The suffragan see of Maidstone in Kent, vacant since 2009, is to be revived to accommodate a conservative Evangelical bishop, it was announced on Thursday.
The appointee will take a conservative view on male headship. Such a bishop was promised by the House of Bishops during the debates over women bishops, to reassure conservative Evangelicals who opposed the change that they were still welcome in the Church of England.
The Dioceses Commission agreed unanimously on Thursday with a proposal from the Archbishop of Canterbury that this conservative Evangelical bishop be appointed to the see of Maidstone.
In the build-up the meeting of the General Synod in July, a note from the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to the Synod acknowledged that the “normal processes” for appointing bishops had not yet selected an Evangelical with the conservative Evangelical position on headship.
I wonder if there are strings attached to this post… Will this bishop be expected to regard as legitimate the facilitated conversations surrounding Pilling? Will he be expected to try and placate the churches in his care and push the ‘good disagreement’ line? Is the bishop, in accepting the position, and churches in seeking his oversight, accepting the premise that their ministry is simply part of the ever-increasing array of different approaches and interpretations of Christianity in the CofE?