The  Consensus  Position  Articulated

The  1980s  saw  a  hardening  of  attitudes  towards  homosexuality,  both   amongst  evangelicals  and  in  wider  society.  The  anxiety  around  AIDS  encouraged   the  depiction  of  gays  as  promiscuous,  dangerous  and  diseased.⁸²  Conservative   evangelicals  increasingly  believed  there  was  a  gay-­‐liberal  conspiracy  in  the   media  and  within  the  churches,  working  in  an  almost  satanic  manner  to  draw   people  away  from  biblical  values  and  to  undermine  society  as  a  whole.  ⁸³  In   1984  the  Anglican  evangelical  Tony  Higton  formed  Action  for  Biblical  Witness  to   Our  Nation  (ABWON),  attacking  liberal  compromise  on  homosexuality  and                                                                                                                            

80  Homosexuality  and  the  Church,  51.  

81  Homosexuality  and  the  Church,  105-­‐6.  

82  Anglican  evangelical  Tony  Higton  wrote  a  letter  to  the  Times  calling  for  unrepentant  gay   clergy  to  be  dismissed  as  an  AIDS  risk.  The  LGCM,  55-­‐6.  

83  Notably  the  1980s  saw  some  significant  increase  in  gay  visibility  in  the  mass  media.  The  first   openly  gay  soap  character  on  British  TV  appeared  on  Eastenders  in  1986.  The  new  Channel  4   broadcast  magazine  programmes  aimed  at  the  gay  community  such  as  Out  on  Tuesday  in  1989   and  1990.  

interfaith  issues  and  calling  for  a  return  to  traditional  values.⁸⁴  Their  stance   against  permissiveness  and  homosexuality  created  common  ground  between   some  evangelicals  and  parts  of  the  Conservative  Party,  then  in  power.  

In  1986,  in  the  wake  of  the  success  of  the  Keep  Sunday  Special  campaign,   the  Conservative  Family  Campaign  was  founded  by  Graham  Webster-­‐Gardiner,   as  a  pressure  group  with  Tory  MPs  and  Church  of  England  clergy  as  

supporters.⁸⁵  It  presented  Britain  as  suffering  from  a  25  year  period  of  moral   decline,  and  opposed  easing  of  laws  on  abortion  and  divorce.  They  urged  the   recriminalisation  of  homosexuality  and  the  internment  of  AIDS  patients,  the   ending  of  funding  for  the  Terrence  Higgins  Trust  and  the  Family  Planning   Association,  and  denounced  government  information  and  safe  sex  campaigns  as   a  waste  of  time.  The  CFC  represented  an  extreme  grouping  within  Anglicanism  –   for  many  Anglican  evangelicals  in  this  period  cooperation  with  the  

Conservatives  was  unthinkable  –  but  the  existence  of  the  group  demonstrated   the  extent  to  which  this  profoundly  reactionary  vision  resonated  with  both   political  and  theological  conservatives.  

In  1987  Tony  Higton  introduced  a  private  members  motion  on  

homosexuality  at  the  Church  of  England’s  General  Synod.  After  an  acrimonious   debate,  an  amended  motion  was  passed  noting  that  homosexual  genital  acts  ‘fell   short  of  the  ideal’  and  required  repentance  and  the  exercise  of  compassion.⁸⁶  In   the  same  year,  again  at  the  instigation  of  Tony  Higton,  LGCM  (they  had  renamed                                                                                                                            

84  The  LGCM,  53.  

85  The  LGCM,  54.  

86  Compare  the  accounts  of  Gill  The  LGCM,  59-­‐62,  and  Some  Issues,  28.  Some  Issues  suggestively   states  that  this  motion  is  the  only  statement  of  the  mind  of  the  church  as  a  whole  on  the  issue,   290.  

