Let Women V

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Let Women Be Women:

Equality, Ministry & Ordination

by Peter Toon

Gracewing. Fowler Wright Books, 1990

Chapter Three – An inescapable question

A tolerant and moderate person who is generally inclined to favour women priests will probably have been upset or disturbed by the last chapter. I say this because of my experience in sharing the content of feminist theology and the implications of feminist thinking with people in both private conversations and talks to groups. Often the reaction I get is something like this: “Surely we can have the ordination of women without changes in the way in which we address God. Even if what you have described is happening in North America (where everything is exaggerated!) and New Zealand (which is so small and so far away) we cannot believe it will happen here in Britain. Surely the leadership in the English Movement for the Ordination of Women is not as advanced as their American counterparts.” I have to point out as gently as possible that British Christian feminists appear to be well advanced in the content of the agenda they are seeking to see completed in holy mother Church. This is easily seen by reading the articles, book reviews and books which, for example, Monica Furlong and Janet Morley have published in the last decade.

The future

In all honesty I do not know whether or not the Church of England will find itself in the mid 1990’s with a growing number of parishes using inclusive language in liturgy both of humanity and of the Godhead, if women are ordained priests say in 1992/3. It seems to me that there are suggestions that things will move in this direction even within the Liturgical Commission’s booklet, Making Women Visible. I refer specifically to the commendation of new Canticles intended as options and designed to incorporate the supposed feminine in deity into worship (pp. 56–61). But also I refer to the “Litany of New Birth” which begins: “O gracious God of life and birth. How you labour, how you suffer, to bring forth the new creation”.

Further, if what happened in a rural parish far away from feminist headquarters in London is any indication of what is happening elsewhere then I really do have justifiable fears! In a special Mothers’ Union service a visiting female deacon, chaplain to the diocesan Mothers Union, began her prayers by addressing God in this way, “O God, Father and Mother of us all....” And there was a bishop present! As far as I know she received no episcopal reprimand. She took her prayer I believe from a booklet produce by the Movement for the Ordination of Women and she obviously thought that the source guaranteed the orthodoxy.

Bearing this in mind, I think it is prudent for those who feel that, taking all things into account and attempting to be fair and just, ordaining women to the priesthood is probably right, ought to face this question: Is it possible at this time (the 1990s) and place (western society) for the Church of England and other Anglican Churches to ordain women as priests without being drawn into adopting, officially or unofficially, the whole programme/agenda of which ordination is only one part? From what I have seen in my frequent visits to North America and from what I have gleaned from my survey of literature produced by those advocating women priests, I must say in all sincerity that to my mind this is an inescapable question forced upon all Anglican Christians. It is so, I believe, because of the very powerful cultural context in which we live and worship which insists that equality must mean identity of vocation.

Only God knows (and is sure to know) the correct answer to this question! My own judgment is that there is a high probability that the Church which ordains women will be drawn into the use of inclusive language for deity and thereby into serious doctrinal errors. If this occurs the fault will not be primarily with the majority of the women ordained as priests, many of whom do not wish to see major changes in the way we address God in worship. Rather, it will lie with those who have pushed the adoption of inclusive language for humanity and deity, and also with those who have done little or nothing to stop its adoption, because they wished to be tolerant and kind. As far as the Church of England is concerned the responsibility will rest with the House of Bishops. This is why it is they who ought to face this question in an honest and open way.

I need now to explain why I think that there is a high probability of these changes occurring within a decade. The best way I can do it (without introducing a lot of new material into my presentation) is to seek to show that the whole tendency of the arguments given for women’s ordination in chapter one is towards the total Christian feminist position. In fact, to show that because the general internal movement of the arguments is towards the total agenda of Christian feminism, they have therefore an inbuilt tendency within our present secular culture to serve that programme. Further, that they will introduce the whole programme unless there is a determined effort to reject and stop them immediately. I shall divide the ten reasons or arguments into several types and comment on each type.

Arguments from equality

The full equality of males and females is the aim of feminists. This is why they are vehemently opposed to all forms of patriarchy and paternalism of which they believe the Church is the last stronghold and bastion. When Betty Friedan, author of The Feminist Mystique (1963), was asked at an early stage in the feminist movement what she thought would be the most important effect of feminism, her reply was that it would be theological.

