How to defend the belief only men should be ordained?

You wrote:

Do you imagine that in the CofE a candidate for the Anglican Priesthood's testimony, as to calling, is merely accepted at face value, then they are accepted for ordination?

I don't know what experience you have of the process but that is not the way it works at all. A great deal of enquiry into very personal history is involved, along with psychiatric, and psychological profiles looked into, spiritual and doctrinal profiles drawn up and references sought, before ordination goes ahead. Every ordinee's profession is 'tested'.

I wrote:

You answered:

Correction: Women have been barred by men who claim the authority of scripture and 1600 years of male church tradition, as their, supposedly, valid reasons for debarring them.

You nor any other man or woman knows whether God has called any man or woman to minister to Christ's flock. God simply does not consult the likes of you, or me or any other man or woman on the matter. God is sovereign. His call is known only to the person called. 1600 years of men denying women CAN be called by God, is 1600 years of MEN telling God what to do, and who to call.

That had to stop sometime. Pity it still goes on in some places.

The OT Levitical Priests and High Priest were living in a profoundly patriarchal society, where women and children were of such low regard, their testimony was not even accepted in court to establish truth. Christ had women disciples, (many of his, at least 70, disciples), may have been man and wife, and there is even an instance in scripture of a New Testament female designated an Apostle by St Paul. Only after 300 AD, when the church was once again infected by the selfish and dominating spirit of misogyny that permeated Jewish and Roman, Pagan society, (and had not until then seriously infected the church), were women once again subjugated, vilified and demoted to the status of servants, slaves or domestic skivvies and heir producers, by the increasingly patristic 'authorities', by now, (after Constantine), ever more secular, than spiritual.

You wrote:

Women have been 'called' and 'chosen' ever since The Virgin Mary was 'called' and 'chosen', and probably before that too. "Pharisaical Gatekeepers" have been keeping them silent and denying their 'calling', for 1700 years or more.

I will not even offer the rest of your assertions in this paragraph, the dignity of an answer.

I wrote:

You replied:

You clearly do not understand the symbolism behind Jesus' actions in Jn.13:1-20. Read this link.

Then read this link:

I wrote:

You wrote:

Then you clearly have not read Jn.13:1-20 with very much insight.

"For I have given you an example, that you also should do just as I have done to you. Truly, truly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them."

You must surely be aware that Jesus was speaking to 11 of his Apostles, and insisting that they be either 'servants' or nothing to do with HIM.

 

And yet a woman's testimony about being called is accepted by you at face value, isn't it. It might as well have been a man claiming to be called. You would treat the claim of both to being called equally, and then you would test for other criteria. In other words this basic initial difference you pass over WITHOUT testing it. I would suggest that you must test even the gender of the person being called. For a woman cannot be a man, and a man cannot be a mother. A male cannot be a nun. A woman cannot be a brother. A male cannot be an aunt. These are divinely appointed categories, that come from revelation and from Nature -- from natural law. If you battle both God and nature for the sake of secularist morality, you are doomed to lose my friend.

So are you saying that the Church of the Old Testament was profoundly in moral error, and the 'patriarchy' it established was immoral and unjust?

Yes give me a pro-WO pop article by a half-brained journalist, as your evidence in favor of a theological claim that was considered a heresy until the 1970s.

Okay we need to be clear about how we're using our words. When Our Lord enjoins on his followers to offer service, he means that we as Christians, and especially our clergy, must represent the posture of submission to God and to our Neighbor. He does not refer to any specific activity; it is ALL activities that man is capable of doing, which by us must be performed in a servant-like attitude.

Now with you and I in this discussion of holy orders, we are discussing a specific profession. When I say 'service' I mean worldly assistance, of the kind you might receive at a gas station or at a restaurant. The problem with your statement is that you would equate the Christian priesthood with THAT kind of service. As if the point of the clergy is to be a friend to people, to be a therapist, and to produce therapeutic feelings by preaching platitudes. The Christian priesthood has nothing to do with THAT kind of service.