themselves  to  include  Lesbians  that  year)  was  ejected  from  its  offices  on  church   property,  with  the  diocese  taking  them  to  court  to  do  so.  The  campaign  against   them  became  virulent,  accusing  them  of  promoting  promiscuity,  pornography,   paedophilia,  sado-­‐masochism,  and  proscribed  drug  use.⁸⁷  In  1988,  following   campaigning  by  CFC,  the  Local  Government  Act  was  passed,  section  28  of  which   prohibited  the  ‘promotion  of  homosexuality’  or  its  acceptability  as  ‘a  pretended   family  relationship’.  During  a  debate  in  General  Synod  that  year,  John  Selwyn   Gummer,  then  Minister  for  Agriculture,  as  well  as  a  lay  member  of  Synod,  was  to   accuse  the  church  of  not  giving  a  strong  enough  moral  lead  to  the  nation,  and  to   censure  the  Archbishop  of  York,  John  Habgood,  for  not  supporting  section  28  in   the  House  of  Lords.⁸⁸  In  1989  the  Osborne  Report,  commissioned  by  the  Church   of  England  as  a  further  attempt  at  producing  an  official  statement  of  the  

Church’s  position  on  homosexuality,  was  presented  to  the  House  of  Bishops,   who  declined  to  publish  it.  It  was  shrouded  in  secrecy,  but  leaked  to  the  media.⁸⁹   It  had  examined  the  experiences  of  gay  Christians  and  summarised  opposing   views  before  stating  a  need  for  the  bishops  to  be  creative  and  inclusive,  but   made  no  specific  recommendations.  LGCM  criticised  the  report  as  lacking  teeth.  

Evangelicals  saw  it  as  too  liberal.⁹⁰  These  debates  and  conflicts  confirmed  for   many  evangelicals  that  there  was  a  powerful  liberal  conspiracy  ranged  against   them,  connecting  church,  media,  and  gay  rights  organisations,  which  worked  to   undermine  traditional  values,  destroy  the  family,  and  marginalise  the  church.  

87  The  LGCM,  65-­‐68.  

88  The  LGCM,  62.  

89  Monica  Furlong,  CofE:  The  State  It’s  In  (London:  Hodder  and  Stoughton,  2000),  140-­‐2.  

90  The  LGCM,  84-­‐5.  Michael  Vasey  noted  that  many  of  the  contributors  to  the  Osborne  Report   were  evangelical  in  his  Evangelical  Christians  and  Gay  Rights  (Nottingham:  Grove  Books,  1991),   12.  

The  more  gay-­‐affirming  tone  that  had  marked  the  modernist  evangelical  writing   of  the  1970s  began  to  disappear  during  the  1980s,  as  fears  rose  that  the  church   was  being  too  timid  in  resisting  the  cultural  forces  ranged  against  it.  

It  was  in  the  1980s  that  the  evangelical  consensus  position  on  

homosexuality  was  to  find  its  classic  exposition,  in  John  Stott’s  Issues  Facing   Christians  Today.  Stott  was  the  key  figure  in  English  evangelicalism  throughout   our  period,  widely  recognised  as  a  touchstone  of  orthodoxy,  and  a  guiding  force   in  Keele  and  post-­‐Keele  evangelicalism,  seeking  to  engage  with  church  and   society  rather  than  withdrawing  from  it.  His  Issues  Facing  Christians  Today,  first   published  in  1984,  was  one  of  the  most  important  expressions  of  this  

commitment,  discussing  a  number  of  the  most  significant  social  issues  of  the   day  and  seeking  to  present  a  principled  evangelical  perspective  on  them.  Its   intent  was  therefore  primarily  ethical  and  apologetic:  presenting  an  ethical   position  on  a  topic  in  the  public  eye,  and  defending  it  against  alternative  views.  

Pastoral  concerns  (even  if  included  in  the  discussion)  were  not  primary.  It  has   remained  a  classic  popular  evangelical  text  on  social  ethics,  continuously  in   print  since  publication  and  now  in  its  fourth  edition.  

