Why God created women?

Amidst the comments to my previous post the following are particular challenges I would like to respond to within a post rather than another comment:

"I'm asking YOU why God created women, what did/does He ask us to do/be? I presume you have already decided what He asks you as a male to do." 

" I don't have any idea how to prove that I have 'looked more deeply' into whether my arguments 'take account of the fullness of humanity, in creation and in redemption, a fullness in which men and women share completely.' You have set up the answer in this way. "When you delve more deeply, you will end up agreeing with me." Disagreement thus becomes evidence of not having 'deeply delved.' It's an impossible burden that I can never meet. "

First, I do not think God created women to be sent out for coffee. One reason why I am prepared to bat for women being able to share in all the ministries of God's church is the suspicion I harbour that lurking beneath arguments which sound principled may be a basic denial that women are equal to men. Take this comment as an instance (which I linked to in the previous post):

"I love the way that Doug Wilson writes. I might not always agree with what he writes but he has a beautiful way of putting things that only enhances what he’s saying. So, in a series of recent posts on the Women Bishops nonsense in the Church of England, and particularly N.T.Wright’s contributions, he has come up with some corkers, 

Wright also says that Junia is listed among the apostles (Rom. 16:7). He earlier was dismissive of the unusual words in 1 Tim. 2, but here is apparently unaware of the common uses of the noun and verb forms of apostello. An apostle is a “sent one,” and the verb means “to send.” Jesus was an apostle of God (Heb. 3:1), the twelve were apostles of Christ (Luke 6:13), and Paul and Barnabas were apostles of the church at Antioch (Acts 13:2-4). How much authority is involved is a pure function of the sending agency, and what the sent one is commissioned to do. Of course Junia was a sent one. But whose? To what purpose? The mere use of the word gives us no basis for promoting someone who was sent for coffee to the ranks of the Twelve."

It is not a beautiful way to put things to ascribe the apostolic Junia as "someone who was sent for coffee." It sounds belittling to me.

Nevertheless, I accept that there are principled arguments for denying women may share in all the offices of the church. In respect of the second comment above I do not want to (and apologise if I set things up in the previous post to look as though I do) set up an unwinnable argument about looking more deeply into the fullness of humanity of women. If I implied that I could not accept any look in depth that disagreed with my own conclusions then I went too far. The point I am trying to make I will now put this way: I think we (especially we men) owe it to women to check, re-check and double check that any argument we bring against women being ordained to roles such as presbyter and bishop does not hide within it a diminution of women's full humanity.

If, having checked, re-checked and double checked that no such diminiution is overt or covert then we may have an argument against women's ordination that is coherent with the full humanity of women. (Obviously I think Mr Wilson, cited above, fails my standard on the matter! And I wonder if the writer who commends him would write so approvingly if he checked, re-checked and double checked what he has written. Sent out for coffee? Yeah, right!).

So, back to the first comment: positively, what do I think God created women to be and to do?

First and foremost I think God created women and men to people the earth, to enjoy its goodness, to steward its resources, and to praise its Creator. To people the earth, men and women come together in marriage in order to create families, for without one another the peopling of the earth fails, and following this particular aspect of God's purpose for men and for women, men become husbands and fathers and women become wives and mothers.

Secondly, God created women and men for service: serving God and serving one another. At the heart of Jesus' own vision for humanity is a vision for serving one another: the least is the greatest, the last is first, love one another. The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve and give his life a ransom for many. I sense that from this perspective we should understand the word 'helper' in Genesis 2:18-25: a 'man' alone (whether a male or a female) has no equal counterpart to form human society, so 'man' alone became 'male and female he created them' (binding both Genesis 1 and 2 together). Neither beast nor bird creates human society: men and women do. But each is to be 'helper' (or, in the language of Jesus, 'servant') to the other. What Adam exclaims when he discovers Eve is not 'At last, a helper' but 'This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.'

