Some comments on Ecumenical Responses to "Women Bishops in the Church of England?"

This briefing paper by the Theological Secretary of the Council for Christian Unity, Dr Martin Davie, identifies ten key topics raised by the ecumenical responses to Women bishops in the Church of England? It suggests that these responses highlight the need for a proper debate in the Church of England about the theological, missiological, ecclesiological and ecumenical issues involved in the proposal to introduce women bishops into the Church of England. 

 

1. Introduction

 

As Paul Avis explains in his introduction to GS Misc 807, copies of Women bishops in the Church of England? were sent to the other provinces of the Anglican Communion and to a wide range of ecumenical partners both at home and overseas with an invitation to comment on it.

 

As he also explains, thus far we have had four responses. The response from the Baptist Union of Great Britain explained that they felt it inappropriate to comment, but the responses from the Methodist Church, the United Reformed Church (URC) and the Roman Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales contained detailed comments and it is these comments on which the General Synod has been asked to reflect. 

 

We are extremely grateful to the Methodist, United Reformed and Roman Catholic churches for taking the trouble to comment. Their comments are an important reminder to us that we cannot discuss the issue of women bishops as if it were purely an internal Church of England matter. The New Testament teaches us that all Christians are one body in Christ (1 Cor 12:12-16, Eph 2:16, 4:1-16) and we have to take the views and concerns of the other members of the body into account.

 

This is for two reasons. Negatively, it is because, if at all possible, we must seek to avoid taking action that will cause offence to other Christians and do further damage to the visible unity of the Church. Positively, it is because other Christians, being united with Christ and filled with the Spirit, possess gifts of spiritual and theological discernment as great as our own and may be able to perceive truths that we have overlooked.  It is ‘with all the saints’ (Eph 3:18) and not in isolation that we are called to discern the will of God for His people.

 

2. Topics for consideration raised by the ecumenical responses

 

Not only do their comments remind us in general terms of the need to take the views of other churches into account, but they also point to ten specific topics that we need to consider further as part of our continuing debate about women in the episcopate.

 

Episcopacy

 

The first topic is episcopacy. There are three issues here.

 

The first issue concerns the range of understandings of episcopacy within the Church of England and Anglicanism in general. The Roman Catholic response suggests that the existence of this range of understandings is a theological problem and that: ‘It may be wise for the Church of England and the wider Anglican Communion to work towards an agreed understanding of the episcopate before progressing with a decision to ordain women as bishops’ (p.26). This response raises the question of what degree of agreement about the theology of the episcopate is required. Women Bishops in the Church of England? notes that alongside the range of views about episcopacy that exist in the Church of England there is also a body of agreed texts that provide: ‘…an accepted Church of England position on the place of bishops in the life of the Church’ (2.7.4). The question that we may need to explore further with our Roman Catholic friends is why they think this body of texts does not provide an adequate basis for deciding whether women should be bishops.  

 

The second issue is whether episcopacy has to take the same form in every church. The Methodist response invites us to consider whether the ecumenical quest may be best served by the acceptance of: ‘…a variety of forms of episcopacy, all connected to the historic episcopal succession.’ (p.7). Given that the Lambeth Conference of 1888 identified the historic episcopate ‘locally adapted’ as one of the necessary features of a visibly united Church, the idea of a variety of forms of the historic episcopate is not one that is alien to the Anglican tradition. The key issue, however, is what kind of variety is permissible. What are the core features of the episcopate that have to exist in common across the churches if it is to function as an effective sign of the apostolicity and catholicity of the Christian Church?

 

The third issue concerns the relationship between the personal, collegial and communal aspects of episcopacy.  The Methodist response argues that there is an unresolved tension in Women Bishops in the Church of England? between an affirmation of the teaching of Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry (BEM) that oversight should be exercised in a personal, collegial and communal fashion and an insistence on the overall responsibility of a diocesan bishop for the life of his diocese (pp.5-6). What we will need to consider in our further thinking about episcopacy is whether this tension is acknowledged and creative or is indeed unresolved

 

The traditional Church of England response to the teaching of BEM has been to say that the responsibility for the life of his diocese that belongs to the bishop as an individual is an example of the personal dimension of oversight and that this personal ministry is always exercised in creative tension with a collegial and communal context. In the light of the Methodist comments it may be helpful to look again at this response and say whether we still find it convincing.