To wrap up, yes it is completely true, in accord with the teaching of our Lord, that Christians must exhibit a servant-like demeanor in our thoughts and actions. But that does not carry with it any specific details for what that means. You cannot construct a profession out of that description, and the holy orders are NOT just a generic demeanor of 'service'. It is a specific job, with a specific definition, requirements, and outcome.

 

Exactly: because there is no difference between them, in Christ Jesus. One is as able to serve as presbyter as the other. Each must have their calling tested by the church to see if it is of God.

But they can all be servants of Christ and he said to Peter "Do you love me more than these, (sheep?/friends?/fish?), Then, "Feed my lambs", "Simon, son of John, do you love me?". Then, "Tend my sheep". "Simon, son of John, do you love me?". Then "Feed my sheep".

It is clear then that Jesus intends the leaders of His Church to be pastoral shepherds and servants of the flock. to feed lambs, tend sheep and feed sheep.

Yes and No. Just that it was the Old pattern and the old has passed away, all is become new. We are under a New Covenant you must be aware. Many of the old things are passed away, and The Kingdom of God has replaced them with God's kingdom principles on earth, as it is in heaven. Where angels do not marry and gender is no longer any kind of an issue. Where the serpent has had his head crushed by the heel of our Savior and women are no longer 'ruled over by men', but share an equal 'baptism' and equal endowment of The Holy Spirit and gifts thereof.

Priests marrying was and still 'considered a heresy' in the ultra law-bound RC legalist super church, but that does not mean it IS a 'heresy'. It just means that 'heresies' are easily declared by those who do not understand scripture very well, or deliberately seek to pervert it.

You replied:

On the contrary, it is about feeding lambs and sheep that Christ is speaking. Not pumping gas on a garage forecourt or serving burgers and clearing tables in a roadside canteen.

The point of the clergy is to 'Feed Sheep and their lambs". To lead them to metaphorically safe pasture and protect them from predators by hopefully educating them to be, 'wise as serpents and gentle as doves'. All tasks as well performed by a woman as by a man.

I just have and masculinity alone is not a qualification for 'Shepherd'. The job description for 'Shepherd' is Ezek.34:12, Jn.10:11-15. None of these requirements are specifically male.

 

We don't accept isolated prooftexts but read Scripture in the context of Scripture and the Patristic and Anglican Tradition. So according to the complete teaching of Scripture there IS a difference between them (men and women). And thus we DO treat them differently, as was always taught by the Anglican Divines and the timeless unchanging teaching of the Church. A woman was made in the image of man. A woman may not teach a man in divine things. The wife must submit to her husband, but the husband must cherish his wife (the requirements are not symmetrical). The husband is the covenantal head for the household, the wife isn't. The bishop must be male, according to Scripture; he cannot be a she. Jesus had to have been male, because he was the second Adam. Adam was a male, because only men can be the covenantal head of the whole human race; Eve couldn't be. Thus Jesus had to be male as well. And God is the Father, not a Mother or an It. The Holy Ghost, also, is male, not a female or an It. I can go on and on. These are divinely revealed truths, in accord with natural law.

There is nothing divine or natural about your transgender heresy.

Would you say that one is able to serve as a father as the other?

That is the heresy of Marcionism.

 

In the important matters there is no difference. Gen.1:27-28.

God did not give dominion to Adam alone. Dominion was given to BOTH of them.

"Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;"

"Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them.

With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;

The priesthood has nothing to do with marriage or the relationships that exist between husband and wife according to the scripture.

We ALL have the responsibility, with longsuffering to forbear one another in love, not grasping for authority over others of differing gender, but striving to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Our calling is ONE just as the body is ONE, and the Spirit is ONE.

The bishop must be male, according to Scripture; he cannot be a she. The Bishop must be "the husband of ONE wife. (Meaning that he must not be in a polygamous married relationship). If your pedantic interpretation is followed to its logical (or should I say illogical), conclusion, then ALL Bishops must me married according to scripture. Not only that but they must all also have obedient children.

