Women and Holy Orders

Being the Report of a Commission appointed by
the Archbishops of Canterbury and York
Published by the Church Information Office, London. Dec. 1966

APPENDIX 3

Supplementary Essays

D. THE CASE FOR THE ORDINATION OF WOMEN TO THE PRIESTHOOD

by Kay M. Baxter

1 The essence of the argument for thinking it is now right for the Church to go forward and to ordain women to the priesthood is based on the conviction that this is a part of what is involved in adapting the forms of the church’s ministry to the situation of the time. It is involved, that is, in a true aggiornamento. For it is a perennial temptation for the church to identify itself with a particular way of ordering society, or with a particular metaphysic, or with a particular cosmology, which then becomes obsolete. It becomes the continual duty of the church to be on its guard and to keep itself free in relation to what is obsolescent and merely transitory, and to strip itself of dying attitudes that have become attached to it through the accidents of the historical process. And today, as at no previous time, it has laid on it the urgent task of adapting the forms of its ministry to the needs of the contemporary world. The social environment in which the church has now to do its work is as different as possible from that of the first century or of the middle ages and the Reformation. To the church fathers as to Dr Johnson the proposition that women are inferior to men had all the force of a self-evident axiom. For modern western society it is no longer self-evident. In consequence the movement for feminine emancipation has now opened to women many professions that were once rigidly closed to them and were regarded as a male citadel. Women are doctors, lawyers, accountants, university professors, mayors, diplomats, cabinet ministers, and members of the House of Lords. Their admission to these professions was at one time regarded with distaste and fear. It is now accepted as natural and right. The more widely this acceptance is diffused, the more anomalous appears the continued exclusion of women from the ordained ministry of the Church. If the exclusion is to remain, at least it ought to be given some justification which carries conviction. On the face of it, there is no apparent reason why a person, on the sole ground of having been born female, should be debarred from a pastoral function and office for which she believes she has the inward calling, the natural ability and capacity, and even the professional training.

2 The argument so stated may look feminist and therefore secular in spirit. It does not however, depend on the assumption found in some feminist writers, that men and women are really wholly identical in their essential humanity, and that masculinity and femininity are mere accidents, external characteristics imposed by social environment, which individuals may overcome in asserting their personal freedom. Nor does it presuppose that the ministry does not belong to a divinely given order within the church and may therefore be treated on a level with any lay profession. The argument presupposes that the difference between the sexes is not one upon which there can be based the difference between capacity and incapacity for ordination. Just as men are not ipso facto capable of ordination by being male, so also women ought not to be declared incapable by the mere fact of being female. Just as there are many men without the gifts and qualifications which would make ordination appropriate, so also there are some women with these gifts and qualifications who would be very appropriately ordained to the priesthood if this were held to be possible and right. There is no dispute that there are many women who for one reason or another would be unsuitable for ordination. The sole question at issue is whether this bar applies to all members of the female sex.

3 These considerations eliminate entirely the argument that women are unfitted to be leaders in the way that a parish priest is expected to be; or that ‘ women are too emotional, too touchy, too deficient in personality and drive’. No generalisation about women is universally true. There are many men, including a large number who have been ordained, in whom the same frailties could be found.

4 The most important arguments against the ordination of women are not broad psychological generalisations about the feminine character but ‘ theological’. The supporters of this view argue from scripture and from ecclesiastical tradition that women are inherently incapable of being validly ordained or that even if they are capable their ordination is nevertheless not in accordance with the will of God. Thomas Aquinas argued that women have an inherent incapacity for orders on the basis of Aristotelian science, according to which woman is a ‘ deficient’ being with an inferior nature to man. He argues that because woman is subordinate to man there is no question to discuss and draws the characteristic conclusion that the ordination of a highly qualified and saintly woman would be invalid, while that of a mentally defective boy would be valid (even if wholly inappropriate). Luther, faced by the controversy with enthusiasts and Anabaptists, vigorously appeals to St Paul’s command that women should keep silence in church (1 Cor. 14. 34), but the Lutheran tradition has (with few exceptions) regarded this Pauline exhortation as being on a par with the apostle’s direction that women should cover their head for prayer; that is, it is a matter of order and decency, to be classified among things indifferent which are to be determined by the judgement of the church of what is conducive to edification. In the twentieth century the arguments have commonly taken rather different forms. Catholic writers opposing the ordination of women have normally argued that in the pastoral and priestly office there is that which it is inappropriate for women to perform, not that women have an inherent incapacity for orders. The main arguments turn on the appropriateness of the symbol of father or husband.

