Women Bishops in Wales?

In my lifetime, women have become full members of the Episcopal Church. It wasn't that long ago when they couldn't be deputies to our General Convention. They could become priests and bishops only in the 1970s. And now, our Presiding Bishop is a woman! There are still some places in the Episcopal Church (the Diocese of Fort Worth, for one) that believe God is limited to calling only men to the priesthood, but most have seen how richer we are for allowing women to play a full role.

In the Church of England and the Church in Wales, women can become priests, but not bishops. The Church in Wales is addressing that issue today, and the Archbishop of Wales, Dr Barry Morgan, wrote an article, "At odds with the Gospel," in today's Guardian newspaper about it. Here are some excerpts:

In an age when women have broken through the glass ceiling in most professions in Britain, it is strange that they still face discrimination in a church that believes there is "no male or female" in Christ. Women can become judges, surgeons, chief executives and heads of state, but in the Church in Wales--which waited until 1997 to ordain women as priests--they are as yet unable to become bishops.

I do not see how, having agreed to ordaining women to both the diaconate and priesthood, the church can logically exclude women from the episcopate. That is why I and my fellow bishops will be asking members of the church's legislative body today to vote in favour of a bill to allow women clerics to become bishops. It's a move that Anglican churches have made in other countries--Scotland, Ireland, New Zealand, Canada and the US, though not yet England. I believe Wales is now willing to embrace this important change too.

***

At the heart of the Christian gospel are values of integrity, justice, wholeness and inclusion: "In Christ there is no bond or free, male or female, Jew or Greek" (St Paul). How, therefore, can a church, which claims to set people free and treat all as equal, refuse even the possibility of considering whether women can be called to the episcopate? All this is not irrelevant to the mission of the church, for when women are barred from even the possibility of being elected bishops, it makes the gospel inaudible in our world. As the late Robert Runcie said: "It cannot be irrelevant to evangelism that so many unbelievers think that the place we give to women is absurd."

***

If the Church in Wales refuses today to ordain women to the episcopate, it will be in danger of giving the impression that: the maleness of Jesus is more important than his humanity; only men can really represent God and his church to the world; men are the really important members of the human race; the church does not value the gifts and talents of women; and the church is not interested in testing the vocation of women, or even willing to consider their suitability as bishops, because their gender has automatically debarred them from such consideration.

None of these things may be true, but try explaining that to a class of sixth-formers who are interested in what the gospel may be offering them, but for whom that gospel is proclaimed by a church that refuses even to consider the possibility of opening up the episcopate to women.


I can't say it any better than that. Thanks to the Episcopal Cafe for bringing the column to my attention.

[Later today, the Church in Wales failed to pass the legislation for wonen bishops.]