Equality and the Church of England

 

"The truth will set you free"
 John 8:32

The Church of England is the state Church in England and has enormous privilege in society and associated wealth. For many people, the Church has been the centre of social gatherings and the centre of faith. Many people (although not everyone) have been baptised in the Church and lived their lives in the sacraments of the Church. The Church contains many 'closeted' gay and lesbian clergy and despite that constituency the Church has often been seen as indifferent to the needs of gay and lesbian worshippers. More recently, the Church has moved away from being vaguely 'indiffferent' and has actively attacked gay and lesbian people in the area of civil marriage. It seems that in response the English people  must now decide what to do about the traditional privilege of an organisation that has failed gay and lesbian people as well as simultaneously intruding into equality issues.

The  idea of the cemetery is, for me, bound up with the concept of ‘wholeness’ where we are all equal under the soil. The eternal certainty of death means that we are collectively brought together again in a sort of community.  Even people with few links are re-united by their burial in the same earth and all this process has been traditionally managed by the Established Church. The influence of the Church had been diminished over time by the provision of secular cemeteries, Dissenter burials and more recently by the appalling behaviour of the Established Church.

Instead of being the traditional centre of the community, the Church of England has begun to see itself not as a national organisation but as the representative of a small faction in society. You may ask what I am talking about. Well, the answer is ‘equal marriage’. In this matter, The Established Church through the actions of former Archbishop Carey has misjudged the British people and chosen to speak out against Civil Marriage equality. In this process, the Church has displayed poor assessment skills and a lack of national judgement and it has strayed from speaking on religious matters and chosen to speak negatively about civil matters.

In choosing to speak out so forcefully against equality, the Established Church and some senior clergy have confirmed one or two previously unproven facts. It was always suspected that the Church hierarchy in England was homophobic and that assertion now seems proven beyond all reasonable doubt. In effect, Christians really do hate gay and lesbian people and have finally chosen to 'come out' in their homophobia. There is now clear and unassailable evidence of an Anglican attempt to de-rail equality. The Church of England has finally nailed its homophobic colours to the mast and that may be the best that can be said for their judgement and bigotry. In the past, we had to imagine what was in the mind of the hierarchy and yet the intention of the Church is now as  clear as crystal. The Established Church really hates gays and lesbians and they especially hate the idea of the people having the opportunity to engage in permanent and lifelong commitments. To this end, the Church of England has associated itself with fringe Evangelicals and others who fight against equality. The Anglicans have even associated themselves with the Roman Catholic hierarchy often seen as a major critic of Anglican holy orders. The wish to deal the death blow to equal civil marriage has created strange bedfellows indeed. The Churches have elected to segregate themselves from the great body of their people and this is sad if not entirely unpredictable.

It seems then that the people must finally re-consider the 500 year old compact between the Church of England and the English people. The Church created through the efforts of Henry Tudor to betray his wife has, in effect, finally turned against  the English people who supported  this transitory organisation. What then to think about a national Church that pours forth venom on individuals who seek equality ? Well, it seems that we must start the process of asking why a Church is ‘Established’ in the first place? Why should we have a Church that uses its privilege against equality in such a poorly judged manner?

The position of the Church of England, as the Established Church has become untenable. It is inconceivable that unity can be encouraged by this diminishing and increasingly factional organisation. The unity so often espoused in the past is now out of the reach of the Church and the Church has become increasingly offensive to many English people.

A declining Christian denomination with few adherents (although with great wealth and resources) seeks to mock the aspirations of hard working people and this is in a country where the people are not particularly religious. The English increasingly seek diversity and equality in all things and it seems inappropriate to have an Established Church in the first place. It is arguably time for a change and  poorly judged Anglican views on equal marriage indicate that it is the correct time for the majority to think about the role of the Church.

I would say that through the homophobic comments of former Archbishop Carey  the Church of England has finally been found out. Let the Church confess its manifest sins against its own people, let them acknowledge how many Bishops and clergy are really Gay or lesbian and then let this relic of a former conflict slip away into history.