This is not scripture stipulating that Bishops must be male fathers with at least one wife and two obedient children. It is scripture stating that Bishops need to be monogamous, even in a polygamous society. They must also be mature enough to deal with issues of discipline with kindness and compassion, without being lax in seeing right done. The Apostolic authors did not express themselves in inclusive language, even when they were addressing both genders equally. One Apostle only addressed his letter to "Brothers and Sisters in Christ". Whereas there are 128 instances of Apostles writing only, "Brothers" when referring to The Church. What does this tell us?

That there were no women in the church? Definitely not true.
That the Apostles were misogynists? No, I don't think so.
That the Apostles were unconsciously conditioned by their patriarchal society? Almost certainly.
That women were generally regarded as less important than men? Definitely.
That the teachings of Christ and scripture support that notion? Definitely Not.

Jesus probably HAD to be male for one single essential reason. If he had not been male, NO ONE would have listened to him, no one would have followed him, no one would have opposed and crucified him, and the entire Human race would have been eternally lost. And it would have been entirely the fault of MEN.

Jesus spent most of his time teaching and preaching to MEN, because it was MEN predominantly who were sinfully, "getting it totally wrong". It was men that most needed teaching and saving. The women were generally less of a problem to God.

I wrote:

One is able to serve as a Shepherd or Pastor as the other. If Paul had been Chloe and Chloe had been Paul, she would probably have served as a "Mother" to Christ's flock.

So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. 2 Cor.5:17-19.

So are you accusing St. Paul of Marcionism? (Impossible I know because Paul died many years before Marcion was even born.)

The Greek says literally:

Therefore if anyone [ ] in Christ [ ] a new creation the old things have passed away behold has emerged [ ] new.

You can put in your own [is] which does not appear in the Greek.
You can put in your own [he is] or [there is] or just [is] because that is not in the Greek either.
You can put in your own [the] because that's not in the Greek as well.

So what Paul actually wrote in Greek was according to your theory "Marcionised".

 

@Stalwart

I have found that if you are arguing with someone who feels so confident in casting aside the Church, Tradition and substituting a papacy of one, there is very little point in debating a point with them. It's like trying to grab a single part of a balloon, the air just moves to other parts.

 

Yeah but we can't let them take over yet another Anglican community. We've been retreating long enough. It is war time.

 

@Stalwart

That is also a good point.

 

Ps.120:7.

 

Since people here are generally into extra-biblical lore, seeing as this is central to the Anglican tradition, one of the strongest cases for men-only ordination comes from the early witness of the Gospel of Thomas. Filled with mostly legitimate sayings of Jesus as well as unique spiritual teachings found no where else, the ending, which can be found in my signature, says as follows:

Simon Peter said to them, "Make Mary leave us, for females don't deserve life." Jesus said, "Look, I will guide her to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every female who makes herself male will enter the kingdom of Heaven."

 

The point is not dominion. I never raised the question of dominion. I like how you shift and twist to find something which you can affirm.

My point was that the man in God's ordinance is the covenantal head. He stands for his whole family. We are called Adam's children, not Eve's. It is Adam's sin that doomed us, not Eve's; although both committed sin, it is only his that counts for us. Her sin does not matter, and does not count, because it is Adam who is our head and we inherit from him. Similarly it is only through a man that we are saved; we did not get a second Eve, but a second Adam, because a second Eve would be ineffectual and powerless. We needed a second Adam, to be the new covenantal head for the new family. When you see groups of people getting baptized in the New Testament, it is written that the men get baptized, and you are meant to know that his whole household got baptized, wife and children included. In a similar fashion God chose only men to be the priests, kings, and prophets of the Old Testament. And he only chose men for his Twelve Apostles, and for his 70 Elders/Presbyters. The reason is that only men have the power to teach in spiritual things, and they resonate with God's own maleness, his Fatherhood. God made man first, and then made woman in man's image.

First of all, that wasn't the question. The question was: does gender matter to God. You're again squirming and shifting to try to avoid the answer, that gender differences do exist. God places different requirements on the men and the women, in marriage.

