"While we wait to see whether the College of Bishops is persuaded by the TAA signatories to practice faithfulness to God by practicing civil disobedience to our constitution" - this sums it up quite a lot I think.
Another excellent and helpful explanation. Thanks for walking through the articles so carefully.
I find Article 26 helpful not as a way of suggesting that women priests are somehow bad or evil, but to underscore that there isn't a way to mess up or invalidate the Eucharist and point out the short-sightedness of being very worried about that.
Anyway, thanks so much for doing these! I'm curious to see if you'll write about the significance of a moratorium and what that would look like if it played out. As best I can tell it's just a scenario where bishops handshake agree to not ordain women indefinitely. But I don't think it's enforceable. At least GAFCON had a moratorium on ordaining women to the episcopate and then some were and I'm not sure there was any mechanism of enforcement. But the GAFCON Primates as well issued a statement that WO is a secondary issue, which also has me wondering how supporters of statements like these two latest envision ACNA's participation with global Anglicanism where WO is normative.
Thanks, Marissa. I haven't looked into the GAGFCON moratorium, or the statement by the GAFCON primates. Yes, I have the impression that our surface disagreements are expressions of our unexpressed premises about the nature of full communion.
I feel fairly able to read documents, but I have a lot to learn about the nature of communion - how it is defined, achieved, argued for, etc.
I don't think your observation that Christ in commissioning the Apostles was instituting new patriarchs does the work you need it to do. The patriarchs operate as priests; Abraham marks out sacred space and offers sacrifices, for example.
When Jesus breathes on the Apostles and says, "Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them..." it's hard to understand that as not conferring a priesthood of some sort. And of course St Paul goes on to commission Timothy and Titus to be in authority over and ordain local presbyters, which would I find odd if Paul is not himself at least a presbyter.
All this to say it seems to me the burden of proof is on the claim that our Lord didn't institute a New Covenant priesthood when he commissioned the Apostles.
Thanks for writing, Matthew. I'm sympathetic to that reading, and it/you may be right.
I'm not sure my observation (which I take from a paper published by the CTSA) does the work I need it to do, either. I have questions about the various kinds of priesthood depicted in the Bible:
- Like the Levites (Num. 8), Adam is charged to serve and to keep sancta.
- Cain and Abel offer offerings.
- Melchizedek offers bread and wine out of his own 'indestructible life', and this is supposed have to do with Jesus.
- Abraham marks out sancta, but not the same kind of *inner* sancta that's developed in Leviticus.
- Israel is a royal priesthood (Exod.), and so is the church (1 Pet.)
- Then there's Levi, Aaron, Aaron's sons, and all the Levite men.
- Saul gets in trouble for unauthorized offerings, but kings are permitted to offer the toda' (thanksgiving offering, which, I think, is the most proto-Eucharistic offering, acc'ding to Hebrews)
- The NT letters describe the 'sacrifice of praise' and the 'spiritual sacrifice'.
I don't know where the Logic Judges think the burden of proof is, and I think that there's enough fundamental disagreement on *that* Q that the two sides are speaking past each other. The more common formula is, "Do the Scriptures permit/warrant WO?" When, since I'm unsettled about where the burden of proof is, I ask, "Do the Scriptures permit/warrant sex-exclusive ordination policies?" (I'm aware that even that is talking past you a little bit.)
What I'm more sure of is that our Lord did institute a New Covenant *ministry* when he commissioned the apostles (e.g. 2 Cor 5., "the ministry of reconciliation"). I'm confident that Jesus instituted a new ministry and new sacraments, but I'm not yet sure of the restrictions he places on the selection of his new ministers, and to what degree this is meant to be discerned, developed, and adapted over time.
Just two things:
1. I am really enjoying the depth and nuance of these WO posts
2. It’s me, I am the target audience for your Schoolhouse Rock reference
Ha! I should have known.
"While we wait to see whether the College of Bishops is persuaded by the TAA signatories to practice faithfulness to God by practicing civil disobedience to our constitution" - this sums it up quite a lot I think.
Another excellent and helpful explanation. Thanks for walking through the articles so carefully.
I find Article 26 helpful not as a way of suggesting that women priests are somehow bad or evil, but to underscore that there isn't a way to mess up or invalidate the Eucharist and point out the short-sightedness of being very worried about that.
Anyway, thanks so much for doing these! I'm curious to see if you'll write about the significance of a moratorium and what that would look like if it played out. As best I can tell it's just a scenario where bishops handshake agree to not ordain women indefinitely. But I don't think it's enforceable. At least GAFCON had a moratorium on ordaining women to the episcopate and then some were and I'm not sure there was any mechanism of enforcement. But the GAFCON Primates as well issued a statement that WO is a secondary issue, which also has me wondering how supporters of statements like these two latest envision ACNA's participation with global Anglicanism where WO is normative.
Thanks, Marissa. I haven't looked into the GAGFCON moratorium, or the statement by the GAFCON primates. Yes, I have the impression that our surface disagreements are expressions of our unexpressed premises about the nature of full communion.
I feel fairly able to read documents, but I have a lot to learn about the nature of communion - how it is defined, achieved, argued for, etc.
I don't think your observation that Christ in commissioning the Apostles was instituting new patriarchs does the work you need it to do. The patriarchs operate as priests; Abraham marks out sacred space and offers sacrifices, for example.
When Jesus breathes on the Apostles and says, "Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them..." it's hard to understand that as not conferring a priesthood of some sort. And of course St Paul goes on to commission Timothy and Titus to be in authority over and ordain local presbyters, which would I find odd if Paul is not himself at least a presbyter.
All this to say it seems to me the burden of proof is on the claim that our Lord didn't institute a New Covenant priesthood when he commissioned the Apostles.
A blessed feast of the Sacred Heart, Fr. Jack.
Thanks for writing, Matthew. I'm sympathetic to that reading, and it/you may be right.
I'm not sure my observation (which I take from a paper published by the CTSA) does the work I need it to do, either. I have questions about the various kinds of priesthood depicted in the Bible:
- Like the Levites (Num. 8), Adam is charged to serve and to keep sancta.
- Cain and Abel offer offerings.
- Melchizedek offers bread and wine out of his own 'indestructible life', and this is supposed have to do with Jesus.
- Abraham marks out sancta, but not the same kind of *inner* sancta that's developed in Leviticus.
- Israel is a royal priesthood (Exod.), and so is the church (1 Pet.)
- Then there's Levi, Aaron, Aaron's sons, and all the Levite men.
- Saul gets in trouble for unauthorized offerings, but kings are permitted to offer the toda' (thanksgiving offering, which, I think, is the most proto-Eucharistic offering, acc'ding to Hebrews)
- The NT letters describe the 'sacrifice of praise' and the 'spiritual sacrifice'.
I don't know where the Logic Judges think the burden of proof is, and I think that there's enough fundamental disagreement on *that* Q that the two sides are speaking past each other. The more common formula is, "Do the Scriptures permit/warrant WO?" When, since I'm unsettled about where the burden of proof is, I ask, "Do the Scriptures permit/warrant sex-exclusive ordination policies?" (I'm aware that even that is talking past you a little bit.)
What I'm more sure of is that our Lord did institute a New Covenant *ministry* when he commissioned the apostles (e.g. 2 Cor 5., "the ministry of reconciliation"). I'm confident that Jesus instituted a new ministry and new sacraments, but I'm not yet sure of the restrictions he places on the selection of his new ministers, and to what degree this is meant to be discerned, developed, and adapted over time.