The General Synod of the Church of England has obviously never heard that the best way to get anything done is to "Keep it simple, Stupid (K.I.S.S.)".
Having, last year, overwhelmingly voted in favour of consecrating women bishops, a "Revision Committee" of the Synod is now engaged in working out some very complicated arrangements for allowing conscientious objectors to ignore their female diocesan bishop and turn to some new breed of super-bishop with the statutory authority to overrule the Diocesan. If this isn't the kiss of death for the Church of England as we know it, I don't know what is. The whole point of a bishop is that they are the "focus of unity" in their area. How can anyone, male or female, be the focus of unity knowing that some of their flock won't even talk to them and are taking instructions from an interloper?
The revision committee state that they are trying to address the concerns of those with "conscientious difficulties" so that they won't leave the church altogether. Conscientious difficulties?? Their conscientious difficulties should lie in their continued insistance on treading a path that is at clear odds with the declared will of the majority of Synod. In the "good old days" of the Church such people would be declared heretics and burnt at the stake. You wouldn't have found Henry VIII or Queen Mary saying "let's just change the whole order and structure of the church to accommodate these folk who, quite clearly, do not believe in the unity of the church anyway."
If the Church is not one it is nothing. Stop pandering to these people and let them either put up or shut up. It is surely better to preserve the majority of the church and lose a few than to risk destroying the whole church.
More on this here: www.churchtimes.co.uk/content.asp?id=83359
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