wfn.org | Panel seeks compromise on women's o

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July 17, 1997
Episcopal News Service
Jim Solheim, Director
212-922-5385
ens@ecunet.org

ENSGC-02-01

Panel seeks compromise on women's ordination

By Herb Gunn

PHILADELPHIA (July 17, 1997) - A subcommittee of the cognate Ministry Committees Wednesday recommended a compromise to a resolution that would mandate that all dioceses implement Canon 3.8.1 on the ordination of women.
	
"We felt that the canons were very clear," said Timothy Wittlinger of Michigan, chair of the subcommittee about the original Resolution A052, which would amend Canon 3.8.1 to state that no one can be denied access to the ordination process or the priesthood "solely on account of sex."
	
"We should not single one out and say, 'This one is more mandatory than the rest," said Wittlinger, who noted that the group  tried to avoid two conflicting reports.
	
The subcommittee also reworked the language of Resolution A053, which protects "a place in the life and governance of this church" regardless of a member's theological position on women's ordination, adding a provision that clergy in dioceses that provide an "alternative method" to abide by the canons should not have presentments brought against them.
	
The subcommittee report met with numerous questions by members of the cognate committees.
	
Bishop Keith Ackerman of the Diocese of Quincy (Illinois), a member of the subcommittee and one of four bishops who will not ordain women, called the compromise a sincere attempt to deal with a very serious issue.
	
"I am fighting to stay in the Episcopal Church and I am fighting to keep the people that I represent in the Episcopal Church," he said. 
	
But Suffragan Bishop Catherine Roskam of the Diocese of New York said the new version "renders [the resolution] totally ineffective and it is a section based on fear. I don't think we should legislate based on fear.
	
"This is a document divided against itself," Roskam said.
	
The committee planned to continue discussion  Wednesday evening. 
	
The subcommittee's proposal followed five hours of hearings Monday night and Tuesday morning, which drew large crowds even as many deputies and bishops were arriving at the convention.

The chairs of the committees, Bishop Robert H. Johnson of the Diocese of Western North Carolina and George McGonigle of the Diocese of Texas, urged witnesses to keep a focus on how, not whether, Canon 3.8.1 should be implemented. They praised those attending the hearings for their decorum and the 52 witnesses with what McGonigle termed "both compassion and purpose."
	
The Committee for Dialogue on Canon 3.8.1, chaired by Bishop Robert Rowley of the Diocese of Northwestern Pennsylvania, considered an array of ways to implement equal accessibility to ordination.  But the committee failed to achieve consensus on a method that was deemed acceptable to bishops in the four dioceses that will not ordain women to the priesthood.
	
Rowley said the proposed changes stem from the perspective that "individuals can hold a theological position but cannot institutionalize it when to do so would be contrary to the canons."
	
"We believe that a vote against A052 is not a vote against the ordination of women," said the Rev. Mary Hays of the Diocese of Virginia. 
	
She presented a letter signed by 84 clergy women who oppose the canonical change. It stressed that the signatories "share the pain of those who are in parishes or dioceses that will not affirm the ministry of ordained women." 
	
However, the letter continued, "To adopt the proposed Canon 3.8.1 would be to indulge in the sin of impatience."
	
The letter stated that the integrity of General Convention's leadership is at stake because promises were made that the ordination of women would be permissive, not mandatory.
	
"I invite you to stand on your convictions," responded Katie Sherrod, a lay woman from the Diocese of Fort Worth, to those who signed the letter. "Come live with us in Fort Worth for the next 20 years or so - where, if what you urge happens, you can live out your call for patience by not functioning as priests for the next two decades.
	
"Come hear our stories, not just those of the bishops," she said.
	
"The majority of our people have spoken on this issue in the election of Bishop Jack Iker,"  said Sharon Jameson, a deputy from Fort Worth.  "We are not being held captive to his conscience "These proposals would go far beyond our own diocese as they will affect and permanently alienate thousands of Episcopalians in other dioceses throughout the church."
	
Jameson told the committee of a process in Fort Worth by which a woman can begin discernment that could culminate with ordination in the Diocese of Dallas.  But Jameson warned that further pressure in the form of a stronger canon could bode trouble for her bishop and others.
	
"The adoption of these proposed canonical amendments are a very grave matter indeed," she said. "You can expect that attempts at force will be met by resistance."

"The committee did discuss Fort Worth's agreement with the Diocese of Dallas," said the Rev. Canon  Gay Jennings, deputy from the Diocese of Ohio and a member of the dialogue committee. "For the majority of the committee, it did not go far enough. A woman from Fort Worth ordained in Dallas could never come and function in Fort Worth as a priest because, as Bishop Iker stated, the parish calling her would be transferred to another diocese."
	
"You have an impossible task," the Rev. Cynthia Black, president of the Episcopal Women's Caucus, told the committee. "Regretfully, I believe there will not be a win-win situation. Regretfully, after almost 130 years of discussion in the church about the ordination of women, the church has reached a stalemate on this issue."
	
"It seems to me that these resolutions put us in the same situation as the laws that were passed in the '60s," said the Rev. Sarah Chandler of the Diocese of Virginia, who opposed Resolution A052. She compared the situation to the civil rights struggle of 30 years ago. 
	
"They enforce something, making dialogue impossible," she added. "[I don't assume] that if we pass a law and throw out anyone who disagrees that we will be on the road to wholeness."

- Herb Gunn is editor of the The Record of the Diocese of Michigan.