Inevitably, in our service of God and of one another, specific directions are given. As people met Jesus on the way, some were called to literally follow him, others were sent back to their place of residency, but all were asked to live the lifestyle of the kingdom (cf. the Sermon on the Mount and other teaching). Within the kingdom there seems to be only one constant role for its citizens: service.

When New Testament talk moves to 'church' it seems to reckon both with the question of diversity-in-unity (so talk about the body of Christ, members of one body, diverse gifts, one Spirit) and practical arrangements for the daily and weekly life of churches (who hosts, leads, serves, teaches but, as noted here in the last few days, without mention of who presides at eucharist). Previously, I have argued that the early days of the church were days of pneumatological flexibility: the charismatic church rather than the institutional church. Within that flexibility offices were created as required (e.g. Acts 6), instructions were given to fit local conditions (e.g. 1 Timothy - and they were local conditions because in different conditions today we ignore most of 1 Timothy's instructions about practical arrangements for church life: men do not raise hands in prayer, widows are no longer organised according to Paul's instructions).

What has God created men and women for in the church? To serve one another, to serve the cause of the gospel, to love one another through the power of the Spirit. The richness of talk of submitting to one another, of being fellow workers working together with God is a richness which comes from the profound foundational truth of the church that it is birthed through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on men and women, a baptism of the Spirit in which there is neither male nor female, slave nor free, Jew nor Greek because the church is the one body of Christ inclusive without distinction of all humanity who make its members.

God created men and women for freedom in Christ, constrained only by the law of Christ which is to love one another. This profound gospel truth, vehemently propounded by Paul in Galatians, is our guide to the roles of men and women in the church. What has God created us for? To love God, love our neighbour, love our enemy and love one another.

ADDENDUM: John Richardson at The Ugley Vicar has posted something which relates very closely to what I am trying to say here. My quick, and initial comment (also in a comment below) is this:


In that post I suggest John R is coming very close to what I am saying and veering away from it at precisely the point which worries me: by emphasising woman as image of the image-bearer, whether he wishes to or not, he sets up the conditions under which women may be treated as lesser than men.

In a slightly larger comment I suggest we need to consider whether his understanding of adam as 'collective singular' precisely fails to acknowledge that as a collective singular noun it includes the one collection Genesis 1:26 and 5:1b-2 refers to, 'male and female.' Crucial here is Genesis 5:1b-2 (noted by John, so fascinating that he understand its implication differently to me):

"When God created man (adam), he made him in the likeness of God. Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man (adam) when they were created." (ESV).

The adam is collective singular: they are male and female - it (adam-kind) is male and female.

Further, in setting out the relationship between 'Adam' and 'Christ' he drives this to settle an argument that Adam (the male) is the image-bearer of God and this Eve (the female) is the image of the image-bearer. But the Adam in whom we all sin and therefore die is the collective in action, the male and the female  engaging together as humankind falls - each is culpable (as, perhaps ironically in this present discussion, is drawn attention to by 1 Timothy 2:13-14). It is 'humankind' which falls and Christ is the representative and first fruit of the new humanity in whom we live. Paul, I suggest, understands this in at least two places in his writings. In Galatians 3:28, the new humanity, those who are 'in Christ', are 'neither male nor female'. In 1 Corinthians 11:11, he writes, 'Nevertheless, in the Lord woman is not independent of man nor man of woman'.

To ignore these texts when attempting to argue that men image God as image-bearers of God and that women are images of the image-bearers (a derivative relationship) is a problematical theological exercise because it does not seem to allow for what Genesis 5:1b-2, Galatians 3:28 and 1 Corinthians 11:11 are saying, men and women as one humanity image God, scar that image and in Christ are restored as that image.

