Women bishops: the desperate and disingenuous distinction in the Five Guiding Principles

Mar 31, 2017 by Jill

by Archbishop Cranmer:

Of all the responses to the post on the ‘review’ instigated by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York into the operation of the Five Guiding Principles in the nomination of Philip North to become Bishop of Sheffield, this one from ‘None of the above’ was by far the most interesting:

It is HG, not the bishops of The Society, who is “obfuscating the meaning of ‘true’”. Guiding Principle 1 requires that it be acknowledged that clergy are “the true and lawful holders of the office which they occupy.” To then speak of this as if it referred to “true validity” or “true ordination” is to fail to grasp a fundamental distinction between orders and office – a failure which indicates either mischievous misrepresentation or simple ignorance. The Principle is precisely worded, and uses the terms it does for a reason: not to provide convenient loopholes, but to say exactly what it intends to say and no more. There is no contradiction in the Principles, and no need to amend them, but simply to insist on them being applied in the sense in which they were plainly intended.

Now this is really geeky Anglican stuff, not to say lawyerly ecclesial pedantry. Honestly, if you’re not an anorak, please don’t waste your time reading further. And if you belong to another denomination and want to use this analysis simply as an(other) opportunity to trash the Church of England, please don’t bother commenting at all.

The context was the assertion that the Five Guiding Principles incorporate at the outset the patent nullification of Philip North’s (and The Society’s) theology of Church leadership. This first principle states:

Now that legislation has been passed to enable women to become bishops the Church of England is fully and unequivocally committed to all orders of ministry being open equally to all, without reference to gender, and holds that those whom it has duly ordained and appointed to office are the true and lawful holders of the office which they occupy and thus deserve due respect and canonical obedience;

So “all orders of ministry being open equally to all, without reference to gender”, and the Church of England holds that women priests and bishops “are the true and lawful holders of the office which they occupy”. It was thus reasoned:

Read here