Bishop Wabukala on Yet More “Conversation”

This may come as a shock but there are Anglican bishops out there who, instead of producing ecclesiastical fog, cut right through the same.  The Primate of Kenya, Eliud Wabukala is such a bishop.

He graciously but very clearly puts the Pilling Report’s call for yet more conversation on homosexuality in its place:

There is urgency about the gospel and it must be proclaimed in word and deed, in season and out of season and it is the same gospel, whether in strife torn nations such as South Sudan or in the affluent but morally disorientated nations of the developed world. 

We cannot therefore allow our time and energy to be sapped by debating that which God has already clearly revealed in the Scriptures. Earlier this week, the English College of Bishops met to reflect upon the ‘Pilling Report’, commissioned to reflect on how the Church of England should respond to the question of same sex relationships. Its key recommendations were that informal blessings of such unions should be allowed in parish churches and that a two year process of ‘facilitated conversation’ should be set up to address strongly held differences within the Church on this issue.

While we should be thankful that the College of Bishops did not adopt the idea of services for blessing that which God calls sin, it did unanimously approve the conversation process and this is deeply troubling.  There has been intensive debate within the Anglican Communion on the subject of homosexuality since at least the 1998 Lambeth Conference and it is difficult to believe that the bishop’s indecision at this stage is due to lack of information or biblical reflection. The underlying problem is whether or not there is a willingness to accept the bible for what it really is, the Word of God. 

Absolutely right.  With few exceptions, calls for the church to have yet more conversation about homosexuality and “homophobia” come from those who either do not hold to the authority of scripture or who are timid about doing so in the face of a decadent and hostile society.  The Lord Himself could tell these people that homosexual conduct is wrong and the church is not to condone it – and he has – and they would not submit or would dither and delay about doing so.

The church has far better things to do than be hectored about the sin of “homophobia” from those who wallow in the sin of rejecting the authority of scripture while pretending to be Christians*.  Such churchly apostates should not be continually listened to; they should be rebuked.  And if they stiffen their necks and refuse to repent, they should be rejected.

You want some “conversation”?  Let’s have some conversation about church discipline and the cowardice and/or apostasy of bishops in exercising it.

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* IMPORTANT NOTE: Please note that I am talking about those who claim to be Christians, especially leaders in the organized church.  The church should virtually always be in conversation (without compromising or watering down the Faith) with honest non-Christians as Bishop Wabukala himself wrote.  My problem here is not with them at all.