Stott  followed  the  pattern  of  biblical  interpretation  already  established   by  Green  and  Lovelace  –  in  a  discussion  centred  on  the  creation  narratives,  he   argued  that  lifelong  heterosexual  marriage  was  the  divinely  ordained  pattern   for  sexual  activity,  and  all  deviation  from  that  (including  homosexuality)  was  to   be  seen  as  sinful.⁹¹  Gays  were  to  live  a  life  of  abstinence,  though  healing  might  

91  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  303-­‐12.  

be  a  possibility  for  some.⁹²  Stott  was  careful  to  affirm  the  full  humanity  of  gays,   maintaining  a  clear  distinction  between  orientation  and  behaviour  as  a  means  of   arguing  against  homophobia.  However,  he  also  argued  for  an  appropriate  place   for  church  discipline  in  enforcing  agreed  standards  of  sexual  morality,  asserting   that  rejecting  homophobia  should  not  prevent  ‘proper  Christian  disapproval  of   homosexual  behaviour.’⁹³  

Despite  Stott’s  condemnation  of  homophobia  it  is  hard  to  avoid  Michael   Vasey’s  conclusion  that  such  statements  were  becoming  conventional  rather   than  carrying  much  actual  weight.⁹⁴  Although  Stott  mentioned  the  church’s   failings,  there  was  no  sense  that  corrective  action  should  be  taken,  or  that  the   church  might  have  a  moral  obligation  to  work  for  justice  for  gays  in  wider   society.  Stott’s  approach  contained  an  implicit  argument  that  undermined  his   explicit  stance  against  homophobia.  It  was  clear  that  he  felt  a  robust  apologetic   was  a  necessity  because  of  the  existence  of  a  defined  ‘enemy’:  a  liberal-­‐gay   conspiracy.  Although  at  times  his  interlocutors  were  named  writers,  he  also   referred  to  groups  like  the  ‘so-­‐called’  Gay  Christian  Movement  (the  rather   ungracious  ‘so-­‐called’  was  removed  in  the  third  edition),  and  the  less  clearly   defined  ‘homosexual  lobby’,  ‘the  secular  world’,  ‘the  world’  or  ‘the  secular  mind’,   (all  used  interchangeably).  The  implication  was  that  a  homogeneous  liberal   enemy  existed  that  advocated  even  the  abandonment  of  monogamy.⁹⁵  At  one  

92  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  319.  

93  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  322.  

94  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  321;  Michael  Vasey,  Strangers  and  Friends  (London:  

Hodder  and  Stoughton,  1995),  180.  

95  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  303,  306,  317,  318;  (2^nd  ed.),  338,  341,  355,  357;  (3^rd   ed.),  384,  389,  411,  413,  (‘the  world’  not  in  3^rd  ed);  (4^th  ed.),  452,  470,  473.  

point  he  even  referred  to  ‘homosexual  Christians’  as  a  monolithic  grouping   whose  views  are  uniformly  liberal:  

Homosexual  Christians  are  not,  however,  satisfied  with  this  biblical   teaching  about  human  sexuality  and  the  institution  of  heterosexual   marriage.  They  bring  forward  a  number  of  objections  to  it,  in  order   to  defend  the  legitimacy  of  homosexual  partnerships.⁹⁶  

    In  the  third  edition  of  1999,  the  following  section  appeared  (remaining  in   the  fourth  edition):  

They  [‘many  homosexual  people’]  regard  it  as  a  great  victory  that  in   1973  the  trustees  of  the  American  Psychiatric  Association  removed   homosexuality  from  its  official  list  of  mental  illnesses.  Michael  Vasey   declares  that  this  decision  was  not  the  result  of  some  ‘liberal’  

conspiracy.  But  that  is  exactly  what  it  was.  Seventy  years  of   psychiatric  opinion  were  overthrown  not  by  science  (for  no  fresh   evidence  was  produced)  but  by  politics.⁹⁷  

Perhaps  unconsciously,  Stott  was  painting  a  picture  for  his  readers  of  an   organised  liberal-­‐gay  conspiracy  representing  the  cultural  forces  of  the  sexual   revolution  of  the  1960s,  who  were  closely  linked  to  Christian  groups  to  the   extent  that  gay  Christians  en  masse  may  be  assumed  to  be  ‘not  satisfied’  with   biblical  teaching  and  the  institution  of  marriage.⁹⁸  Gays  were  once  again  being   presented  as  emblematic  of  liberalism  and  the  visible  face  of  a  shadowy   conspiracy  seeking  to  undermine  church  and  society.  

