It is a little disturbing to see in the media reports that Tuesday's vote of the General Synod on women bishops may be either set aside or the vote carried out again until the desired result is obtained.
This is the sort of electoral jiggery-pokery that has so discredited the European Union (you will keep voting until you vote the way you are told).
The vote on Tuesday was, in its way, a mini-reformation with the laity rebuffing the hierarchy of black coated priests. For the hierarchy to keep on about the votes of the diocesan synods (as Bishop "Tom" Butler did on Thought for the Day this morning) may be unwise and invite scrutiny on how valid those diocesan votes have been. Normally a constitutional vote of the kind we saw on Tuesday would effectively place the issue off limits for a generation.
To the argument that women priests are feeling hurt and disillusioned one could say welcome to the club - large areas of the Anglican laity have been feeling hurt and disillusioned for many years about the way the Established Church has given in to every trendy modish fad that has come along.
Now it seems a line has been drawn and the demands of the secular world held at bay.
The position of the refuseniks has been to say to the hierarchy: you commit as much heresy as you like so long as you do not insist we join you.
No doubt there will be a lot of pontificating by atheists and non-Anglicans that the Church of England should now be dis-Established for its audacity in resisting equalities legislation (you will probably see an example of this arguing on tonight's Question Time with all sorts of socialists and atheists and anabaptists piling in to give us their views on how wrong the Anglicans are).
To the issue of disestablishmentarianism one can only say bring it on.
Dis-Establishing the Church of England will be such a fundamental change in the constitution that it would be inconceivable (and invalid) without a national referendum in England.
And I am confident that such a referendum will oppose disestablishment and reassert England as an officially Christian country - all the tests of public opinion suggest this will be the case.
This is the sort of electoral jiggery-pokery that has so discredited the European Union (you will keep voting until you vote the way you are told).
The vote on Tuesday was, in its way, a mini-reformation with the laity rebuffing the hierarchy of black coated priests. For the hierarchy to keep on about the votes of the diocesan synods (as Bishop "Tom" Butler did on Thought for the Day this morning) may be unwise and invite scrutiny on how valid those diocesan votes have been. Normally a constitutional vote of the kind we saw on Tuesday would effectively place the issue off limits for a generation.
To the argument that women priests are feeling hurt and disillusioned one could say welcome to the club - large areas of the Anglican laity have been feeling hurt and disillusioned for many years about the way the Established Church has given in to every trendy modish fad that has come along.
Now it seems a line has been drawn and the demands of the secular world held at bay.
The position of the refuseniks has been to say to the hierarchy: you commit as much heresy as you like so long as you do not insist we join you.
No doubt there will be a lot of pontificating by atheists and non-Anglicans that the Church of England should now be dis-Established for its audacity in resisting equalities legislation (you will probably see an example of this arguing on tonight's Question Time with all sorts of socialists and atheists and anabaptists piling in to give us their views on how wrong the Anglicans are).
To the issue of disestablishmentarianism one can only say bring it on.
Dis-Establishing the Church of England will be such a fundamental change in the constitution that it would be inconceivable (and invalid) without a national referendum in England.
And I am confident that such a referendum will oppose disestablishment and reassert England as an officially Christian country - all the tests of public opinion suggest this will be the case.
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