Really, truly, completely, equally human

Jody Stowell makes an excellent case excellently. At the heart of the turmoil over women in ministry, focused in the last week or so on women in the English episcopacy, is a simple question, Are women human as men are human? If women are not really human, Jody's question, then churches should boldly say so. After all, if women are not really human, then the simple fact is that they should not be ordered in such a way as to represent Christ to humanity or humanity to Christ through a priestly role, nor should they presume through a teaching ministry to speak about the incarnation of Christ as human to be saviour of humanity (i.e. to preach and teach the gospel).

But what if women are human? Actually, I am assuming here that all readers do think women are really, truly, completely, equally human, as men are, so my question turns out to be, Why can all (gifted, called, Spirit-filled, in Christ) humans not be able to be discerned for any office of the church? That is, if we are all on the same page in wishing to treat one another as fully human (note carefully, I am assuming we are), the question remains whether the decisions we make about church order properly give effect to that intention, and whether the argumentation or reasoning supporting those decisions constitute true recognition of the full humanity of women and men.

One argument against an affirmative answer to the question is that the truest and greatest office of the church, being servant to all, is already open to women, indeed held in many instances by women. This argument was drawn to our attention the other day in a comment pointing to this article on Kyrie, Eleison! To which I simply reply that if the greatest office of ministry in the church is open to both genders, why isn't the least office (by comparison, i.e. bishop) also open to women!

The same article stoops very low in suggesting that women desire to be bishops (a noble desire according to Scripture) as a matter of power ambition. Jody Stowell rightly nails that on the head. Women enter the diaconate and priesthood to respond to God's call and to serve the church. Power, ambition, career aspiration: cheap shots. Do we use that language when a man aspires to be ordained?

Whether we have a 'catholic' or 'evangelical' understanding of church office, the role is about being a saved human being in service to humanity, called and set apart by God to spread the gospel of the Word who became flesh in order that all flesh might be saved. On a 'catholic' understanding the priest represents Christ to humanity and humanity to God: there is nothing intrinsic about Christ's maleness to being our Saviour (ditto, as is often observed, his being a Jew). On an 'evangelical' understanding the priest is the presbyter or teaching elder, discharged with responsibility to lead the church through teaching sound doctrine: the emphasis falls on the ability of the presbyter to teach, not on the gender of the teacher. (In special regard here is 1 Timothy 2:12-15, but this is an explosive text in the sense that a reading of it which concludes it is universal in application relies on a reading of verse 14 that women are instrinsically and permanently unreliable: do we really believe that?)

In recent times a new* argument against women being presbyters and bishops has entered the fray, namely that the church is a household, the head of the household is a man, and thus the head of the church should be a man (where 'head', in episcopal churches, particularly pertains to the office of bishop as the licensing authority over the presbyters, deacons and lay officers). The questions about this argument which strike me as most pertinent are: (a) is the analogy between household and church a strong one, in particular strong enough to base as important a decision as denying to (remember) gifted, called, Spirit-filled, in Christ women the possibility of holding any office in the church? (b) should rules and regulations about church offices be based on an argument which, essentially, is a 'drawing a line through the dots', that is, an inferential argument? (c) are there not many situations in which women are heads of households and thus why can the church (on a straightline analogy) not also be a household headed by a women? A further question, but perhaps not the most pertinent, concerns the nature of biblical headship and whether women in the role of wife are not mutually bound with husbands into the role of head of household.

As I reflect on these situations I suggest we are too prone to read from the New Testament a set of everlasting rules when the essence of the New Testament in respect of 'how we then should live?' is about life in the Spirit (the most important criterion for church office is endowment of the Holy Spirit) and the fullness of the kingdom (which is a seed growing into a harvest, an ever widening and deepening healing of creation, one aspect of which is the fullness of our humanity being experienced, through (among other things) the healing of the rift between men and women in which women have been subjugated, set upon and sidelined through male dominance and aggression).

