A friend of mine taught me that rather than "giving up" things for Lent, it is better to add something—more quiet time, more prayer. Similarly, I suggest that Christmas be a time not for getting more and doing more, but a time to get rid of some unwanted stuff. For instance . . .

In its series The Question The Guardian asks "What would you get rid of for Christmas?" Anglican clergyman Peter Bolton responds 23 Dec 2009 that he would get rid of churchmen who denounce sexual sins with a fervour they never apply to any other sin.

This is like writing a letter to Santa! Resisting with all my might the temptation to ask for the extermination of certain people who get on my nerves my mind wonders around to the big and worthy issues. Should I ask for the end of war or global warming or poverty or homelessness or child abuse? Well, yes, I should [. . .]

I am going to ask for the end of something that is making me really angry right now. Like most Guardian readers (I hope), I am very angry and upset about Uganda's proposed anti-homosexuality legislation. But my wrath is not directed at Uganda or even its government especially. A little knowledge of the history of Uganda helps one realise that this is too complicated just to be angry with the people who will pass this law.

No, my anger is directed at those Western Christians who feed the bigotry. I can just about understand that Christians might regard homosexual acts as sinful but what I completely fail to understand is why they get so worked up about it. I just wish that churchmen (yes, I do mean that) who get so upset about what they regard as sexual sins would get just as worked up about illegal wars, the greed that leads to global warming, or the violence done to women in the name of Christian marriage. I wish were as vociferous in their campaigning against world poverty, against nuclear weapons or the appalling treatment of refugees and asylum seekers in the UK. Why do they seem to get more upset about people trying to love than they do about poverty, the penal system, or the exploitation of women?

So, dear Santa, please get rid of all talk from churchmen about sex unless it is a celebration of God's wonderful gift. [. . .] Come to think about it, though, it might be more realistic to hope for the end of poverty.

A Theological Roundtable on Churches' Response to Human Sexuality jointly organized by the National Council of Churches in India and other Indian Christian bodies in Kolkota on 5-6th Dec 09, sent this Message to the Indian Christian Communities:

We affirm that sexuality is a divine gift, and hence God intends us to celebrate this divine gift in committed, consensual, and monogamous relationships. It is in such celebrations of our sexuality that we grow into the fullness of our humanity, and experience God in a special way.

We believe that our negative attitudes towards sexuality and our body-denying spirituality stem from our distorted understanding of God's purpose for us. The embodied God who embraced flesh in Jesus Christ is the ground for us to love our bodies and to celebrate life and sexuality without abuse and misuse. So God invites us to experience sexual fulfillment in our committed relationships of justice-love with the commitment to be vulnerable, compassionate, and responsible.

We recognize that there are people with different sexual orientations. The very faith affirmation that the whole human community is created in the image of God irrespective of our sexual orientations makes it imperative on us to reject systemic and personal attitudes of homophobia and discrimination against sexual minorities. We consider the Delhi High Court verdict to "decriminalize consensual sexual acts of adults in private" upholding the fundamental constitutional and human rights to privacy and the life of dignity and non-discrimination of all citizens as a positive step.

We believe that the Church as 'Just and Inclusive Community' is called to become a community without walls to reach out to people who are stigmatized and demonized, and be a listening community to understand their pains, desires, and hopes.

We envision Church as a sanctuary to the ostracized who thirst for understanding, friendship, love, compassion and solidarity, and to join in their struggles to live out their God given lives. So we appeal to the Christian communities to sojourn with sexual minorities and their families without prejudice and discrimination, to provide them ministries of love, compassionate care, and justice.

We request the National Council of Churches in India and its members to initiate an in-depth theological study on Human Sexuality for better discernment of God's purpose for us. This involves a deeper engagement with Bible, traditions, and other disciplines such as social theories, psychology, and medical science. This process should be an inclusive one where people with different sexual orientations can learn from each other and contribute to this process without prejudice and fear. We also request the Theological Fraternities in India to help this process through integrating issues related to Human Sexuality into the process of theological and ministerial formation.

We hope and pray that the embodied God will bless our endeavors to grow into the fullness of life, and to transform our faith communities into rainbow communities of the beloved and equals.

In a piece published by Anglican Mainstream (11 Dec 09) Andrew Carey criticizes "liberal" Anglicans for "targeting the Archbishop of Canterbury in a vitriolic campaign aimed at deflecting attention from their inability to win the argument over human sexuality on theological grounds." This is of course related to the Archbishop's response to the election of Canon Mary Glasspool as assistant bishop, which many have contrasted with his failure to condemn publicly the anti-homosexual bill currently going through the Ugandan Parliament. Reasonably enough Mr Carey argues that quiet unsung diplomacy is as effective as loud public pronouncements.

It's the wrap-up to Mr Carey's piece that caught my attention:

The problem that the Archbishop of Canterbury faces is that the Anglican Communion will continue to fragment. The Covenant which he believes is a centre of unity around which the vast majority of provinces can coalesce is not even yet in its final form. Such is the polarisation of the Church of England, as a result of the Anglican Communion crisis, that there is now no guarantee that it can pass in the General Synod let alone in other more liberal western provinces.

It seems likely that any Anglican future worth having will be radically different from the current shape of things. The so-called instruments and international meetings will become largely a thing of the past, replaced by networks, regional conferences and some tangential relationships to the Canterbury primate. It is a fragmented and difficult future, but one preferable to a constant state of hysteria and schism.

With that conclusion I wholeheartedly agree.

Ruth Gledhill comments in The Times (7 Dec 09) that the Archbishop of Canterbury was "impressive" and "characteristically human and erudite" when speaking in Rome recently on why there could be no going back on the ordination of women. But:

Just a few days later, he failed to condemn openly the new law to be enacted in Uganda that will condemn a large number of homosexuals to death. Yet when it came to the election as a bishop of a monogamous woman who has been in the same relationship for 21 years he was quick to judge. The problem was that this woman's relationship is with another woman.

