Flourishing...

This weekend at General Synod I had intended to try to speak in one of the debates, on the report of the Implementation and Dialogue Group. For various reasons, involving quite a lot of Life and a fair bit of Stuff, I wasn’t able to engage as fully in the prep for Synod as I usually would, and I was very late in writing my speech and putting in a request to speak. (In fact I raised my ‘blue hand’ slightly before the speech was finished, which could have led to an interesting outcome if I had been called!). In the end I wasn’t called, which is probably for the best, as I’m not sure I’d have made much sense. (Incidentally it happens also to be the only time in six years of Synod that I’ve tried to speak in a debate and not managed to do so – my normal strategy of ‘stand right in the eyeline of the chair, to my full 5.11 height, plus heels, and wear bright orange’ doesn’t work quite so well on Zoom! I was delighted that my friend Esther Prior was called to speak first – she made an excellent speech, said some similar things to what I would have said, only better, and set just the right tone for the rest of the debate.

I woke up this morning with my head full of all of the things that I would have liked to say if only I could have got the thoughts together more quickly and clearly. Therefore, I thought I would share those thoughts here. I won't focus so much on the IDG report (which you can read here), as on the whole concept of mutual flourishing and the 5 Guiding Principles. I won’t explain the background to them, but if you’re unsure you can read more here). 

Sometimes when I write a blog it is cheery and light and I press ‘post’ in the confident hope that people will receive it with enthusiasm and all will be well. At other times I press ‘post’ with fear and trepidation, knowing that it is quite possible that I’m about to upset everybody everywhere, from every possible point on every possible spectrum, all at the same time, and slightly holding my breath for the backlash. I’ll leave you to work out which is true on this occasion…

The thing is though, that I believe we need the 5 GPs, and I also believe that mutual flourishing really matters. For a start, the 5GPs state extremely clearly that the CofE has come to a decision on this issue. The matter has been decided. Women can be deacons, and priests, and bishops. This is important to me, and I am delighted that it is so. There are now, joyously, so many women ordained bishop that I cannot tell you the total number without googling it. If I tried to name them all, I would certainly forget some. I consider that to be rather wonderful, only 7 years since the vote that enabled it. But, secondly, and also very importantly, the 5GPs clearly recognise that not everyone is able to “receive the ministry of” ordained women. This is also important. People have the right not to believe in or agree with the ordained ministry of women (whether those objections relate to the issues of priesthood, or of leadership, or of preaching).

Very clearly, it is hard to hold those two things in tension. It can be painful and complex. It certainly requires huge amounts of grace and generosity from everyone involved. And in this area (as in literally every single other area of the life of the church and of the world) we could do with a huge amount more grace. Grace is just about my very favourite thing, but there can never be enough of it.

There are a few key moments in my own ministry when I’ve really experienced mutual flourishing and the 5GPs in action. Just a couple of weeks ago, for instance, I was privileged to lead the priests’ ordination retreat for the Edmonton Area of the Diocese of London (a Diocese which I think many others could learn from in terms of how they navigate this stuff, with the London Plan). There were six deacons on the retreat. Five of them were ordained priest on the Saturday, at a service at which I preached, and Bishop Sarah ordained (and also, joyfully, at which the female vicar of the church we were in sat opposite me). I found myself tearful on a couple of occasions, for all sorts of reasons to do with covid, and worshipping together with others, and ordinations simply being wonderful, but also for the privilege it was to preach at a service where a female Bishop was presiding and ordaining. However, I’ve mentioned six, and then five – the other candidate wasn’t ordained that same day, but two weeks later, by the Bishop of Maidstone. He was part of the retreat, we all spent that whole time journeying together, but his decision was that he couldn’t be ordained by Bishop Sarah. I obviously can’t pretend to know what that must feel like as a bishop. But in its practical outworking, during the retreat, it worked. I received nothing but respect and kindness from the candidate, and I hope he would say the same of me.

Several years ago, I was invited to give a seminar at the Word Alive conference, and I was delighted to do so. (I did spend much of the rest of the day explaining to people that I wasn’t the wife of any vicar, there or elsewhere, but that’s another story. Never before have I wished I’d worn a dog collar to a summer festival. Even more ironic when you consider that the seminar was on singleness!). 

More recently, I was invited to give the morning sermon in the chapel at Oak Hill College. What an extraordinary privilege that was. I don’t take such invitations for granted, but am honoured to receive them, and treasure them.

It so happens (unsurprisingly, given my own tradition) that all of those examples relate to the evangelical world. But just this morning I had a conversation with a friend, a traditionalist catholic priest, for whom I have nothing but respect and admiration. We discussed General Synod, and I was enthusiastic in my encouragement of him to stand. He will, if elected, bring much wisdom and grace to the chamber. He was also kind enough to express to me his thanks for my own ministry on General Synod, and his support of my campaign for re-election. We’re interested in each other’s flourishing, and it’s mutual.

I’m very pleased to be able to call the Bishop of Burnley a friend (it’s true – some of my best friends are bishops…). Together we’ve been part of an only averagely successful, but extremely entertaining, online lockdown quiz team. But even before we were friends, I had invited him to speak at a New Wine event that I was leading, because I’d heard him speak about urban mission and ministry, and it had moved me to tears. His passion and clarity and wisdom continue to inspire me. We’re interested in each other’s flourishing, and it’s mutual.

