IN THE intimacy of the bedroom, the words “hermeneutical” and “Trinitarian” can be whispered but rarely across the pillow between lovers of whatever orientation.

But when the General Synod debates sex, it obfuscates the mechanics and raises the topic to a strictly above-the-waist matter.

There was nary a titter when the Bishop of Oxford, Richard Harries, introduced the debate on the Church’s report on issues of human sexuality with the explanation that it sought to set out a range of positions, and that searching questions should be asked of every position.

The good bishop was talking about moral stances, not venereal gymnastics. And the debate whether fully to embrace lesbians and homosexuals is given a protective bubble-wrap in the phrase “interpretive charity”. If there’s one thing that must make God tear at his white beard, it’s religion.

So high is the moral plane of the report, so anguished in its search for answers that will please everyone, that it can seem light-years away from this everyday corporeal life.

Speaking from the floor, Anne Thomas-Betts of Oxford observed that sex was one of the most powerful urges within the aforesaid bodies: “God also made it fun, but you wouldn’t guess it from this report.” Dr Thomas-Betts, a married person, also thought more guidance on the nature of sin would be useful — “not that we’re likely to want to be bound by it”, she added.

So preoccupied is the Anglican community with the homosexuality debate that the issue has generated its own shorthand, with one speaker from the floor referring to “LGBT Christians.” That’s lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transsexuals. We haven’t left anyone out, have we? Oh, yes — the celibate singles such as Sister Rosemary, an Anglican nun with more than her share of compassion and good sense, who earned an extra round of applause when it was announced that she was making her maiden speech. She defended her celibacy and singleness but admitted they were “minority ways”. Forced celibacy was as bad as forced marriage, and she rejoiced with gay Christians in committed relationships.

We certainly haven’t left out the Rev Paul Collier, who declared emphatically that he was not a heterosexual Christian gone astray; he was a gay Christian. “I don’t recognise the Church in this report; I trust God to lead the Church.”

There was much debate on whether the Church should be “trendy and agreeable” or whether it should stand for traditional values in a promiscuous world. Jane Pitts from Liverpool thought the homosexuality debate was — unhappy choice of phrase — queering the Church’s pitch.

Only the Rev David Banting of Chelmsford had the wit to point out that the debate was taking place during National Marriage Week. He appeared to be in favour of old-style marriage between different genders; the gay lobby was merely causing “disturbance and schism” in the Church.

Anthony Barratt, the Roman Catholic fraternal delegate, began a short address on holiness, but when he proceeded to talk about “sex reassignment surgery” he appeared to have steered himself into something of a blind alley, and he mercifully sat down.

Archdeacon Ronald Hesketh, Anglican chaplain to the RAF, had his feet more firmly on the rudder pedals. The Armed Forces had finally accepted homosexuals in the ranks, and the world had not fallen apart.

Archdeacon David Gerrard of Wandsworth likened the persecution of gays to that of Jews, and strongly objected to a poster he had seen at a South London church: “Shoplifters and shirtlifters welcome here.”

A final word on sin from the Rev Brian Leathers of Derby, an ex-policeman and father of four, who commended the report as “an excellent tool for study” but could not understand why everyone was stuck on sex as the sin.

It all depends on what kind of sex. We know what they did in Sodom, but what went on in Gomorrah? The same thing probably, but the day after. Having voted almost unanimously for the fudge of a catch-all report, the Church of England at least becomes like the rest of us. Now it can carry on talking about sex tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after that.

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