At least five [1,2,3,7,10] of the arguments appear either to arise from within or point to the feminist call for full equality of women in society and church. For example, the insistence that a woman has a right to have her call to the priesthood tested by the church authorities, is in essence a religious form of the claim to equal rights in al spheres of life. In fact it is a very subtle argument for no-one can say that she has no inner call since only God himself in the last resort knows whether or not she has a genuine call.

Then, with respect to the arguments based on the Pauline teaching that in Christ the distinction between male and female is removed and on the Genesis doctrine that both female and male are made in the image of God, it may be said that in and of themselves these texts (in Galatians and Genesis) do not naturally point to women’s ordination. It is only in looking for texts to support that ordination that equality of male and female in both nature and identity/function is read out of these texts. They can just as well be read to imply equality of nature but not of identity (that is women are equal before God as human begins but this does not require an identical vocation to that of men). In other words the theme of equality in terms of identical calling appears to have been first in the mind and then read into the texts.

Arguments from a false view of ordained ministry

The bishop and the presbyter/priest are called by God to be Christ’s servant and ambassador within the churches. The ordained minister is asked to represent Jesus Christ, Head of the Church, while being his servant and ambassador. In the ordination services of the Church of England found in the Ordinals of the Book of Common Prayer (1662) and the Alternative Service Book (1980) the ordained ministry is not described as representing human beings or the churches before and to God; but, rather, of representing Jesus Christ who is in heaven amongst and to human beings and the churches which are on earth. (It is true that in the Liturgy the priest does represent the congregation in that he prays on their behalf. However, the priest’s representative relation to Christ is in every way prior to his relation to the church as its liturgical agent.)

The sixth and seventh arguments are based on the general notion that a presbyter/priest both represents human beings before God and represents the church to those human beings who are not of the church. Since human beings are male and female then (it is said) it is logical that priests ought to be male and female also. Therefore we see that this argument from the role of representing humanity is based on a view of the nature of the ordained ministry which is not taught by the official Anglican Ordinals, and which is very much a secondary and derived role of representation. It may be claimed with some justice therefore, that the source of this idea of male and female being required properly to represent humanity before God is the secular teaching of equality and equal rights for males and females. It is not derived from either the New Testament or the Ordinals. [We return to this important theme of representation in both chapter four and chapter six in the discussions of the priesthood and the maleness of Jesus.]

Turning to the ninth argument based on the Articles of Religion we note that it proceeds on the assumption that there is no major doctrinal change involved in ordaining women as priests. It is presumed that whether or not women are priests is a matter of the same order of importance as what vestments are required to be worn or what type of services are allowed/required. Thus a National Church has the power to go its own way on ordination as in other supposedly non-doctrinal matters. Here the argument about the rights of a National Church is historically sound but the claim that making women priests is only a matter of good order and not of doctrine is false.

Arguments based on a sound principle

The fourth argument rightly insists that Jesus gave to women a dignity and opportunity which were not there in official Judaism. This aspect of his liberating ministry has been brought out in recent years by a stream of erudite books which reveal how Jesus did not follow the way of the rabbis in his treatment of women but in certain respects treated women and men as equals in discipleship. However, we all know that while women were his disciples none were chosen as his apostles; and that while women worked with the apostles in a variety of missionary tasks and situations, none were appointed as presbyters or bishops in the new congregations in either the Jewish or non-Jewish world. So while the principle set forth is sound, the conclusion drawn from it that women should be presbyters now lacks firm foundation.

The eighth argument which is based on the unity of word and sacrament in the public Eucharist is, in my judgement, the soundest of all the ten arguments offered for women’s ordination as priests. Having admitted women deacons to an official preaching ministry within Anglican Churches, the Bishops have (according to the principles set forth by the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 11 & 14 and 1 Timothy 2 & 3) committed to them that which in the Early Church belonged to the ministry of the pastor or presbyter or bishop of a congregation. In other words, though described as a deacon, the deacon has been admitted in function to that ministry which is peculiarly that of the presbyter or bishop in the New Testament. (The N.T. states nothing directly about the presidency of the Lord’s Supper or Eucharist although the assumption is that the visiting apostle or the local senior pastor will preside at it.) The office of deacon was originally that of supervising and enabling Christ’s ministry of compassion and social service in and through the congregation. Regrettably the modern deacon is so often but an apprentice presbyter/priest and the dimension of serving has virtually disappeared!

