Women in the English Episcopate, May 2014

Thanks Seagull I suspected you wouldn't see anything wrong here. I am just interested in Sherelink's and Peteprint's view if there is anything wrong with the photo in this church in light of their views.(maybe we will have to wait a week or so to find out

 

Or this, perhaps:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYay408Rd7c

 

Are the replies I got to this question.
"Ok - Then can you spot what is wrong with this picture in this church?"

This question could have been put better as thus "Ok - Then can you spot what is wrong with this picture in this church?"
For indead this Church is Westminster Abbey- so what?- well Westminster Abbey amongst other churches is a royal peculiar. This means the sovereign (a mere women in this case) acts as the Bishop of this church and she has visitorial rights. A book I read "How the queen reigns" mentioned that the Queen in these cases does have "spiritual powers" but didn't elaborate. I have been having no luck finding out exactly what these spiritual powers are. Perhaps others here know and can elaborate and maybe tell us how this impacts on the women Bishops issue.

As for the strong for, or anti women, Bishop issue. I am suprised that people can take such a die in a ditch approach to this issue. The issue seems far from clear theologically, all the for and against issues seem to revolve around the "c" word context, and again aren't clear.

 

Dear Cousin,
It used to be thought that there was a spiritual dimension to the Royal Coronation ,anointing with holy oils and receiving the Body and Blood of our Lord and Saviour. The only King that took it at all seriously was S. Charles the Martyr, who was indeed executed by a Calvinist Parliament for defending the Church in England against Calvinist attacks. No other king since the 17th Centur ever gave thought to it

Since 312 AD, the Monarch has been the Head of the Church. Not mind you the spiritual head, but because the Emporer was in theory the Firse Magistrate secondly the early Church couldn't turn around without trying to ingratiate the Civil side of life. Henry the VIII, , according to Mee , in his publication on the Elizabethan state, feared a Lutheran take over on his death. He thought putting the old legislation back on the books would safeguard his successor.The idea wasn't warmly welcomed, but the Convocation applied a caveat,'as far as the Law of Christ allows.'(Rough Trans.) The Queen, or whatever Monarch has no spiritual authority though Cranmer, thought that as a result of an accident, Henry could consecrate bishops. Seeing that Henry ,'lost it,' in 1536, were luky the idea didn't take hold.

 

Anglican Agnostic,

This won't answer your question either, but it will affirm (and thank you) that your question obtains properly for the Church of England, the established Church of that realm. In many places where imperialist English exporers and merchants planted the Anglican faith in other lands literally all round the globe, where those lands later no longer looked to the British Monarch as their head of state, so some of them also no longer recognized the British monarch as the head of the Anglican faith so long ago planted on their shores.

I apologize for my ignorance here with respect to New Zealand -- is it in the Commonweath? Is Elizabeth II the head of state in New Zealand? Is Elizabeth the head of the Anglican Church in New Zealand. She is none of these in the United States, of course.

 

The answer is "Yes" to all your questions.

I think everyone here is missing my point. Yes the Queen is the non spiritual leader of the Anglican church in England. But! some churches including Westminster abbey (the one in my photo) are royal peculiars along with a few other churches such as The Chapel Royal at St Jamses Palace The Queens Chapel at the Savoy and the Chapel of St Mary Undercroft . There is also apparently at least one in Canada. These churches don't have a bishop, the Queen acts as the bishop in these churches, they come under the direct rule of the sovereign and I believe she has some spiritual powers in these churches.
My point is those who are agin women bishops have to weigh this against that most anglican of things Royal peculiars. Can they have it both ways?

 

i think the issue here, except for Westminster Abbey perhaps, is that all of these are called Chapels, which generally operate outside of the parish system and often outside the normal administration of the clergy. For example I know a TEC family that owns a hunting plantation nearby. The grounds feature a small chapel, and while it was cansecrated by the bishop it is not under his jurisdiction. The family keeps and administers it. perhaps the same is true for these chapels.

