When the Rev Dr Jennifer Cooper was ordained at Bristol Cathedral a month ago, it was a moment of uncomplicated joy. “I was overwhelmed to be surrounded by so many people, sharing in this very powerful moment,” she says. “I was finally going to fulfil my calling.”
On the surface, few ceremonies could offer more hope to a Church of England fighting for survival than an ordination. It is a sign of new life, at a time when Sunday attendance threatens to dip below a million.
And, since the ordination of women was approved exactly 15 years ago tomorrow, their presence is now taken for granted: more than 2,000 out of 9,500 Anglican clergy are women, as are almost half of trainee priests. And yet no issue has divided the Church so violently in recent times as that of women priests.
From the moment it became a reality, after a vote of the General Synod in November 1992, there was talk of schism and threats of an exodus to Rome. “This is the death of the Church,” concluded one opponent. “You can no more ordain a woman than a pork pie,” suggested another.
How has the Church of England grown or declined in this time? ASA? number of clergy? number of parishes? giving?
i used to watch the vicar of dibley and thought it humourous but never found it particularly Christian…
This article in a secular (by nature anti-Christian) publication equates opposition to priestesses with “prejudice.” However, it is not prejudice to believe that the father of a community can only be a man. Women have no business pretending to be a father–it is simply fraud. Also, maybe that is why the Episcopal Church is so much in turmoil over Gay issues –gender anarchy.
In our tiny Catholic parish north of Boston we will set a record for converts entering the Church this year. Most are women (guess they didn’t hear the message we are “sexist.”) One is the woman Methodist pastor of a parish north of here. She told me (I am in charge of conversions for our parish) that after much study of Church History and the Bible she is convinced her church should never have ordained her. She also concluded that authority is a necessity, a gift from God, and clearly biblically rooted in the office of St. Peter.
However, try to find her story and the story of many other women like her in the MSM. Anyone interested in the issue should read the book : “The Catholic Mystique” by former women Luthern ministers now Catholics: Jennifer Ferrara and Patricia Sodano Ireland.
This is an interesting piece. First off, I agree with Magnolia that The Vicar of Dibley is most decidedly not a Christian program. I am agnostic on the issue of WO. We have one female clergy at my parish, and one preceeded her. We also have a former parish member who was ordained and now leads a house church plant. All three are wholly orthodox and fantastic preachers, far better than I would say 99% of the male clergy in ECUSA. OTOH, if WO were to be a stumbling block to a re-formed Anglican province in the USA, I would be OK with setting it aside. (Then again, I am not female and not a member of the clergy, so it is not my calling that would be on the line…)
What a misinforming and terrible article!! Take for instance:
[i]”The two main factions were evangelicals, who were opposed mainly on theological grounds, and Anglo-Catholics, who were concerned over relations with other denominations” [i]
EXCUSE ME??? How insulting???? Anglo-Catholics are the very ones who have presented the theological arguments against again and again and agian. Iam SO SO SO tired of putting forward our argument which NOONE then bothers to listen to or address theologically. ‘Yes but I know a nice lady vicar’ is about the best you get- or the desperate clutching at Junia.
FIF’s ‘Consecrating women’ sets out a wonderful and cohesive argument grounded in orthodox theology…but synod refuses to even reply. And noone has ever offerded me a sound counter argument.
FACT 1: there is no precedent for WO in scripture or holy tradition which makes it an innovation impossible to defend – and dangerous to implement as it leads to anytthing goes- note how the gay issue always follows the WO issue. If we ignored the rules once- why not again?
When you then add the role of priest as ‘in persona Christi’ at the Mass…….oh why bother. Its all been said before and noone bothers to listen. Or if they do they do not bother to present the opposition in a fair light. Merely branding us mysognist or cold. It is very hurtful.
