My recent post on the women’s ordination in the ACNA has been passed around a decent amount. I’ve gotten a lot of direct feedback, and I thought I would quickly discuss a few of the more important points. I should add that I am now drawing more attention to this topic not because I am personally excited to talk about it or even that it’s one of my favorites (though I have studied it and discussed it in detail over the years) but rather because it appears that now is an opportune time for actual constructive discussion in the ACNA. I offer these thoughts at this time in the hopes that something helpful and practical can come about.

Agree to Disagree?

One response has been to argue that while some proponents of women’s ordination believe that it is morally and spiritually necessary, most people in the ACNA do not hold that view. Instead, many believe that women’s ordination is good but up for negotiation. It is, technically speaking, a secondary issue, and it is something that each diocese can decide upon while allowing others to disagree. There is no need, they argue, to force this issue further.

To this point, I would respond that it’s entirely fair as a description of the de facto reality in the province. I would assume that this is the actual position of most proponents of women’s ordination. But is it logically coherent? Consider. At the bottom of the argument for ordaining women is the assertion that to do so is a good. It is fair. It brings valuable things to the church. It recognizes what the Spirit of God is doing.

And so we have to face the implication here. Can rulers in the church prohibit a good? Can they legitimately ignore or deny what the Spirit of God is doing, and can they do so over the course of decades? Can a bishop be, constitutionally, unfair towards those people in his diocese?

One of the basic definitions of the word “justice” is “giving to each their due.” If you withhold their due, then you are violating justice and are being unjust. If ordaining qualified women is fair and necessitated by the original equality that God desires and which has been restored by Christ, then it is giving them their due. It is just.

With this being the case, we can make the following logical demonstration.

If justice demands a certain action or duty, then failing to do it or prohibiting it from being done is unjust. (If P, then Q)
Justice demands the admission of qualified Christian women to Holy Orders. (P)
Therefore, it is unjust to fail to ordain women or to prohibit their ordination. (Q)

quod erat demonstrandum

What About Unmarried Men?

Another response was that my emphasis on 1 Timothy 3’s use of household governance would disqualify single men. They don’t have wives or children. Instead, the proper way to use 1 Timothy 3 is to only apply it to whom it is applicable. If it is not applicable, then we need not apply it. Single men and women are to be treated differently.

The response to this is twofold. In the immediately preceding chapter, Paul actually makes an argument about the relationship between women and men in the church (see esp. 1 Tim. 2:11-15). It is unreasonable to think that you can so easily evade the force of the domestic arrangement without also simply ignoring Paul’s voice entirely. But in addition to this point, we can say that single men are potential husbands and fathers. While the remarks about domestic government may not immediately apply to single men, they are still applicable to them. It is possible for a single man to eventually fulfill them.

That Was Then This Is Now (Or, Progress Moves Us Forward)

A very common egalitarian argument is that every instance of gender limitation or prohibition in the New Testament is a concession to the culture and society at the time but one that has no intention to work as a lasting rule for all future times and places. There are also several serious problems with this line of thinking. First, this is the “progressive” hermeneutics. Now, please, bear with me. I do not mean that people who adopt this line of thought are on a slippery slope. I do not mean that they will become progressives. No. Instead, I mean that this way of interpretation is itself progressive. It looks at a movement from a less developed (and less truly or fully Christian) culture and then moves forward to a better, fuller, and more mature time. Under this hermeneutic, what was tolerable in the past is not necessarily tolerable in the present. Indeed, in the case of something very obvious like slavery, it would be evil to “return.”

Additionally, since this is a forward motion, it only moves in one direction and you do not necessarily know where it will move in the future. What one person thinks is unlikely, another will think is certain and desirable. If you want to see a good example of this, read (or re-read) N. T. Wright’s essay in the book he co-authored with J. I. Packer, Anglican Evangelical Identity: Yesterday and Today. Originally written in the 1980s, Wright then says that the Church of England is in little danger of going the same way as The Episcopal Church in the United States. American culture is peculiar, after all. England is grounded and moderate. The English don’t even have to have biblical inerrancy or a written constitution, after all. They have a way to work things out. Move forward to the present. Rowan Williams has more or less affirmed transgender rights. Justin Welby supports gay marriage. The new Archbishop of Canterbury is a woman and also supports gay marriage. The English may not have dyed their hair as many colors, pierced as many parts of their head, or played their guitars quite as loudly as we Americans, but they got to the same moral position– even without successfully changing their written canons or ever fairly defeating the global communion in votes at Lambeth. If the arch of progress bends towards justice, then you are going to go to that destination, no matter your personal preference, temperament, or strategy.

