Reform, as a grass roots movement, envisages action coming from members who have thought, studied, discussed and agreed. Discussion papers such as this one are written by individual members for the council of Reform and the wider church. The author alone is responsible for the paper. This paper may be copied freely.

Dogged by the collar? getting women's ministry right in the Church of England

Pat Lawler and Angela Pearce

Prologue

It has been wrongly perceived that Reform is against the ministry of women. This booklet has been written to disprove this allegation and to show, indeed, that conservative evangelicals are the first to recognise the equality of men and women in Christ. We believe that women have a distinctive rôle in the ministry of the church, as in society and that this is a rôle which is not properly undertaken by a man. We are equal and different.

There are, however, members of Reform who believe that the Scripture makes it improper for women to take a leadership rôle in the church where a man is available. Headship and leadership is male according to the Scriptures. This paper is not the place to expound why this is so and interested readers are invited to read many of the other publications which demonstrate a fact which was commonly held amongst all Christians until fairly recently.

Amongst the members of Reform there are differing views as to whether women may speak in church or not when men are present. Some take the view that this is forbidden in the Scriptures and others take the view that women did prophesy in the early church and that, therefore, it is appropriate that women should be deacons and readers in the Church of England.

This booklet will seek to expound how women's ministry can flourish as a work complementary to that of men, how it is essential to the life of a healthy local church and how it should be encouraged, how we need many more women workers and deacons in the service of the Church of England and how these ministries ought to be respected and honoured not least because they are different from the calling of men in the body of Christ.

One of our problems is that the Church of England has conducted its debates on this whole matter without establishing first what ministry is and the precise rôles of the presbyter and the deacon (let alone the bishop). We are still hung up on theories of ministry which are essentially Anglo-catholic and certainly not scriptural. For example, it is improper to regard the diaconate as a mere preparation for the presbyterate. It is arguable from the Scriptures that the office of deacon is not really that of a pastor-teacher at all and is probably more akin to our church warden. Nevertheless the Church of England has persisted in its outdated ways. It is for this reason that we have considerable semantic and organisational difficulties.

The title of "priest" is, of course, one quite unknown to the New Testament and the proper designation is "presbyter", an office which seems to combine leadership, pastoral care and teaching, if the Pastoral Epistles are a guide for our church life.

Since women are not required to take a leadership rôle, they are not called to the presbyterate. But this is quite another matter from the question of who may administer the Holy Communion. There is a debate going on amongst Evangelicals and indeed other groups in the church, as to whether any reputable lay person might lead the Holy Communion Service. That is an unresolved question and is complicated by the fact that most of us would not wish the main service on Sunday to lack a scriptural exposition. If this ought to be the case every Sunday, it is questionable whether anyone ought to lead the Holy Communion who has not been trained to expound God's Word. But, as we said, this is an unresolved question. The presbyterate is not about administering the Lord's Supper but about being a leader and a pastor-teacher.

There are then, if we leave aside completely as unfinished debate the question of the Holy Communion, two forms of service which are indubitably open to women.

The first of these is pastoral work, especially amongst women. It is perfectly clear at the present time that there is no ministry more seriously needed than this, when so many women are living without a male support and often are trying to bring up children alone and doing a remarkable job. Such women need the support and pastoral care of other women and often the women will be those authorised by the church as women workers or deacons (deaconesses). This is a major rôle which needs filling in virtually every reasonably sized community.

The second rôle is a more visible one when women and men together share in ministry to the congregation, not only as pastor, but also as teachers in their rôle as readers or deacons / deaconesses. In this work the voice of a woman will often be distinctive and will bring insights to bear which are unlikely to occur to the average male presbyter. Therefore, we need the public ministry of women.

In what follows we shall seek to show how these ministries work out in practice and we appeal for many women to hear God's call to this vital work. Men and women are complementary in the church as in ordinary life. We need each other.