Wary of Schism, Anglicans Delay Decision on Ordaining Women

The Church of England’s General Synod, faced with a report warning that the 450-year-old church could be split if women are ordained as priests, Tuesday postponed resolving the issue for at least six months.

The 574-member policy-making body voted by what appeared to be a unanimous show of hands to have the church’s college of bishops study a report on women’s ordination and reach a conclusion before the next synod meeting, set for February.

The vote by the group, which includes bishops, clergy and lay members, came on the last day of the synod’s five-day summer session in this northern English city, and was fashioned as a compromise between opposing sides in a bitter 11-year debate.

The divisions within the church on the ordination of women surfaced Saturday when the synod voted against allowing women ordained abroad to officiate at services in England. Of the three synod houses--bishops, lower clergy and laymen--only the bishops mustered the necessary two-thirds majority in favor of the proposal.

The church agreed in principle in 1975 to ordain women and in 1984 the synod voted overwhelmingly to draw up the necessary legislation. However, subsequent efforts to work out the legislation have foundered for lack of the necessary votes.

About 750 women priests already have been ordained in the worldwide, 70-million-member Anglican Communion. Most of them were ordained by the Episcopalians in the United States and the rest in Canada and New Zealand. However, none has been ordained by the mother church in England.

The women’s ordination report, if it had been approved by the synod, would have formed the basis of draft legislation to be submitted to Parliament. Because the Church of England is a state church, with Queen Elizabeth II as its head, any change in the way it functions must have parliamentary approval.

Archbishop of York John Habgood, the church’s second-ranking prelate and a supporter of women’s ordination, conceded that the decision could delay the ordination of women beyond the target date of 1990.

The issue of the ordination of women is complicated by the Church of England’s continuing dialogue with the Roman Catholic Church to try to repair the 500-year doctrinal rift between Rome and Canterbury.

The Vatican believes any move by the Church of England to ordain women would block progress on their unity talks.

But the Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert A.K. Runcie, the church’s spiritual leader, firmly reiterated that a majority of church members favored ordination of women and that the bishops intended to move in that direction while trying to bring dissidents with them.

Runcie appealed to both factions to try to avoid a breach in the interim.

“I hope this (delay) will enable us to handle change without inflicting intolerable hurt on any one group and without bringing self-destruction on the church in which we all find our spiritual home,” he said.