In this 'big picture' perspective we look into the New Testament and see a Spirit-led church which was very flexible in the way it was led, responding adroitly to local concerns (whether Acts 6 or 1 Timothy 2), remarkably mutual in the manner in which women and men took part in the ministry (think Priscilla and Aquila, Junia and Andronicus, Paul with Euodia and Syntyche), and fluid in its understanding of apostleship (so not only 'the Twelve' were deemed apostles). In those days of the 'charismatic' church, before it (for various reasons) solidified into an 'institutional' church, we see remarkable possibilities of the fullness of humanity developing in God's healing kingdom.

The point of being Anglican is being a catholic-and-reformed church, following the tradition yet ever open to varying it through examination of it in the light of re-reading Scripture, semper reformanda and sola scriptura. But what is the Scripture we read about men and women in the life of the church? Is the New Testament a deuteronomistic book (that is, a second law book for God's people) or a pneumatological handbook of the kingdom (that is, a guideline to life in the Spirit a.k.a our freedom in Christ and under Christ the king to become what God created us to be).

At the heart of the turmoil in England as it spills out into the Communion is an important challenge to Anglican theology: what is our vision for humanity in the kingdom of God? Does that vision truly, deeply, thoroughly engage with what it means for women and men to be really, truly, completely, equally human?

I side with Jody and against Anastasia!

ADDITIONAL ARTICLE: Read Tim Chesterton's excellent post here.

ADDITIONAL ARTICLE: For an interesting endorsement of Junia's apostleship in terms of being sent out for coffee, see here ...

*By 'new' I mean that in my reading over the past few decades I feel that a headship based argument is a relative newcomer to debates. It is, of course, an 'old' argument in the sense that it goes back to the New Testament era for its line of reasoning.

Confused? So is TEC!

If you are a little confused by what is going on in South Carolina you are not going senile, demented or otherwise mad. It is genuinely confusing to have the legally incorporated Diocese of South Carolina being pursued by TEC (via charges against its bishop (the canonically consecrated and enthroned) Mark Lawrence, charges, more or less, that he has been derelict in his duties of obeisance to TEC while attempting to be faithful to God), while simultaneously TEC is setting up an alt.Diocese of South Carolina.

Actually, just to make you really mad in your confusion it is more confusing than that. What I am attempting with logical precision to call the 'alt.Diocese of South Carolina' is being described by TEC officials as the genuine Diocese of South Carolina (meaning the genuinely genuine Diocese of South Carolina, in the eyes of that Diocese of South Carolina, is the former Diocese of South Carolina).

Meantime, rather than falling over the fiscal cliff which may be the fate of all Americans if Obama cannot seal a deal with Boehner, why not fall off the cliff of confusion with this final piece of absurdity: the charges remain against Bishop Mark Lawrence, presumably because the allegedly former Diocese of South Carolina is not quite former (since if it was then Mark Lawrence would no longer be a bishop, nor would be remain an Episcopalian subject to Episcopal discipline).

It may be that I am missing something what with being a rather boring person who lives in just one universe at a time rather than in parallel universes. I have a feeling that in parallel universes none of the above would be confusing.

Anyway, I can only leave you to see for yourselves what is what ... here ... and I disclaim all responsibility for any confusion you may incur as a result.

Won't make any difference at all

Still with eyes overseas, the ACI has written an open letter to the bishops of The Episcopal Church which, summarising, says the Presiding Bishop and others in respect of the Diocese(s) of South Carolina have acted uncanonically. As best I can tell, nothing will change in response to the letter. I am glad they have written it since it lays out in the public domain many things which should not be hidden. But apart from that I predict the effort going into the letter is a complete waste of time.

In England there will be a fresh attempt to bring legislation to the GS re women bishops' this time with some renewed resolve that there will be women bishops as a result. This will require fresh legislation (otherwise what was voted on last week cannot be reintroduced to the next Synod until after 2015) and a clear commitment to a robust means of respecting those who do not wish to live under the authority of a woman bishop which satisfies that part of the church, thus securing the required majorities in all three houses.