 

I am against women priests and bishops. As have been the practice of the historical church based off of scripture.

 

The queen does have a role in the sacraments of the church. She not ordaining priest or confirming the faithful.

 

Someone back up the thread suggested British monarchs do not take their anointing seriously. That is a most strange assertion. Everything I have read about the Queen insists that she took her anointing very seriously and regards herself as having taken on a duty to God as well as to country; and by all accounts she is a very serious Christian. As to her spiritual supremacy in England, it is no different from her temporal supremacy, that is it exists, but it is exercised for her by those appointed and elected to do so. It is true that the Abbey is a royal peculiar, however, and that the dean is responsible to her.

The arguments against women's ordination made by Anglo-Catholics often carry some theological weight. Those based on the "headship" idea, however, seem to me to be as difficult to justify as their mirror-image, the argument for women's ordination based solely on egalitarianism. At any rate the Church of England is unconvinced by the scriptural arguments against women's ordination (as was the Papal Biblical Commission, I recall) and by the theological ones. Those based on some conception of male superiority in spiritual matters are regarded with especial disfavour, I think.

This piece by Professor Bishop N.T.Wright gives the opinion of a distinguished Bible scholar on the disputed Pauline texts.:

http://ntwrightpage.com/Wright_Women_Service_Church.htm

 

Sorry, AA, but surely while of course New Zealand is in the Commonwealth, and the Queen is the NZ head of state, the Queen is not supreme governor of the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia?

 

How -and -ever, if we look at the record of the various monarchs since the so called Glorious Revolution we are not presented with a pretty picture at all. Cromwell was an Independent Calvinist, who lived off Church money. William of Orange (1988) was a Calvinist and tried to persuade the Anglican Church to drop its opposition to Calvinism and in favour of the Dutch Calvinist Church.
German George I, 1715 tried his best to weaken or disable the Anglican Church through his choice of Bishops. This meant that opposition to the deist's onslaught in Britain was led by Non Jurors, such as William Law. Whilst the lead supporter of dissent was the Bishop of Bangor, ( he didn't, I understand, believe in the Trinity!) a particular favourite of the Hanoverian Monarch! Both Geo I and Geo II, were Lutherans. George the Third did try, but the next 3 or four monarchs like the post Revolution ones , simply used the Church as a Dept, of State, when I was a child we were taught about the days of the Hanoverian Wilderness. , under these monarchs.
that the Church had endured.

As for Spiritual Supremacy? Henry VIII, Cromwell and Cranmer all discussed the subject, but the Convocation added a piece to the effect ,'as far as the law of Christ allows!'(1532). Truthfully both Eliza & S.Charles abused their trust somewhat, but it was in an effort to preserve the the poor Church from even worse abuse by Calvinists.

 

You object to the policies of these royal folk, and who's to say you are wrong? That does not suffice to establish that they were unaware of their religious obligations. (Quite the contrary, one might think.)

 

I thought we already addressed this topic? Monarchs are not in the church hierarchy and have no sacramental order. They were excplicitly prohibited from this in the Articles.

 

I'm sure I'm not the only one to enjoy Onlookers contributions and indeed read Mr Wright's observations, However neither NT.Wright nor Onlooker sees the real point and that is, it is an old claim that the C.of E., is not the whole of the Universal or Catholic Church , but simply a Communion of Catholic Believers within the Whole, hence our use of Anglican Communion! Given the obvious objections within the Anglican Communion, the interest of the Roman Bishops and the Orthodox Prelates as shown by their reaction. Surely the correct position for our Church to take up is to call for a free Council of all Catholic Bishops.
Up to now the question of women in Apostolic Orders certainly in the U.K. has been run like a political campaign with interventions from political leaders trying to get their political parties out of stagnation.

 

The council would be a splendid idea, although the arguments about who would be qualified to attend might be even more of a spectator sport than the arguments over women's ordination.