I’ve seen sound arguments for women’s ordination. I would recommend
_Why Not Women? Biblical study about women in missions, ministry and leadership By Loren Cunningham and David Hamilton_. The argument that a woman can’t act “in persona christi” doesn’t really hold water in a protestant church, either (and yes, the Anglican church is Protestant)
Vivat Archiepiscopus:
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/11/12/america/NA-REL-US-Ordaining-Women.php
and let the good times roll.
#7 er would you show me WHERE the Church of England (and laterly Anglicanism) is referred to as protestant? Not in the BCP- as you will find that the church of England is Catholic and reformed not pretestant – hence its three fold order.
Re: #6,
Err, indeed; you must have meant #6.
Even if Cranmer, Latimer, Ridley, Jewel and that whole lot were as Protestant as Bullinger, Calvin or Luther, and even if the 39 Articles were meant to foist a Protestant Confession of Faith upon the Church of England (albeit one whose very vagueness at key points undermines their framers’ intentions), Catholic-minded Anglicans have but to invoke the Canon of 1571 about which I wrote here:
“At the same time [1571], however, this same Convocation passed a canon asserting that the Articles were in agreement with the ‘Catholic bishops and fathers’ of the Early Church and insisted that they be interpreted accordingly. This was a remarkable canon, for despite the fact that advocates of all sides to the 16th-Century religious conflict, Catholic, Lutheran and Reformed alike, were given to claiming that their particular doctrinal stances and, in some cases, distinctive practices, were in accord with those of the Early Church Fathers, or at least with those of high standing (such as St. Augustine), none were willing to require, or even permit, their confessional stances to be judged by, or subordinated to, a hypothetical ‘Patristic consensus’ of the first four or five centuries of Christianity.”
to evade the Reformers’ intentions and meanings, for whatever those Reformers may have imagined or thought, none of those “Catholic bishops and fathers” (not even St. Augustine) ever professed such distinctively Protestant notions as Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide, Private Judgment “Biblianity” and the rest; and so a Catholic-minded Anglican may say of those Reformers “let the dead bury the dead.”
FWIW, I like watching the [i]Vicar of Dibley[/i] on TV, but would not consider it — or the vicar — in any way an example of Christian TV. “Geraldine’s” behavior on the show is definately one of ‘I like Jesus when it’s convenient, but when it’s not, I make my own rules”. Her lust for ‘Simon’ and flauntint her ‘affair’ in front of a living room full of town-folk is a good example, and then trying to rationalize her behavior to ‘Alice’ that “sex outside of marriage is not [i]always[/i] wrong — is it?”
In fact, the one person who probably does make an attempt at upholding Christian values is ‘David Horton’, but he’s shown as a hypocrite all through the program (or is it ‘programme’?).
No, decidely not a show that portrays Christian values. But funny.
Jim Elliott <><
Re 8
RPP,
Apologies in advance for what I fear will be a less than irenic comment.
[blockquote] #7 er would you show me WHERE the Church of England (and laterly Anglicanism) is referred to as protestant? Not in the BCP- as you will find that the church of England is Catholic and reformed not pretestant – hence its three fold order.[/blockquote]
Would you show me where either of the other two “branches” of the Catholic Church have acknowledged the AC’s self proclaimed catholicity? Claiming to be something does not necessarily make it so. Does it not strike you as odd that Anglicanism’s claim to be one of the three branches of the catholic church is not recognized by either of the other two so called branches? As I once read somewhere else, it’s a bit like knocking on the door to the club and announcing your a member when in fact none of the other members ever saw it that way.
Who granted the CofE its autocephaly? Canonically only Rome could really that. How is it that Rome and Orthodoxy can be “branches” of what you perceive to be the Catholic Church when we are heretical? Surely you do realize that we [b][i]are[/i][/b] heretics? We must be since we expressly and unreservedly reject the theological nonsense spouted by the AC. After all the only other possible alternative is that the Anglican Communion is heretical.
The laws of logic: Two contradictory statements of fact cannot both be correct. Either one is wrong and one is right, or I suppose you could take the evangelical approach and argue that both are wrong.