I think this response from Bruce Kaye, a neighbouring Anglican across the ditch, bears reading. One might also reflect as Kiwis on why our nation's public broadcasting service has nothing similar to the Religion and Ethics site which ABC runs.

In a quite different mode is Colin Coward's Changing Attitude's reflection on the lost measure. I disagree with nearly everything he writes, including his characterization of the conservatives in the C of E, and his division between the God they (and we, elsewhere in the world) meet in the Bible and the God who Colin, Julian of Norwich and quite a few non-Christians think God is. But he does offer an interesting observation about English bishops and the argument that none truly represent the conservatives!

I draw attention to his disagreeable commentary because I think he makes a point inter alia which all Christians need to constantly consider as we think about and seek to act missionally. He charges opponents of women bishops as living inside a very tall fence which is difficult to look over (e.g.):

"I think the crisis that hit the Church last week arises from the inability of the conservative group of lay members of Synod to see over the fence. Their very concrete world is circumscribed and even if they have a description of the world beyond the fence, nothing will convince them that it describes authentic reality."

At one level this is nonsense which fails to reckon with the wisdom, insight and intelligence of the theologies which lie at the heart of (e.g.) Reform and Forward in Faith (to say nothing of being insufficiently self-critical of his own theology and its possible shortcomings). At another level, however, it puts its finger on something important: are all Christians in a shrinking church in a rapidly changing society (simultaneously secularizing and receiving immigrants from many faiths) living in a kind of stockade?

Within the stockade we have our squabbles and quibbles, and some of us, unwittingly or not, live in such a manner that makes the walls of the stockade taller. But mission is reaching beyond the stockade, and its long-term goal is not to race outside, snatch a few souls and bring them back into the stockade. Successful mission, in the history of the church, has always been about lowering the stockade walls and chattering the gospel with those outside of it in a public conversation about God.

I think the anguish in the CofE is that, quite inadvertantly, because no one on any side of the argument intended it to happen, the walls of the stockade have been raised. The desperate need in the particular circumstance of the English church is to lower those walls. To lower them by showing it is a church which is engaged in the public conversation about the dignity and integrity of womanhood through permitting what the majority of its members want, women bishops. To lower them by showing it is a church which finds a way to respect the integrity of its own beliefs, that is, its historical theology founded on Scripture and developed in tradition which has led a minority to passionately believe that women bishops are inconsistent with those beliefs - only such a church can engage in a society with many minority groups.

Contrary to Colin Coward, I do not think maintaining such beliefs is a form of spiritual ignorance or immaturity. Indeed such beliefs are nearly always intrinsic to Anglican churches as a whole avoiding the heresy of becoming indistinguishable from the Labour Party at prayer. (Not that there is anything bad about discovering that the Labour Party prays!!).

If the church - any church, everywhere - is to make a difference in the world, it is through our ideas (theology), the clarity with which we hold them and the clarity with which we communicate them. Our habit of building walls between church and world seems an inescapable part of being Christian. Breaking them down again is our inescapable obligation as disciples in the kingdom of God.

To return to TEC and ACI. The tragedy unfolding in South Carolina is the loss of missional vision. Canonical rules, whether observed or broken, are triumphing over gospel imperatives. It is no part of Anglicanism to build stockade walls with canons. The way forward for the C of E is to find as few canons as possible to make women bishops happen and a reformed mission move forward in faith.

Have I lost the plot?

The answer to the title question is nearly always 'Yes'!

But I am - seriously - wondering if I am losing the plot a little re the rejection in the English GS of the immediate possibility of there being women bishops in the C of E. To an extent my response has been cool, calm and collected: the motion wasn't a good one so it was defeated; a better one will be brought in due course. It wasn't a good motion because it didn't provide for the minority position, so a little more discussion between majority and minority and, hey, presto, all will be well (though maybe not "most well"). Further, with very cool detachment, one can mount, as I have done below, a critique about the theological paucity of the arguments for the motion. As best I can tell, however, few observers in England are being cool, calm and collected today. All are in a tizz and this is very, very serious for the C of E which is now in a crisis on several fronts. As a simple measure of how big this is over there, our own Christchurch Press devoted the whole of its first "World" news page to the situation.

