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Ben Kenobi
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McGregornobi!
Oct 2002
time: 21:37
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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/articl...1691343,00.html
Why men should head the Church
Sacha Bonsor
Former deacon Caroline Sandon puts the case against female bishops
AFTER the Synod’s vote on Monday to remove the legal blocks to women becoming bishops, a quiet celebration is taking place among the Church’s female ranks. But, as a former deacon of St Andrew’s Church in Cambridge, I feel that the ordination of female bishops will destroy values that the institution to which I belong has spent 2,000 years establishing. The point about the Church is that it is like the family: it has a hierarchy — and women should not be at the head.
I have enjoyed a quiet faith all of my life. One of my first memories is of my grandfather sitting beside my bed and reading a bedtime story from the Bible — not a task he took lightly. He would smooth out the pages so that they were flat and speak slowly and clearly, evidently lost in the words and stories that were so alive to him. I recall wanting whatever it was that he had.
Unlike many of my peers, I took my confirmation, at the age of 13, very seriously. I was conscious that being a Christian was about more than going to church and I promised myself then that I would seek to live in accordance with what the Bible taught. But it never entered my head to become ordained. When I left school, I decided to become a teacher. Like my friends, I believed in and applauded female leadership in the workplace. I moved to Cambridge, where I taught as a secondary school teacher, and I planned to climb up the educational ladder.
There was no defining moment at which I felt called to the Church, but when the Bible Club that I ran during lunch break was closed down by my teachers’ union, I realised that I far preferred teaching the Bible to algebra. After four years of contemplation and talking to friends, I applied for theological training at Wycliffe Hall in Oxford, aged 27. I was somewhat surprised to be accepted.
When I started the three-year course in 1990, the only opportunity open to women was to be ordained as a deacon. Two years later, in November 1992, that all changed: the General Synod accepted the measure to ordain women as priests. I remember the day very clearly. A good friend said to me: “Carrie, I’ll be a bishop within 20 years.” She, like the majority of women in my year, saw the ordination of women priests as a stepping stone to something far greater.
For me, the decision was very simple — I was as much opposed to the ordination of women priests then as I am opposed to the possibility of women bishops now.
Old-fashioned as it may sound, it is my theological conviction that the ordination of women to the priesthood is wrong. There are various biblical passages that dictate my belief, the most significant of which is St Paul’s teachings in I Timothy where he does not allow women to teach or to have authority over men within the context of the Church.
My critics argue that St Paul’s words, along with much of the Bible, should be reinterpreted according to our culture — women in his day were not as educated as they are today, for example — but I am as unconvinced by their argument as they are by mine. St Paul’s teachings are not based on the prevailing culture of his time but on the pattern of human relationships established at the Creation. Adam was formed first and then Eve.
Just as the pattern of the Creation produced mother, father and child, so it should be echoed in the family of the Church. The father figure stands for leadership, the mother figure for nurture.
In the Church, there is a variety of different roles that a woman can take on within the nurturing realm — as deacons, pastoral workers, youth or child workers — but by ordaining them to the role of the man, we are denying God’s children of the clear roles that the two sexes play in the developing process.
Many see my views as a promotion of inequality, which I vehemently deny. Society seems determined to define equality by eradicating differences; the challenge for the Church is to model equality and diversity at the same time. It is perfectly possible to be equal but to have different functions. You do not say of a man, for example, that because he didn’t bear the child he is not equal to his wife. I have worked alongside men for 11 years and I do not see myself as “below” them or inferior to them — we both serve God in our different ways. Nor do I apply my belief to the private sector — I am in full support of female leaders outside the Church and the family.
It is inevitable that, at some stage in the future, we will have a female Archbishop of Canterbury. It grieves me that women see serving the Church as a career with a glass ceiling. I see it differently. I am fulfilled by being able to offer something that a man does not have, just as he can offer what I lack. By making a stand, I worry that my peers’ desire for promotion has become more about status and prestige in the eyes of the world than it is about serving God.
The ordination of the first female bishop will be a sad day for me. It will signify that the Church is once again moving away from what I understand to be the clear teaching of the Bible; it will undermine the richness of male and female diversity within the Church and it will limit our individuality. There will always be a range of different opinions depending on where one locates one’s authority.
The strength and the weakness of the Church of England is that it strives to accommodate every view: by encouraging its followers to stick to their convictions, it ensures that there will always be division.
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mrmitchell
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Ben, if a woman believed her calling was to be a bishop, would it be appropriate for her to undergo a sex change operation to fulfill her purpose?
