Browning to Bishops: 'Help Us All Listen'
Episcopal News Service. April 9, 1987 [87083]
NEW YORK (DPS, April 9) -- "If we are not free as a family of Crowd's people to engage one another in love and compassion, how are we being faithful to the Gospel we preach?" With that question Presiding Bishop Edmond L. Browning sought to enlist diocesan bishops in efforts to create a constructive context for the Church's debate on human sexuality.
In an April 3 letter to the bishops of the Episcopal Church, Browning rejected bids to make him come down prematurely on "one side or the other" of the debate and said his role was to develop a climate of mutual respect in which the discussions could take place. His letter to the bishops was prepared after wide consultation and in response to the floods of mail and telephone calls he and many bishops have received. (Editors: the full text of the letter is attached.)
Recalling what he told the House of Bishops in his address last year about his own nurture and growth in traditional values of the family, Browning tried to lay the broad ground for the continuing debate.
"The Christian sexual ethic is hard, but it has been the experience of Christians that only when human love participates in something of the divine, unconditional love can the yearning of the human heart be satisfied. Many people do settle for relationships and sexual intimacy outside the Church's teaching. The question before us is how does the Church minister to those within, and those outside, the Christian community who engage in sexual intimacy outside the marriage state. This question is now being explored and, indeed, agonized over by our Standing Commission on Human Affairs and Health. I believe we are hearing that there are many minds on this subject. What we must all strive for is the grace to hear God's voice in this discussion. Our responsibility is to be faithful to God's will, not merely bless the status quo."
He went on to suggest that the Church needs to look at both the concept of values and that of behavior and added: "There is great conversation about the actions but little comprehension about the root values. What some are hearing is that we are insisting upon both a set of common values and uniform patterns of behavior from applications of such values. No wonder some are confused and angry, especially at those of us who are lifted up as guardians of the faith."