Posted on 01/24/2012 10:02:45 AM PST by marshmallow
In attempting to mollify opponents of female bishops, the House of Bishops has simply nourished the resistance
The Church of England's House of Bishops – for which, read the archbishops of Canterbury and York – has explained how they hope to mollify the opponents of female clergy. The proposals are breathtaking.
The archbishops envisage that the Church of England, once it has female bishops, will continue ordaining men who do not accept these women, finding them jobs they will deign to accept, and promoting some of them to be bishops who will work to ensure the continued supply of male priests who refuse to accept female clergy. In fact, the church will pay three bishops (the formerly "flying" sees of Ebbsfleet, Richborough, and Beverley) to work full time against their female colleagues, and to nourish the resistance.
The General Synod, last summer, rejected the archbishops' plan to fix a reservation in law where the opponents could live as if nothing had changed. Now they have brought back the same proposals, but call them "a code of practice" instead. In theory, this gives both sides what they want. In reality neither will find it easy to accept.
Obviously this will be unacceptable to most supporters of women's ordination. But the cream of the joke is that it will probably be unacceptable to their principled opponents as well. The unscrupulous ones will, of course, be very happy with the deal.
Despite all these concessions, there will be female bishops, as there are already female priests, and these will be treated exactly the same as male ones – except by the men who don't want to treat them equally and who believe that God has called them to undermine women's authority wherever it appears.
This is apparently Rowan Williams's idea of justice.
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
The Church of England’s Fudge on Female Bishops is Breathtaking
Wow. Poor headline writing is epidemic. Funny, but epidemic.
An example where “democracy” fails and a church falls. Thud.
Apart from the theological issues, let’s just look at this pragmatically, from the historical vantage.
Every denomination that has gone down this road has (1) then moved to ordain homosexuals (first, “celibate”, then practicing homosexuals), and then (2) has eventually gone away, dwindling to practically nothing.
The headline would read much more naturally to a Brit reader.
The headline would read much more naturally to a Brit reader.
female pastors = UNBIBLICAL ;
whether it’s Catholic OR Protestant
(3) has also rejected Christ as the exclusive path to salvation.
Pluralism breeds more pluralism breeds idolatry breeds heresy.
Quite so. I'm wondering if you could indicate where I might find one or more Catholic female pastors. I might want to tell them that they're UNBIBLICAL. I'll leave to you the job of passing the message on to Protestants.
I’m not sure why the Communist Guardian should have anything to say about the Church of England. Their dearest wish is to destroy the church completely, so there is nothing left but Communist-atheist ideology.
Does the author of this piece even believe in the existence of God? I doubt it. Then why should he take it upon himself to say what kind of bishops the church should have?
“fudging,” evading, and obfuscating serious issues, and basically blurring them so they can be kicked down the road.
I understand the term...it’s still awkward. Unless there was whipped cream involved, it’s a pretty cheeky headline, mate.
When I hear “Anglican Fudge” I think about homosexual Episcopalians and thier proclivities. It is not a pretty picture if you catch my drift.
The simple solution is being overlooked. The C of E could just declare the females are males. end of problem, only “males” are being ordained.
No offense but the visual representation of Christ isn’t there with a woman in the pulpit.
Every other job is available for women. It’s the whole Garden of Eden thing all over again. The one thing they can’t do biblically is the one they demand to do and somehow we all hate them and want them oppressed because they aren’t permitted to do that job - for no other reason is the qualifications set down in Scripture by God.
You can preach that in my church.
In a similar solution, they could just say all priests and bishops will all be female. Get rid of all the guys and the only ones left to fill the roles would be female.
Equally stupid but I’m sure both ‘solutions’ were seriously discussed.
We know that sense, but we also know the sense of the job title of Fudge Packer, as in “Tom Cruise Is A Fudge Packer.”
Rowan Williams is a few brain cells shy of snake eyes.
Let me be more exact:
This Anglican church is not any church that Christ founded.
of course what will really happen is that those opposing female bishops or openly gay priests will simply find that they won’t be allowed to become priests. The end result will be that in a couple years time the church hierarchy will “accept” these changes.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.