(a) ‘ The priest stands in a paternal relation to his people, which a woman could not properly do. He represents the divine Father, and in this symbol there is an inherent masculinity which would be destroyed if the priest were a woman.’

(b) ‘ The priest represent Christ to his people: Christ is male in respect of his human nature. The apostle teaches that in the family the wife is subordinate to the husband, and that this is a figure of the subordination of the Church to Christ the bridegroom. (Ephesians 5.)’

5 The force of this argument from parental and nuptial imagery is likely to be felt differently by different people. As with all arguments from analogy, it is precarious, and it is probable that it has persuasive power only with those who are already convinced of the conclusion required. It is noteworthy that St Paul also uses the maternal image of his relation to a church for which he is responsible (Gal. 4. 19), and that the maternal image for God is found in the Old Testament (Isaiah 49. 15, 66. 13) as well as that of the Father. The argument should be treated with care and caution. On the one hand, the notion that there is in God something inherently masculine raises enormous theological difficulties. On the other hand, the use of the nuptial and parental imagery should clearly not be dismissed as ‘ mere metaphor’—that is, as not actually illuminating the nature of the relation between Christ and the church or between the priest and his people. Nevertheless, to say that the metaphor is illuminating is not to accept the proposition that the priestly function is an exclusively male role. Yet there is a positive argument in favour of the embodying of the priestly role by a priesthood both male and female.

6 In practice, there are women of profound spiritual power who have exercised and now exercise a pastoral ministry that falls short of being priestly only in their lack of authorisation to absolve and to celebrate the eucharist. Lacking this authorisation, they are sometimes hampered by having to bring in a third person—a priest—at a critical point in pastoral care.

7 Theological arguments among protestant theologians have turned chiefly on the Pauline principle of the subordination of women, which the apostle in turn derived from the narrative of the creation and fall in Genesis 2 and 3. Protestant theologians are far from being agreed whether the apostle’s command that women shall keep silence in church is an expression of a permanently valid principle, or merely a restraint imposed by the particular conditions of the first century. It is clear that there is a sense in which in marriage and the family subordination is a principle to be asserted, though a Christian theologian today is more likely to insist that both husband and wife must be mutually subordinate to one another—that there is an absolute self-giving on either side, in which both partners sacrifice and both obey.

8 So far, the argument is probably acceptable to many who would prefer not to press for the ordination of women. The case can be put more definitely.

9 The priesthood is sought now because some people believe that some women are ‘ truly called ’. These women already perform a ministry of reconciliation in Christ’s name, but they ask for the grace of orders to strengthen their ministry. They need to be able to speak, with the full authority of the Church, the word of God in absolution; to preach the word of God, and to be able to consecrate bread and wine to be the spiritual food of the family of God, in the given power of the Sacrifice of Christ. They can, they do, reconcile and feed souls, without this grace, but their ministry is weakened and they themselves suffer through lack of this assurance of the Church’s authorisation. They know that men, quite ordinary men, are strengthened for service by the grace of ordination.

10 Another reason why women ask for ordination now is that they believe the constantly re-iterated assertion that the clergy are too few to serve God in his Church as he should be served. Women offer their help, but if it is to be real help, it must be on equal terms or the burdens cannot be shared. This is not to say that a woman priest’s priesthood would be identical with that of a man. It would, as in all other shared tasks, be complementary. But the training, the level of professional competence, the line of responsibility, and (since we are all worldlings) the status, must be equal. There is no way of achieving equal and shared responsibility except by accepting full interchangeability of function. This has been proved over and over again by the preference for a curate rather than a woman parish worker ‘ because a curate can “ take services ” ‘. That, in the event, a woman’s priesthood might prove to be exercised more in pastoral, while a man’s was in liturgical, offices, is perfectly possible. Women seek ordination now because they wish to follow what they profoundly believe to be a vocation to the priesthood at a time when the Church asserts that it is critically short of priests.

