Ladies hats

So we heard last week that the Royal Enclosure at Ascot will be enforcing a stricter dress code this year.  They will be cracking down in particular on ladies hats.  Ladies attempting to enter the Royal Enclosure wearing a fascinator instead of a hat will be turned away.

Similarly, the Church of England has enforced a strict hat code amongst its clergy for some time.  Women are allowed to wear any hat except for an episcopal mitre.  The pointy hat that shows you are a bishop has been strictly reserved for men.

And next week, the General Synod of the Church of England will be meeting and one of the most important votes on the subject of women bishops.

The February session of Synod will debate a motion which could throw the whole legislation into turmoil.  So Mouse thought he would return to his blog for one post only, to set the scene for those who have not been following closely, and to plead with any Synod members who come to read this, pass the legislation once again, without any further amendments.

The issue being discussed next week is actually very simple.  If we cut away all of the legalistic complexities and opaque ecclesiastical language, what we have is a proposal which says that women bishops should only be half bishops.  The idea is that male bishops will continue as they are at present.  But women bishops, may only have "co-ordinate jurisdiction" in their dioceses.  In other words, they must also have a male bishop on their patch who can oversee parishes who cannot accept women bishops for theological reasons.

The current draft of the legislation proposes that women be made bishops on the same terms as men, but that all diocesan bishops must make provision for traditionalist parishes by allowing another (male) bishop to oversee them.

There has been much debate about the strength of the "code of conduct" which sets out the requirements for such provisions to diocesan bishops.  The draft of this code makes clear its legal status.  It is a statutory code, and failure to abide by it will leave the bishop concerned open to legal challenge by judicial review.  Be in no doubt that this requirement is binding and cannot simply be ignored by those who are not sympathetic to the traditionalist cause.

One is left wondering why these arrangements are not acceptable for opponents of women bishops.  Particularly so for the conservative evangelicals.  Their issue relates to the role of women in the church.  They believe the Bible requires "male headship" within the church.  For them, Mouse cannot see any reason to split legal hairs over the precise formulation by which alternative bishops may provide oversight.

Their principle concern has, in fact, been that women bishops may be reluctant to put forward conservatives for ordination.  The Archbishops have made clear that there will be no discrimination on theological grounds like this, whether the provision for opponents comes by "co-ordinate jurisdiction" or by a code of conduct.

For the Anglo-Catholic wing of the church, what appears to be semantic legalities to most of us, are in fact important differences of principle.  Some Anglo-Catholics do not accept that women can be bishops, whatever the General Synod says, and will not recognise them as holding valid orders when they are finally appointed.  Whilst many of us are not particularly bothered who our bishop is, and consider our local vicar to hold sufficient authority in their own right to baptise, say the eucharist and conduct other vicarly business.  For the Anglo-Catholic, however, these things are all done by the parish priest under the delegated authority of the diocesan bishop.  Any problems there, and the whole diocese falls apart.

Anglo-Catholics also have concerns about muddying the waters of ordination.  The fear is that the direct line of ordinations from St Peter to your local parish priest will be broken.  The theory goes that for anyone who does not hold valid orders (like a woman, for example) to conduct an ordination would be invalid.  Once that happens, confusion will reign as we try to identify validly and invalidly ordained priests.  And imagine if some of the men who were ordained by a woman bishop themselves become bishops.  We won't even be able to tell who isn't really a valid priest by checking their chest region and footwear.

Yet, Mouse cannot accept that "co-ordinate jurisdiction" is the answer here.

It takes only a cursory reading of the gospels to spot that Jesus had serious issues with those who had allowed their religious life to become legalistic.  And here we are discussing whether provision within the measure itself or a statutory code of conduct provide an adequate legal framework for traditionalist priests to continue to do what they do every day of the week already.

However, Mouse isn't seeking to convince anyone of his own position on these issues.  For what it is worth, Mouse considers it nonsense to suggest that a priest's ministry becomes invalid because his boss in the diocese changes. Or that it is credible to suggest that no single bishop between St Peter and today's crop have invalidated their orders, so the purity of the line is already broken.  Mouse does not believe that ordination is valid because of the purity of the person laying on their hands.

The purpose of this post is to point out what will happen if the proposal for "co-ordinate jurisdiction" is passed next week.

