Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #386353 in Books
• Published on: 2005-10-21
• Released on: 2006-01-05
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

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magnanimous to evangelicals, chiding them for refusing to consider that scriptural imperatives about sexuality might be outdated and inapplicable to "today's society."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

Review
"In A Church at War Stephen Bates has given us a book that reads like a thriller and unfolds like a tragedy. It is a story of an attempted coup, the takeover of a once benign and inclusive institution by religious extremists who want to recreate it in their own narrow and destructive image. The battle is ostensibly over homosexuality, but in reality it is about the status and interpretation of the Bible. As Bates eloquently shows, though the struggle is not over already there have been some spectacular casualties--the most notable being Rowan Williams, the present Archbishop of Canterbury. Anyone who cares about the future of the Anglican Church should read this book."--Richard Holloway, formerly Bishop of Edinburgh and Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church
"Bates manages to turn the minutiae of church politics into an engrossing and exciting narrative. He takes a pitiless scalpel to the poverty of conservative evangelical thinking on sexuality, and reveals plenty of evidence of a determined conservative minority bidding to seize power in worldwide Anglicanism. He poses a challenge to the Anglican Communion to fight its way out of its current mess through the exercise of a good deal more generosity and imagination than has so far generally been the case."--Diarmaid MacCulloch, Professor of the History of the Church, University of Oxford
"Human sexuality has become one of the more contentious issues for churches as they wrestle with their identity and place in the modern world. Bates' insightful book does an admirable job of revealing the fissures and faultlines of the current debate in the Church of England and the wider Anglican Communion. His analysis is a sure-footed guide and an essential companion for all those who want to understand the competing convictions that have contributed to the discussions so far."--Martyn Percy, Director, Lincoln Theological Institute, Manchester and Adjunct Professor of Theology, Hartford Seminary, Connecticut
"Stephen Bates has left us in his debt with his gripping account of recent events in the Anglican Communion. It is a sorry tale, but is one that needs urgently to be told, and Bates tells it brilliantly. There is an old Anglican prayer which speak of charity as being the bond of peace and of all virtues. A good dose of that is needed at the moment if an historically 0inclusive church is not to end up being narrow, exclusive and unchristian."--Christopher Rowland, Dean Ireland's Professor of the Exegesis of Holy Scripture, University of Oxford
"Stephen Bates leads the reader briskly through the biblical and historical background, as well as telling in a most entertaining style all the more recent stories of debates and meetings about homosexuality...I hope that American Episcopalians, both conservative and liberal, will read it with care..." --Simon Sarmiento, Anglicans Online
"...a racy and enjoyable account of Anglican battles over homosexuality...Bates has done his homework...thanks to Bates' detective work, we now have a clearer idea of what happened...."--Damian Thompson, Sunday Telegraph
"Writer Stephen Bates' well-regarded book on gays and the clergy...has predictably not pleased everyone at Lambeth Palace." --Richard Kay, The Daily Mail

Customer Reviews

Sobering but also unputdownable
It's a bit of a surprise to discover that a book which discusses some of the splits and controversies within the Anglican Church is unputdownable, but "A Church At War" was indeed that. What made the book so good was, firstly, the excellent writing style of Stephen Bates, whose book "God's Own Country" about American Christianity is also fascinating. Bates identifies himself as a Catholic married to a Charismatic Evangelical and his writing shows that he is very familiar with and at home in the world of Anglicanism.

This book is not just about the homosexual debate within Anglicanism. It looks wider, describing some of the political machinations behind many of the events including Lambeth Conferences, the Appointment of Canon Jeffrey John as Bishop of Reading, the US Episcopal Church's Gene Robinson situation and the contribution made to events by the ever-strengthening Evangelical section of the church. The underlying theme is that the divisions over homosexuality are more of a power struggle with the evangelical wing of the Church identifying this issue as one over which they could make a stand and wrest power from the liberals. This includes conservative American Christians bankrolling the African Anglican churches in their campaigns against the loosening of the church's stance on gay people, and many of the machinations such as this are shown taking place behind the Lambeth conferences and other meetings while the Archbishops of Canterbury make statements about listening to and learning from each other in a spirit of love. Parts of this book make for very uncomfortable reading, rather akin to watching children having a punch-up in a playground.

Bates speaks firmly from the side of those who believe that gay people have their part to play in the life of the church. He doesn't spend much time considering the Biblical references to homosexuality, just enough to show that there are scholarly reasons that mean it isn't a cut and dried issue, whether or not people find the arguments convincing themselves. This book isn't an impartial discussion but instead is a gripping read with caricatures of many players in the story, amusing asides and yet an overall sobering message. Bates reminds the reader many times of the inconsistencies in some of the arguments used against homosexuals (for example that divorce and remarriage are now allowed, although Jesus forbade that) and it's hard to know whether he has chosen some of the worst of the quotes from the Evangelical wing to contrast with the humble and godly statements of the gay people in his pages. Most of the evangelicals campaigning against changes in the church's acceptance of homosexuals come across very badly, with particular focus on many of the African church leaders and their own double-standards (as Bates points out, the Nigerian church vilified homosexual acceptance within the church but doesn't do anything about the polygamy, child sacrifice and the stoning of adulterous women within their own church).

This book isn't an easy read. It's hard to read of the strife and arguing between people who are supposedly in mission together. It's appalling to hear of some of the abuse and discrimination that gay people within the church have suffered. It's also frightening to believe, if his overall thesis is right, that those in control of the section of the church with growing authority chose to make a stand on this subject in order to wrest power from other traditions within Anglicanism, apparently unconcerned about the human despair and devastation that would follow. This isn't an impartial book but it's an important book for people from all sides of Anglicanism to read as it acts as a mirror to those within the church and can help them to see how the outside world may see them and their squabbles.

Interesting comparison
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.

Excellent book!
I loved this book--it made me think a great deal about how I have bought into fundamentalist ways of thinking. Thank you.