The motto of the Church of England is taken from John 8:32 and reads "The truth will set you free" It is time for the British (as a whole) to be at peace with each other in life as well as in death  and be set free from the shackels of all the Churches. Let this process begin with the dis-establishment of the Church of England.

Edwin Chadwick - "Practice of Interment in towns"

Detail:
Ashill Parish Church
© Godric Godricson

Edwin Chadwick's report on burials is a seminal work that influenced a generation of people in the area of burials.  He reported on a variety of issues relating to burials and some areas are a little 'icky' by the standards of the early 21st Century. For the next few weeks I want to add some snippet's from Chadwick's work which are illuminating and show how far removed our own views on death are compared to the 19th Century. Here is the first snippet.......

“Some years since a vault was opened in the church-yard (Stepney), and shortly after one of the coffins contained therein burst with so loud a report that hundreds flocked to the place to ascertain the cause. So intense was the poisonous nature of the effluvia arising there from, that a great number were attacked with sudden sickness and  fainting, many of whom were a considerable period before they recovered their health.”

From  : PRACTICE OF INTERMENT IN TOWNS EDWIN CHADWICK, (1843) p15

Isaiah 26:19



The cemetery
A.K.A "The Parish Church"

© Godric Godricson

 "But your dead will live; their bodies will rise. You who dwell in the dust, wake up and shout for joy. Your dew is like the dew of the morning; the earth will give birth to her dead" Isaiah 26:19

There is something that strikes me when I visit an English Church and that is the proximity of the living and the dead. This proximity brings us back to the idea of Christianity being nothing more than a cult of the dead. In prayer, we cast our eyes upwards and we notice the plaques on the wall extolling the virtues of the departed. We notice the arms and titles of the great landowners and we are reminded that this building is often little more than a charnel house for the  rich and famous.

Indeed, if churchgoers  could develop x-ray vision or a personalised ground penetrating radar we would find the floor of any parish Church as a honeycomb of vaults and tombs fashioned from the 14th Century onwards. The vaults, full of humanity, would stretch as far as the eye can see. In this way we sense both the desire for salvation of past generations alongside their fear that God will seek revenge upon them. Regrettably, this mindset of fear and anxiety is not a modern way to design a building or lay out a cemetery.

The parish Church is a very real series of contradictions. On the surface,  the Church is an apparent place of  serenity and prayer and yet, underneath, there is nothing but death and decay. The line quoted above, drawn from Isaiah, is by 21st century standards a truly creepy statement. The quotation is saying something about the Church as being a 'parking lot' for the dead. The parish Church becomes a place where we are laid down like a fine wine awaiting the time when we rise again and 'pop' like a champagne bottle. The parish Church, rather than being a place of serenity, becomes the loci of a death cult where the living focus on nothing but death and dying. Oh dear, this theology of death seems far removed from the account of the Resurrection containing hope and joy. The cult of death is writ large in our society and the parish Church is the heart of the cult situated in most villages.

I am not convinced that the Church has anything very much to offer to a modernising society and the photograph above is a little charitable to the Church. When I visited the parish the Church had children's toys and games in the main areas. The altar had been moved into the main body of the Church from the east end. The children's toys was a sign that this ancient cult of the dead was striving for a sort of modernity and 'applicability'. However, the Church Authorities had missed the point. Rather than being open, inclusive and modern, the parish Church holds onto the  older ties to death whilst trying to support past errors by appearing 'modern'. The parish Church becomes a whited sepulchre rather than a focus for the community.

I understand the English and their sensibilities. The English easily fall down at the feet of 'tradition' and 'power' before they gently and quietly melt away  away to 'do their own thing'. That the Church has lasted so long in English culture is a testimony to the holding power of this cult of the dead. My greatest hope is that the 'cult of the dead' that passes for a state religion is left behind. Let the parish Church become a creche for the one or two children of the village if that is what the community really wants  although think about this......who would have a Creche in a cemetery?