In the first instance, it will put the House of Bishops in a real pickle.  You see, General Synod has no power to amend the legislation at this stage.  The vote will merely be one requesting the House of Bishops to make the change.  Which will put them in a difficult position.  If they refuse and continue with the unamended legislation, then the vote in July is likely to reject it. Synod will have already expressed its dissatisfaction with the drafting, and everyone Mouse speaks to who is close to Synod tells him that the vote is on a knife edge already.  Rejecting the legislation in July would allow it to be redrafted with this new provision included, pushing the issue out by another two, three or four years.

If the House of Bishops decide to amend the legislation as requested, this will require it to once again pass through the dioceses, pushing the issue out by another two, three or four years.  However, the supporters of women bishops are threatening to vote against it if it does not provide for women bishops on equal terms with male bishops, so this would not be straightforward.

Either way, we won't make progress for a number of years.

And here's the rub.  Mouse is asking those considering their position on the vote what the impact will be on the Church of a rejection of this legislation.

The proposal being put in February goes just a hairs breadth further than the current proposal, but at the cost of making women bishops a second class of bishop.  So Anglo-Catholics must consider the extent to which they are prepared to dig in and fight, and how much collateral damage they are prepared to inflict, for a near identical compromise to the one already on the table.  Conservative Evangelicals must consider why it will make any difference to them at all.

If you thought the PR caused by the appearance of a tented protest at St Paul's was bad, then just imagine the impact of General Synod voting down the legislation on women bishops.

We have been on the course of admitting women to the episcopate for so many years that to cock the whole thing up now would be a total disaster.  The legislative process has so far managed to get General Synod and 42 Diocesan Synods to agree on a position.  There is a reason why Synod does not have the power to amend legislation now - it has already been through Synod.  For the legislation to be changed now would be an abuse of process which would inevitably be seen by the world at large as a wrecking act from traditionalists at the expense of the wishes and desires of the overwhelming majority of the church.  This would be disastrous for the cause of evangelism and mission in England, as the rest of the country would be left wondering what planet the Church of England is on.

It has been the clearly expressed will of General Synod and Diocesan Synods that women be admitted to the episcopate on the same terms as men, with graceful provision for those who cannot accept this.  Those who are being offered graceful provision should accept it gracefully.

For the good of the gospel in this country, Synod members must vote against the proposal to reintroduce the Archbishops' amendment for "co-ordinate jurisdiction".

Blog-cation

After two and a half years of continuous blogging, Mouse is a little tired.  And Mrs Mouse and the baby mice need more of Mouse's attention that he's been giving them lately.

So this Mouse is going to take a break.

I may be some time.

Why Rowan Williams should respond early to AMIE

First, some news.

The good folk who previously bought you Anglican Mainstream and the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans UK have a new venture.  The Anglican Mission in England has been announced at conference for conservative evangelicals last week.

Paul Perkin and Chris Sugden are the two names given on the press release, with Paul Perkin Chairman of the AMIE steering committee (also Chair of FCA UK and Anglican Mainstream Steering Committee member) and Chris Sugden in his usual role as secretary (also secretary of FCA UK and Executive Secretary of Anglican Mainstream).

This organisation appears to be a new name for the previously announced Saint Augustine Society.

The declared aims of the new society are the re-evangelisation of England, church planting and to provide alternative episcopal oversight to clergy who don't think their existing bishop is up to the mark.

And this is a pretty big warning sign.

We are told that AMIE has a steering committee and a panel of bishops overseeing the society, but we're not told who these people are.  Anglican Spread was at the launch, and tells us that the panel of bishops is Bishops Michael Nazir Ali, John Ball, Colin Bazley, Wallace Benn and John Ellison.  So no surprises there.

The next warning sign is this mention in the press release:

At the London conference three English clergy who have been ordained in Kenya for “ministry in the wider Anglican Communion” with the support of the GAFCON Prımates’ Councıl were welcomed and prayed with by bishops and church leaders in support of their ministry.

So perhaps a little context is required.

Anglican Mission in the Americas was formed in 2000 by the Rwandan Church when they thought the official Anglican churches in the US and the Canada were heading too far in the wrong direction (too gay friendly).  This has eventually led to the Anglican Church in North America being formed as a separatist movements, still claiming Anglican heritage, but outside the official Anglican Church structures.

So naming a society after this, with the involvement of clergy ordained in Africa is more than a coincidence.

