as far as marriage is concerned’.


2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 343-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Ellen Gordon ◽  
William L. Gillespie

AbstractPolitical mobilization by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints against ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) was more widespread and important than most studies of the episode have acknowledged. Several decades later, the Church is again organized and active in opposing legal recognition of same-sex marriage. In this article, we explore why and how the Latter-Day Saints mobilized on these two issues. We argue that their mobilization can be understood through classic social movement theory, even though the Church is not an economic-based interest group. Furthermore, the Mormons' approach in fighting the ERA — drawing on centralized authority, tapping into established volunteer and communications networks, effectively channeling money and personnel to where they are most needed, and engaging in stealth politics (obscuring the centralized nature of apparently spontaneous action) — is echoed in the fight against same-sex marriage, even though the times and technology have somewhat changed the mobilization dynamic.


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