Cremation

Cremation is a polluting activity

© Godric Godricson

The British are often pragmatic in nature and frequently elect to be cremated  rather than  to be buried. They perceive that cremation is ‘clean’ and there is a long tradition of cremation. The British  traditionally consider that cremation is better for the environment because the process takes up less physical space and the family don’t have to keep the headstone clean and tidy. In many ways, cremation appears a clean and tidy ‘once and for-all’ solution. For a predominantly Protestant country like Britain, largely unaware of  Catholic teaching, cremation appears a traditionally desirable process.

It's correct that cremated remains don’t take up the same amount of land  that burials require. However, the public do not consider that  the process of cremation releases huge volumes of air pollution and particulates into the atmosphere. I know that this idea of releasing material is a little ‘icky’ but let’s briefly consider what happens when a body is cremated.  When we place a body in the cremator we are placing a lot of material in there. In addition to human remains we are also adding 'wood', textiles and potentially a lot of embalming fluid and chemicals. That sounds very unhealthy as a combination. In effect, if a  human body plus the  coffin  weighs approximately  300 pounds and we are left with a final weight of 2 pounds in  ashes that means a lot of material has gone up the chimney as smoke . We have deliberately sent a lot of solid material up the chimney and created nothing but smoke and water vapour. How do we, on the one hand, believe that we love the departed and honour their memory and, on the other hand, consign them into the upper atmosphere for everyone on Earth to breath and ingest.

Most of the adverse chemicals released in the cremation are created from the foam held in rubber mattress, the polyester fabric of coffin linings, human clothing and the urethane finishes of the coffin itself. The composite 'wood' of conventional coffins is often comprised of fibreboard rather than ‘real’ wood and is held together by complex and polluting glue and oil based resins. We have heard from newspaper reports of the toxins and pollutants dispersed into the atmosphere through the chimneys and such pollutants are a fairly toxic cocktail of heavy metals, hydrogen chloride, dioxins and furans. The metal from our dental fillings are lethal . Crematoria are aware of this pollution and have doubtless taken care of the matter (as far as they can) with the use of filters  The effect of such attempts to contain pollution are probably quite patchy depending on efficiency and local circumstances.

I would suggest that the rise in ‘green burials’ and ‘woodland’ burials are an expression of a concern at the effects of cremation and the pollution that cremations cause. In effect, there can be no more energy efficient way of disposing of the dead than to  open up a grave and reverently place the body in there to await decomposition. Without embalming and using only natural fabrics, the body quickly returns to its constituent materials and soaks into the earth from which it came. So, much better than all that natural gas being consumed to transform a body largely comprised of water into gas and smoke.

If you consider that this article may be incorrect. I challenge people to stand close to a cremator and see what happens  when a funeral party has left the environment. The chamber is fired up and sooner or later there is that faint, vague and sweetish smell of burnt 'wood' in the atmosphere. It's a pleasant smell but one that betokens that the filters aren’t working.

Resurrectionists Great Yarmouth - 1827

"Great excitement was caused in Yarmouth by the discovery that upwards of twenty recently interred bodies had been removed from the churchyard by resurrection men.  “The churchyard was quickly crowded by the population.  Wives were searching for the remains of their deceased husbands, husbands for those of their wives, and parents for their children.”  Three men, Thomas Smith, alias Vaughan, William Barber, and Robert Barber, were apprehended, and committed for trial at Yarmouth Quarter Sessions, whence, on April 1st, 1828, the indictment was removed by writ of certiorari to the Court of King’s Bench.  The case was tried at Norwich Assizes, before Lord Chief Baron Alexander, on August 11th, 1828, when only Vaughan (or Smith) was proceeded against.  Robert Barker turned King’s evidence, and described the method by which the graves were robbed, and how the bodies were sent to London by the wain.  A verdict of guilty was returned, and on November 14th, 1828, the prisoner was brought up for sentence in the Court of King’s Bench.  He urged that he was driven by poverty to the commission of the offence, and was sentenced by Mr. Justice Bayley to six months’ imprisonment in the house of correction at Norwich."

Title: Norfolk Annals  A Chronological Record of Remarkable Events in the Nineteeth Century, Vol. 1     Author: Charles Mackie