Another piece of context worth remembering are the repeated threats from Reform, the chairman of which was present at the launch of AMIE and gave it his fulsome support.  Repeated threats have been made by Reform along the lines of "if you don't do what we want on gays and women bishops then we'll take our ball and play somewhere else".  More specifically, they threatened to stop sending ordinands to Anglican colleges and stop paying parish shares to dioceses.

This has been a pretty hollow threat until now, partly because the numbers involved are not worth worrying too much about, but also because there has not been a credible alternative destination for ordinands and funds.

It appears there is now.

Before we jump to any conclusions, we don't have any information yet on the intentions of AMIE - and in itself evangelism and church planting are good things.  But there are pretty ominous signs that this organisation's intent is to become a church within a church.  This could lead to 'irregular' ordinations, outside those approved by regular diocesan procedures.  In the US, this included the irregular ordination of bishops.

So, Mouse's question is how Rowan Williams will respond.

Mouse strongly recommends he does something.  Whilst a number of the bishops involved are retired, a number are still serving clergy, as are Chris Sugden and Paul Perkin.  Either way, the Church has the authority clergy disciplines measure at their disposal.  This applies to all members of the clergy, whether in active ministry or not.  The clergy discipline measure is rather hard to pin down in some respects, but it does give grounds for misconduct as acting in a way that is unbecoming or inappropriate to the office and work of the clergy.

Now, Mouse wouldn't want to suggest that this has already taken place, but it might be wise for Rowan to outline the circumstances under which this would be invoked.  For example, would irregular ordinations by AMIE result in discipline? Or what about simply accusing serving bishops of "failing in their canonical duty to uphold sound teaching".  This is the grounds on which 'alternative episcopal oversight' is being offered by AMIE.

Mouse suggests Rowan does two things.  First he should speak with the leadership of AMIE in its entirely and set out his views on how he will respond under various scenarios which could develop.  Second, he should make his views public, so that those who may be tempted to follow this organisation are aware of where they stand.

A prayer for the Olympics (tickets please)

The good old CofE has released a prayer for the Olympics.  Good to see that it includes a prayer for health and safety.  No mention of those of us who can't seem to get hold of tickets, though.



A prayer in preparation for the 2012 Games

Eternal God,
Giver of joy and source of all strength,
we pray for those
who prepare for the London Olympic and Paralympic games.
For the competitors training for the Games and their loved ones,
For the many thousands who will support them,
And for the Churches and others who are organising special events and who will welcome many people from many nations.
In a world where many are rejected and abused,
we pray for a spirit
of tolerance and acceptance, of humility and respect
and for the health and safety of all.
May we at the last be led towards the love of Christ who is more than gold, today and forever. Amen

Church of England to allow civil partnerships in Church (or not)

The Church of England's press release relating to its response on the Government's civil partnerships proposals was a bit odd.  On the one hand, it was a statement of the obvious.  It said that civil partnerships will not be allowed in Church of England churches unless Synod votes to allow it.  On the other hand, that left open the interpretation that the Church of England will allow civil partnerships in its churches whenever Synod gets round to voting on it.

It is not surprising then, that we see the headline in the Guardian, "Church of England to allow civil partnerships - if Synod agrees".  Like the good old CofE's press release this seems to Mouse to be both totally accurate and utterly misleading at the same time.

Of course, the Church of England by definition "allows" whatever Synod agrees - that is the policy making body for the Church.  However, there is no proposal going to Synod to make this policy, and it is pretty hard to imagine that this will happen in the near future, given the undoubted fury that this policy would unleash.  You might as well write that the Church of England is to allow golden labradors to conduct doggie baptisms - if synod agrees.

And the Guardian piece states all of this.  Well, not the bit about doggie baptisms, but all the rest.

I guess the moral of the story is that a loosely worded press release can lead pretty directly to press stories.  So if you want to influence what the press report, try a little harder.

Friday round up

Here's my round up from the blogosphere.  Ten of the best from the blogs this week.