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lord of the mark
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FUKCOV - Former United Kingdom Colony of Virginia
Dec 2000
time: 00:37
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quote:
Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
The part that I bolded, is where I think she makes the strongest argument. To say that equality in value requires one to be equal in function is a horrible kind of equality. It's like in Harrison Bergeron, where everyone needs to be brought down to the same level, so that everyone can be truly equal in function. |
are you perhaps getting overly philisophical? I cant speak to the proper interpretation of the words of Saul-Paul, or the proper quals for the rank of bishop. I can give you something illuminating from the discussion of the ordination of women in Cons Judaism. The Conservative Committee on Jewish Law and Standards did NOT declare a blanket gender equality across all areas of Jewish law. Blanket statements tend to mess up established areas of law unintentionally. (In particular the CJLS has insisted on maintaining the matrilineal standard of Jewish descent) However they faced a real issue. At a time when there was strong need for more quality rabbis, half of the jewish people were excluded from the rabbinate. Young Jewish women needed role models, and the most intensely Jewish were turning away from normative Judaism for want of female rabbinic leadership. This established the need for change, and NOT a theoretical commitment to equality. The next step was to determine if the law allowed for change. They concluded that it does, using a legal loophole. Women were excluded from the rabbinate on the grounds that they were not subject to time bound positive commandments (for ex the duty to pray 3 times day - on the grounds that motherhood could make this impossible) The rabbis did NOT say that all women were so bound - however they said that individual women COULD choose to accept the full obligation of all the commandments - and those who did so would then be eligible for the rabbinate.
The result has been, among other things, to revive interest among Consverative Jews in such declining areas of observance as the ritual bath for women - something that would likely have been impossible in a non-Orthodox community without women rabbis. I can only say its worked out well, and many of the segments of the C rabbinate that were most opposed have gotten on board.
Of course, YMMV.
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Spiffor
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CPA - Evil Clone brigade
Nov 2001
time: 06:37
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quote:
Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
You've missed the point. The point is not could a woman be a bishop, the question is should a woman be a bishop. She tackles the argument that St. Paul's letter to Timothy ought to be rejected, since our culture is different from the culture then, but then she goes on to make her point that women and men do not fulfill the same role. |
Well, if BAMing is what you call "making a point", then yes she did 
Her only theological opposition to women being priests (not only bishops) is a letter from St Paul. This man wasn't the son of God. This man was responsible for the earthly organization of God's worship. I don't see any valid reason to believe that his word is more intemporal than the word of the current leaders of the Church.
I think this letter from St Paul is actually a rationalization of more deep-seated attitudes toward genders. To her, "The father figure stands for leadership, the mother figure for nurture", and she strongly binds this attitude with what she believes is the natural order of the family.
The reason I think the St Paul's argument is a mere rationalization is because the Bible can be used to rationalize pretty much everything if you quote it out of context, and because she couldn't pick anything that came directly from God's or Jesus' mouth (despite the many cites in the Bible)
quote:
The part that I bolded, is where I think she makes the strongest argument. To say that equality in value requires one to be equal in function is a horrible kind of equality. It's like in Harrison Bergeron, where everyone needs to be brought down to the same level, so that everyone can be truly equal in function. |
Nobody ever argued that all humans should hold the same function. The supporters of gender equality argue that everybody should have access to the same functions. Big difference.
She's basically saying that men and women should be hindered from holding a role they wish, because they were born with the wrong sexual organs. In order to make her belief look more palatable, she wraps it in a nice and fuzzy equality talk. She also rationalizes it with a weak argument.
She is entitled to her opinion that comes from her preconceptions about gender-roles in family. But her opinion isn't backed by reason, and it seems to me that it isn't backed by any solid theology. It's a good thing that the Anglican Church took the other way.
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Admiral
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of the peace and coexistance movement
Feb 2001
time: 00:37
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quote:
Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Thank you! So 'tolerance' simply means that you tolerate those who agree with you.  |
I apologize for not elaborating my post. What tolerance means is that you embrace the idea that there are different opinions of equal worth, and do not descriminate against one particular opinion. For this to work on a systematic level, individual freedom is critical. To use your example, the woman has every right to express her opinion, and woe to whoever would try to restrict that. However, if based on her opinion, she and others band together to make sure that women who feel that they entitled to be bishops cannot achieve that position, she is infringing on others, which cannot be tolerated.
The basic fact is that intolerance is poison to the system of tolerance. Rightists maintain that certain actions are morally wrong and must be punished or prohibited, and that mechanism cannot be in place in a tolerant system.
In other words, you're wrong. We will tolerate your belief in anything. We only speak up when you try to inflict and enforce your beliefs upon others who may not agree with you.
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Ben Kenobi
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McGregornobi!
Oct 2002
time: 21:37
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quote:
The basic fact is that intolerance is poison to the system of tolerance. Rightists maintain that certain actions are morally wrong and must be punished or prohibited, and that mechanism cannot be in place in a tolerant system.
