What is in Kelvin's Head?

  • Florence Li Tim-Oi – Celebrating 70 years since her ordination

    I’m just off to celebrate a Eucharist because it is a Feast Day – the Conversion of St Paul. The standard, if rather weak, in-joke is that one is going to pray for the Conversion of St Paul rather than simply remember the Conversion of St Paul – not least because Paul had things to say that have not been terribly helpful to a modern world where women and men are equal.

    As I celebrate the feast today I’m going to be remembering with thanksgiving this woman: The Rev Florence Li Tim-Oi and celebrating 70 years since her ordination.

    Florence Li Tim-Oi

    She was the first woman to be made a priest in the Anglican Communion and today is 70 years since it happened. It happened in wartime when there were no men around and it happened secretly and without the permission of synods and decision-making bodies simply, I suspect because they couldn’t meet at the time.

    The most extraordinary thing about Mother Florence is that once the war was over, she gave up her license to act as a priest (but not her orders) until such time as her church accepted the principle that women and men could equally be regarded as priests. In her part of the world, that meant waiting until 1971.

    I can’t imagine what it was like to wait so many years to be treated as an equal.

    No, wait a minute.

    I can.

    , ,

5 responses to “The Anglican Covenant and Communion Motions”

  1. Tim Avatar
    Tim

    A is for Anglican is for Affirming things and for Adopting things even when they’re mutually contradictory?

    Reply
  2. kelvin Avatar
    kelvin

    It will be entirely up to the synod to decide whether to adopt either of these motions. My hunch is that it will adopt one of them resoundingly.

    Reply
  3. Brother David Avatar
    Brother David

    I hope the Synod votes against the first motion and approves the second motion.

    BTW, we in Mexico thank you for the consecration of Bishop Seabury because of our TEC heritage.

    Reply
  4. kennedy fraser Avatar
    kennedy fraser

    For those who aren’t able to be present for the debate (or for any part of Synod’s business) a live audio stream will be available from the Provincial website when Synod is sitting.

    Kennedy

    Reply
  5. Tom Wilson Avatar
    Tom Wilson

    It is interesting to ponder that if an “Anglican Covenant” had existed in the 18th century, that it is distinctly possible that the SEC might have been “excluded” from the Anglican Communion for consecrating Bp Samuel Seabury, the first American Bishop, as the Church of England Bishops had refused to do so.

    Reply

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