1. Bishop Nick Baines on whether bishops are too sensitive about media coverage

2. Heresy Corner on the fake news story about stoning a dog

3. Tall Skinny Kiwi on Christian festivals and the Jesus movement

4. The Beaker Folk on when study groups go bad

5. The Church Sofa on the Church Zoo

6. Epiphenom on fear and God

7. Clayboy on the Church of England communications

8. BRIN on religious affiliation and immigration

9. Spectator Faith Based blog on the rise of the Mormons

10. Greenbelt blog has a great opportunity for young aspiring journalists

Church in online data capture shock

Mouse is rather chuffed to hear that the good old Church of England is trailing a web-based membership and finance data capture tool for six dioceses (Bradford, Lichfield, Manchester, Newcastle, Southwell and Nottingham, and Worcester).  With a bit of luck, we'll be able to get access to more detailed information, more quickly and in a more useable format at some point in the future.

It was back in December 2009 when Mouse called on the Church to do exactly this.  In fact, he offered to to it for them, although no-one called to take him up on the offer.

It might have taken another 18 months, but still - we're on the way.

Church "membership" & membership of other groups

A very interesting nugget of information has been highlighted by the invaluable BRIN website.

A YouGov survey has asked a representative sample of 2,500 people about a range of issues, including their membership of various groups, with "Church or Bible Study" being one of the options.

And the results are very interesting.

Trade Unions and gyms both had 12% claiming membership, the National Trust had 10%, whilst 6% claimed to be members of a Church or Bible study group.

BRIN reckon that this number is higher than some recent estimates, whilst cautioning that the nature of the question may lead some to answer 'aspirationally'.  The response for the National Trust, for example, implies a membership around 1m people more than their last published membership figure.

What is interesting for Mouse, however, is the demographic breakdown.

Whilst most figures show religious affiliation increasing very much in line with age, this survey does not.

In fact, the same proportion (7%) of 18-24 year olds claimed membership of a church or Bible study group as did those in the 60+ age group.  However, there was a significant dip in the 25-39 age group to 3%, which bounced back up to 6% for the 39-60 age group.

Now, we should not get too focused on details in the numbers where there is a margin of error in the statistics.  However, the demographic breakdowns in the results here show no significant variance in membership of church or Bible study groups in any of the demographic groups.

That is interesting.

We don't have any comparative data for previous years, however, the BRIN commentary makes the important point that membership of all groups has been steadily declining over the past couple of decades.  Whilst secularists rejoice in declines in Church membership, seeing it as a sign of a more secular age, a more careful reading would say that it is a sign of a more atomised and individualistic age.

This is not something to be celebrated.

The question for the Church is whether it can buck this trend.

Equalities watchdog chief offends all equally

Trevor Phillips has never been one to shy away from speaking his mind, and as a result he is no stranger to controversy.  Over the weekend, the equalities chief he has managed to offend people of all faiths and none in a single short interview.

It is quite some feat to have united both the Evangelical Alliance and the British Humanist Association in their condemnation Mr Phillips, although the careful reader will notice that they are offended by different aspects of Mr Phillips' comments.

The interview was being conducted ahead of the publication of a major report from the Equalities and Human Rights Commission on religious discrimination.  It was a short, but wide ranging interview in which Mr Phillips gave his views of discrimination against Christians and Muslims, and about their reactions to that.

The interview contains something that people of all faiths and none could cheer, and something which will get stuck quite unpleasantly up each group's nose.

So religious groups might like when he said:

There is a view that says religion is a private matter and it's entirely a choice. I think that's entirely not right. "Faith identity is part of what makes life richer and more meaningful for the individual. It is a fundamental part of what makes some societies better than others in my view.

I understand why a lot of people in faith groups feel a bit under siege. They're in a world where there are a lot of very clever people who have a lot of access to the airwaves and write endlessly in the newspapers knocking religion and mocking God. The people who want to drive religion underground are much more active, much more vocal.

There is no doubt there's quite a lot of intolerance towards people of faith and towards belief.

There's a great deal of polemic which is anti-religious, which is quite fashionable. People can sometimes think we're part of that fashionable mocking and knocking brigade. We're not that.

That is slap bang in the middle of our anti-discriminatory work.

Being an Anglican, being a Muslim or being a Methodist or being a Jew is just as much part of your identity and you should not be penalised or treated in a discriminatory way because of that. That's part of the settlement of a liberal democracy.

Our business is defending the believer. The law we're here to implement recognises that religious identity is an essential part of this society. It's an essential element of being a fulfilled human being.

Wow - strong stuff, and great to hear.  Except that the BHA are rather upset by it, as they see it as rather divisive that Mr Phillips sees his job as to defend religious people - isn't his job to defend everyone?

