{"id":954,"date":"2013-11-29T21:38:00","date_gmt":"2013-11-29T21:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/?guid=8955a230e529aeb51faa30380564b189"},"modified":"2013-11-29T21:38:08","modified_gmt":"2013-11-29T21:38:08","slug":"the-pilling-report-a-bisexual-perspective","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/2013\/11\/the-pilling-report-a-bisexual-perspective\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pilling Report – A bisexual perspective"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Church of England published today a report commissioned in January 2012, named Report of the House of Bishops Working Group on Human Sexuality. <\/i>Many news agencies are trumpeting the news that it contains recommendations that <\/span><\/span>“there can be circumstances where a priest, with the agreement of the relevant parochial church council, should be free to mark the formation of a permanent same-sex relationship in a public service but should be under no obligation to do so.”<\/span><\/span>

<\/span><\/span>Exciting as this may be, it was when I was perusing the CofE’s official news item on its website (<\/span><\/span>http:\/\/www.churchofengland.org\/media-centre\/news\/2013\/11\/pilling-report-published.aspx<\/a>) that I came upon this sentence – “<\/span>It warmly welcomes and affirms the presence and ministry within the church of gay and lesbian people both lay and ordained.”<\/span><\/span>

<\/span><\/span>Oh here we go, I thought. Where are the bisexuals please?<\/span><\/span>

<\/span><\/span>So I am going to search the report (PDF: <\/span><\/span>http:\/\/www.churchofengland.org\/media\/1891063\/pilling_report_gs_1929_web.pdf<\/a>) for the word ‘bisexual’ and write notes here as I go (I haven’t the time to read through the whole thing, thought I wish I could).<\/p>\n

1. First mention is in the classic LGBT list in paragraph 32 on page 6. Not a good start.
2. Same again in par. 41
3. Ooh, quoting stats now. 2012 British survey by Office of National statistics – 0.4% identified as bisexual. Unsurprising that, seeing as it is misunderstood, marginalised, and discriminated against by straight, gay and lesbian people!
4. OMG they’ve raised their game, I’m impressed! The next paragraph is actually quite rational and reassuring: These data give a combined total of 1.5% of the adult population that self identifies as homosexual or bisexual…only gives a snapshot of those who self-identified in this way when the survey was taken. It does not take into account those with a degree of same sex attraction who chose not to identify as homosexual or bisexual, those who would have identified as homosexual or bisexual in the the past but who no longer chose to do so, or those who did not identify as homosexual or bisexual at the times of the survey, but might go on to do so in the future.<\/span><\/i>
5. <\/span>Par. 199 acknowledges that sexual fluidity is probably a thing! <\/span>Again, surprised and pleased at the level of knowledge show. <\/span>
6. FOLLOWED BY THIS AMAZING PARAGRAPH: Rather than thinking about the human population in terms of a <\/i><\/span><\/span>fixed binary division between two sets of people, those who are straight <\/i>and those who are gay, it seems that we need to accept that while there is a <\/i>large majority of people who only ever experience heterosexual attraction <\/i>and a smaller number who only experience homosexual attraction, there is <\/i>also a significant minority of people who either experience some form of <\/i>bisexual attraction or who move between heterosexual and homosexual <\/i>attraction at some point or points in their life.<\/i>
7. And back to being part of the LGB\/T list.<\/span>
8. Interesting phrase “bisexual and same sex attractions” in par. 418. What are bisexual attractions?? I think they’ve gone too far with trying to use inclusive language. But good on them for trying!<\/span>
9. OOH Par. 419 points out that we’re well beyond just dealing with homosexuality and homophobia! Yay.<\/span>
10. “<\/span>What…would the Church of <\/span>England say to someone…<\/span>who says they identify as <\/span>gay or lesbian or (increasingly likely)<\/u> as bisexual…” Interesting.<\/span>
11. Oh, mention of those bisexual attractions again, quite a few times.<\/span>
12. And finishing back in the LGBT list.<\/span>

<\/span>Wow, okay, that is encouraging. Amazing that the investigation really stuck into the nature of sexuality, an understanding of which is, I believe, crucial. I think it is that education, <\/span>above all,<\/span> <\/span>that has enlightened the writers and led to their recommendations of progress and improvement. Small steps, but my Church might just be on the right track after all!!<\/span>

<\/span>Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Church of England published today a report commissioned in January 2012, named Report of the House of Bishops Working Group on Human Sexuality. Many news agencies are trumpeting the news that it contains recommendations that “there can be circ…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":1211,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-954","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=954"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9214,"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954\/revisions\/9214"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=954"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=954"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bimedia.org\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=954"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}