The crisis on several fronts includes the possibility of parliament intervening, the prospect of disestablishment taking root as reality, the need for the Archbishops' Council to come up with an imminent and fairly immediate solution (even if that means another vote in as short a span as a year from now), the threat that the minority will (somehow) be swept away in a cataclysmic deluge of majority voting scorn which sweeps away any notion of 'provision', and, most significantly, a strong sense that this might constitute a moment when the C of E's irrelevance to English society is embedded for a long time to come, with consequences for the hearing of the gospel proclamation. Or not. History, of course, will have to tell us one day in the future what all this means.

My post below, re Gerald Bray's Anglican Ink article, has received more "hits" than anything I have posted in a long time - it now has in the comments a rejoinder by Gerald himself.

I wonder if the crisis in England is linked to a general crisis in global theology: how do we live in this world in which respect and dignity for all human people (itself a fruit of the gospel) is out pacing the ability of the vessel of the gospel (the church) to communicate the gospel to new generations?

A savage irony might be that if the C of E fades terminally in English consciousness, the Roman church will quietly continue its steady work on 'the conversion of all England'!

Has Gerald Bray lost the plot?

I like Gerald Bray and have several pleasant conversations with him on his visits to NZ in recent years. He is very intelligent and learned, facts reflected in his writings and teachings over the years as a teacher in both Britain and the USA, to say nothing of his global lecturing.

But Anglican Ink carries an article by him which responds to the train wreck that was the most recent English General Synod. I find this article somewhat disturbing. For example, in capital letters, this is written:

"THE CHURCH RUNS ON MONEY ALONE AND HAS DONE SO SINCE JUDAS GOT THOSE 30 PIECES OF SILVER. IT WAS MONEY THAT CRUCIFIED JESUS AND DON'T YOU FORGET IT."

That comment, and others offer a highly cynical, denigratory view of the people who offer their ministries as servants of the Church of England, to say nothing of denigration of people who stand for General Synod (at least some of whom must have voted for an outcome which lines up with Gerald Bray's relentlessly negative opposition to women bishops). I question an ecclesiology which finds little good to say about those with whom one disagrees. But worse is to come, as we might expect when the title given the piece is, 'Evangelical supporters of women bishops are "liberals in disguise".'

Gerald Bray writes this:

''One side-effect of all this is that whereas twenty or thirty years ago most Evangelical organisations contained a mixture of people for and against women's ordination, battle lines have now hardened. Today, an Evangelical who claims to be an 'egalitarian' in such matters is simply a liberal in disguise. 

Anyone who doubts this need only look at the Fulcrum Anglican website. Fulcrum is a tiny pressure group that exists only in the blogosphere but claims to represent the 'Evangelical centre', for which read 'slightly right-wing liberal'. (It is officially against gay marriage but in favour of 'dialogue' - you get the picture.) 

Evangelicals cannot be defined by the women's issue, which remains secondary to their chief interests (evangelism, mission, teaching the Bible and other things that the rest of the church only talks about once in a while), but after the most recent events I would be surprised if anyone who supports women bishops would be welcome in most Evangelical circles. As happened before, the extremism of those people is alienating the Evangelical constituency and causing the latter to close ranks against them."

On the one hand this is simply libellous (meaning an unwarranted claim) in the way it generalises across the ranks of evangelicals who support women bishops to impute a lack of integrity and dishonesty to fellow evangelicals: we are not what we seem, Bray says, indeed we are deceptive because what we truly are is disguised.

On the other hand this is confusing in its logic. Those evangelicals who support women bishops are liberals in disguise, yet evangelicals "cannot be defined by the women's issue." What?