Secondly, the priesthood has everything to do with marriage, the divine marriage of Christ to his Church. Priests are little christs, married to the church; they are men, and she (the church) is female. That is one of the core institutions of the priesthood, as explained by St. Paul.

Again, a shift and a squirm. Whatever else you can say, the Epistle presupposes the bishop to be male. You cannot avoid this simple syntactical fact, bolstered by 4000 years of Church History. You stand outside the divine faith of the Ages.

That's because inclusive language is heretical. You have chosen the secular morality of the world, over the Christian morality of the divine revelation and millenia of saints and martyrs. If you are indeed 72 years old, as you claim, then when you were a little boy, your fathers and grandfathers thought inclusive language was hogwash, rubbish, not worth to be thrown on the trash heap. Through clever politicking, you waited for them to retire, and put your own clones in their place, making the present generation parrot your secular gospel. But that does not mean you have the truth behind you.

The one key point you keep forgetting is that the New Testament is not a record of the 1st century AD, like so much history. It is God's Holy Word. Therefore:

• You've just said that God (not the NT writers, but God, the author of the NT) could regard women as less important than men.
• You've also just said that God could be unconsciously conditioned by patriarchal society. As if God can have a subconsciousness.
• You've also implied that God's institution of a patriarchal society is unjust, when he is Father, all his priests and prophets were men, his first son was a man, and his Divine Son was a man, and that the universe he created was and is patriarchal.

St. Paul (and the epistles generally) go to great lengths to show how the truths of the Old Testament still apply and are just as relevant as ever. He writes that he is "the Jew of the Jews"; he trained under the chief Rabbis of the Temple, and he constantly quotes the prophecies and the passages from the Torah and the rest of the OT as evidence for the truths of the New Testament. His so-called 'new word' arsenokoitia is actually just his literal borrowing from the Genesis (see above). The Epistle to the Hebrews famously shows how the incarnation of Christ is more in accord with the Old Testament than the Jews' own teachings. In other words, to a right thinking Christian, the Old Testament must be seen as God's Revelation, while you would rather excise it out of your Bibles. Meet Marcion.

 

Random thoughts:

The Gospel of Thomas is not considered canon, deuterocanon, or even good fanfic. It has a talking cross. It excluded itself.

Tiffy agrees with some parts of some people, some people agree with some parts of him, and some agree with non of what he says. Yay Anglican Communion.

This will remain of place of orthodoxy. The best way to have that is to show your work. The debate is good. Please don't make it personal. Not easy, I know.

No one is taking over anything. But, if you want this to be a place for people all over the world to come, you also have to show you are not going to run anyone off.

Be firm, and with love, as our Lord did.

He didn't back away, he told tough truths, but he also ALWAYS respected the people. Yes, I know you can prooftext things. Brood of vipers and all that. But I also look to the woman at the well, and other examples.

You can defend truth strongly, and still do it with respect.

None of you speak 1st century aramaic, greek, or latin. Yes, you may read it and speak what you know, but we all know that isn't the same. I love that you are all hashing out things that the church at large is trying to hash out. Yay that we don't leave it to just the clergy! We are all of the Body.

If you solve it here, you people will fix the Communion. But, that is unlikely (but possible!) to happen. Keep that in mind.

I don't agree with everything Tiffy states. He's of a different generation, society, and life history than me. I do appreciate his willingness to engage, and I find nuggets of history and insight. But realize that while the CoE helped bring anglicanism to the world, the rest of the world has serious concerns about it lately. Be a diplomat, and be willing to be a Listener, as well as Reader.

I don't agree with Stalwart on everything, but I respect the hell out of him (can I say hell?). I do appreciate his deep love of orthodoxy and his ability to bring great knowledge to the fore. The willingness to battle for the Truth is awesome. But be a Paladin, not a Partisan for it.

I hesitated to say anything, as I have no desire to squelch debate. But the last three non-sequiters made me feel the need to at least drop my hat in the conversation. I could have written a complete essay, I tried to just hit high points. It's not perfect. I'm in the office and shorthanded.

God bless you all.

 

OH! So that's where it comes from! There's an italian fairy tale about a talking cross which can be found in Italo Calvino's collection of fables from Italy!