It is well known in church circles that Dr Williams, once barred from becoming Bishop of Southwark because of his liberal views, was the favoured choice of Tony Blair's Government and the mostly liberal Church of England bishops to lead them because of what they believed to be his fearless advocacy for gay rights.

The dreams of these liberals, and the oppressed minorities they speak out in support of, are almost dead. One blog commenter yesterday suggested that the Archbishop, instead of asking "serious questions" about the election of Mary Glasspool, might like instead to appoint her as his representative to go and lobby the Ugandan Government. What a thrilling spectacle that would be to behold.

Otherwise, frankly, there seems little point in the Anglican Communion bothering to exist any more. Maybe that is what the Pope has realised.

Quite, but not for any reason the Pope might propose. A supra-national/international church such as the Anglican Communmion is organisation is simply unnecessary for the cause of the Gospel. In the Anglican scheme of things, the Diocese is the essential unit of organisation. As in Australia, structures above this should be absolutely minimal or non-existent.

To many Anglicans, embarrassed and ashamed by a Church that knows not which minority it stands up for or which tradition it is prepared or not to breach, the Catholic option must seem increasingly attractive.

On the contrary. The failure of the Anglican international church is a reason to avoid the Roman substitute, which would serve only to further quench the Spirit of liberty and grace.

The only person who needs to make Canon Glasspool's selection for leadership is the Holy Spirit. The only people who need to confirm that selection are the people of the Diocese who elected her.

Andrew Brown says (6 Dec 09) that Rowan Williams has been forced into an impossible corner by his own diplomacy.

Rowan Williams has found himself in some difficult and undignified places as Archbishop of Canterbury, but it looks as if the Ugandan church is going to land him in the hardest and most uncomfortable early next year. But his difficulties have been greatly aggravated by his own diplomatic ineptitude. He has got himself into a position where he thinks that he can tell liberal Americans what to do, but dare not tell conservative Africans. He's certainly wrong about the Americans; the Ugandans may leave him with no choice but to speak out.

If he speaks out against the homophobic Ugandan law now, he may make it more likely that the bill will pass. One Ugandan prelate, Bishop Joseph Abura of Karamoja Diocese, has already written a blood-curdling denunciation of the protesting West. Gays, he says, are in the power of Satan.

[. . .]

There is perhaps something that could be said about a Bishop who wants to put men to death for loving other men, and accuses his opponents of "being inhumane, looking at own self, own feelings, and not the feelings of others" But this is no time for irony. Let's cut to the message.

Africa, run away from gays, let us save our continent by refuting the vice; practice, and preserve our heritage, that is our traditions and culture believing and trusting in the Almighty God ... Christ is the answer, feelings or sympathies, especially on evil, are not! Ugandan Parliament, the watch dog of our laws, please go ahead and put the anti-gay laws in place. It is then that we become truly accountable to our young and to this country, not to Canada or England. We are in charge!

Perhaps it is the Church of Uganda that's in charge here; perhaps it's the devil that the church so firmly believes in. But it certainly isn't the Archbishop of Canterbury. Williams's office has let it be known that he is appalled by the proposed bill, and doing everything he can behind the scenes to scupper it. You can see the problem. Having his press secretary tell people he is exerting covert pressure isn't the most covert way possible to pressurise the Ugandans. But the bill is now widely known and condemned among his natural sympathisers. He can no longer be seen to be doing nothing, any more than he can be seen to be acting against it.

What makes his difficulty darkly comic rather than tragic is the speed with which he has reacted to the election of a lesbian assistant bishop in Los Angeles. A statement came out of his office less than 12 hours later urging the Americans not to proceed.

Consider the case of two Anglicans of the same gender who love one another. If they are in the USA, the Anglican church will marry them and may elect one of them to office. If they are in Uganda, the Anglican church will have try to have them jailed for life, and ensure that any priest who did not report them to the authorities within 24 hours would be jailed for three years; anyone who spoke out in their defence might be jailed for seven.

Under Williams, the church that marries two women who love each other is to be thrown out of the Anglican Communion. The church that would jail them both for life, and would revile and persecute their defenders, stays snugly in his bosom. Not even the Archbishop's remarkable gift for obfuscation can conceal these facts forever.

The Age reports (28 Nob 09) that the Vatican has ordered Roman Catholic Bishop of Sandhurst Joe Grech to withdraw an offer to let Bendigo Anglican Bishop Andrew Curnow ordain deacons in a Roman Catholic church tomorrow—not because the the Vatican doesn't recognize Anglican orders, but because four of the candidatesare women. (The Anglican cathedral is closed for major repairs.)

Bishop Grech and his Vicar-General John White both expressed disappointment. Bendigo-based Anglican theologian Dr Charles Sherlock said it was particularly disappointing because Bishop Grech had been so generous. "It is disappointing that he is not allowed to act as he thinks best for the people of God in Bendigo," Dr Sherlock said.

Anglican Dean Peta Sherlock (Dr Sherlock's wife) said the Anglicans would hold tomorrow's ordination at St Andrew's Uniting Church instead, and were grateful for the hospitality. "I think it's indeed sad. Catholics in Bendigo are shocked by it. They say 'it's not us', and we say 'we know'. It was a fantastic good news story, and now it's gone." Local Catholics criticised the decision and apologised to Anglicans in letters to the Bendigo Advertiser.

Given that Rome does not recognize Anglican orders in any case, what's the difference between an invalid ordination of an male and that an invalid ordination of a female?

This is misogyny gone mad.