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. Copyright © Mark Burkill, 1993.

This paper does not re-run the arguments over the ordination of women. Instead, Mark Burkill explains why this has become an issue of such importance to the Church and why some have reacted so strongly to the vote taken in November 1992.

Women's ordination: why is this issue a crisis for the Church of England?

Mark Burkill

Why is this issue a crisis for the Church of England?

It is hard to believe that we are at a watershed in the life of the Church of England. Perhaps because evangelicals have been so good at crying wolf in the past it is hard for us to realise that we are living through a crisis for the Church of England whose magnitude has not been matched for several centuries.

Of course we should not exaggerate the Church of England's influence and importance today. Over the past century its place in the nation's life and its role in bringing the gospel to the nation has been greatly weakened. Nor should we exaggerate our own numbers and influence as evangelicals. However because we are at present part of this denomination and have been seeking to evangelise our country through it, it is vital that we have no delusions over the critical nature of the current situation.

Yet when I or others speak in these terms many will want to take issue. They will say that we are indeed like those who have cried wolf and sounded unduly alarmist before. They will say that the gravity of the present crisis has been greatly exaggerated. They will point to the many good things which are to be found in much parish work today. They will say that we really should not worry and no harm will come to those against the ordination of women, or indeed to the Church of England as a whole.

So I want to deal with such remarks by outlining why I am convinced that this is indeed a critical moment in the history of the Church of England. If there are any who set out with an attitude of scepticism to what I say then I would ask them to start by acquainting themselves with what has happened in other denominations which have ordained women. In every denomination which has not been totally dominated by liberalism there has been big trouble over this issue, and evangelicals have not been able to insulate themselves from it. However much we might like to immerse ourselves in the life and witness of the local congregation this matter will one day affect us. Wherever we stand on the actual principle of ordaining women, if we are concerned about the long term future of biblical ministry in this country we must take what is going on now very seriously. In a few years time it is likely to be too late.

Of course there is always the possibility that the Church of England will be unique in being able to square the circle where others have found this to be impossible, but the evidence from other countries of the Western world leads us to expect that this issue is truly a crisis for the Church of England.

But why precisely is this issue a crisis? I want to answer this question by looking at a series of comments that have been made on the current position by various parties. Some of these comments come from sincere gospel people, some from less honourable quarters. However all these comments have one thing in common - they all tend to minimise the importance of the situation now facing the Church of England.

"We should not get so bothered about the ordination of women when there are clergy in our church who deny the Virgin Birth and the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ."

At first sight it is puzzling that the debate over the ordination of women has provoked so much anguish and heat when there already exist within the ordained ministry those who do not believe such very fundamental doctrines. That state of affairs has provoked much shame and deep dismay but it has never led to the sort of consequences which we see in other denominations that have ordained women.

I think the reason for this is that ordaining women is a very practical matter which will have profound consequences for ordinary parish life and the exercise of Christian ministry. It seems that when the importance of sound doctrine for the health of the church has been ignored for so long, the Lord has forced the question of authority and the source of truth onto the agenda through this supremely practical issue.

It is not that the ordination of women in and of itself is an issue to which we should go to the stake. The problem is that this is an issue which strains the notion of a comprehensive church to breaking point. A denomination either ordains women to positions of headship or it does not. While thus far we have been free to exercise our ministry as evangelicals and flatly contradict heretical views, the question now is whether someone will be allowed to exercise that same ministry while refusing to have anything to do with the ordination of women. The difficulty now thus centres on the application of the legislation to ordain women.

"We should not aspire to a pure church - that is an impossible dream."

Let it be clearly understood that evangelical opponents have not suddenly become separatists and started to seek the supposed bliss of a pure church. It is not that anyone wishes to make the ordination of women the test of whether someone else is sound or not. No one wishes to unchurch evangelicals or others who disagree with the biblical case against the ordination of women.

The problem that is now being raised is whether it is possible for a church which ordains women to accommodate indefinitely those who resolutely believe that this is an unbiblical practice. Opponents are not seeking a pure church, they are seeking a church in which the legislation is applied in such a way as to permit the exercise of their biblical ministry.

