The issue of same-sex relationships, and more recently same-sex marriage, has caused bitter divisions among Christians. Conservatives advocate faithful adherence to the Bible’s teachings, saying that its words cannot be disputed. Liberals and LGBT+ equality advocates say such a rigid approach to biblical teaching should also mean that adulterers are put to death and forbidden to wear wool and linen at the same time. The constant reference to Leviticus 18:22 is demeaning and hurtful to LGBT+ people, they say. The Anglican Communion, the umbrella organization of the 65 provinces of the worldwide Anglican church, has been in a battle over sexuality for at least four decades. To complicate matters, the divisions broadly fall along the lines of global north and global south. The current 12-day once-a-decade Lambeth conference – confusingly held in Canterbury, Kent, rather than south London – was postponed from 2018 when Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, concluded there was no hope of finish toxic sections. It was rescheduled for 2020 but postponed again due to the Covid pandemic. In 1998, the conference adopted a resolution, known as Lambeth 1:10, which confirmed the biblical teaching. He rejected “homosexual practice as inconsistent with Scripture” and supported “faith in marriage between one man and one woman in lifelong union.” Same-sex unions should not be legalized or blessed, he added. Over the past decade, Welby, the leader of the Anglican Communion, has tried to hold together the polarized wings of his church, urging bishops, priests and congregations to “disagree well” and “walk together” despite their differences. In practice, it has angered both liberals and conservatives. In the Church of England, the leadership has insisted on a long-running debate, called Living in Love and Faith, perhaps in the hope that the world will tire of the controversy. There seems little chance of that happening. People in the UK and other countries of the global north may be looking on in bewilderment, wondering how the shrinking church can be so out of step with societal attitudes towards same-sex marriage, which the church still forbids. Subscribe to First Edition, our free daily newsletter – every morning at 7am. BST But in the global south, Anglican and other churches are growing in size and influence. Worldwide, the Anglican church includes 85 million people from 165 countries, speaking 2,000 languages. Development over the past 50 years has concentrated on young people in sub-Saharan Africa. Justin Bandi, the conservative archbishop of South Sudan and leader of the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches, which claims to represent 75% of all Anglicans, suggested on Tuesday that his church was growing because it was “believing in the Bible”, while the Church of England was shrinking because it “did not respect” the scriptures. His role was “to remind people to follow the truth and restore the authority of the Bible,” he told the Guardian. “Archbishop Welby is my leader. I respect him as a man of God and I pray for him.”
