Earlier this month, Bishop Jack Iker addressed his
Diocese of Ft. Worth in convention.
He was very frank in addressing division in the Anglican Church in North
America over women’s ordination.
After discussing the Holy Orders Task Force and the Conclave earlier
this year, he concluded:
So where are we? Most ACNA bishops and dioceses are opposed to women
priests, but as it presently stands, the ACNA Constitution says each diocese
can decide if it will ordain women priests or not. We now need to work with
other dioceses to amend the Constitution to remove this provision.
And he went further (Emphasis mine.):
We are in a state of
impaired communion because of this issue. The Task Force concluded
that “both sides cannot be right.” At the conclave, I informed the College
of Bishops that I will no longer give consent to the election of any bishop who
intends to ordain female priests, nor will I attend the consecration of any
such bishop-elect in the future. I have notified the Archbishop of my
resignation from all the committees to which I had been assigned to signify
that it is no longer possible to have “business as usual” in the College of
Bishops due to the refusal of those who are in favor of women priests to at
least adopt a moratorium on this divisive practice, for the sake of
unity. Bishops who continue to ordain women priests in spite of the
received tradition are signs of disunity and division.
The hoary joke about bishops having their backbones
extracted at ordination does not apply to Jack Iker!
The bishops and dioceses that ordain women are the
sources of so much that is objectionable in ACNA – weakness on the authority of
scripture, confusing lib/left activism for ministry, lack of concern for unity
for starters – that I am glad to see the Bishop of Ft. Worth take this stand. I once was sanguine about ACNA and
women’s ordination. Taken by
itself, women’s ordination has not been a big issue with me. But I now see the issues are more than
the gender of whom we ordain.
After seeing these bishops and dioceses – and who they ordain – in action
since ACNA’s formation, I am with Bishop Iker on this. Sometimes godly unity requires saying
enough is enough.
2 comments:
It had to come to this.
I have to agree with you and with Bishop Iker. The larger catholic church (Orthodox and Roman) excludes the ordination of women; if we are to seek the unity of the Church Catholic then it needs to be so.
This is not a matter of politics or of secular equality, the order of the Church is not that of the world. In matters secular, equality is fine but God has defined his people differently.
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