"We should accept the decision of the General Synod with a heavy heart and get on with our work."

The difficulty with this comment is that when the General Synod made the decision on November 11th 1992, it does not seem to have paid much attention to the consequences of what it was doing. If it had then there would have been no need for the House of Bishops to meet and discuss those consequences in January.

Of course those who are against the ordination of women will recognise the decision of General Synod and indeed they will work to have it overturned. However it must again be emphasised that resting content with this will not face up to the danger of classic evangelicalism being eradicated in the Church of England in the long term. General Synods may err and when they seek to impose something which cannot be proved from Scripture they are treading on very dangerous ground.

"We should stay in our parishes and carry on preaching the gospel as we always have done."

This fails to recognise that while present incumbents may be able to take this option (provided they are prepared to stay in one parish for the rest of their ministries), this preaching of the gospel is unlikely to be possible for the next generation.

The gospel is not a simple ABC statement which can be extracted from the pages of the New Testament. When Paul preached the gospel, he did it by declaring the whole counsel of God. The gospel we preach is taught in an ecclesiological setting which we cannot ignore. The salvation and new life which Christ brings to believers has to be lived out within our denominational framework. Elders would not be called shepherds (1 Peter 5v2) unless there was some shepherding to do. However much we might like to keep our heads down and get on with the work we must recognise that our work will have no long term future unless we wake up to what is going on now.

This question is put into sharp focus when we consider what advice we would give to a prospective ordinand in the current situation. Can we really guarantee that by the time he is ordained, or seeking his first incumbency, there will be a ministry open to him?

"The decision to ordain women is irrelevant to evangelicals because the debate was conducted in the wrong terms."

I actually disagree with the premise of this statement. In the months leading up to the November debate it was suddenly realised that the vote would turn on the evangelical and biblical issue of headship.

Be that as it may, we still have to come to terms with the reality of the situation which faces us. Even if others see the matter as a question of who says what in the communion service, it is quite clear that the measure will open the way for women to be in charge of congregations in a position of headship. That is the practical consequence of this measure and that must be something which many reject as unbiblical.

Some will say that there are already cases where women have been in such positions of headship over congregations before this measure was passed. That is certainly true but we must recognise that up till now there has been no danger of traditional ministries which reject that state of affairs being excluded from the Church of England.

"Proper provision has been made for those who disagree with the measure by the legislation itself and by the statement of the House of Bishops following its January meeting."

To those who say this I would reply first of all that the legislation itself totally misjudged the importance of the issue and the depth of opposition which the measure would encounter. The legislation was framed on the basis that in the long term opposition would die away and therefore no provision needed to be made for an indefinite time scale.

It is precisely because the legislative safeguards are so inadequate that the House of Bishops has had to start thinking long and hard about the implementation of the measure at its January meeting. After that meeting a statement was issued whose merits have been much discussed.

I would only point out here therefore that as yet the bishops have provided no legal safeguards, that different bishops appear to interpret the Manchester statement in diverse ways, and that we cannot be sure that its proposals will actually work.

Through all these comments that I have been addressing you may have noticed a common thread. The reason why many do not appreciate the gravity of the current situation is that they do not perceive that the real problem is one of the sufficiency of Scripture. The crisis now is not directly about the issue of the ordination of women. The crisis now is about the application of the legislation to ordain women, and that is an issue which centres round the sufficiency of Scripture as a source of truth. This is what we as evangelicals must wake up to. The current crisis is one which centres upon the authority of Scripture within our denomination, and that is a matter which no evangelical can ignore. The House of Bishops are in a terrible dilemma because they are trying to do something which is well nigh impossible. They are trying to apply the legislation in a way which does not make being in favour of women's ordination a test of orthodoxy.

Let me explain this by pointing us to the wisdom of the 39 Articles where they touch upon this matter. The most pertinent is Article 6 on the Bible's sufficiency:

Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation: so that whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation.