 

The basis for theological reflection

 

The second topic is that of the proper basis for theological reflection on the episcopate. As before, there are three issues here.

 

The first issue, raised by the URC response, is how Scripture should be used in the debate about women bishops. The URC response declares that Women Bishops in the Church of England?: ‘…seems to move between a ‘proof text’ way of reading scripture and following the ‘general direction’ of scripture. We have concerns that the former seizes texts out of scripture rather than reading it contextually while the latter idea is largely unexplained’ (p.15). Whether or not this is a fair criticism of the report, what this comment highlights is the need for consideration to be given to how both particular biblical texts and the overall thrust of the biblical message need to be taken into account when looking at an issue such as the ordination of women as bishops.   

 

The teaching of particular biblical texts such as, for instance, Gen 1:26-27 or 1 Tim 2:9-15 needs to be taken seriously since the overall teaching of Scripture is after all built up from the teaching given in particular texts. On the other hand, these texts do need to be read in the context both of the books of which they are a part and of the message of the biblical canon as a whole. What is needed is a reading of Scripture in relation to the issue of women’s ordination that gives due weight both to particular verses and to the general canonical witness and the way that this developed during the time that the Bible was written.

 

 The second issue, raised by both the Methodist and URC responses (pp.6-7 and 15) is whether Women Bishops in the Church of England? gives sufficient weight to developments outside the Church (what the Methodists call ‘wisdom from the world’) as a source of reflection on the episcopate alongside Scripture and Tradition. The question that this issue raises is how to assess the value of what is claimed to be ‘wisdom from the world’. The traditional Church of England approach has been to say that the theology of the Church of England is grounded firstly in Scripture and secondly in Tradition (Canons A5 and C 15) and that together these provide us with the theological framework within which to assess the ‘wisdom from the world’. The question we have to ask is whether there is any need to change this traditional approach in favour of giving worldly wisdom more weight alongside Scripture and Tradition when thinking about women bishops.

 

The third issue is the issue of the place of Christian anthropology in thinking about the episcopate. The URC response felt that Women Bishops in the Church of England? failed to engage sufficiently with ‘theological anthropology and the vocation of Christian personhood’ (p.15) in relation to vocation to the ministry. Whether or not this criticism of the report is justified, it highlights the importance of thinking about ministerial vocation within a Christian anthropological framework, a point that is also stressed in the Roman Catholic response (pp.22-23).  Specifically, this means asking about how the idea that women may have a vocation to the episcopate relates to what we believe about the way(s) in which God has created women and men to relate to one other in order to fulfil their vocation of imaging God in the world in distinctive and complementary ways (Gen 1:26-27).

 

The importance of historical continuity

 

The third topic is the importance of historical continuity. The Methodist response argues that it might be legitimate for the form of the Church’s ministry to differ from the form it possessed in the early centuries: ‘Unless it can be shown that Christian doctrine requires not only a three-fold order of ministry, but an episcopate identical in form to that adopted uniformly in the earliest Christian centuries, then there is room for creative development in understanding episcopacy’ (p.9). The Roman Catholic response, on the other hand, notes that one of the reasons that the Roman Catholic Church is opposed to the ordination of women is precisely that it would entail a break in the historical continuity of the form of the Church’s ministry.  In their view it is a:

‘…radical evolutionary step, breaking the historical continuity of ministry from the apostles down through the centuries’ (p.24).

 

In our debate about whether to introduce women bishops we have to decide where we stand on the topic of historical continuity. Would women bishops mean a break in the historical continuity of the ministry and, if so, would this matter theologically ?

