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Theology Wales: the Ordination of Women to the Episcopate

 

 

Full contents:

Guest Editor's Introduction
- Rev'd Canon Dr Raymond Bayley

The Admission of Women to the Episcopate
- A Statement by the Bench of Bishops

Women Bishops in the Church in Wales
- Canon Mary Stallard

Learn from the past and build for the future
- Rev'd Joanna Penberthy

Male Episcopacy
- Rev'd Canon Peter Russell Jones

A Noble Task
- Bishop David Thomas

Empirical Theology and Women Bishops
- Rev'd Professor Leslie J Francis

Male Episcopacy:‘a thing apparently and most clearly Apostolical’ (Hooker)

Peter Russell Jones

This article aims to survey some of the Biblical and historical data relating to the possible ordination of women as bishops. It seeks to demonstrate the close relationship of the offices of bishop and priest, the most significant distinction between them being the responsibility for Apostolic continuity committed to the episcopate.  The choice of the Lord Jesus of exclusively male Apostles to constitute the Twelve is given singular weight in this connection. The theology of St. Paul as it articulates the relationship of man to woman is explored, especially in its symbolic connection with that of Christ to the Church. The historical material considered is of the Reformation period, and aims to demonstrate that despite the identity of the Church of England as a reformed Church, it was always intended that her ministerial orders should unequivocally be those of the patristic and medieval church. This, it is argued, is a fundamental and non-negotiable characteristic of Anglican ecclesiology.

In many respects, arguments for or against the consecration of women to the episcopate will have a familiar air about them, for they are largely the same arguments as those employed in the debate about the ordination of women as priests. There is, of course, an a fortiori aspect to them, and at critical points distinctively new considerations will come into play. But even though much of the argumentation has been heard before, that in itself is no reason for not hearing it again; for it has often been stated that the admission of women to the priesthood was a provisional act, the rectitude or otherwise of which will only become apparent in the course of time; it will need, in current Anglican parlance, to be ‘received’, and reception in this sense is not the work of one generation.

The orders of bishop and presbyter are closely related. It has been widely held that ‘presbyter’ and ‘bishop’ were originally alternative terms for the same office. Bishop Lightfoot suggested that the former term was current in predominantly Jewish congregations because of its existing usage in the synagogue, while the more religiously neutral term episcopos (‘overseer’) came into use in predominantly Gentile congregations where there would be no prejudice in favour of such a precedent. It is a matter of historical debate whether, once differentiation of terms began, the presbyter’s office derived its nature and authority by ‘downward’ delegation from the bishop (as, for example, the teaching of Ignatius of Antioch assumes) or whether the episcopal office evolved by ‘upward’ movement from the presbyterate, the bishop being essentially a super-presbyter (as Jerome implies and John Chrysostom seems to assume – a doctrine delightfully described in the Forward in Faith Report Consecrated Women? as the bishop being a priest with ‘added voltage’). It is possible that even at Rome the episcopate proper only emerged in the mid-second century, and as late as the third century the presbyters of Alexandria consecrated their own bishop. But whichever understanding of the origins of the episcopate may persuade us, it is right to recognise and stress the close theological relationship between priest and bishop, however wide the sociological gulf may have become at various times and places. Against this background, it will be seen that arguments concerning the priesthood will be found to be equally relevant to the episcopate, and often vice versa.

Some have suggested that the Church in Wales was wrong in principle to accept the admission of women to the priesthood without including the possibility of their consecration as bishops in the same legislative act – as indeed was the case in the Church of Ireland. It is certainly true now that both strong proponents and definite opponents of the admission of women to holy orders see the episcopate and presbyterate as belonging together. To the former, to ordain women as priests without consequently opening the episcopate also to them appears to be naked discrimination and is seen as the perpetuation of an arbitrary glass ceiling; to the latter, the orders of both bishop and priest by divine appointment require men as their proper recipients, and to admit women to either office constitutes an unapostolic act.

