I’ve very mixed feelings about the vote that has just taken place in the Church of England Synod regarding the question of whether that church should allow women to be able to made bishops.
On the one hand, I know some of the women who are likely to be made bishops and I know the joy and the thrill that will be theirs in taking on this role which previously was denied them. They will make fantastic leaders.
However I also know that the C of E has fallen a long way short of equality. It will still be the case that people will be able to behave in that church as though women are not really bishops at all.
Here in Scotland we’ve been able to have women as candidates in Episcopal elections for some years now however we’ve not elected anyone who happens to be a woman yet.
However if a bishop is ordained in Scotland then she is a bishop. Should someone not accept that, she may take whatever action she needs to take in order to facilitate the governance of the diocese. (She might invite another bishop to work with her or she might not, as she judges appropriately). In England, it will still be possible for someone unable to accept that a women can be a bishop (or even a priest) to simply request a male one.
It is a profoundly different state of affairs and this will embed into the Church of England the notion that the ordination that women receive, whether to the presbyterate or the episcopate can be accepted or rejected by anyone who choses to do so. The same doesn’t apply to men who are ordained.
For that reason, whilst wanting to get all excited about the new opportunities that lie ahead for friends down south who will make brilliant leaders, my fear is that in due course, women and men alike will regret the decisions that led to women being appointed as bishops on these terms.
A single measure clause which simply allowed women to be candidates for the Episcopate would have been just and right. This solution feels far from that.
I know women and men in England who know that this is a vote in favour of allowing women to become second-class bishops.
I have to admit that my sympathies largely lie with them today.
Hi Kelvin
As I have been saying all along to anyone that listens: if the ‘issue’ at hand was whether priests of colour or differing abilities were/were not ‘allowed’ to be bishops, the issue at hand would never be tolerated. It would be named for what it is: discrimination/oppression. However, the ‘issue’ here is in regards to women (ie gender) and for some reason (I have my theories) the issue of gender never seems to be viewed as an issue of oppression and discrimination. During my time on the Isle of Lewis, I tried to raise the gender issue with both my bishop and the Primus and I was given two separate responses: ‘maintain a dignified silence’ and ‘this issue is between you and your bishop.’ No one wants to name this entire process for what it is: MISOGYNY. Plain and simple.
My preference would have been a ‘no’ vote. What we are left with will be enshrined in canon law. We are second class citizens in the Church of England. Shame.
Misogyny is intolerable, Shona, It’s lamentable that you don’t feel supported by the people whose ministry it is to help promote, develop, and sustain the ministries of ALL their clergy.
The worrying thing is that it is misogyny supported by women, or by a small minority of women. It is beyond me to understand without getting into the kind of psycho-babble I am not really qualified to speak or understand. But yes, it is misogyny – a belief that women are not really people, which is why failing to recognise a woman as a bishop insults ALL women, not just the ones with the ability and calling to fulfil that particular role.
I never heard one person say that women weren’t people so they shouldn’t be bishops. You’re taking this a stretch too far aren’t you,Rosemary?
It is the argument though. Women cannot represent Christ, because Christ was incarnate (in their view) as a man, (not as a human) which is something quite different from being a woman. Or else that women cannot take leadership roles, because they cannot have authority. both arguments depend on women being something less than fully human. Real and full humanity is (according to both arguments) only present in men.
No, Nick, I don’t think Rosemary has taken this a stretch too far. I have heard people express the same sentiments, if using different language. As Rosemary in her second post says, if people deny full equality to women, they are being treated as less than fully human. I don’t buy the ‘complementary’ or ‘separate but equal’ arguments. What happens is is that you get the separation alright but you don’t get the equality. While I am delighted by Monday’s vote, I share Kelvin’s misgivings because the CofE is still allowing discrimination and misogyny in some parts of its domain.
Daniel Lamont
Daniel, Rosemary, how would you minister to the parishes that don’t believe that women should be bishops? Do you tell them simply to just leave the CoE? Do you think the CoE is in a position to say such a thing, given how many people have left and are actual practicing Anglican Christians?? What really bothers me is how people are looking at consecration to the episcopate as some kind of a “right”, when NO ONE has a right to ordination, either men or women. Just like I told someone else above, no one has a “right” to the sacraments.
I seem to detect a somewhat authoritarian sub-text to Nick’s posts. Speaking for myself only. I would want to make two replies to Nick. 1) As a member of the CofE who frequently worships in Anglican churches in Scotland and Canada, I do feel free to reject my bishops’ pronouncements on anything whether or not it be prophetic. I adhere to Hooker’s classic summary that the CofE is based on the three legs of faith, tradition and reason and I don’t leave my reason at the church door. Merely because someone is a bishop does not mean that ipso facto I accept what they say. A bishop has to provide leadership – though I find that sadly lacking on the English bench of bishops at the moment, who generally are theologically under-educated- but he/she cannot compel my agreement since I am nor ordained. I listen seriously to what they say and and weigh it up but a Bishop has to earn respect and also establish a ‘track record’. Thus I always take seriously what Bishops Nick Baines and Alan Wilson in England (and, for that matter Kelvin) have to say because they have established a pattern of thoughtful and considered comment over the years. Thus reading Bishop Nick and Kelvin on assisted dying has forced me to reconsider my views. We are a Reformed church and the SEC’s ordinal has a lot to commend it. 2) What I consider ‘prophetic’ depends on my own thinking, what members of my church say, what I read and hear in discussion and then come to a conclusion which might be tentative.