 

Reception

 

The fourth topic is reception. It is obvious from all three responses (pp. 9-10, 14-15, 20-22) that our ecumenical partners have difficulties with the Church of England’s view of reception. The Methodist response, for example, states that they: ‘…remain unclear precisely what is meant by an: ‘open process of reception’ when the decision to ordain women is: ‘hypothetically reversible’’(p.10) and the Roman Catholic response declares that they find the Church of England position: ‘…not only paradoxical but contradictory’ (p.21).

 

These difficulties are shared by many within the Church of England as well, and so it seems clear that more work needs to be done to explain why the Church of England, following the lead of the Eames Commission, feels that it can say both that its female clergy are duly and canonically ordained and yet also that the decision to ordain women has to be regarded as provisional until it is received by the Church as a whole and is theoretically reversible. As Women Bishops in the Church of England? notes, this approach is the necessary result of the ‘…fact that the Church of England has to act on what it believes to be right at any given time, while at the same time remaining open to the possibility that its decision might in the end be judged unacceptable by the universal Church’ (3.6.26) , but the ecumenical responses highlight the fact that further exposition and defence of this point is required.  

 

In addition, further work also needs to be done on explaining how there can be sacramental assurance in such a situation, an issue highlighted by the Roman Catholic response (21, 28-30).  The issue that needs to be explored here, which has a much wider application than the specific question of the ordination of women, is how we can have confidence that the grace of God is at work in the visible Church notwithstanding the fact that the visible Church will always be subject to sin and error.

 

Collegiality and Communion

 

The fifth topic is collegiality and communion. This topic is central to the Roman Catholic response to Women Bishops in the Church of England? As they see it the central ecclesiological problem posed by the proposal to ordain women bishops in the Church of England is that it would divide the college of bishops and thus lead to a serious deepening of the impairment of communion that already exists in the Church of England as a result of the ordination of women priests (pp.33-37). They note, for example, that: ‘If people we unable to recognise a bishop of another diocese as being a validly ordained bishop and was in consequence unable to recognise episcopal actions performed by him or her, then the communion of those dioceses with each other would be very seriously impaired’ (p.35).

 

In addition they note that the Church of England has traditionally claimed that its bishops are part of wider episcopal college that includes the bishops of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches and they feel that because this is the case it is difficult to justify the Church of England altering the character of the episcopate unilaterally: ‘Should not decisions which radically affect the nature of that wider college be made in solidium?’ (p.31).

 

This issue of the potential fracturing of the episcopal college and of episcopal communion is one of the most important issues surrounding the proposal to introduce women bishops and requires serious discussion before any decision to introduce women bishops is made. At the heart of the issue is the question of what makes the Church of England one church. The traditional position has been that the sacramental communion between bishops is one of the key elements that holds the Church of England together as a single church and there is a clear danger that if this communion is lost the Church of England will fragment into what will effectively be two or more different churches.

 

The importance of the matter of the Church of England altering the character of the episcopate unilaterally is also one that should not be underestimated. If the historic threefold order is something that belongs to the whole of the Catholic Church, on what grounds can an individual church vary that order without the agreement of the Church as whole? If it is argued that the ordination of women does not change the fundamental character of the episcopate the question that then arises is whether this argument is not in itself something that needs to be agreed ecumenically before being acted on.

 

The representation of Christ

 

The sixth topic, which is again a central Roman Catholic concern, is whether Christ needs to be represented by a male minister. The Roman Catholic response cites with approval the statement quoted in Women Bishops in the Church of England?: ‘Just as the historical particularity of the Last Supper can only be properly represented by the use of bread and wine, so the historical particularity of the incarnation can only be properly represented by someone who is male’ (p.27). In weighing the importance of this argument the issue that needs to be considered is whether what needs to be represented is Our Lord’s assumption of maleness or His assumption of humanity. If what is central to the Christian faith is the fact that Christ assumed the humanity that is common to men and women alike and for that reason is able to save both, then the question arises as to whether He does not need to be represented by both men and women in order to make this fact clear.