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Only rightists believe that? What you are saying is precisely the same thing. Some beliefs are wrong and ought not to be tolerated. The disagreement is which actions ought to be considered right or wrong.
quote:
In other words, you're wrong. We will tolerate your belief in anything. We only speak up when you try to inflict and enforce your beliefs upon others who may not agree with you.
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Is it wrong then to prevent someone from killing another person, since you are inflicting your beliefs that murder is wrong upon that person?
quote:
For this to work on a systematic level, individual freedom is critical.
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Granted. However, you are inflicting your beliefs that individual freedoms are necessary. To someone who rejects that, why couldn't they say that you ought to tolerate their actions since to do otherwise, means you need to force your beliefs on them.
quote:
To use your example, the woman has every right to express her opinion, and woe to whoever would try to restrict that. However, if based on her opinion, she and others band together to make sure that women who feel that they entitled to be bishops cannot achieve that position, she is infringing on others, which cannot be tolerated.
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Why should one be tolerated and the other should not? Who are you to restrain one individual and loose the other? Is it because there are some things that are right and some things that are wrong for everyone?
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Admiral
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of the peace and coexistance movement
Feb 2001
time: 00:37
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quote:
Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Is it wrong then to prevent someone from killing another person, since you are inflicting your beliefs that murder is wrong upon that person? |
That doesn't apply here. The murderer is inflicting their beliefs upon someone else, which must be prevented in this system. I could also invoke the harm principle, and state that it supercedes the system of tolerance, and that we must ensure that no one is causing harm to others.
quote:
Granted. However, you are inflicting your beliefs that individual freedoms are necessary. To someone who rejects that, why couldn't they say that you ought to tolerate their actions since to do otherwise, means you need to force your beliefs on them. |
Because if you concede that point, tolerance is impossible to achieve. My point is that once again, individual freedom is a value that supercedes the tolerance system, and is a prerequisite for the construction of that system.
quote:
Why should one be tolerated and the other should not? Who are you to restrain one individual and loose the other? Is it because there are some things that are right and some things that are wrong for everyone? |
Of course there are. I referred to the harm principle above. But that isn't the point. The point is the idea of a level playing field. If everyone is equal, what grants one group the right to tell another group what they can and cannot do? Once you concede that certain groups have that power, there is no equality, and the system is destroyed. You insist on saying that tolerant people are only tolerant of like-minded views. This is simply not the case. Anyone can believe anything. But allowing one group to act on their belief by disallowing another group to act on theirs is a de-facto tilting of the ground in favor of the first group. While it is true that this system favors people who believe that they can act as they see fit over people who believe that everyone should act in accordance with their beliefs, maybe that is the way it should be. We fought wars against monarchies to establish our freedom. How is this that different?
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Ben Kenobi
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McGregornobi!
Oct 2002
time: 21:37
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quote:
That doesn't apply here. The murderer is inflicting their beliefs upon someone else, which must be prevented in this system. I could also invoke the harm principle, and state that it supercedes the system of tolerance, and that we must ensure that no one is causing harm to others.
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Good. This is what I was driving at earlier, and it's nice to see it come out. Tolerance cannot be the principle good, because then one would have to tolerate intolerant people. .
quote:
Of course there are. I referred to the harm principle above. But that isn't the point. The point is the idea of a level playing field. If everyone is equal, what grants one group the right to tell another group what they can and cannot do?
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Society does this for many things, in restrictions, regulations, laws and principles. There are various arguments behind each of these, that permit one group to restrict another.
quote:
While it is true that this system favors people who believe that they can act as they see fit over people who believe that everyone should act in accordance with their beliefs, maybe that is the way it should be. We fought wars against monarchies to establish our freedom. How is this that different? |
The idea of freedom, is balanced by the thought that those who are willing to act however they see fit over people need to be restrained from doing so. You cannot have freedom without restraints of some kind, otherwise, those who, as you said, act in accordance to their beliefs are apt to lose their freedoms.
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Ben Kenobi
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McGregornobi!
Oct 2002
time: 21:37
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quote:
I don't agree that there should be a difference in roles per se, because it does not follow from general differences between man and woman, certainly not as general rule.
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Sure it does. That's why the argument is that women, in general, are said to be better nurturers. Granted, there will be exceptions to this, but the general case remains true.
quote:
except maybe in the mother/father thing, but this is rather irrelevant to me here, since it is a biological function, while the discussion here is about roles in society, which are not biologically pre-determined.
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Okay, there's quite a few things that are bundled up here. First of all, is there a relationship to the social role, and the biological role?
Last edited by Ben Kenobi on 15-07-2005 at 20:55
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14-07-2005 21:40
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