WO was the last nail in the coffin of Anglican claims to being catholic. Everything that has followed is just the predictable consequence of the complete abandonment of the Catholic and Apostolic Faith. Your female clergy are no more priests than… well… your male clergy.
This is way off the topic of WO, but for those interested in the argument for the Anglican Church being Protestant, I highly commend the work of Paul Zahl, The Protestant Face of Anglicanism.
At the end of the article it mentions ordaining a pork pie. At least a pork pie would be unable to declare itself Christian *and* Muslim, as a certain priestess recently claimed.
This looks certain. In t he future, the CofE will have nothing but women priests. TE C will surely be the same. Why is this? Have men lost their drive, their nerve, as they h ave in so many other American en0deavors? Have they simply decided to opt out of competition?
T he reason why I do not want a woman priest is the injection of touchy-feely-dom into the priestly role. Moreoever, I do not want a female priest who has learned to be a man; it is these creatures that I have met most frequently in the TEC priesthood. As the cost of appearing a wild-eyed radical, I observe that men and women are different, not sort of different, but really, substantially, at the core idfferent, and evolution has designed this difference, if you will allow me the word designed in this context.
FOr some reason, American doesn’t seem to understand this. Feminism has created a variety of female who needs a jock. My guess is that feminism has been so successful is telling men that they are testosterone-poisoned, inhnerent rapists, and are now unnecessary for t he continuation of American society, they have created a male society t hat will no longer compete because they can only lose. The image of the American male is most clear in advertising on tv. Men are childish, incompetent, clumsy, awkward, and th e women are superior in family situations and in work. What “man” do we now see increasingly on t v? The nerd and the geek. LM
#14, this is unfair. For sure you can make a solid theological argument against WO, but not all female clergy are all touchy feely with no substance. Read the Veteran’s Day sermon from Canon Heidi Kinner at Advent http://www.adventbirmingham.org/articles.asp?ID=3335
This is as fine a sermon as I have ever heard anyone give on this topic.
I am female. I know for certain that God has not called me to the ordained ministry…of any denomination. He has called me to teach the Bible, He has provided for my education and training and He has given me opportunity to teach in 3 different denominations whose official standard is that women do not teach men. If God had called me to an ordained clergy position, He would have provided somewhat differently for me to fulfill that call.
I have known two female clergy persons (one Episcopal, one ELCA) whose God Issued Call to preach is obvious. If one has opportunity to read their sermons or other writings without a name attached, one would not be able to tell the sex of the author. I have heard their faith stories and the stories of their call to the office of ordained clergy and I believe them.
My own conviction is that anyone, male or female, who presumes to be ordained and to preach and administer the sacrements without the specific call of God is treading on dangerously thin ice. And that anyone, male or female, who has participated in the ordination of such a one is equally, if not more, endangered. Perhaps the whole discernment process needs more careful study and the Call of God on a person’s life given more serious consideration.
It is not only through the priesthood that the saving Word of God comes to those who need it. There are many gifts of the Holy Spirit and it is only in the working together of those who are so gifted that the Kingdom of God truly comes. Perhaps neither enough space, nor enough recognition is given to those whose call is to teach, to administer, to provide food and shelter as they proclaim the Good News. Ordination only sets a person apart for a particular role, it does not change the givens the person brings to the office, nor does it guarantee the desire or the ability to fulfill it.
The O.T. order of the priesthood, which was tied to animal sacrifice, ended with the destruction of the temple. The N.T. order is very different. Apostles(sent ones), prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, elders, deacons, bishops…all these are mentioned but priests, never. In the Episcopal Church the title “priest” is a very recent development. Why quibble over whether a female can be a “priest”? Seek to fulfill your own Call and don’t be overly concerned about the Call of another…unless you are responsible for how that person lives out the Call of God, in that case, make very sure you do not obstruct.