 

Mission

 

The seventh topic is the missiological significance of the debate about women bishops. The Methodist response notes as ‘crucial’ the section of Women Bishops in the Church of England? that argues for women bishops on missiological grounds and explains that ‘…some Methodists would agree that for the Church of England to ordain women bishops would help the urgent task of mission… and that the converse would be a hindrance to mission’ (p.4). On the other hand, the Roman Catholic response suggests that the impairment of communion that would result from the introduction of women bishops would hinder the: ‘…spreading of the Gospel message in our country’(p.32) and we also have to consider whether it would be right to introduce women bishops for missiological reasons unless their introduction could be justified theologically on other grounds.

 

The fundamental issue that needs to be debated in this connection is the message about the relationship between men and women that the Church is called to proclaim to the wider world. If this message is that the equal dignity of men and women before God means that there should be no differentiation of role between the sexes then clearly the Church needs to have women bishops in order to give credibility to what it is saying. On the other hand, if, as the Roman Catholic response seems to suggest (pp.22-23), this message is that alongside the equal dignity and worth of men and women there is also a God given differentiation of roles then the missiological need for women and men to exercise the same roles in the life of the Church would not exist.  

 

Feminization

 

The eighth topic is feminization. The Methodist response urges that ‘great caution’ be exercised with regard to the argument in 5.2.51 of Women Bishops in the Church of England? that women bishops would contribute to the undue feminization of the Church. It questions whether women in positions of leadership would lead to men being alienated from the Church, argues that Methodist experience suggests that it will take a long time for women to take up leadership positions in large numbers, and suggests that the feminization issue needs to be placed in the context of a wider re-examination of the relations between women and men in the Church (pp.10-11).

 

These are all points that need to be taken seriously. Nevertheless, the loss of men from the Church is a significant issue that cannot be ignored when the question of introducing women bishops is discussed.

 

Headship

 

The ninth topic is headship. The question of headship is central to Conservative Evangelical objections to the ordination of women, but it is discounted by the URC response along with the argument that a single-sex episcopate would be a better model of unity than one consisting of both sexes: ‘In response to the former we would wish to affirm that Christ is the only head of the Church. In response to the latter we would look to the trajectory in 20^th century thinking on the doctrine of the Trinity asserting a model of unity in difference rather than unity in sameness.’ (p.15). In considering these points, the questions that need to be considered are whether the Conservative Evangelical argument for male headship contradicts the headship of Christ over the Church and whether the argument from Trinitarian theology could not also be used as a basis for arguing that the unity in difference between men and women is best expressed by their fulfilling different roles within the Church rather than by their performing the same ones. 

 

Ecumenical Consequences     

 

The final topic is the ecumenical consequences of introducing bishops.

 

The Methodist response notes that for the Church of England to ordain women bishops would not only remove an obstacle to the development of Anglican-Methodist relations but would: ‘…conceivably contribute to the Methodist Church’s own current re-consideration of its patterns of leadership, which includes looking at episcopacy once more’ (p.8). The URC response warns: ‘For the Church of England not to ordain women as bishops would be disastrous for the future of the Anglican-Methodist Covenant and future relationships with the Lutheran, Reformed and Methodist traditions’ (p.16). The Roman Catholic response comments that while the introduction of women bishops would: ‘…enhance and progress other ecumenical ventures’, a unilateral decision to do so would be ‘…difficult to harmonise with the texts and spirits of various bilateral ecumenical statements involving the Anglican communion in recent years, including those of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission’ (p.32).  It would be a ‘further obstacle’ on the ‘path to full unity in Christ’ (p.38).

 

What the Church of England will need to consider is what weight to give to these different ecumenical outcomes.

 

Conclusion

 

Although the current focus in the media is on the proposals produced by the Bishop of Guildford’s Working Party for the introduction of women bishops into the Church of England, this survey of the ecumenical responses to the earlier report of the Rochester Commission reminds us that there is still a debate to be had not simply about how we introduce women bishops but about whether it is right to introduce them. If a decision to introduce women bishops is to have proper theological integrity then this is a debate that is urgently required and that needs to involve not just General Synod but the Church of England as a whole at all levels of its existence.

 

M B Davie 26.1.06 

 

M B Davie 26.1.06 

 

 

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