Of course, but this was an interview on religious discrimination, and he is simply saying that he is there to defend those suffering from that discrimination.

And Christians might not have liked it when he said:

I think the most likely victim of actual religious discrimination in British society is a Muslim but the person who is most likely to feel slighted because of their religion is an evangelical Christian.

There are a lot of Christian activist voices who appear bent on stressing the kind of persecution that I don't think really exists in this country. There are some Christian organisations who basically want to have a fight and therefore they're constantly defining the ground in such a way that anyone who doesn't agree wholly agree with them about everything is essentially a messenger from Satan.

Ouch.  Not surprisingly the Evangelical Alliance have responded, describing the comments as "patronising and disparaging".

Or perhaps more worryingly:

I come from that kind of community. We like our faith strong and pretty undiluted. If you come from an Afro-Caribbean Christian background the attitudes to homosexuality are unambiguous, they are undiluted, they are nasty and in some cases homicidal.

I think there's an awful lot of noise about the Church being persecuted but there is a more real issue that the conventional churches face that the people who are really driving their revival and success believe in an old time religion which in my view is incompatible with a modern, multi-ethnic, multicultural society.

Gosh.

The attack on the Muslim faith is rather more passive-aggressive.  He praises Muslims for making big efforts to integrate, making it clear that they must abandon their rather unpleasant beliefs in order to do so.

Muslim communities in this country are doing their damnedest to try to come to terms with their neighbours to try to integrate and they're doing their best to try to develop an idea of Islam that is compatible with living in a modern liberal democracy.
...

Integration is also about compromise and I think the reason you don't hear a lot about that from Muslims is that they're trying to find ways of being good Muslims in a way that is consistent with the society they're living in.

So, there we go.  In order to get Mr Phillips' seal of approval for integration efforts, something that Christians don't seem to be doing, you have to give up your beliefs for something more acceptable in modern Britain.

No doubt some will not like this very much.

[Gurdur also has some interesting perspectives on this from a secular humanist perspective.]

Old legal advice confirms legality of existing Church policy on gay bishops

This is the somewhat less dramatic headline we should be reading today instead of nonsense like "Church of England clears the way for gay bishops" or "Church of England set to allow gay bishops".

The story hitting the news is that new legal advice has been published by the Church of England which states that celibate gay bishops can be appointed, indeed that it is illegal to consider the sexuality provided they are celibate.

Here are some reasons why this story has absolutely no news behind it:

1. This "new" legal advice was published by the Guardian a month ago

And it is hardly as if it wasn't a big news story at the time.  Andrew Brown received two leaked documents and published them on 25 May.  The first was an explosive memo from Colin Slee, former Dean of Southwark Cathedral, with explosive comments surrounding the controversial appointment of Tom Butlers successor as Bishop of Southwark.  The second was the legal advice, which is now published in General Synod papers by the Church of England.  It was extensively covered at the time, but some seem to have forgotten it already.  And those who read it will note that it is dated December 2010.

2. The legal advice simply re-iterates existing policy

There is nothing new in this.  The Church's only formal policy on homosexuality is the document Issues in Human Sexuality which is very clear that homosexual orientation is not an issue, but gay sex is.  This legal advice says, in a nutshell, that it is illegal to consider homosexual orientation when appointing bishops, but it is fine to consider gay sex.  Rowan Williams has recently confirmed this position himself.

3. We already have gay bishops

I know we don't like to talk about it in the Church of England, but some bishops are gay.  Colin Coward, of Changing Attitude, puts the number of gay bishops at 13.  How he has identified them is not clear.  Some of Coward's less guarded comments on the subject have actually made it very easy to identify some of the 13.  The point here, however, is that the current rules already allow gay bishops.

4. The legal advice is not a policy - it is just advice

This document is simply advice from lawyers at Church House.  It is not a new "policy", and does not originate from within any of the leadership structures of the Church.  This has not been proposed by the House of Bishops or anyone else.  It is simply legal advice.

5. The legal advice is being sent to General Synod for information only - no resolutions are attached

Some have got rather excited by the idea that this 'document' will someone become policy when passed by Synod.  They should read the opening sentence, which states that this document is being sent for information only.  No policy will be formed.  No resolutions passed.  This is just useful information on the law.

So all in all, we have legal advice being given to Synod for information only which re-iterates existing policy.

Big news story this one.