FOLLOWING the publication of the Church of England’s draft Prayers of Love and Faith for thanksgiving, dedication and God’s blessing for same-sex couples, the Revd Cate Jacobs, a long-term member of the first Open Table community in Liverpool, has written this poem:

Your prayers of blessings,
are not, in my opinion,
crumbs from the table
so much
as seeds of hope.

You cannot break the rainbow -
for we would gather up the scattered
fragments and make a stained glass window
of God’s covenant; a reminder, that the curtain
of the temple was torn in two,
when his body was broken for us.

All of us.

READ MORE about the Church of England College of Bishops’ response to the Living In Love & Faith process on identity, sexuality, relationships and marriage. This will be discussed again at the CofE’s governing body, General Synod, in July.