Canadian Diocese First to Pass Rite for Same-Gender Blessings
Episcopal News Service. June 15, 2002 [2002-152]
Jan Nunley
(ENS) For the third and final time, Canadian Anglicans in the Diocese of New Westminster have voted to approve a rite for blessing same-gender relationships. The June 14 vote, held at the annual diocesan synod in Vancouver, was 215 in favor and 126 opposed, a margin of 63 percent.
Similar motions at previous synods, in 1991 and 1998, passed by margins of 51 and 56.5 percent, but Bishop Michael Ingham had said he would not implement the change until the margin exceeded 60 percent. Ingham immediately gave his assent to the measure.
"No one is being excluded from our fellowship today. We have not taken sides with one group in our church against another. We have chosen to live together in mutual respect," Ingham said in a statement released after the vote. "In this we ask for the support of the wider church, not condemnation, and patience from those who live in very different social contexts from our own."
First to bless
The vote makes the diocese the first in the Anglican Communion to authorize a rite for the blessing of same-gender unions. The ceremony carries no legal weight and does not resemble the Rite of Holy Matrimony. The measure allows priests to perform the ceremony if the priest and congregation agree.
While the original motion before the synod had asked for a rite for the blessing of same-gender relationships while still providing a "conscience clause" for those opposed, the movers withdrew it in favor of an alternative proposal by Ingham which included the appointment of an "episcopal visitor" for parishes and clergy which disapproved of the change in diocesan policy. No priest or parish will be forced to provide the rite for same-gender couples.
Conservatives walk out
Immediately after the announcement of the results, the Rev. Trevor Walters of St. Matthew's in Abbotsford rose to withdraw his own motion asking for the creation of a non-geographical diocese within New Westminster, declared a state of "pastoral emergency" and led the walkout of nine conservative parishes.
The churches whose members walked out included Christ Church, Hope; St. Andrew's, Pender Harbour; St. John's, Shaughnessy; St. Martin's, North Vancouver; St. Matthew's, Abbotsford, St. Simon's, North Vancouver; Church of Emmanuel, Richmond; Church of the Good Shepherd, Vancouver and St. Matthias and St. Luke, Vancouver. The last three are Chinese congregations.
Walters said the nine parishes that walked out and "members of at least six other parishes" are in touch with primates of Anglican provinces worldwide and will decide their future soon.
The Rev. Ed Hird, rector of St. Simon's, North Vancouver and a spokesperson for the conservative Anglican Essentials group, read from a letter signed by five current and two retired primates of the Anglican Communion who said a positive vote by New Westminster "would be viewed not only as a grave affront but will also set in motion deliberations on breaking communion" with their provinces.
The letter was signed by David Gitari, Archbishop of Kenya, Bernard Malango, Archbishop of Central Africa, K.J. Samuel, Moderator and Primate of South India, Yong Ping Chung, Archbishop of South East Asia, Rev. Drexel Wellington Gomez, Archbishop of the West Indies, plus Harry Goodhew, former archbishop of Sydney, and retired primate Maurice Sinclair, former presiding bishop of the Southern Cone.
Members can leave, parishes can't
Neale Adams, communications officer of the diocese, said that while members of congregations are free to leave the church, parishes cannot. "If members leave, then the remaining members are the parish and they maintain the facilities. This is not a congregational church."
Steve Schuh, president of Integrity/Vancouver and a member of one of the walkout parishes, said the walkout "says to me that they have a great deal of contempt for gay and lesbian people. It says to me they can't be in a church which accepts me." Schuh said he planned to worship at St. John's in Shaughnessy on Sunday despite the walkout. "It is my parish," said Schuh, a self-described evangelical Anglican.