But in one vital respect, of course, the bishop is distinctive. In any episcopally ordered church he bears the burden of apostolic continuity. He focuses in himself the relationship of his church with other churches across time and across geographical distance. He is especially responsible, albeit with his presbyters, for the continuing apostolic character of his church, in its worship, teaching, discipline, and all that constitutes its life. And this, of course, takes on a very particular focus in the conferring of Holy Orders by which provision is made for the church’s future ministry until the Lord’s return in glory. In saying this, I am not implying an ‘unchurching’ of non-episcopal churches; the issues raised by the ministry of such churches I will by-pass. I write as an Anglican for Anglicans, and so am simply stating that in a church which preserves the historic, catholic structure of the ordained ministry, this is the distinctive nature and calling of the bishop.

There are two leading areas of argumentation relevant to women’s ordination which I wish to outline and explore, with particular reference, of course, to the episcopate. Both have already been much invoked in the earlier debate on women priests but now assume a greater urgency and, possibly, cogency in the present debate. They are Biblical and Ecclesiastical, and we shall now turn to them in that order.

In Holy Scripture, men and women are regarded as both bearing the image of God, both culpable through falling into sin, and equally candidates for redemption through the saving work of Christ. To all alike, restoration to fellowship with God is offered on the basis of ‘repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ’ (Acts 20:21); and the sacrament of baptism which embodies both the divine offer and the human response is administered in an identical manner to male and female. That much-cited text, Galatians 3:28, is relevant here, for it is precisely the incorporation of men and women impartially into Christ through baptism that is in view, as the preceding verse puts beyond question.

All of which makes it the more noteworthy and significant when gender distinction appears, especially in relation to the ordering of God’s household. Firstly, the Lord, who was so often apparently ready to defy convention (not least in his dealings with women), chose only men for the select company of the twelve whom he designated apostles. This free and wholly unconstrained choice cannot be sufficiently emphasised, for whatever precise theology of ordained ministry is espoused, this act must be seen as the fount, pattern and model of that whereby some are set apart for ministry to and on behalf of others. Theological judgement has varied as to precisely how, and to what extent, the apostolic office is continued in the Church in the episcopate; but that the bishops succeeded at least to certain aspects of the apostolic office is surely beyond question, and the Lord’s choice of men as Apostles must therefore be seen as relevant to the episcopate.

Secondly, St Paul insists that women’s ministry is limited in its scope (2 Timothy 2:12). The fuller exposition of the Apostle’s mind is to be found in 1 Corinthians 11:1-16 where he differentiates between men and women in a context concerned with worship and on a basis not derived from passing cultural norms and patterns but from nothing less than the relationship between the Father and the Son. Just as the Father is the head of the Son (St Paul asserts a propriety of order despite the equality of Godhead which the Church affirms), so the man is head of the woman (again, a question of order which does not negate the equality of their shared human nature). Some have tried to mitigate the Apostle’s argument by making kephale here mean ‘source’ rather than ‘head’; but the lexicographical grounds for doing so are not strong, and even were the point conceded distinction is still being made between man and woman at worship.

This gender distinction also appears, naturally enough, in the Apostle’s teaching about the Christian household (Ephesians 5:22-33); what is significant here is that an immediate connection is made with the life of the Church. St. Paul is not content to say simply that ‘the man is head of the wife’ and then give moral directions as to how that headship is to be exercised; rather he adds ‘as Christ is the head of the church’, and his argument thereafter is based on this spiritual symbolism. The whole passage is a reminder to our pragmatic culture that there are levels of significance in the spiritual sphere that evade superficial analysis; gender distinctiveness is one such area of symbolism where we are dealing with a deeper reality than may appear at first sight.

The domestic pattern of the man as head of the woman is therefore to be reflected in the life of the Church, the household of God. If it is admitted (as I believe it must be) that the bishop (and priest) speak and act for Christ in relation to the Church, then the female symbolism of the church as bride may in itself suggest that Christ’s liturgical minister should be male. It is important in this connection not to see ‘headship’ in overly authoritarian or domineering terms. The imagery rather denotes relationship than power; and besides, the archetype is the relationship of the Father to his well-beloved Son, which itself is reflected in Christ’s sacrificial love for his people. Indeed, St. Paul explicitly commands Christian husbands to express their headship by means of self-giving love towards their wives, a love which is modelled on the Lord’s love for his church: ‘Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her’ (Ephesians 5:25). 