 

Actually, my mistake. The Talking Cross comes from "The Gospel of Peter". But yeah, the fairy tale has an early origin.

The Gospel of Thomas has issues, though, and the early Fathers chose to not include it in Canon or Deuterocanon. So...it's a lightning rod.

Showing my work. Might be good for another thread, actually.

 

I have the heat get the best of me sometimes. Thanks for being a neutral agency.

 

You then went on to say:

If you are going to quote me Stalwart, please have the decency to not 'Marcionise' my quotes. Your redactions and subtractions merely obfuscate the issues.

I will leave it to the objective and unbiassed reader to decide if my logic has been twisted to make it appear to say something other than I had intended.

Here is my original:

So you have my clear statement to the effect that The teachings of Christ and scripture do not support misogynistic male supremacy.

They merely, naturally reflect the 'patriarchal attitudes' of the era in which they were written. Yet you then present your case in such a way as to imply that I said that God regards women as less important than men. Your attack was dishonest, of that you must surely be aware.

New Testament scripture bears all the distinguishing marks of having been written by real human beings, inspired by God, but human beings nonetheless. Scripture therefore bears the signature of their humanity, i.e. their distinctive writing style, personality and world view, while, in addition, conveying to us the wisdom that God wished to impart to us, through them.

The Bible is not a magic book full of unequivocal, infallibly authoritative, commands demanding our unquestioningly obedient compliance.

It is"given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." That means you and me and every other believer in the atoning work of Jesus Christ, including the ladies.

Your second accusation was also unfounded, and an 'Aunt Sally' or 'straw man', of your own devising. I actually said nothing remotely like what you claim in your second bullet pointed statement.

Your third assertion, is not actually dishonest, I admit, but I did not imply God was unjust, nor that God instituted patriarchal society unjustly. That was merely what you erroneously inferred by applying your own theological theories to my words. I accept what you honestly wrote, in the spirit of debate, but still disagree with your assertion.

We can debate the issue of whether God actually instituted patriarchal society, but that would derail the current thread. By all means start another on that subject if you wish.

 

If you just said that originally, we wouldn't need to have the rest of this conversation. Next time please state up-front what you really think of the Sacred Word of God, so that the rest of us know in what light to see your verse references, bible-citations, and your surface piety.

You stand apart from all of your Anglican predecessors. The divines, the saints, the martyrs, the apostles, prophets, and fathers. You may think you have many on your side today, but in reality you guys are all alone. Atheism may produce children, but it can not produce grandchildren. Its children are sterile. The future belongs to the obedient, and the faithful.

 

The problem with most Christian heresies and liberal theology that is unorthodox is how long would God let man go without correcting him on the most crucial matters of faith? Most of the Episcopal Church's heresies assume God has put his church at the mercy of man's freedom and capacity. They feel the bible should be conformed to what we feel is right, basically saying we already have the authority to judge within us apart from God's will. But, if this was true, I think God would've either fixed the problem with Adam and Eve right from the get go, and/or would've sent someone to correct the church as soon as it fell away into this now 2,000 year old 'heresy' of rejecting women and LGBT priests, with no surviving witnesses moved and guarded by the Holy Spirit to speak up about acceptance of these things, etc. Even the Reformers, who were controversial with Catholics, did not accept these things as being part of Christian tradition. If God thought more about these things the way we did, he wouldn't have let the church cause all this trouble with people for so long, since things like universalism and premarital sex are often argued for the sake of short-tempered convenience. Yes, God is patient in putting up with apostasy, but as I said, the Reformers did not even say a word about it or felt it had any need to be challenged. If the Holy Spirit wanted it to be questioned and corrected, and recorded for proof in history, that would've been the right time, since Anglicans do agree that many of the practices of that time were in need of reform.

 

Am I then to conclude that you are stating that:

and that you consider yourselves unquestionably obediently compliant to all it demands?

 

Yes of course. What kind of authentic Anglicans could we be, not to mention Christians, otherwise?

What do you think Christianity has been, these last 2018 years?