Church of England votes against woman bishops

[merithyn]

As it's a religious group, I have no real opinion on this. The congregation as a whole has a right to decide who they're led by. If it's distasteful to some, there are other religious organizations to choose from.

Brits, what is your opinion? Will this affect anything in any meaningful way in the UK?

With many hoping to smash the stained glass ceiling, the Church of England voted over allowing women to serve as bishops on November 20. But the ceiling remains intact, as the vote failed to pass and the outcome could have major implications for the Church's future.

The Church's legislative body, known as the General Synod, made the decision late Tuesday afternoon. After a long day filled with dozens of speeches by various members of the Synod's three elected houses – one each for clergy, bishops and lay people – at Church House in Westminster, London, the measure was put to a vote. It needed a two-thirds majority from each of the Synod's houses to pass, but fell short by just six votes from lay-members.

For years, there has been a strong push to allow women to become bishops in the Church, which opened its doors to women priests back in 1992. Women bishops are already common in the Anglican churches in Canada, the U.S. and Australia and many in Britain were shocked at the Synod's decision, which was widely expected to go the other way. Reverend George Pitcher, an Anglican priest at London's St. Bride's, was stunned by the vote, saying that it could cause "chaos in the Church of England." The decision was also a blow to both the outgoing Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, who has long supported the move, as well as the incoming Archbishop, Justin Welby, who endorsed women bishops in his first address from Lambeth Palace just two weeks ago. "I will be voting in favor," Welby told a group of reporters on Nov. 9. "And join my voice to many others in urging the Synod to go forward with this change."

Though it's not the most divisive issue facing the wider, worldwide Anglican community – that would be the question of gay marriage – ordaining women bishops has caused serious conflict within the Church of England for years now. According to Pitcher, the Church is divided between reformers who want to see the Church evolve and conservatives who are against the Church of England becoming a "mainstream, liberal, Episcopal—as in the States—type of Church." Traditionalist members and clergy have been especially firm in their views that only men should serve in the role of bishops, believing it to be scripturally sound. "We accept that there are different interpretations of the scriptures," Jane Patterson, a member of the conservative evangelical group Reform, told the Guardian, "but the church needs to guard against placing society's views over what we see as God's views, as expressed in his written word, the Bible."

Meanwhile, others believe allowing women bishops is not only the right thing to do, but also the necessary thing to do to keep pace with modern England. The Church has been bleeding members for a number of years, with reports from the Research and Statistics Department of the Archbishops' Council for 2010 showing that less than 2% of Britons attend regular services. And the Church's latest move isn't likely to register well with the average citizen; a July poll showed that 74% of Brits thought the Church of England should allow women bishops. "Theology doesn't exist in a vacuum," Jan McFarlane, the Archdeacon of Norwich, pointed out during her speech to the Synod on Tuesday. "A church so out of step with the world around us becomes an irrelevance."

Incidentally, even some advocates of women bishops weren't fully supportive of Tuesday's measure anyway, as it included a clause allowing individual traditionalist parishes to opt for a stand-in male bishop to oversee a women bishop. The clause was an attempt to placate inflexible opponents of women bishops, but it obviously wasn't enough to win over everyone. After the measure was rejected on Tuesday, Archbishop Williams expressed his sadness over the decision and added that "this vote of course isn't the end of the story. This is not an issue that is going to go away." Which, unfortunately, was the one conclusion that the entire Church of England was hoping for.

Read more: http://world.time.com/2012/11/21/the-church-of-england-votes-against-women-bishops/#ixzz2CsvKIQzk

[derspiess]

I have problems taking a female minister too seriously, so yeah I'm okay with this.

[Valmy]

Rowan Williams really is putrid as a leader.  But I suppose a charismatic and dynamic leader would be wasted in an institution like the Church of England anyway.

Funny people are saying the church is out of touch when it was the laity who voted it down though 

[CountDeMoney]

The Church's legislative body, known as the General Synod

Sounds like a ST:TOS Klingon.

[derspiess]

[Gups]

It's a part of our Government, with seats in the House of Lords. It also runs many of our schools.

What an embarassment of a church. Incapable of making a decision after 12 years of preparation. Trying desperately to balance the homophobic Africans with the liberal Yanks, the evangelicals with the vurtual catholics. Result a messy compromise that everyone hates. 

[merithyn]

It's a part of our Government, with seats in the House of Lords. It also runs many of our schools.

What an embarassment of a church. Incapable of making a decision after 12 years of preparation. Trying desperately to balance the homophobic Africans with the liberal Yanks, the evangelicals with the vurtual catholics. Result a messy compromise that everyone hates.

The Liberal Yanks already have female bishops, don't they? I thought they'd pretty much thumbed their nose at the Bishop of Canterbury.

Didn't know about the rest. That kind of puts a new spin on things. How can the Prime Minister allow this when it directly affects the government?

[Valmy]

What an embarassment of a church. Incapable of making a decision after 12 years of preparation. Trying desperately to balance the homophobic Africans with the liberal Yanks, the evangelicals with the vurtual catholics. Result a messy compromise that everyone hates.

Hey that sounds like the Byzantine Empire.

[derspiess]

What an embarassment of a church. Incapable of making a decision after 12 years of preparation. Trying desperately to balance the homophobic Africans with the liberal Yanks, the evangelicals with the vurtual catholics. Result a messy compromise that everyone hates.

Hey that sounds like the Byzantine Empire.

Not to mention the United Methodist Church and several others.

[Ed Anger]

Good. Who wants to be lectured to by a woman? Yuk.

[merithyn]

What an embarassment of a church. Incapable of making a decision after 12 years of preparation. Trying desperately to balance the homophobic Africans with the liberal Yanks, the evangelicals with the vurtual catholics. Result a messy compromise that everyone hates.

Hey that sounds like the Byzantine Empire.

Not to mention the United Methodist Church and several others.

Yeah. It kind of sounds like most churches. Criminy, how long does it take the Catholic Church to do anything?

[CountDeMoney]

Criminy, how long does it take the Catholic Church to do anything?

[derspiess]

Good. Who wants to be lectured to by a woman? Yuk.

With most good male ministers, it's like dad or some uncle telling you a witty (if possibly heavy-handed) story.  With a woman minister it's at best like mom nagging you.

[Ed Anger]

Women. 

[OttoVonBismarck]

This kind of thing is getting dumb. A lot of Christians want to emphasize 21st century values to make their religion more palatable. I'm an actual Christian, a Catholic matter-of-fact, and the simple truth is much of Christian doctrine does not jive with 21st century ideals of equality. Church doctrine and even Christian theology is not about or even promoting of gender equality in the Church hierarchy. (Doctrine also clearly states in Galatians that all are equal in salvation.) Genuine Christianity however cannot, if you read scripture at its face value, treat women and men as equal in business of the Church. You can gnash your teeth and be mad about it or not, but at the end of the day I wish these atheists-in-all-but-name that still go to churches and advocate basically unchristian things would stop calling themselves Christians, it deludes the brand.

Christianity was never intended to be easy, it wasn't supposed to be something you could sign up for casually as some sort of faddish thing. It's supposed to be hard. Fasting is supposed to be often, for example, and most have simply abandoned that. Even Orthodox Christians, who I greatly respect for their adherence to some traditions despite their unpopularity, have mostly gone soft on fasting.

If Christianity just changes with all the social changes, then you might as well stop calling it Christianity. I'd rather have a 95% atheist world with 5% true Christians than a bunch of CINOs running around with modern, incompatible views on the Church.