Welcome to the echo chamber. If you tuned in to the fierce battle over gay bishops in the Episcopal Church -- whether it would fracture the U.S. branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion and maybe the Communion as well -- you will certainly hear a familiar clashing sound if you pick up the latest New Yorker.

In the context of a massive look at the history, status and struggles of the Church of England (miniscule church attendance, immigration, rising fundamentalist and charismatic Protestantism), writer Jane Kramer examines its current fight over whether to ordain female bishops.

Things are slower over there. It took England nearly two decades longer - until 1994 -- to allow female priests in the Church of England. The Episcopal Church ordained women officially in 1976 (although 11 were "unofficially" brought to the pulpit in Philadelphia in 1974). While that the CofE's governing Synod will debate female bishops at its July meeting, the Episcopal Church already is led by one, presiding bishop Katherine Jefferts Schori.

Continues: http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... Stories%29

Ironically, it's reformers who seem to be delaying things, by refusing to give the traditionalists the provision they want. If the request for a third province, or some other institutional solution, were agreed, things could move forward immediately. Most trads who couldn't stomach being in the same church as ordained women went back in 1992. What those who remain tend to want is a space of their own within the CofE.

Instead, a feeble "code of practice" is offered, and there seems to be a progressive block who will accept only total victory, with traditionalists forced to either accept women priests, or leave. Such illiberalism from the self-styled liberals.

*Disclaimer* I find the theological arguments against women's ordination weak in the extreme. Why the possession of meat'n'veg is more essential to standing in persona Christi than being a Middle Eastern Jew, I've no idea. The arguments fall back on a vauge appeal to "tradition" in no time, which boils down to "it's always been this way, so it always should be", which falls apart on its own terms when evidence of deconesses in the early church is adduced. But this isn't about what I think, but how those who think differently should be treated.

Can a woman bishop speak for god in England?

I see no reason why not. I mean, they all make shit up anyway and women are quite good at that too!

"God has a penis. So no."

That's what a Catholic indirectly said on a talk show a few weeks back.

NineBerry wrote:"God has a penis. So no."

That's what a Catholic indirectly said on a talk show a few weeks back.

Perhaps he was flicking through his god pin-up calendar and noticed the godly bulge as god posed on the bonnet of an Aston Martin Vantage. It couldn't be stuffing as that would be a deceit and god don't do dat.