Non-Anglican parents of children in Anglican schools are unhappy that the Anglican Diocese of Sydney has simply restated basic principles about the biological nature of human sexuality.

In what sense is an Anglican school that rejects Anglican teaching in order to keep non-Anglican families happy still an Anglican school?

That’s the question Sydney Anglicans are wrestling with as the opposition to Christian teaching ohe n sexuality and gender grows.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported at the weekend that alumni and parents from Anglican schools had issued a letter complaining the Anglican church was ‘imposing its social conservatism on classrooms’.

In other words, they were worried that the Anglican church was instructing Anglican schools to be, well, Anglican.

Specifically, parents were upset about guidelines for schools on dealing with students struggling with gender identity.

Basic Principles

The Anglican Diocese of Sydney has advised its schools to show compassion, reject bullying and abuse, and note that nobody was immune from “brokenness”, but to also tell students to “honour and preserve the maleness or femaleness of the body God has given you”.

All of which sounded a little too much like Anglicanism for Anglican school parents.

“I feel awful for any student who has to endure this senseless attack on their identity,” a transgender woman who identified as an Anglican parishioner told the Sydney Morning Herald.

Another parent told the Herald that most families at his daughter’s Anglican school were not religious, and that he worried “socially conservative” forces were pushing the school “in a different direction”.

By “socially conservative” he presumably meant Anglican. And by “different direction” he evidently meant Christian.

If only those Anglicans wouldn’t be so Anglican, their Anglican school would be less Anglican so that non-Anglicans could enjoy it!

Biblical & Scientific

Judging by the reported comments of disaffected parents, it will likely come as a surprise for them to learn that Anglican leaders don’t take their cues from Libs of TikTok.

Church leaders base their doctrine on the teaching of Jesus who, among other things, told His followers:

“Surely you have read in the Scriptures: When God made the world, ‘He made them male and female.”

Jesus’ words align with science, but not with the new-fangled gender transformation fetish.

The Anglican Diocese has essentially reminded its Anglican schools — which include some of the most exclusive colleges in the country, such as The Kings School and Abbotsleigh — that they are Anglican.

___

Originally published at The James Macpherson Report.
Subscribe to his Substack here for daily witty commentary.
Photo by Mikhail Nilov.