Women bishops

The question about women bishops is back in the news in the UK; the Church of England has today voted to accept having women bishops.

This is a subject that seems guaranteed to raise strong feelings one way or the other, but personally I don’t know quite what I think about it - I can see both views.

However I have been very interested in the ways people have made their arguments, in the motivations and the resulting stances, whichever way they have been arguing.

Here are a number of arguments that I have heard put forward frequently:

• the equality agenda demands action to address a clear inequality
• if the church is to keep up with public opinion it's high time to address this anachronism
• the church has always done things this way, and changes in public opinion are no reason to change now
• it's clearly not fair
• what was right in 1st-century Palestine is not necessarily right now
• the 'stained-glass ceiling' effect
• that one view is obviously right and the other side is being belligerent / unreasonable / old-fashioned / liberal / etc.

All the above arguments appeal to common sense, human opinion, or an internal sense of 'rightness' or fairness. It is hard to disagree with such arguments; they are common and useful bases from which to make judgements.

However, they are all also 'human worldly thinking’, even when Bible verses are tacked on the end to ‘prove their point’!

And I am certainly wary of any argument that resorts to force or that does not take seriously the views of the ‘other side’.

There are some behaviours that are ‘obviously wrong’ - for example thieving is wrong. Few people would argue that thieving is right, and the Bible is unequivocal: “Do not steal” is one of the 10 commandments.

But the issue of women bishops is not such an issue - there are many, many people who care deeply about this, and present their case carefully for or against - and many use scriptures to back their view. There is no straightforward commandment, “Thou shalt / shalt not have women bishops”, but there were certainly many ways in which Jesus went against the cultural norms of his day to recognise and value the place of women, and there are also passages which speak about leadership being male.

So this seems to be one of those issues that is not ‘core’ Christian doctrine - such as Jesus’ humanity and divinity, death and resurrection, and salvation by faith, are. And yet it is an issue that people feel strongly about!

So, I am happy to hear from any who...

• will grapple honestly with the complexities of what the Bible has to say about men and women, and about leadership
• who demonstrate their love for those of the opposite opinion, by listening carefully and respectfully, and by working for their wellbeing if they are hurt by the outcome.
• and who speak with humility, and listen with openness to the mind of Christ.

For I know that honesty, humility, and love are qualities of God.

The problem of authority

One of the wisest pieces of advice I recall receiving as a young man was along the lines of "before you can handle being in authority, you first have to learn to be under authority". This also seems to be a Christian principle, for until we submit to Christ's authority, he will certainly not entrust us with having any small authority under him.

But why is submitting to authority so difficult? Of course, it's only difficult when we disagree with those in authority over us; where we are in agreement, all is straightforward.  

Let's think of an example in order to help us make the issue more real. (I'm not interested here in the issue itself, but rather in how we respond to authority in this example.) The Church of England is painfully divided over the issue of women Bishops.  Whichever side of the issue we are on, if we disagree with the church leadership, will we submit to their authority?  Now this is no longer a theoretical matter - it feels a whole lot harder!

There are several possible ways of responding to this conundrum.

1. If we believe the church leadership is wrong, then we will disobey and do what we see to be right

This clearly places ourselves above the leadership; we do not accept their authority. We retain authority in ourselves and do not submit to their leadership.

2. They are the leaders, our job is to follow

At the other end of the spectrum, this response accepts that, even if we disagree with the leaders, they are nonetheless in authority and shoulder the responsibility for the decision; our job is to submit to their leadership.

Actually there are two ways in which we may take this stance:

• We may do this in an attitude of humility, submitting to the authority of the church leaders in the pattern of Acts 15. It also respects the responsibility they hold, even if we do not personally agree with their decision over these particular matters.
• But we can take this stance as a way to shirk our own responsibility: "it's not my fault; I just do what I'm told". This isn't so much a humble submission to authority, as a denial of our own responsibility in choosing to follow.

So far we have just considered the authority of other men or women.  But in Christian circles we cannot ignore God (actually, we cannot ignore God in any area of life!). Suddenly the issue of authority gets harder. While Christians will probably agree that Jesus has the ultimate authority, we may well disagree over how to understand and interpret his will! Here we are inclined to bring out our most invincible of all weapons: "God says so: it's in the Bible".

3. So long as it doesn't contradict God's word in the Bible, I'll submit to their authority

So we come to a commonly held position amongst Christians: 'So long as the leadership doesn't ask us to disobey God's command, we'll obey; but we won't go against God's command'. At first sight there is a lot to commend this stance; there is even a Biblical precedent (Acts 5 v29).

But this is often not as clear-cut as it might sound! There are some very clear foundational truths in the Christian faith. The ancient creeds were written by the apostles and early church leaders to set these down as inviolable; there can be no submission over matters which undermine the foundations of the Christian faith. But our sample issue of women bishops is not addressed by the creeds, and people on both sides of the argument point to scripture to back their cause. So the difficult issue of authority hits us full force, especially if we disagree with the position of the church leadership.

We need to proceed very humbly in asserting the authority of the Bible. Are we really bowing to the authority of the Bible, or are we merely holding to 'my interpretation of the Bible'? The latter actually puts myself back in charge as the ultimate authority, not the Bible. And we are right back to the difficult authority question...

We are sinful human beings, inevitably seeing things our own way and prone to putting ourselves - rather than Jesus - centre-stage. So we need to look beyond ourselves to other Christians, and together humbly and openly seek God's leading and a right application of Scripture. 

But if we are to look beyond ourselves for a shared Christian understanding of an issue, then why are we not submitting to the view of the church leadership? Are we wriggling and wanting to choose a 'panel of Christian experts who will agree with us'? This is nothing but jury rigging!

The trouble is that we tend to herd together with other like-minded Christians in order to reassure ourselves that we are right after all. So we first form cliques, and then go further to create power blocs in order to promote our particular view. If this is what we are doing, we are certainly not openly and humbly seeking God's will. Moreover, such behaviour is condemned in the Bible. We read Titus 3 v10 and point the finger at the other side but miss God's warning to us. We like verses such as Acts 5 v29 (which is about the limits to submission to worldly authorities, but need to be read in the context Rom 13 v1-7 and 1 Pet 2 v13f) but we skirt around Acts 16 v4 and Heb 13 v17, which are about submission to church authorities. Jesus' own example was ultimately one of choosing to submit to a worldly authority which was patently ungodly!

I sometimes wonder whether God may be less interested in the actual issue, but in how we conduct ourselves in seeking his will over the issue.  If we are 'right' but have spent our time using worldly and underhand means, dressed up with a few handy Bible verses, to assert our personally preferred outcome, what Christian merit is there in that? And what a shameful witness! Jesus' prayer was for unity amongst Christians; there was no prayer that the 'rights' of each individual or faction should be recognised and allowed for!

Perhaps it is time we reminded ourselves of the starting point: Before you can handle being in authority, you first have to learn to be under authority (even when you believe the leaders are wrong).

[In case you wonder about my personal motives in writing this piece, I am one who leans toward disagreeing with the church leadership on this particular issue, but I acknowledge that I am subject to their authority under Christ.]