What a Load of Frocks!

Church of England appoints a trans bishop and then threatens to defrock a priest who calls it out

Reverend Rachel Mann

I would love to be part of the Anglican Church, but there are limits to how far my faith will stretch.

I’m not talking about the idea that Mary was a virgin. That doctrine I can get my head around.

How else was God to enter human history except via the womb of a virgin? The virgin birth was a miracle, to be sure, but a logical one.

So no, the stumbling block for me is not the Virgin Mary; it’s the Reverend Rachel Mann.

Reverend Mann, you see, is Mann by name and man by nature.

But the man Mann is getting about in the Church of England these days as a woman.

And believing that requires more faith than I have.

Reverend Mann - or Rachel as he prefers to be called - was recently appointed the C of E’s first transgendered bishop, making the man Mann the main man Mann.

LGBT campaigners along with all the devils in hell, but I repeat myself, called Rachel’s appointment a “beacon of light and hope”.

Reverend Rachel Mann told The Telegraph …

“I’m self-evidently a woman, but I’m glad I was once a man.”

Honestly, unpacking all 27 chapters of the book of Leviticus would be easier than unpacking that sentence.

A man cannot be self-evidently a woman. And a woman cannot be glad for having once been a man.

On a positive note, no progressive should ever again complain that Moses parting the Red Sea, or that Christ rising from the dead, makes Christianity impossible to believe. Those miracles at least made sense, and were performed by God.

But there’s another twist to this story. (There’s always a twist)

A vicar who dared to point out that main man Mann is a man is now likely to be defrocked.

Yes, you read that correctly.

The man Mann who wears a literal frock will continue ministering while the man who pointed out Mann’s manliness will be metaphorically defrocked.

Reverend Brett Murphy is being investigated by the church after he referred to Rachel as “a bloke”.

Genesis 1v27 is apparently unsayable now, even by priests within the church.

For the sin of “intentionally derogatory and disrespectful remarks”, Murphy is facing banishment from the Church of England.

So while lying used to get you kicked out of the ministry, now lying is a prerequisite for staying in the ministry!

Reverend Murphy made the offending comment on YouTube when he criticised the church for putting “a radical rainbow activist” in a “position of high authority in a diocese”.

He told his social media followers …

“The Reverend Rachel Mann is in fact, biologically, a bloke, who identifies and lives as a woman.”

All true.

Reverend Murphy went on to question how Reverend Rachel Mann would deal with a member of his congregation who saw his lifestyle as “complete rebellion against God’s word”.

A fair enough question.

Church officials said Reverend Murphy’s comments were “not appropriate as a cleric in Holy Orders”. They advised him …

“You clearly recorded your vlog wearing clerical attire aware that this would give you both status and make it clear you were a Church of England priest.”

So, to be clear, Reverend Rachel Mann can put on priestly attire to pretend he is a woman, but Reverend Brett Murphy cannot put on priestly attire to point out that Mann is not.

The Bible says something about Reverend Rachel Mann’s situation.

“A woman must not wear men’s clothing, nor a man wear women’s clothing, for the Lord your God detests anyone who does this” - Deuteronomy 22v5

If only the Church of England was interested in the Bible, that verse might be relevant to the situation.

While God detests a man in women’s clothing, the Church of England detests only a man who calls it out.

The church hierarchy accused Reverend Murphy of trying to spread his views to “as wide an audience as possible”.

In other words, if only he would keep the truth to himself, he would be an acceptable priest.

When the church is advising its ministers to hide their light under a bushel you can be sure it is no longer the church of Jesus Christ.

So I’m no longer interested in the Anglican Church. But Monty Python might be.

There's got to be be a comedy sketch in there somewhere about a bloke in a frock being threatened with being defrocked by a bloke in a fancier frock, because he pointed out that another bloke in a frock is, in fact, a bloke in a frock.

What a load of frocks!