It might be worth pointing out that the Scottish Episcopal Church is the only Anglican church not to emerge from the CofE. The Reformation in Scotland has a very different history from that in England.
Daniel Lamont
Thanks for your response Daniel. I frequently ignore my own bishops and priests on social issues here in the US.
I can understand why you might find that very polarised climate difficult, Nick. Over in old Blighty we’re all packed tightly into these funny islands and are more inclined to be arch with our ecclesiastical ‘enemies’ than to be directly aggressive. You seem to be seething with rage, which is good for neither body nor soul. I don’t jump on the liberal bandwagon for every issue and am conservative on some so I wonder if you’re feeling steamrollered by a community you feel kinship with but who appear to you to be betraying their values for reasons nothing to do with the Gospel. Actually, that sums up my feelings about my cradle Roman Catholicism, at least about the Scottish hierarchy. But it takes all types to make up the people of God. Would you not feel more at home in Rome?
No Alan, because in good conscience, I cannot sign on to all of their teachings as I believe Rome is still in error. I’m not “seething with rage”, I personally have no issue with women in any of the holy orders, but I respect the parishes that don’t see it that way, and I would expect the church to minister to them. That’s not rage, that’s logic.
The problem is that the C of E has gone down a road of letting particular parishes paint themselves into corners. Rather than letting it be a matter of good pastoral practise to fit the clergy to the parish (as already happens with low and high church priests/parishes) they allowed particular parishes to set themselves in stone by adopting ‘resolutions’.
I have expereince of a church in Scotland where one or two prominent older members of the congregation were against women priests. The then bishop formed the opinion that ‘that church should never have a priest who is a woman serve there.’ At that point, one member moved and another died. Coincidentally, a woman priest came to take a wedding of the adult offspring of a regular member. Attitudes changed. A different, incoming bishop who took soundings from the church was surprised to find that the overwhelming bulk of the congregation were open to having a priest of either gender, and one member had reservations but felt there might be a possibility of their changing their mind, which, when the next priest happened to be a woman, they actually did.
Informal arrangements allow for flexibility. Arrangements to accommodate the weaknesses of of people’s faith are very different from trying to make honoured places for prejudices. Very few congregations have left over the issues over women priests, but the people who do not come to church are not simply motivated by feeling God is an implausible hypothesis or that they need a lie in on Sundays. Many do not come because they see churches as wedded to biased views which secular society has quite rightly binned.
There can never be a right for a particular person to be ordained. But there are no different classes of people. Everybody is human. The only people available for ordination are human. It is splitting people into artificial classes which makes the trouble. It is arguing that gay people or female people or black people are not really human and so cannot be ordained that makes the trouble. Saying that a particular person lacks the gifts needed for ordination, and cannot serve the church in that way is a wholly different thing.
Nick, I have carefully read once again both Kelvin’s original post and the comments. I think you are imputing to all of us views that we do not in fact hold. No-one here is saying that anyone has a right to be ordained, whatever people elsewhere might believe. Kelvin said ‘However I also know that the C of E has fallen a long way short of equality. It will still be the case that people will be able to behave in that church as though women are not really bishops at all’. The issue is a matter of discrimination. If you ordain a woman either priest or bishop but limit their authority and also where they might serve on the grounds of their gender and do not do the same for men, you are, ipso fact, being discriminatory. Had the CofE not secured exemption from UK equality legislation, the decision on Monday to consecrate women as bishops but place restrictions on their authority and how they may carry out their roles in ways that do not apply to men, then the Church would have been in breach of the legislation. That is the point that Kelvin has made. It is worth saying for the benefit of non-Brits that CofE canon law has the force of the law of the land in England.
Rosemary has made an excellent point above about differences might be better managed without being entrenched in legislation and I agree strongly with all she has said. Hard cases make bad law. In order to secure approval to consecrate woman bishops, the CofE has had to compromise, and I understand that, but, as far as I am concerned, it has entrenched the right to be discriminatory. You argue that a parish should not be forced to have a male bishop and accuse those of us who disagree of not being inclusive. You also suggest that offering parishes the choice of accepting women priests or leaving the CofE would lead to the further decline of membership. Ii would counter that by saying that I am well aware of many people who will not join the CofE because it institutionalises discrimination on the grounds of gender and sexuality. It is sometimes possible to become so inclusive that you don’t stand for anything. You may have lived a more sheltered life than I have, but I have heard both anglo-catholics and conservative evangelicals speak of women in such appalling and derogatory terms that I am not sure that I wish to belong to the same institution. I think we are unlikely to agree so I will now fall silent other than to say that I strongly support Kelvin and other commentators here in their abhorrence of all kinds of discrimination, whether it be of gender or sexuality.
I agree to disagree,Daniel. I think the people that won’t join because of those things would be joining the church for all the wrong reasons to begin with. But that’s another story.