A Church at War: Anglicans and Homosexuality [Hardcover]

Stephen Bates (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 9, 2004

The consecration of V. Gene Robinson as an openly gay bishop of New Hampshire has divided the Anglican Community, a historic pillar of Christianity embraced by seventy million people in 164 countries. Most Anglican groups outside the United States oppose the ordination of gay clergy. After Robinson's consecration, overseas bishops jointly announced that they were in a "state of impaired communion" with the 2.3 million-member US Branch of the Episcopal Church--a step short of declaring a full schism.

In A Church at War, journalist Stephen Bates assesses the current state and historical context of this fight. Including personal interviews with all chief players in the struggle, this is the only book to offer the full story of the Church's vicious row over homosexuality. Showing the strengths and weaknesses of the different positions, Bates takes the details of church politics and creates an engrossing and exciting narrative. As the threat of schism looms ever closer, this book, with its controversial yet fair look at the fight will be both illuminating and essential to all with an interest in the Church and its relationship with homosexuality.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

When Gene Robinson, an openly gay Episcopal priest, was elected bishop of New Hampshire in 2003, his election sparked ongoing debate and potential schism in the Anglican Church, both in America and around the world. Bates, religion correspondent for the Guardian (U.K.), pens a thoughtful guide to the current controversy. Focusing on England and (to a lesser extent) the U.S., Bates casts the current dispute in the context of the church's grappling with social change since the 1960s—the ordination of women, the acknowledgment of high divorce rates—and explores how different Anglicans interpret the Bible and come to divergent conclusions about homosexuality. But this is no dry survey of scriptural hermeneutics. It is also a work of first-rate journalism, introducing readers to many principal figures in the Anglican scene—the archbishop of Canterbury, conservative ministers, liberal bishops. Bates is unfailingly generous to liberal Anglicans, taking seriously and sympathetically the arguments in favor of full-fledged acceptance of homosexuality. Unfortunately, he is not so magnanimous to evangelicals, chiding them for refusing to consider that scriptural imperatives about sexuality might be outdated and inapplicable to "today's society." The book would be stronger, and would find a larger audience, if it were more evenhanded. But biases notwithstanding, Bates has given us a valuable, informative account of a timely issue.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Few issues are as divisive today as homosexuality and religion. Journalist Bates is balanced and measured in his report on how the November 2, 2003, consecration as an Episcopal bishop of openly gay V. Gene Robinson in New Hampshire has divided the larger Anglican community. There are more than 77 million Anglicans in 164 countries, ranging from the church's historic home in England to the U.S., where the Anglican Episcopal Church wields influence disproportionate to its 2.3 million members, to such far-flung corners as Nigeria, where the church is flourishing. Describing the Church of England's position on homosexuality as inconsistent and confused, Bates points out the hypocrisy surrounding much of the argument against fully accepting gays in the church. While presenting both traditional and alternative interpretations, he pointedly comments on biblical references to homosexuality and, with wit, insight, compassion, and common sense, surveys homosexuality and religion through the ages. His own opinion is that the debate is ultimately about not sexuality but control and authority, power and politics. Strong stuff. June Sawyers
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: I. B. Tauris; First Edition edition (September 9, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1850434808
• ISBN-13: 978-1850434801
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,511,492 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant exposé of evangelical fundamentalism, October 8, 2004

By 

Gerard Lynch "paddingtonw2bear" (Belfast, Northern Ireland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Church at War: Anglicans and Homosexuality (Hardcover)

Bates provides a brilliant exposé of how a small cabal of conservative Evangelicals, a minority even within the Evangelical tradition in Anglicanism, have made homosexuality the definining issue in the Anglican Communion today. Bates ruthlessly exposes the media spin, American big money backers, unbalanced extremists and double standards behind the anti-gay camp in Anglicanism. Bates traces the growth of conservative Evangelicalism within Anglicanism in contrast to an increasingly pluralist and tolerant social stimmung in Britain and Ireland, relating how the sense of being backed into a corner makes the extremist wing of the Church more dangerous. He also casts a caustic eye over the double standards that make male-male sex a defining issue of orthodoxy for conservative Evangelicals while they ignore issues like polygamy and Christian involvement in the Rwanda genocide.

This book is disturbing. After reading it, moderate, Catholic and open Evangelical Anglicans will be in no doubt that we are engaged in a war for the soul of the church. In his final chapter, Bates looks at some of the casualties of that War. For the sake of those broken people, it is a war we must win.

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting comparison, September 26, 2006

By 

K. McEvoy (Toronto, ON CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Church at War: Anglicans and Homosexuality (Hardcover)

It's interesting to note that of the reviews so far, the two favourable reviews both give their real names (and five stars), whereas the two critical reviews do not (and they both give one star).

I think the readers biases are influencing their judgements here.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars For a more balanced and more historical review, January 24, 2011

By 

Roger Nebel "Photographer" (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: A Church at War: Anglicans and Homosexuality, Updated Edition (Paperback)

If Bates is a historian then perhaps he failed to consider the the more historical roots of the controversy. For a more balanced view of the historical roots of the schism see "The Developing Schism within the Episcopal Church: 1960-2010" by Nancy C. James, Mellen Press, 2010.