I fear I am too good a historian to think for a moment that views on sexual activity held by the church are in any way immutable. Gregory the Great, for instance (and this is but one instance) is worried that married couples will fall into sin while finding too much pleasure in the marriage bed, even though they enter it bent on procreation. I cannot think of any branch of the church today where the importance of sex in creating a pair bond is not acknowledged. However much some pretend, attitudes on sex have totally changed. Secular knowledge and understanding always permeates Christian understanding. Sometimes (thankfully) Christian understandings of compassion and forgiveness also permeate the secular world. Neither can exist without the other.

Moreover, it is blatantly apparent that the secular world is as conflicted over this as the church, and that (talking generally) older people, and especially older men, are more liable to dislike the idea of others, and especially men, forming same sex bonds. It is not actually true that in this instance ‘the secular world’ thinks one thing, and ‘the Church’ another, but rather, different segments of the church reflect the views of their secular counterparts.

The Catholic Church is a loaded term. It can be used as it once was to refer to those who are not Arian Christians, but rather Trinitarins. To me, that remains the proper use, and in that context I would applaud Kimberly’s post and add that famously Athanasius refused to yield to truth-as-a-head-count. But over time Catholic has come to mean other things. I will grant you that the Roman Catholic Church is numerically strong. Moreover it can draw a clean line on what is, and is not, the ‘truth of the Church’ by simply excluding those who disagree. In face, in the UK and on the ground, many of her faithful disagree with (and ignore) much of her moral teaching. If by the Catholic Church you are intending to include those parts of Anglicanism which particularly value a spiritual heritage born in the Roman Catholic church and nurtured by the Catholic Reformation, I have to tell you that in fact they are as split on this issue as Roman Catholics are in the liberal West. Only by defining ‘Catholic’ a more and more rarefied way (The Roman hierarchy, Anglo-Catholics but not Aff Caff) can you EVEN support the claim to weight of numbers.

As Kimberly says, we cannot resist the Spirit.

‘catholic teaching’ itself had to evolve and grow as Christians articulated new quesions. The question right now is whether we allow that growth to continue, and what direction Godly-growth takes.

In answer to Rosemary. Remember in the Christian world your views are those of a tiny minority. It is not a question of you giving an inch but of the wider church being prepared to tolerate your extreme views. There is no conflict between Catholic teaching and the body of Christ just conflict between those who are trying to maintain the faith and those determined to pursue protestant revisionist secular agendas.

The second is the very real discomfort with the huge changes in knowledge and society which have occurred of which attitudes to sex are one tiny part. People have found themselves in an unfamiliar and scary world, where they are told that their reactions to creation/sexual ethics/gender roles and a myriad other things are not based on anything rational and they need to re learn and re think. That some are very upset is understandable. I think the whole same sex relationship issue is for many just the stalking horse for a whole set of miseries and angers – they are just as cross over a whole heap of other things.

The church finds itself between the rock of acting according to its principles, and the hard place of further fracturing the body of Christ.

I don’t think that a real compromise is possible – it is possible that a slower pace might enable more to change their minds and re adjust to the world as it is. It is unlikely. Liberals have a fatal weakness for seeing the other point of view and being swayed into actions they do not at all believe in. That seems to be what is happening – some conservatives are throwing all their toys out of the pram, and some liberals hope given time the tantrum will end harmlessly – it is a sometimes a reasonable strategy. I don’t think this time it will work however

I don’t think we liberals should give an inch just now – but I do think we need to continue to have compassion on those who oppose us.