Once we have begun to trace out the interconnectedness of the relationships Father to Son, Christ to the Church, Man to Woman, Bishop (or priest) to Church, we will see the force of C.S. Lewis’s contention (written with remarkable anticipation of future issues in 1948) that ‘with the Church… we are dealing with male and female not merely as facts of nature but as the live and awful shadows of realities utterly beyond our control and largely beyond our direct knowledge’ (‘Notes on the Way’, Time and Tide, Vol. XXIX, August 1948).

Of course, there will always be those who dismiss the Pauline teaching which has here been the basis of our thinking as no more than the culturally limited vision of a first century Jew who could not see past his rabbinical training. To those who adopt such a view there is little that I can say, for the premise on which I write is that the Christian Scriptures are a divinely given revelation which Anglicans in their official formularies have always acknowledged as the prime source for the Church’s teaching and practice. But I would engage here particularly with those (usually liberal-minded Evangelicals) who have freely conceded that the Apostle’s teaching precludes women from being ordained to an office of ‘headship’ in the Church but have held the view that the priesthood is not to be so understood. What such people would surely have to admit is that if any office in the church can be so described, the episcopate is that office. I believe the present stance of such people to be misconceived because of the closeness of the offices of priest and bishop, as argued above; but if the ‘headship’ argument has been held to have no great force in relation to the presbyterate, so enabling liberal Evangelicals to come to terms with women priests, it certainly cannot be so easily dismissed when the episcopate is in view. Those who have thought in this way are now to be confronted with a moment of decision.

Recently attempts have been made to demonstrate that women exercised a regular ministry as priests and bishops in the early church. The presence of women clergy in Gnostic sects and in Montanist circles is unquestioned. But that they ever existed or found acceptance in catholic congregations is an entirely different matter. The evidence is at best fragmentary and dubious. As the Catholic bishops’ response to the Rochester Report states in commenting on the work of feminist writers in this field,  ‘many of the conclusions drawn by such writers are open to serious challenge on purely scholarly grounds, sometimes involving creative speculation based on a paucity of evidence.’ To take one instance (and I have deliberately taken an example involving the use of Scripture), it is often asserted that in Romans 16:7 the second name should read Iounia (feminine) not Iounias (masculine); the Greek name is in the accusative (Iounian) and so linguistically could be either. Andronicus and Iounia(s) are described as ‘men of note among the apostles’. Hence, it is argued, have we not here an instance of a woman (Iounia) recognised as an apostle? But even if the name is feminine (in which case presumably Andronicus and Iounia were husband and wife), the following phrase (episemoi en tois apostolois) is ambiguous: ‘well-known among the Apostles’ can mean either ‘well-known to the Apostolic circle as belonging to that circle;’ it can equally properly mean ‘well-known to the Apostolic circle although not belonging to that circle.’ Nor is this latter possibility at all remote. The preposition en in koine Greek has a wide range of meaning, and it is more than legitimate to render it by the English to, so that the verse may mean nothing more than that Andronicus and Iounia(s) were prominent in the Christian community to which St. Paul was writing, not least because they had both suffered for Christ and been Christian believers from the earliest years, and therefore familiar names to the Apostolic leadership. This verse is fragile evidence indeed on which to base a claim that here is an explicitly female apostle. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that in the attempt to discern the existence of women presbyters and bishops in catholic congregations of the early centuries a strong element of special pleading is present: the desire to find them amidst the literary and iconographic remains of the period is fuelled by the fact that such discovery is quod erat demonstrandum.

Let me turn now to the argument which I broadly labelled above as Ecclesiastical. Here I want to concentrate on the nature of Anglicanism as it emerged as a distinctive expression of the Church in the Elizabethan settlement. The English Reformation has often been regarded as an enigma, not least because it has evolved over the course of time into so broad a church. It has been easy for those of a definitely Protestant conviction to argue that the Church of England was essentially a Reformed Church, belonging (as an admittedly somewhat untypical member) to the family of continental Reformed churches. Its sacramental formularies, especially in the XXXIX Articles, appeared more Reformed than Lutheran, as did the manner of its eucharistic celebration (with the Lord’s Table in the centre of the chancel aligned east-west until the High Church pressures of the early 17th century). It was even represented at the Reformed Synod of Dort of 1617.