The best I can offer in charitable response to a brother in Christ is that the plot is being lost here. [Later: I accept, in the light of comments below, that another charitable response is that Gerald is focussed on 'the English scene' rather than the international evangelical scene, and, perhaps, within that scene, particularly zoned in on Fulcrum. I still think that it is unfair to impute 'disguise' to fellow evangelicals, even though Fulcrum has raised many questions for non-Fulcrum, English evangelicals.]

The simple fact is that it is true that "evangelicals cannot be defined by the women's issues." Logically this also means that evangelicals who support women's bishops cannot and should not be judged to be liberals in disguise. Perhaps, Gerald, if you read this, you would considering withdrawing this description of your fellow evangelicals.

PS Nice touch here from Annabel Crabb in the SMH.

Good argument for women bishops

Following up from below where I excoriate some bad arguments for women bishops, Bishop Tom Wright, in his usual brilliant manner, tackles the British PM who says the CofE must get with the programme of modern life while also arguing that there are good biblical arguments for women bishops.

"All Christian ministry begins with the announcement that Jesus has been raised from the dead. And Jesus entrusted that task, first of all, not to Peter, James, or John, but to Mary Magdalene. Part of the point of the new creation launched at Easter was the transformation of roles and vocations: from Jews-only to worldwide, from monoglot to multilingual (think of Pentecost), and from male-only leadership to male and female together. 

Within a few decades, Paul was sending greetings to friends including an “apostle” called Junia (Romans xvi, 7). He entrusted that letter to a “deacon” called Phoebe whose work was taking her to Rome. The letter-bearer would normally be the one to read it out to the recipients and explain its contents. The first expositor of Paul’s greatest letter was an ordained travelling businesswoman. 

The resurrection of Jesus is the only Christian guide to the question of where history is going. Unlike the ambiguous “progress” of the Enlightenment, it is full of promise — especially the promise of transformed gender roles. 

The promise of new creation, symbolised by the role of Mary Magdalene in the Easter stories, is the reality. Modern ideas of “progress” are simply a parody. Next time this one comes round, it would be good to forget “progress” — and ministerial “programmes” — and stick with the promise."

The whole piece is published simultaneously on Fulcrum and in The Times. I agree with +Tom. The key biblical argument arises from considering the sweeping implications of the resurrection of Jesus Christ as the firstfruits of the new creation - God's new society.

While looking to Fulcrum, worth a peek is a transcript of Elaine Storkey's speech at the GS. I particularly like two things here and draw your attention to them.

(1) If Lorna Ashworth and friends are running here and there saying that a definition, or a key part of the definition of 'conservative evangelical' is the 'complementarian' approach to women in ministry and in the home (i.e. 'equal but different ... so never in charge of men'), could she and they please STOP. [For clarity, could they please stop defining 'conservative evangelical' in such an exclusive manner. Conservative evangelicals include complementarians, egalitarians and (such as myself) non-complementarian non-egalitarians].

(2) Elaine reminds us of a time when the most conservative among us (as represented by Oakhill) could countenance women preaching and women leading. Is the complementarian approach a reaction to modern times which actually goes back on where conservative evangelicalism had been heading without trauma or trouble?

[UPDATED, rewritten para]: Some associate Chris Sugden with a certain kind of extremism, ironically in the guise of Anglican Mainstream. But it looks like on Virtue Online that he offers this reflection on the situation at the GS which is somewhat sober, balanced, and utterly reasonable. But then it has been drawn to my attention that Chris Sugden wrote no such thing - I am guessing that David Virtue has lifted this careful balancing act from Anglican Mainstream where Sugden posted it! Starting the paragraph afresh and accurately: the Tablet has published a good editorial here!!

Finally, and locally, yet also globally in its concern re Commnon [sic], Bosco Peters manages to be both witty (beginning with a hilarious illustration) and wise in asking just what this Anglican Commnon is all about.