Church of England votes against woman bishops

[Neil]

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

You know, I feel the same way.  Then again, I have no religious impulse, so I suppose I have trouble taking any minister seriously, but women more than men.

[merithyn]

I can understand you saying that about the Catholic Church, Otto, but it seems odd that you would put that on all Christian churches given that the reason there are multiple churches is that there was a rift in what being Christian meant.

[CountDeMoney]

Christ was male.  Priests are the symbolic representation of Christ, and the Church his bride.  Ergo, priests are male.  It is not a doctrinal issue, but a sacred tradition.  There is no debate.

It's not an issue of gender equality, as Mary was elevated to Holy Mother, above and beyond the Apostles.  So there, sugar tits.

[merithyn]

Christ was male.  Priests are the symbolic representation of Christ, and the Church his bride.  Ergo, priests are male.  It is not a doctrinal issue, but a sacred tradition.  There is no debate.

It's not an issue of gender equality, as Mary was elevated to Holy Mother, above and beyond the Apostles.  So there, sugar tits.

Why are you directing that at me? I'm not Christian. I don't really care how Christians decide to organize their faith. I was just surprised at the reasoning Otto provided.

[CountDeMoney]

Why are you directing that at me? I'm not Christian. I don't really care how Christians decide to organize their faith. I was just surprised at the reasoning Otto provided.

Who says I'm directing it at you?  You have a real problem discerning expository posts.

Besides, if I were directing it at you, I'd address you as Drama Queen instead. 

[MadImmortalMan]

The tradition dates back to the cultural norms in place at the founding of the church. I see no reason why if the church were beholden to those norms back then, that it can't adapt to the ones we have now.

[CountDeMoney]

No girls allowed in the Honeycomb Hideout, man.  The Pontiff has spoken.

[merithyn]

Who says I'm directing it at you?  You have a real problem discerning expository posts.

Besides, if I were directing it at you, I'd address you as Drama Queen instead. 

Sorry. I didn't see Marti in the thread, so I assumed the "toots" was aimed at me. 

Ooh, too true on the Drama Queen thing. Of course, that does mean that I get to throw a fit and call you everything but a white man when you don't agree with me. 

[Martinus]

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.

The problem with this argument is that, as seemingly logical as it sounds, it has absolutely no basis whatsoever in the history of Christianity in general and the Catholic Church in particular. The church has changed its doctrine countless times in the past. Hell, the entire teaching of St. Paul was about a "fad" of appealing to Romans.

Besides, as a Catholic, you should know that the scripture is only one leg of the Catholic doctrine, and not, by any means, the primary or dominant one. in your over-reliance on the scripture I smell the sulphuric whiff of the Lutheran heresy.

[Martinus]

Christ was male.  Priests are the symbolic representation of Christ, and the Church his bride.  Ergo, priests are male.  It is not a doctrinal issue, but a sacred tradition.  There is no debate.

It's not an issue of gender equality, as Mary was elevated to Holy Mother, above and beyond the Apostles.  So there, sugar tits.

This argument makes no sense. It is circular. Why pick one characteristic of Christ (in this case, his gender) and make it a requirement for priests but not take another, such as his ethnicity, race, cultural background, height, skin colour or anything else you can come up with? I mean, it's not like the Church makes it a point of requiring all priests to be working class gay Jews who speak Aramaic?

[Valmy]

Geez everybody in history is gay according to Marty. 

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Geez everybody in history is gay according to Marty. 

might because of mary magdalen washing Jesus' feet...

[merithyn]

Geez everybody in history is gay according to Marty. 

If it weren't for Mary Magdalene, I'd almost agree with him on this one.

[Liep]

Jesus could've cured his gayness.

[Valmy]

Geez everybody in history is gay according to Marty. 

might because of mary magdalen washing Jesus' feet...

Oh just because you are a man getting a pedicure you are gay huh?  Huh?

Well ok maybe.