But this was ever only part of the picture. The really distinctive element in the English Reformation was the retention of the ancient ministerial structure of the patristic and mediaeval church. It was this that gave the Church of England its flavour as a church reformed, certainly (see its commitment to justification by faith in Article XI), but also making clear that it intended its Reformation to be no embracing of novelty but simply the restoration of Apostolic purity. The preface to Cranmer’s ordinal makes the intention of the English Reformers plain: ‘It is evident unto all men diligently reading the Scriptures and ancient Authors that from the Apostles’ time there have been these orders of Ministers in Christ’s Church: Bishops, Priests, and Deacons.’ The Ordinal is then prescribed ‘to the intent that these Orders may be continued…’ There is here a quite critical element in Anglican ecclesiology: the fact that the Church of England (and consequently other churches of the Anglican Communion) has no ministry of her own, in the sense that she aims only to continue the orders of the Apostolic and Patristic church. This is the understanding that underlies such phrases as ‘ordained priest in the Church of God’ inscribed in the Bible given me at my priesting as to many others over the years.

Even certain strongly Protestant Anglican writers such as Bishop John Jewel understood the English Reformation in these terms. As he stated in his Apology for the Church of England, ‘Lawful reformation of our Church is so far from taking from us the name or nature of true Catholics…or of depriving us of the fellowship of the apostolic Church or impairing the right faith, sacraments, priesthood and governance of the Catholic Church that it hath cleared and settled them unto us.’

It is, of course, fully open to Anglicans to debate and explore the precise implications of this. For example, it would be disingenuous to deny that within the Anglican churches a catholic/protestant polarity exists, at times decently obscured, at other times all-too-obvious, over the question of the sacerdotal or hieratic nature of the priesthood; indeed, we might rightly say that a wide spectrum of views can be cited ranging from those of the Council of Trent to those of Calvin’s Institutes. But what is not consistent with Anglican ecclesiology is to alter the essential nature of the threefold ministry of bishops, priests, and deacons; for this the churches of the Anglican Communion have in common (and by design, not accident) with all the ancient churches of Christendom: Latin, Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, and Assyrian. This is precious ecumenical common coin.

It is one of the tragedies of our time that when there is so much convergence across hitherto intractable barriers (one thinks of the RC/Lutheran work on justification, the RC/Assyrian agreement on Christology, and recent liturgical convergences) a new gulf is opening up because Anglican churches are, in despite of their history, ordaining women as bishops and priests. And if it be objected that many Anglican provinces (our own included) have already admitted women to the priesthood and that therefore this issue is now behind us and the die is cast, our ecumenical partners on the Catholic side (in its broadest sense) have indicated that they nevertheless see consecration of women to the episcopate as a significant and serious further step away from conformity to the ancient canons and norms of the undivided Church. As the response to the Rochester Report of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales expresses it, ‘the ordination of women bishops in the Church of England would undoubtedly create an additional major obstacle to any future full communion with the Roman Catholic Church, and might further impair the degree of communion already existing.’

It is perhaps right to conclude that to many Traditionalist thinkers, the very debate on which we have here been engaged is itself highly dubious. It is, they would argue, not for the Church to debate, still less to question, her given title-deeds (of which the male apostolate and episcopate are one) as though the traditional pattern needed to justify itself in the modern world. It is rather for the Church humbly and receptively to accept what she has been given – and then if needs must, to explore its inner logic, to see (as far as God gives us to see) why things are shaped as they are. John Milton strove in his great epic Paradise Lost to ‘justify the ways of God to men.’ But as some have pointed out, despite the splendour of that literary achievement, there was something unwittingly sacrilegious in the very attempt. God is under no obligation to justify himself or his ways to men; and his servants might be wise not to venture to do so either.

Questions for discussion:

1. How, and to what extent, do the offices of bishop and priest differ? Do the differences have any bearing upon the question of the propriety or impropriety of the consecration of women as bishops?
2. What significance is to be discerned in the Lord’s choice of men, and men only, as Apostles?
3. At times St. Paul states, or appears to imply, that distinction of gender is irrelevant; at other times he upholds and seeks to enforce this distinction. How are these teachings to be reconciled?
4. What were the English Reformers aiming to achieve? What relevance has the answer to this question for the structure of the Church’s ministry?
5. ‘It is not lawful for the Church to ordain anything that is contrary to God’s Word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another…’(Article XX of the XXXIX Articles). In what way is this Anglican ecclesiological principle relevant in the current debate?