Although this article is mainly concerned with the sufficiency of the Scriptures for salvation, it does warn against making belief in something which cannot be proved from the Scriptures an article of the Faith. Again we must recognise that it is disastrous to see salvation and the gospel as distinct from the whole message of the Scriptures.

If there is a real concern for the unity of God's people, then it is this principle which must be practised for the maintenance of that unity. It could be argued from church history that it is not the over-scrupulous consciences of some Christians which have generally caused schism and division, but rather those who have wished to enforce measures on the Church which cannot be proved from God's Word. Whatever else proponents of the ordination of women may say, they would surely find it very difficult to acknowledge that the principle emerges from the plain reading of the Scriptures and can be proved thereby.

The Authority of the Church is described elsewhere in Article 20 as follows:

The Church hath power to decree Rites or Ceremonies, and authority in Controversies of Faith: And yet it is not lawful for the Church to ordain any thing that is contrary to God's Word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another. Wherefore, although the Church be a witness and keeper of holy Writ, yet, as it ought not to decree anything against the same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce any thing to be believed for necessity of salvation.

Again there is an emphasis on the folly of making something which cannot be proved from Scripture a necessity in belief. The Church which does not heed these words is treading on very dangerous ground.

The principle which Articles 6 and 20 are expressing is to be found of course within God's Word. In Acts ch.15 the apostles and elders in Jerusalem met with Paul and Barnabas to discuss the question of circumcision, a matter that was as divisive in the early church as the ordination of women is today. Ch15v1 tells us that some men from Judea were teaching "Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved".

That of course is Paul's summary of the impact of what these men from Judea were teaching. However in ch15v5 when the meeting is being held in Jerusalem, the Christian believers who were of Pharisaic background said "The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses". Presumably they did not think they were denying the Gentile believers their salvation through what they were teaching, yet they wanted to insist on the importance of circumcision.

The conflict came over them making a necessity of something which could not be said to be a requirement of the New Covenant. Once the principle had been established that circumcision could not be forced on the Gentiles and that Paul would not be required to circumcise his converts, the Jerusalem meeting was able to recommend certain measures which would assist fellowship between Jews and Gentiles (vv24-29). It was most certainly not a compromise. Indeed Paul was then happy to circumcise Timothy in ch16v3.

We do not even face the difficult transition period between the Old and New Covenants which the early church had to wrestle with. So to make acceptance of the principle of female headship a necessity for exercising the pastoral ministry within the Church of England would be a very great folly.

The issue of the authority of Scripture, and in particular its sufficiency as a source of truth, has thus returned to dominate ecclesiastical life. This practical question of whether acceptance of the principle of ordaining women will be made a necessity of belief within the Church of England ensures that this is the case. As yet there are no signs that those with the greatest responsibility in applying this legislation have really got to grips with this problem. The fact is that the crisis will not go away until the biblical wisdom of the 39 Articles in this matter is recognised.

Jeremiah 23v29 reminds us that the Word of God is not a comfortable, cosy and ineffectual instrument in God's hands. We are told there that God's Word is like a hammer which breaks a rock in pieces. Surely no Church which is to stay alive can ignore the Scriptures in the long term. It must be because the application of the ordination of women legislation raises the issue of the authority and sufficiency of Scripture that there is now a grave crisis in our denomination. I would suggest that unless God's Word is heeded in this matter then that same Word will act like a hammer and break the Church of England in pieces.

Possible Questions

  • What practical lessons can we learn from the way in which the ordination of women has been applied in other denominations?
  • What should the Bishops be encouraged to do in order to ensure there is no future discrimination against evangelicals opposed to the ordination of women?
  • What advice and help can we give to those who might be turned down at ABMs because of their opposition to the ordination of women (or indeed for other invalid reasons)?
  • What should we do to ensure a future ministry for those opposed to the ordination of women and to safeguard the existence of uncompromisingly biblical congregations?
  • How can we educate PCCs and congregations of the danger in requiring of anyone something which cannot be proved from Scripture?
  • What can we do to create a full time, biblical, ministry for gifted women?