96  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  312;  (2^nd  ed  ),  347;  (3^rd  ed.),  397;  (4^th  ed.),  459,  470,   473.  

97  Stott,  New  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (London:  Marshall  Pickering,  3^rd  ed.,  1999),  413;  (4^th   ed.),  472.  

98  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  312.  

Stott’s  influence  brought  the  work  of  psychoanalyst  Elizabeth  Moberly  to   the  attention  of  evangelical  leaders.  Stott  made  significant  use  of  her  

Homosexuality:  A  New  Christian  Ethic,  published  in  1983.⁹⁹  Moberly  argued  that   homosexuality  was  best  understood  as  ‘same  sex  ambivalence’,  a  response  to  a   (perhaps  unconscious)  deprivation  of  love  from  the  same  sex  parent  during   childhood  by  which  an  individual  attempts  to  find  that  love  through  same-­‐sex   attachments.  ¹⁰⁰  This  analysis  allowed  her  to  view  homosexuality  as  a  natural   response  to  a  childhood  problem  rather  than  as  pathology,  whilst  also  

suggesting  that  homosexual  same  sex  relationships  can  never  be  genuinely   fulfilling.  Moberly  was  actually  critical  of  both  liberal  and  conservative   perspectives,  but  in  advocating  a  position  in  which  orientation  was  not  

condemned  but  sexual  acts  were,  she  allowed  evangelicals  to  cite  her  work  as   evidence  that  their  position  had  scientific  credibility.¹⁰¹  

Particularly  notable  was  Lance  Pierson’s  use  of  Moberly  in  his  Grove   pastoral  series  booklet.¹⁰²  Pierson’s  booklet  would  remain  the  series’  main   pastoral  treatment  of  homosexuality  throughout  the  rest  of  our  period  and   would  be  recommended  by  Bob  Fyall  and  Mark  Bonnington  in  their  Grove   biblical  series  booklet  on  homosexuality  a  decade  later.¹⁰³    Pierson  wrote  

99  Elizabeth  Moberly,  Homosexuality:  A  New  Christian  Ethic  (Cambridge:  James  Clark  and  Co.,   1983).  

100  Moberly,  Homosexuality,  2-­‐4.  

101  Issues  facing  Christians  Today  (1^st  ed.),  319-­‐20;  John  White,  Eros  Redeemed  (Guildford:  Eagle,   1993),  179.  

102  Lance  Pierson,  No-­Gay  Areas  (Nottingham:  Grove  Books,1989).  Pierson  was  the  author  of  the   study  guide  to  Stott’s  Issues  Facing  Christians  Today  published  in  the  1986  reprint  of  the  1^st  ed   and  in  the  1990  2^nd  ed.  

103  Mark  Bonnington  and  Bob  Fyall,  Homosexuality  and  the  Bible  (Cambridge:  Grove  Books,   1996),  2.  

explicitly  as  an  ex-­‐gay  evangelical,  now  married.¹⁰⁴  He  accepted  the  biblical   understanding  of  the  consensus  position,  but  showed  a  remarkable  tendency  to   affirm  gay  culture  and  pro-­‐gay  groupings,  expressing  respect  for  the  LGCM  and   Scanzoni  and  Mollenkott’s  Is  the  Homosexual  my  Neighbour?.¹⁰⁵  He  urged   pastors  to  consider  encouraging  gays  who  would  not  abandon  same  sex   relationships  to  adopt  monogamous  patterns  of  behaviour  as  an  ‘optimum   homosexual  morality’.¹⁰⁶  Pierson  was  particularly  notable,  however,  for  his  use   of  Moberly,  primarily  deploying  her  research  to  reduce  the  sense  of  threat   posed  by  homosexuals  –  if  they  were  individuals  whose  sexual  development  had   been  stunted  through  lack  of  affection  then  they  were  figures  deserving  of   sympathy  and  love,  not  a  threat  to  society.