On July 12, 2019 at the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada in Vancouver, a motion to amend the marriage canon to include same-sex marriage failed in its second reading. It received the required two-thirds majority in the Order of Clergy and the Order of Laity, but failed by a tiny margin in the Order of Bishops.

It is our understanding that individual bishops retain the prerogative to authorize same-sex marriages in their respective dioceses. The Anglican Church of Canada already has many same-sex married laypersons and priests, and at least one same-sex married bishop of which we know.

See the Anglican Journal for a more detailed account of the Synod’s vote and the onsite reactions.

Orthodoxy in Dialogue proposes to host a discussion of this development. Our readers around the planet know that the question of same-sex love, and the possibilities and conditions for its sanctification in the Church’s sacramental economy, have come to occupy a place of prominence in our publishng record beyond anything that we had initially planned.

We welcome articles written in a fraternal spirit, reflective of all sides of the issue, from Anglicans and non-Anglicans alike. Read More

On July 3 Orthodoxy in Dialogue published A Special Kind of Clergy Directory, in which we appeal to priests in canonical Orthodox jurisdictions who feel spiritually, pastorally, and emotionally equipped to serve Orthodox Christians, inquirers, and others who identify somewhere along the LGBTQI spectrum. 

By the grace of God, our directory has grown to eight priests in four countries in just under two weeks. Every good structure begins with the first few stones.

We have made three referrals and are in contact with a fourth individual who is discerning whether to be referred.

In a fifth, heartbreaking case, we helped an individual through the discernment process of finding an ecclesial home outside of the Orthodox Church. This person wishes with all his/her heart to remain Orthodox, and is under no illusions that one church is just as good as another—but if one has been chased away, what can one do? One has to eat somewhere. This case is particularly shameful in that the priest accused the person of lying about being in a sexually abstinent relationship and excommunicated him/her.

In yet another shameful case, an OCA bishop continues to ignore our request for a priest to accompany a bisexual married man on the path to repentance from adultery. Read More

This article can be read in conjunction with No Other Foundation but Farley?. 

Archpriest Lawrence Farley

The utter incoherence of Father Lawrence Farley’s rhetoric, driven by a combination of his homosexual fantasies and rabid homophobia, crosses an unconscionable line in his “Two Men in Bed Together”: A Failure of Exegesis of July 12, in which he responds to my From the Fathers: The Kingdom of Heaven Is Like…Two Men in Bed Together? of July 10. In it he draws a connection between same-sex love and child rape—not once, but twice:

I will not deal with Sanfilippo’s first point at length [i.e., my “Despite endless iterations by churchmen who possess no intellectual curiosity—indeed, no sense of pastoral responsibility—to become familiar with scientific advances and the helpful insights of queer theory in our understanding of sexual diversity in human nature…], other than to note that the same dubious argumentation is now being advanced in some places to justify pedophilia (now being sanitized under the term “minor attraction”).

Sanfilippo’s conclusion—which if taken at face value justifies not only homosexuality but also pedophilia (“also each man and boy”)—simply doesn’t follow.

In  case Father Farley tidies up his text after he reads this article (as he did with his response to my Conjugal Friendship of May 2017 after he had called traditional icons of the Mystical Supper disturbing visual trash), I have appended his full article below as copied and pasted around 11:30 p.m. ET on July 13.  Read More

Orthodoxy in Dialogue and RAICES are exploring the possibility of forming a permanent partnership as a mechanism for our readers to become one-time, occasional, or frequent donors. In the meantime, you can take action today by:

1. Checking in with your neighbour, joining community groups, protesting at the local ICE office, calling your elected official, and asking your mayor to demand ICE not enter their city
2. Donating at the DONATE NOW link below
3. Sharing this post with everyone in your social media and email contacts 

See our related On Sodomy. Providing for the needs of the foreigner and the stranger, the widow and the orphan, is not a matter of liberalism or conservatism, but the very heart of the Christian Gospel as preached by all of the Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church.

ICE has become an American nightmare, nothing less than the main thrust of an attempt to institutionalize racism against a scapegoated minority — undocumented, nonvoting, mostly voiceless brown people.

Darlena Cunha for the New York Times

ICE Raids are set to begin this weekend in Atlanta, Baltimore, Chicago, Denver, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New Orleans, New York and San Francisco.  We have set up a hotline for those in Texas affected by the raids. Read More