Not quite a parting of the ways

Jul 24, 2014

The vote by the Church of England’s governing body to allow women to be ordained as bishops is historic and dramatic, even if it was the logical consequence of the decision by the same body to ordain women as priests made in 1992. That logic was resisted for almost a generation, but eventually a way was found that reassured sufficient numbers of the dissenting minority that their position in the Church was secure and respected. The establishment by Benedict XVI of the Anglican ordinariate in 2011, in full communion with the Holy See, has offered an acceptable alternative home for some Anglo-Catholics and may well have helped the vote. They expect an influx of new members to the ordinariate now. Time will tell.

Archbishop Bernard Longley, co-chairman of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission, has said the synod vote places an obstacle on the path to unity. But it may well also be true that Anglican-Catholic relations, official and unofficial, have never been better, and this week’s decision will not make a lot of difference. The Church-to-Church relationship is conducted at international level and the Anglican Communion has already consecrated 37 women bishops in various provinces. Indeed one of them serves on the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (Arcic), where her gender has not been seen as an issue. Nevertheless, what the mother Church of Anglicanism does carries symbolic value, normalising what hitherto was seen as exceptional.

Thirty years ago the recognition of the validity of Anglican orders seemed on the cards. With its apparent blocking for the long term following this week’s vote, there is an irony which may console ecumenists: the fact that the papal decree Apostolicae Curae of 1896, declaring Anglican orders invalid for all time, applies equally to men and women. This has turned out to be a blessing in disguise. The Catholic Church’s willingness to extend every ecumenical courtesy to the Archbishop of Canterbury, tactfully avoiding the question of validity of Anglican orders, means there is no reason why a female archbishop could not be similarly received. One small additional courtesy to the Anglican Church would be to stop treating those who advocate female ordination in the Catholic Church as infamous outlaws rather than holding a legitimate opinion honestly.

Yet plainly Catholicism is not going down the same road as Anglicanism in these matters, though in both cases the advancement of women is long overdue. There is a danger that the Church of England could find itself creaming off the most effective female Anglican lay leaders into the priesthood and eventually into the episcopacy. Because for Catholic women the road to advancement is not through ordination, Catholicism is automatically prevented from clericalising its best female leadership talent and has to come to terms with them as laywomen. Such progress would also help to improve the status of laymen. In the very long term, that could be just as healthy a move in the right direction as this week’s decision by the General Synod. --Tablet