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My biggest hope for Living in Love and Faith as we wait for publication in half an hour is that it will be of help to people who want to live faithfully to Christ and faithfully to themselves. My fear is that it will point to models of "good disagreement" that miss the point.
Far too much of the controversy in the CofE about sexuality has been about containing the expectations and convictions of others – whether to the left or to the right – and not about helping LGBT Christians live abundant lives in Christ.
Such abundant life does not require 'conservative' or 'liberal' readings of Scripture; it may even be compatible with both; but it does require self-acceptance and confidence in the righteousness of Jesus Christ, imputed to the believer.
Attempts at such righteousness by doctrinal assent (again, whether 'conservative' or 'liberal') lead to deep unhappiness, because they are not faithful to the apostolic gospel. If #LLF focuses on what other people think, whoever the other people are, it will miss the mark.
What is desperately needed is a body of literature for LGBT Christians which is about living wholly as an LGBT disciple of Christ and avoids either doctrinal reactionism or revisionism: books for people, not 'issues'.
This is the main reason 'Issues in Human Sexuality' belongs on the bonfire. Human sexuality isn't an issue. People are the issue: people Christ calls to newness of life, and to deep faithfulness, and who will have all sorts of opinions about all sorts of things.
So may this report take the Bible seriously, the gospel seriously, and people seriously; and take the opinions of others, whoever they happen to be, whether 'traditional' or 'radical', with a great deal of salt.
