Bishop McNaughton, then of West Texas, wrote an influential article a number of years ago for The Living Church in which he acknowledged that there were at that time two churches within pecusa. We see the same thing in the Church of England and the Anglican Communion. I am convinced at this time that in pecusa we have one church and one organization, but the point remains the same - the two parts are not compatible. ed.
Sixteen years after the first women priests were ordained in the Church of England, the bitter controversy about female authority in the church refuses to go away. This weekend it reached a new stage, when the archbishops of Canterbury and York narrowly failed to persuade the General Synod to accept a compromise on women bishops. Could it be time, perhaps, to end the acrimony and accept that the Church of England will have to split?
It is no exaggeration to say that the climate in the Anglican church for a generation and the whole of Rowan Williams's seven-year tenure at Canterbury have been poisoned by the conflict between liberals and traditionalists, of which the role of women is a touchstone. The church is divided nationally, and it is divided even more deeply internationally. In essence, it could be said, there are already two Anglican churches, with the Archbishop of Canterbury striving heroically to hold them together.
Read it all.
It is no exaggeration to say that the climate in the Anglican church for a generation and the whole of Rowan Williams's seven-year tenure at Canterbury have been poisoned by the conflict between liberals and traditionalists, of which the role of women is a touchstone. The church is divided nationally, and it is divided even more deeply internationally. In essence, it could be said, there are already two Anglican churches, with the Archbishop of Canterbury striving heroically to hold them together.
Read it all.
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