The
Church of Scotland
No Witch
Hunts Here
It was interesting to see the caving of the evangelicals to
the new politically correct agenda.
Having confirmed on the Saturday, the first day of General Assembly,
that practising homosexuals in civil partnerships were eligible under certain
conditions to serve as Deacons and Ministers, the GA then moved on to consider
the new legal situation introduced by homosexual marriage. A provision to alter the new legislation to
include homosexual marriage as well as civil partnerships was passed and sent
down to Presbyteries under the Barrier Act.
However, just in case
there happened to be any practising homosexuals who had already defied the GA
and entered into a homosexual marriage – perish the thought that any gay activist
would so defy the Assembly – there was an addendum passed to say that they
would be immune from any discipline just like those in civil partnerships. It later transpired that one such gay
activist had already entered into a gay marriage:
I am sure that the ex-moderator
who proposed this protective moratorium had absolutely no idea that this had
happened; we could not imagine the liberal establishment of the Kirk failing to
give such information to the GA if it was in possession of the facts.
Just to show how “nice” the nasty evangelicals really were he
was seconded by the Rev Gordon Kennedy, of the Covenant Fellowship.
In reporting this, the Covenant Fellowship website explains:
“The moratorium provisions were then proposed
by the Very Rev John Chalmers and seconded by Rev Gordon Kennedy, helpfully
stressing the need for natural justice to apply, and reinforcing the fact that
a witch hunt was on no-one’s agenda. Once tidied up, it was passed
overwhelmingly.”
So
what exactly is a witch hunt? Is this
ecclesiastical code for church discipline?
Are the evangelicals saying that they are perfectly satisfied not to
pursue discipline against the sexually immoral ministers and deacons in their
midst? Given the fact that they cannot
actually bring discipline charges on these matters anyway, church law having
clarified that such conduct is now within the orbit of morally acceptable
behaviour in a broad church, are they saying that those who dare to suggest
such a course of action are witch hunters, pursuing with a vengeance the
innocent ministers who are engaging in such practices?
It
seems to me that there are two choices.
You
can follow Scripture:
“When you
are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus and my spirit is present, with the
power of our Lord Jesus, you are to deliver this man to Satan for the
destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the
Lord... I
am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if
he is guilty of sexual immorality.” ( 1 Corinthians 5)
Or you can follow the old
Scottish ecclesiastical proverb, newly re-discovered, “Let sleeping sodomites lie.”
But then, discipline would not be
nice and what better way to dismiss biblical church discipline than by falsely categorising
it as a form of witch hunt and by setting up an antithesis between “natural
justice” and biblical church discipline.
Interestingly, I noted as I was
writing this the first episode of a new series of the Heidlecast in which Scott
Clark speaks “Of Nice and Men”.
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