In the document Fiducia Supplicans published last December 18, 2023, by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF), the Vatican authorized the blessing of “couples in irregular situations and same-sex couples” provided that it does not “create confusion with the blessing proper to the sacrament of marriage.”
This drew quick reactions from African laypeople and priests. The letter “No Blessing for Homosexual Couples in the African Churches” issued by the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) last January 11, 2024, has generally rejected blessings for same-sex couples especially in countries where this can cause scandal, confusion, or where same-sex relation is criminalized.[1] It should be noted that as of 2020, 32 out of the 54 countries in Africa criminalize homosexuality.[2] A number of episcopal conferences in Eastern Europe have also pushed back against Fiducia Supplicans.
On the other hand, even after the DDF under the past leadership of Cardinal Luis Ladaria released in 2021 the responsum ad dubium(“response to doubt”) that the Church does not have the power to grant blessings to same-sex unions, the bishops of Flanders have unanimously allowed in 2022 the blessing of same-sex couples without any intervention from the Pope or the Vatican.[3]
I have highlighted above how bishops/episcopal conferences, while remaining in communion with Rome, have exercised their magisterial authority, in line with Art. 753 of the 1983 Code of Canon Law which states that episcopal conferences exercise a legitimate role as authentic teachers and instructors of faith for the believing community.
Last February 2, 2024, I took part in a roundtable discussion on Kwok Pui-lan’s book The Anglican Tradition from a Postcolonial Perspective. Chapter 5 of her book focused on the debates on human sexuality, particularly polygamy and homosexuality. I realized how similar our experiences are especially concerning the issue of homosexuality except that the provinces of the Anglican Communion are much more autonomous than the Roman Catholic church. The Anglican Communion has been rocked by division over issues related to the acceptance of homosexuality since the 1990s, with the last 2022 Lambeth conference concluding with the agreement [among the bishops] to disagree. On the other hand, in the Roman Catholic Church, a pastoral Pope like Pope Francis, tries to keep the unity by preserving the teaching but allowing it, in the words of Cardinal Victor Fernandes, current head of the DDF, “to enter into dialogue with the concrete, often so wounded lives of the faithful.”[4]
In light of this and similar occurrences in the past, there are calls from theologians in both traditions to regard ecclesial conflicts in a more positive light. US American Anglican ethicist Kyle Lambelet challenges how we view ecclesial conflict which traditionally is associated with sin that needs to be purged or repressed or healed. Australian Anglican Bruce Kaye sees conflict as a part of our finitude. The history of Christianity shows not a history of uniformity but a constant tension and contestation between the local and the universal. The question for him is not how uniformity can be reached but is rather more relational: “how do Christians generally and Anglicans specifically love one another across their local variations?”[5] Kaye argues that catholicity, rather than unity, offers a better starting point. He does not preclude unity but this should be worked on from the bottom up instead of a juridical account of unity enforced from the top down. With catholicity as starting point, there is less demand for uniformity. Attaining unity here requires much more work that delves into the root of ecclesial conflicts instead of the conflict being managed simply through procedural means.
On the Catholic side, Judith Gruber proposes a theology of conflict within an ecclesiological framework that situates contestation as an integral dimension of the church. Similar to Kaye, Gruber notes how contestation has been an integral part of the formation of the Christian tradition from its beginnings. She asks: “What theological status can we attribute to conflict in the church? Is there a way of understanding inner-ecclesial disagreements such that they are not excluded a priori as heresy (or subjected harmonizingly to an ideal of unity)?” [6]
Appropriating the ideas of political philosopher Jaque Ranciere, for Gruber, dissent or what Pui-lan would refer to as “difference” constitutes a negotiation of 1) what can be considered “visible, sayable, and meaningful” in the community, and 2) who are included or excluded in the conversation. In this perspective, contestation or difference should not be regarded as negative but rather “foundational to any knowledge production and community formation”.
Furthermore, difference is not regarded here simply as a reality of human existence that has to be accepted. It needs to be analyzed in terms of who has the power to speak and who is silenced at certain historical conjunctures, with preference for the voice of those who are rendered invisible in our discourses. Gruber argues that “God comes into view whenever there is a renegotiation of who can be seen and what can be said about them.” (cf. Mt. 25: 31-46)
From this, it can be deduced that it is important for instance, to examine the different cultural discourses about homosexuality in Africa and which voices are suppressed. Pui-lan cited in her book the study of Zambian Anglican Kapya John Kaoma who refers to the researches of Marc Epprecht and E. Evans-Pritchard that challenge the claim that homosexuality is foreign to Africa, showing how African societies have been open to sexual diversity and expressions besides heterosexuality.[7] He also pointed out that it was the British during the colonial era who introduced laws that criminalized homosexuality in Africa. This was reinforced in the 1990s with the globalization of culture wars by the US American Christian right when US conservative evangelicals promoted the criminalization of homosexuality in Africa. Needless to say, more analysis and conversation on the discourses on homosexuality in Africa from a postcolonial perspective need to be done.
Unlike its title, “No Blessing for Homosexual Couples in the African Churches” which initially gives an impression of an all-encompassing closed policy, the document qualifies that “Some countries prefer to have more time for the deepening of the Declaration which in fact offers the possibility of these blessings but does not impose them.” With the openness to further conversation both on the side of the Vatican and the African churches, we hope we are seeing the dawn toward a more decentralized and inclusive (catholic) Church, and in this context, the development of a theology of difference is indeed very timely.
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[1] SECAM, “No Blessing for Homosexual Couples in the African Churches: Synthesis of the Responses from the African Episcopal Conferences to the Declaration Fiducia Supplicans, January 11, 2024, https://theindependentprobe.com/pope-francis-summersaults-over-blessing-same-sex-couples/.
[2] “Criminalization of homosexual relations in Africa 2020, https://www.statista.com/statistics/1269999/criminalization-of-same-sex-relations-in-africa/.
[3] “Germany’s Catholic Church approved blessings for same-sex couples. Is this a revolution?” March 15, 2023, https://www.ncronline.org/opinion/guest-voices/germanys-catholic-church-approved-blessings-same-sex-couples-revolution
[4] Jonathan Liedl, “Cardinal Fernández: Vatican’s Same-Sex Blessings Guidance Is ‘Clear Answer’ to German Bishops,” January 3, 2024, https://www.ncregister.com/cna/cardinal-fernandez-vatican-s-same-sex-blessings-guidance-is-clear-answer-to-german-bishops.
[5] Kyle B.T, Lambelet, “Conflict as Communion: Toward an Agonistic Ecclesiology,” Journal of Anglican Studies (2019): 6.
[6] Judith Gruber, “Consensus or Dissensus: Exploring the Role of Theological Conflict in a Synodal
Church,” Louvain Studies 43 (2020): 239–59, https://doi.org/10.2143/LS.43.3.3288706
[7] Kapya John Kaoma, “Beyond Adam and Eve: Jesus, Sexual Minorities and Sexual Politics in the Church in Africa,” Journal of Theology for Southern Africa 153 (2015): 18.