The argument from the development of doctrine

This has a particular interest for me because I published a book in the U.S.A. in 1978 entitled, The Development of Doctrine in the Church. The questions concerning what is a genuine development of doctrine, and how we can tell whether or not it is a genuine development, were brought into debate through John Henry Newman’s An Essay on the Development of Doctrine (1845), written as he made the decision to leave the Church of England and join the Roman Catholic Church.

The claim that the ordination of women is a development of doctrine which the Church ought to make now, runs through most of the arguments for the ordination of women as priests. It is a view that is widely held. Certainly let us agree that where women are made priests and bishops there is an obvious development of doctrine. The question we need to face is: what kind of development is it? From daily experience we know that a development can be good or bad. We judge housing and commercial developments to be good or bad. Also we judge changes in policy by governments and companies as good or bad. We really cannot escape forming a judgement as to whether the change in doctrine brought into say the New Zealand Anglican Church by the ordaining there of women as priests and bishop is good or bad – that is good or bad for the sake of Jesus Christ, his truth, his gospel and his cause.

Classic examples of the development of doctrine in the history of the Church are the emergence of the doctrine of the Trinity (set forth in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed of 381 and in the Quicunque Vult [Athanasian Creed]), of the Person of Christ (set forth in the Chalcedonian Definition of 451 and in the Quicunque Vult) and of Justification by faith alone by grace (in the Confessions of Faith of the Protestant Reformation). It is rightly claimed of these developments that they were/are both true to Scripture and also serve to illuminate Scripture when used as tools for interpretation of the Bible.

Is the doctrine of the ordination of women as priests and bishops clearly based upon sacred Scripture and does it harmonise with the rest of Christian doctrine as this has been believed, taught and confessed in the Churches? If it is and does then it can be called a genuine rather than a false development of doctrine.

A further consideration in this area is the context in which a development of doctrine occurs. I have to ask such questions as these. Should we expect a genuine development to occur in Churches which are getting smaller in numbers and engaged in little or no positive outreach, evangelism and expansion? Is God likely to be speaking clearly to Churches [e.g. the American Episcopal Church and the Church of England] which are contracting, showing many signs of being weak in faith, hope and charity and obviously suffering from the effects of secularisation? Are not modern claims to be making a development of doctrine more likely to be informed by secular considerations than by those of biblical truth and holiness?

The answers I find myself giving to these questions cause me to conclude that the likelihood that Anglican churches are pioneering a development of doctrine concerning the ordained ministry for the whole Church is minimal. Further, it appears to me that the enthusiasm involved in the making of the claim that there is a true development being made with ordinations in North America, New Zealand and elsewhere in the Anglican Communion is generated not from theological reflections on scriptural foundations but rather from enthusiasm for equality of opportunity for women in the Church. What I think that the Lord is calling us to consider is the right relation of male and female in our modern society where there is a crisis of marriage/motherhood/fatherhood with all the attendant social problems caused by this crisis. Here we could profitably develop the doctrine of sexuality, marriage and motherhood/fatherhood.

Conclusion

Perhaps I have now said enough to open the reader’s mind to the possibility that the tendency of most of the arguments for ordaining women to the priesthood is most probably towards the secular doctrine of equality. I now invite those who recognise that ordaining women may possibly become the open door through which there enters into God’s Church a whole set of new and old errors and heresies, to give serious consideration to what is often disparagingly called “the traditionalist position”.

This description is correct in so far as the tradition of the Church over two millennia is taken seriously. However, it is incorrect if it means looking only backwards in nostalgia. Those who are genuinely committed to the revelation of God recorded in sacred Scripture together with the living Tradition of the Church do not only look back into history. Before they look back to the experience of the Church in history they look up in faith and love to the living and reigning Lord Jesus in heaven: as they look back they also look forward in hope to the Second Coming of the same Lord Jesus and the consummation of all things: and as they look in these three directions they also look around upon the world intent on loving the neighbour.