The Church of England has published, today, new legislative proposals to enable women to become bishops which will be debated by the General Synod in July.
This will be the first occasion that Synod members have met since November 2012, when the previous legislation narrowly failed to secure the requisite majority in all three Houses, despite a 73% majority overall.
The proposals from the House of Bishops accompany the publication of a report of a Working Group which it had established in December. The Working Group’s report sets out four possible options for the shape of the new legislation.
I can’t figure out from the material what is being proposed. Will the present provisions for parishes that cannot in good conscience accept the ministry of women priests and bishops continue? That seemed to be the sticking point before.
Me neither.
Is this it?
1. The bishops propose a simple measure enabling women bishops with no conscience protection.
2. The bishops ask Synod to come up with appropriate conscience protection (whatever that might be) in a separate measure.
The later feels a bit like hand waving and a failure of leadership. On the other hand, it does put the responsibility onto Synod to make this thing work: which may make a bit of sense because Synod shot down every conscience protection the HoB or Archbishops suggested in the last round.
Voting will continue until the correct result is obtained.
reply to (1): I believe the statutory arrangements would only survive in the deprecated Option 4.
With regard to traditionalists it is chilling to read after the document describes the historical breath of the CofE, this paragraph of the WG document:
[blockquote]
17. In the light of the Synod vote in November 2012 a number of the responses to the consultation document – by no means the majority but not a negligible number – have questioned whether a solution that attempts to accommodate as wide a range of views as possible from the spectrum of Anglican teaching is any longer achievable or even desirable.
[/blockquote]
In other words, to admit the traditional view, that was in force for centuries, as opposed to a view accepted only twenty years ago, would be seen an as [i]unacceptably broad[/i].
#3 I see the Daily Mail is reporting that they considered requesting that the current Synod be dissolved and new elections held. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2331054/Church-leaders-ask-Queen-dissolve-Synod-continues-oppose-creation-women-bishops.html
Voting will continue until the correct result is obtained.