97 Bishops Approve Women's Ordination in Principle
Diocesan Press Service. October 18, 1974 [74275]
Isabel Baumgartner
OAXTEPEC, Morelos, Mexico -- Episcopal women deacons seeking priesthood will have to wait at least two years for such ordination to be authorized, but more than two our of three Episcopal bishops voting on the issue in mid-October now support their cause.
The Episcopal Church's House of Bishops, meeting here October 13-18, reaffirmed its 1972 endorsement of the principle of opening the priesthood and episcopate to women.
The tally -- 97 yes, 35 no, 6 abstaining -- indicates a sharp shift of opinion. In 1972, 74 bishops favored the principle, 61 said no, and 5 abstained.
The House decided not to ballot on requests for a special General Convention in 1975 after an informal poll revealed only 14 of the 143 bishops present supported the proposal. Only the bicameral General Convention can alter church canons which now limit priesthood and episcopate to males.
The bishops agreed, by unanimous roll-call vote, "to interpret to the Church the seriousness and importance of this issue " so that "well-informed action may be taken" by the 1976 General Convention.
They asked that the issue be made a special order of business at Convention, with adequate time provided for its consideration.
Stimulation for churchwide study of "the doctrine of priesthood and contemporary Christian sexuality" will come from a process set in motion by Presiding Bishop John M. Allin and endorsed by the House. He has created an ad hoc and expandable consultation committee to secure, from across the Church and beyond, a "mosaic" of brief articles treating the subjects. The material, to appear next year in two small paperback books, will engage the whole Church in consultation "at the local level in homes and parishes and small groups. " Full bibliographies will allow study, at any depth, by scholars.
Bishop Allin told the House, "We hope for a decision that's more than a majority vote over against a strong minority. (We hope) we can come together with a common mind, and celebrate the wholeness of ministry."
While the Presiding Bishop did not cast a ballot here on this issue, he told a newsman later that, had he voted, he would have voted yes.
Ways to involve seminary faculty members -- " now feeling by-passed, " said one bishop -- in dialogue on the theological aspects of the issue may be devised. The House authorized its Committee on Theology to secure advice and counsel on this or any matter from selected theologians and other consultants from time to time. After Committee chairman Bishop Arthur Vogel pointed out that it is not feasible for this small committee "to enter into dialogue with the faculties of 11 seminaries," Bishop C. Kilmer Myers of California suggested the annual Conference of Anglican Theologians as a possible forum.
The House resolved to " respect the wisdom and integrity" of the Church's legislative process and called upon "all Church members to restrain from" the ordaining of women priests until Convention approves. In the voice vote, only Bishop Robert Spears of Rochester said "No."
The eight diocesans of the women deacons who participated in the intended ordination service July 29 in Philadelphia spoke to the House.
Bishop Spears quoted Franklin D. Roosevelt: " It's different when the measles are on your kids." He said that in the Diocese of Rochester "mail is running about 90 to 10 in support of deacon Merrill Bittner. "The sense of urgency and contention is very real."
Bishop Philip F. McNairy of Minnesota termed the event "a prophetic act. " Bishop Vogel said that, in West Missouri, he and Katrina Swanson have signed a "covenant of suspension " agreeing she will not " function or dress clerically " for three months, but may then resume ministry as a deacon. Bishop George Rath reported that, in Newark, there is " a strong feeling something must be done to regularize " the invalidated ordinations. "I feel sure," he said, "that a majority though not all of our Standing Committee will recommend Nancy Wittig for the priesthood."
Speaking on a point of personal privilege, Philadelphia participant Bishop J. Antonio Ramos of Costa Rica said, "I realize my actions created anger and pain and hurt, and been interpreted by some as an act of disregard and not love for the Church . . . . It represents a theological stance to which I am committed, but never in my mind or of the others in Philadelphia was any intention to separate from the Church."
Feelings of Episcopalians "outraged and deeply harmed" by these events were expressed on a point of personal privilege by Bishop William C.R. Sheridan of Northern Indiana, who termed them "the forgotten Churchmen." He said, "Many hundreds of hurt and angry priests and tens of thousands of scandalized and depressed lay people from one end of the Church to the other . . . (have been) sickened by the evident fruits of this tragedy . . . . We go home to some who don't know what to do and who may abandon the Church . . . . Let us each make a pledge to our blessed Lord to set personal examples of charity and loving trust in dealing with these . .. in anguish . . . (because) they cannot accept (these events)."
Presiding Bishop Allin announced that formal charges against the four bishops at Philadelphia are in the hands of a 10-person Board of Inquiry, the ecclesiastical equivalent of a grand jury. He urged that the judicial process be followed "with that care of purpose with which it has been set up. "
[Contact Archives for Resolution on the Ordination of Women and the Report to the House from the Committee on Theology - Ed.]