Forward in Faith has welcomed the amendments which the two Archbishops are proposing. I am less sanguine than FiF about this attempt to get round the Revision Committee\u2019s proposals concerning women in the Episcopate in England.<\/p>\n
The notion the Archbishops are pressing is \u201cco-ordinate jurisdiction\u201d\u009d \u201d\u201c by which they mean that the \u201d\u02dcnominated bishop\u2019, a sort of downgraded PEV, will exercise those functions which the Diocesan Bishop decides to hand over in his or her diocese.<\/p>\n
Now I have had to deal with diocesan bishops. Some of them see no problem in letting Flying Bishops operate. Others have allowed only minimal functions to be undertaken; for instance, not allowing them to ordain candidates within their diocese, even when the candidate has requested it from the start of training. There has been a Code of Practice agreed by the House of Bishops, and this Code has been undermined and ignored in far too many instances. Each diocesan has decided for himself how much of the Code to implement, and how much to ignore. The Archbishops\u2019 proposals make this situation potentially much worse.<\/p>\n