11 The arguments against the ordination of women are indeed based upon Scripture and tradition. But Scripture requires interpretation and tradition is the reflection in the social pattern of those of the interpreters’ views which have gained acceptance at a given moment in history. Until this century, scriptural interpretation and the formation of the consequent tradition has for the most part been in masculine hands, and those, almost exclusively, of ordained clergy. It is therefore hardly surprising that (since it was also men who set down the word of the Lord as it came to them) the interpretation and the tradition should have been in favour of male government in society generally and religion in particular.

12 The question arises, why has this been so? Why has the Word and its interpretation been entrusted solely to men? The answer of course ultimately is ‘ we don’t know ‘. When the Word of God became flesh he entrusted himself solely to a woman, a mystery at least equally impenetrable, for once miraculous birth is accepted, birth from a male would have been no more ‘ impossible’ than birth from a virgin. But, practically, women were for centuries so deeply involved in the maternal duties, child-bearing and home-making, that their life had to be limited to these duties. This limitation was inevitable so long as the only route to survival in a sparsely populated country lay in the rising fertility of the race. Judaism, in rejecting the cults which allowed women any authority was no doubt taking its proper route to survival as a nation under constant threat from foreign attack or infiltration.

13 A great gulf yawns between such a society and the interpretation its way of life would necessarily impose upon the practical relationship of the sexes, and our own urban society and the place of women within it. Much has already been discarded from Biblical modes of worship and the Biblical social pattern. The priestly caste, the legalistic ritual, the spiritual primacy of the first-born male; all these have long disappeared, at least from Anglican Christianity. The paternalism remains however; and with it the desire to retain leadership for the male. This desire is shared by most men and many women: but not by all of either sex. Conservatives dislike change and the Church of England is conservative. Yet the Church of England does accept change. Its priesthood is no longer celibate. Priests are fathers now in fact as well as in title. Anglicans have accepted contraceptive methods of family planning, and no Anglican can legitimately claim it to be a religious duty to have an unlimited number of children. Even in the ordinary family the Father-image has lost much of its remote authoritarianism and is being replaced by the image of parenthood which is one of partnership in equality. Setting aside all question of laboratory techniques for the production of human life, since the impact of such techniques, though profound, is unlikely to have immediate influence on family life, yet already, in the world outside the home, the necessity for partnership rather than dominance increases with every advance in the education of young people and with every invention which, rather than limiting the need for specifically ‘ male ’ or specifically ‘ female ’ attributes, demands that both male and female co-operate in creating our complex environment. The Church must look forward not back in the matter of sex relationships unless it really wants all its wives to be pillars of salt. It will be almost as difficult to persuade women of the necessity for partnership as it will be to persuade men, for the conditioning to the present mode has been continuous and on the whole successful, but (in words submitted to the Commission in evidence by the Anglican Group for the Ordination of Women to the Historic Ministry of the Church):

‘ Women are fully human beings: male and female members of the human species are two significant orientations of one human kind.

‘ Women are, and have been from the beginning, admitted as full members of the Christian Church: as members of the Body of Christ they severally and together share in his prophetic and priestly ministry in the life and work of society as well as in the organised life of the Church.

‘ While women are excluded from Holy Orders the ordained ministry of the Church is “lame”: it is enriched by the experience of men—as men, husbands and fathers; it is lacking the experience of women—as women, wives and mothers. Holy Orders are not truly representative of the Body of Christ.

