More on Jeffrey John's nomination

There was a very curious wee statement today in the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

As the facilitator, John Humphreys, introduced the programme, he said that the Rowan Williams would like the new bishop of Southward "to be Jeffrey John who is openly gay."

That is quite a remarkable statement but, what is even more remarkable is that The Very Rev'd Chris Sudgen and the Very Rev'd Giles Fraser, cannons to the Archbishop of Canterbury (ABC), did not utter a single protest to that statement.

One may conclude by their silence that Rowan is now advocating for the same man he stabbed in the back just a few years ago.

What I find most interesting about all of this is that the ABC seems to have backed himself it a corner. The two leading candidates are an openly gay man living in a civil partnership and a man married to a divorced woman.

There is a wonderful statement in Be very careful before you object to Dr. John by the Rev'd John Richardson* over at The Ugley Vicar that really sums up the whole  schismatic war

We would not be in half the mess we are in today if the Church, during the years in which homosexuality was almost universally regarded as perverse, had acted as a haven for real sinners, rather than a rather choosy hostel for the outwardly saintly.

Well said, in my opinion.

Although I gather The Ugley Vicar is on the "conservative" side of the debate (I believe he is involved in the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans), his post is really worth a read. He is actually defending John's nomination because the only valid objection is homophobia. If Mr. John were straight or married to a nice wee woman to hide his sexuality, he'd have been a bishop long ago - just as many other gay male bishops in the Church of England and throughout the Anglican world.