And then, finally, this is not how the apostles argue about marriage or ordination. They do give hints and indirect statements about liberation, from slavery, from tyranny, and from abuse. But they do not talk about liberation from marriage. They never upend or overturn the hierarchy between parents and children. And they don’t (contrary to what an abstract philosophy might expect) ever say that Christian equality requires equality of outward station or office. 1 Timothy 2 (already mentioned above) has many parallels with 1 Cor. 11:2-16. Both appeal to creation ordinances. Both even invoke the late-antique notion of “propriety.” And 1 Cor. 11 argues from the image of God, but not in order to argue for total equality in all ways but instead to reinforce a certain measure of hierarchy. So, the progressive reading is not the apostolic one. Indeed, it does violence to the apostolic way of reading and applying the Scriptures.

Conflicting Vows

A final point comes from the opposite point of view. Someone wrote me to say that they largely agreed with my argument but that I had failed to make one important point. As I did mention, the classic marriage rite in the Book of Common Prayer includes a vow from the wife to obey her husband. The Ordinal, for its part, requires vows of the clergy to obey the appropriate bishop. This presents a conflict for married female clergy. If a wife has vowed to obey her husband, and then she enters into holy orders, she must also vow to obey her bishop. But now she has two different points of obedience. In an ideal world, there would never be any overlap or tension between these different authorities. But in the real world, we could imagine occasions where the husband might give one direction and the bishop might give a contrary directive. Both cannot be obeyed at the same time, but she has vowed to God to do precisely this. The married female clergyperson faces a moral dilemma.

Now you could respond that one of the sources of authority is surely wrong. One has overstepped their bounds, and so the married clergywoman is under no true obligation. But proving that is exactly the thing in dispute, and when it comes to church polity, the point of the orders, superiors, and vows is precisely to establish who governs in such disputes. Finally, Anglicans do maintain that the church can make laws concerning things indifferent which may not be biblical mandatory but are also not evil. When the church makes these rules, those under its jurisdiction have a moral obligation to obey. So, there could well be matters that are not inherently wrong or unjust but which conflict with other duties elsewhere. There is no inherent sin or injustice in the command. The problem is in the conflict of interest and contrary vowed duties.

At this point someone might say that all of this talk of vows and obedience and conflicts between domestic duty and ecclesiastical submission is just kind of crazy. Why am I using such antiquarian language? Am I going to foist upon us frilly collars and belt-buckles on hats? Get real, man.

But that sort of reaction shows how far indeed we have moved off the Anglican tradition and the language and categories of our formularies. If the language of domestic obedience makes you chuckle, blush, or gasp, then you should not promise to uphold the classic Book of Common Prayer. And if you don’t think that ecclesiastical vows of obedience could ever put you in a difficult position, then I am not sure that you take them seriously enough. Whatever you conclude, surely it is still a bad idea to create a system where people are taking divine oaths which are potentially contradictory or which undermine other explicitly stated duties.

And so, I think this point does carry weight. The married woman who pursues ordination must take upon herself a moral burden that a married man does not. She will be under more vows than the ordained man, and these vows could place her in a moral dilemma. Under the historic Anglican Formularies, ordaining women to Holy Orders requires the use of unequal weights and measures.

Conclusion

Again, I offer these thoughts for the sake of the coherency and consistency of the arguments. The bishops of the ACNA have acknowledged that the tradition of the church must be given appropriate weight. So too must the integrity of the arguments, themselves. It’s not safe to drive in the fog, and it’s not fair to ask someone to get on board without telling them where they are going. We might not want all the heat of controversial rhetoric, but we do need the light of sound argument.