‘ Women have been debarred from Holy Orders through the Christian centuries because of traditional custom but Christian custom may be varied as circumstances demand. The responsible part now played by women in all the offices and functions of our society constitute such changed circumstances. Since the new understanding of partnership between men and women in society and in the family has come about, at least in part, under Christian influence, it is now imperative for the Church to take significant action so that the new possibilities may make for the renewal of Church and society, both in this country and throughout the world. Thus, the Church of England should take this decisive step in leading the Christian Church as a whole into that renewal which is essential for unity in holiness and in truth. Only so could the Church of England proclaim to the world its conviction that the new situation is God, Holy Spirit, leading the Church and society into new birth. Only by such renewal will the Church be able to undertake her task of ministry to men and women in all their new offices, roles and functions in society and in their new partnership in the family.’

14 Yet it may be that the real point at issue in the question of ordination is not one of sex relationship at all. Is it not possible that the whole of the debate about women as priests comes from a misapprehension of the role of the priest? Priesthood is not a role of domination. It is a ministry. A vocation to the priesthood is not a vocation to be in command, though priests must be clear channels of an authority not their own; they are not called as ‘ men born to be King ‘ but as ‘ men for others ‘. Women are as capable of providing this service as men are, without themselves becoming dominant. It may well be that in a new concept of lay ministry most women (like most men) could find acceptable fields of service in ordained ministries other than the priesthood. A great deal of the work of a priest is pastoral and requires the gifts traditionally associated with women’s gifts. It would be easy to agree that, in their child-bearing decade, women were not available as active parish priests; but it becomes increasingly difficult to defend a position where women, solely on the grounds of sex and without any consideration whatever of their social, intellectual, or spiritual gifts or the circumstances of their life, are debarred from serving wherever those gifts can be of most use. (1)

15 To attempt to fight this battle on the arguments of temperament, or intelligence, or tenacity of purpose, or the depth of spiritual gifts, is sheer absurdity. Women are no more touchy than men, no more easily despondent, no more prone to slander or silly quarrelling; no less capable of endurance. They are as prone to all vices, as susceptible of all heroisms as men are. They can be as useful as men in all professions if given the necessary training and if entrusted with the necessary responsibility to test that training. All public skills need their appropriate education and the appropriate education for public service has for centuries been available predominantly to royal women. But among educated women there have been, not many, but always a few, who have believed themselves to have been truly called to the priesthood, but who, because of the certainty of rejection, have turned their energies to other channels. They minister, but their ministry is maimed because they are denied the grace of ordination. It may indeed be held by some that ordination itself is a relic of a ‘ magical’ view of priesthood. One of the greatest difficulties facing those who press for the ordination of women lies in getting a clear definition of what ordination is. There is a clear relation between ecclesiastical office and spiritual power. Not all those who are appointed to the office show evidence of the power and there are many of high spiritual power who hold no office. There is evidence that the grace of ordination is a reality of experience for some men, though others see a danger in the individualising of grace apart from its relationship to community. Some of the deepest understanding women have received in this debate has come from men who, remembering the access of strength their priesting gave them, recognise the deprivation women suffer in being refused ordination for service. The experience may be regarded as identical with the access of confidence experienced by those who attain full professional status and are received among their peers, as doctors, lawyers, or teachers. Or it can be dismissed as just the satisfaction of gaining desired membership of an ‘ in-group ’. But however it is described, ordination is the rule of the Church for its clergy. It is thought to confer some gift which helps them to serve the Church. It does confer the right to practise the office, and the potentiality to receive the power of grace to serve. It is therefore understandable that women who seek to share in this service should ask for the help they think men receive from their ordination.

16 Nor is this service to be envisaged as purely towards the laity. The present alleged discontent experienced by some of the clergy will not be alleviated until there is achieved a real sense of human partnership in the extremely hard ministry of the Church, without false distinctions of greater and less, male or female, bond or free. If it could even begin to practise this partnership, the Church might experience the birth of that new creature (a live, loving, faithful, Christian community) towards which Christians are undoubtedly groaning and travailing at this hour. But it cannot be accomplished by women alone, nor by clergy alone, nor by any separatist movement or lay group. It must be a willed co-operation free of fear and irradiated by hope.

(1) See above, Supplementary Essay A, section VI, on Prejudice (pp. 69-73).

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