By Paschal Norbert
NAIROBI, FEBRUARY 14, 2023 (CISA)– The Anglican Church of Kenya has dismissed the vote by the Members of the Church of England General Synod that ultimately approved the blessing of same-sex unions terming the move as “hypocritical and sinful.”
In a statement dated January 10, Archbishop Jackson Ole Sapit, the head of the Anglican Church of Kenya (ACK) said that the Church in Kenya would not condone same-sex marriages and homosexuality as it goes against the traditional teachings of marriage and Christianity.
“It is ridiculous that the Church of England affirms to remain faithful to the traditional teachings of marriage yet have sanctioned the so-called prayers of love to be used in their Churches to bless unions between persons of the same sex. This is hypocritical and a blatant lie for there is only one truth and not many versions or opinions of it,” he said.
On February 9, the Church of England approved to offer blessings on same-sex couples while maintaining the ban on same-sex marriage. According to the measure, “Same-sex couples still won’t be able to marry in the church, but they can come to church after a civil marriage or civil partnership to give thanks, dedicate their relationship to God and receive God’s blessing.”
According to Archbishop Ole Sapit, this divisive move by the Church of England has been regarded as both a flawed compromise and an outright mistake and is a departure of the mother Church from the true Gospel.
“The General Synod of the Church of England makes legislations for the Church of England, and their resolutions apply only to the Church of England. Whereas we in the Anglican Church of Kenya (ACK) are saddened by the departure of our mother Church from the true Gospel, their resolutions do not apply to us and we do not recognize any teaching that is extra-biblical or contrary to the teachings of the Bible,” he clarified.
“We in the Anglican Church of Kenya call upon these Western liberal Provinces to repent and return to the one and only faith in Jesus Christ as revealed and taught in the Canonical scriptures of the Church,” he appealed.
The archbishop also warned that “Rhetoric of political and secular correctness will only serve to undermine the one and only pure Gospel, and unless these churches preach the Gospel as we inherited it, they will soon be irrelevant and lose their identity as a Church.”
Archbishop Ole Sapit urged the faithful to stick to the teachings of the Bible, which he said is authoritative in all matters of faith and any departure from the historic formularies and the plain teachings of the scriptures is an error that must be corrected.
“We affirm that marriage, as taught in the Holy Scriptures is between one man and one woman, monogamous and heterosexual. Any deviation from this God-designed covenant relationship is sinful and unacceptable,” said the archbishop.
This statement by Archbishop Ole Sapit comes days after Pope Francis, the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and the Moderator of the Church of Scotland Rt. Rev. Iain Greenshields denounced laws criminalizing homosexuality and said gay people should be welcomed by their churches.
While the Church of Scotland allows same-sex marriages, the Catholic Church regards homosexual acts as intrinsically disordered and forbids both same-sex marriages and blessings of such unions.