Now please understand me, I am not naïve. I realise that this stuff doesn’t always work out well. But I genuinely believe that isn’t enough of a reason to give up trying. I have had my fair share of rude, unkind and unhelpful comments. In fact I probably haven’t had my fair share – I know some women who have suffered with this far more than I have. In no way would I wish to downplay or minimise what they have been through. Sometimes those comments, or reactions, or behaviours, come from a place of ignorance and prejudice. Sometimes they come simply from a place of not having engaged the brain and the mouth at the same time. When I preached once at evening prayer in the chapel at Wycliffe Hall while I was training for ordination, someone told me that it was the best sermon they’d ever heard by a woman. The thing is, I genuinely think they meant it as a compliment! (For the avoidance of doubt, it is not!).

I understand – of course I understand – that these matters can be intensely hard. I have found the pain of knowing that someone has stayed sitting in their seat, rather than coming forward to receive communion, because I am the one who has presided, to be a moment of unique and deep pain. When someone belittles or dismisses our ministry it is hurtful, painful, difficult – deeply so.

It is my belief, though, that scrapping the 5GPs, ditching the concept of mutual flourishing, announcing that from now on everyone who is a candidate for ordination must assent that they are in favour of women’s ordination and ministry – these things wouldn’t (necessarily) help. Of course, where there is bad behaviour, it must be challenged. Online abuse, hate mail, nasty comments, ignoring/blanking female colleagues – these things are totally unacceptable, and they must not be allowed to continue. I know that many of my friends from traditionalist catholic and conservative evangelical backgrounds would challenge these behaviours if they witnessed them, and we need more of this. We need too to learn from examples of good practice, such as we see in the Dioceses of London, Blackburn, and Chichester, among others.

The Bishop of Rochester said during the debate yesterday that perhaps we needed some of this work to have been done on 2014, rather than now, and I think he is probably right. I hope that we can learn from some of the good practice around, as well as from some of the bad experiences people have had, so that we can all get better at this. 

I want to try hard to recognise and acknowledge that the need for grace isn’t only one sided, and nor is the potential for pain. It isn’t that I must summon all of my grace in order to cope with the views of these people who don’t accept my ministry, and the pain that may cause while they just merrily continue with their views. There is grace too in their interactions with me, with us. There will also sometimes be pain in the outworking of their ministries. I don’t know, maybe on the morning that I preached in the chapel at Oak Hill, some people stayed away. It’s pretty likely, I guess. But some didn’t. Some came, and listened, and received my teaching – and I recognise and give thanks for the grace that some of them will have needed to exercise in doing so.

The point at which I differ, I guess, from some of my colleagues, is that I don’t believe that for someone simply to hold the view that women can’t (or shouldn’t) be ordained, or lead, or preach, is in itself harmful. It is only the behaviours which sometimes arise out of that view that are harmful. The theological and ecclesiological opinion is, I believe, entirely valid, and what matters is how you then live with and behave towards your colleagues. We’re right back round to grace again.

Inevitably this blog has become very long. I don’t want it also to become waffly (you may consider that ship to have sailed…). I’m sure there will have been points at which I have expressed myself clumsily. If I have misrepresented anyone’s point of view, or offended anyone, I ask for their forgiveness. These are, of course, only my own views. I’d welcome further discussion on what I’ve written – but please, be kind!

The Billy Graham Rule

Hmm. I've been meaning for ages to blog about this, but never quite got round to it. I think today's the day, although I realise it'll not be without controversy!

That source of all true and accurate knowledge, Wikipedia, says: "The Billy Graham rule is a practice among some male evangelical Protestant leaders, in which they avoid spending time alone with women to whom they are not married. It is adopted as a display of integrity, a means of avoiding sexual temptation, to avoid any appearance of doing something considered morally objectionable, and to avoid being accused of sexual harassment or assault. The rule has been named after Billy Graham, who was one of the early proponents of the practice. More recently, it has also been called the Mike Pence rule, after a US Vice President who also supported the idea."

I guess right at the start, before I go on to criticise the Rule (because you better believe I'm going to criticise it!), I should say that I absolutely get where it's coming from, and what it's seeking to avoid, and the desire for honour and holiness which lies behind it.(I just don't think that it goes about it in the right way).

I understand how it came about, as part of a wider rule called the 'Modesto Manifesto,' since Billy Graham and others were seeking to hold one another to the highest standard, and to ensure that nothing about how they behaved could be misinterpreted or misunderstood.

(It's also worth saying of course that there may be times when a woman wishes to enforce her own version of this rule, because she needs to keep safe and to feel safe, and that's absolutely fine. I'm talking her about when this is enforced upon women.)

OF COURSE as Christians we need to live with the utmost integrity in our relationships. Of course we need not just to live that way, but also clearly to be seen by the outside world to be living that way. We're called to be chaste, to be pure, to be above reproach. The Bible calls married people to live faithfully within marriage, and single people to be celibate. I absolutely support, endorse and uphold that standard.

And equally, of course we have to be realistic about the world in which we live, about the temptations we all face, about the sinful behaviour to which we are all prone. We all need to be honourable in our relationships, to steer clear of temptation, and to make wise choices.

I'm not naive about this. I have witnessed far too many marriages, families and churches torn apart by sexual sin. This stuff really, really matters. The thing is, it actually matters *too much* to be neatly packaged away in a 'rule'. And not just any rule, but a rule which demeans and degrades everyone. A rule which casts the man in the role of weak willed robot, slave to his desires, incapable of withstanding temptation or resisting feminine wiles. A rule which casts the woman in the role of sultry temptress, who with one wink of her eye can draw the man into sin. It's like a cross between a low budget Channel 5 romance and a shampoo advert. Surely we can all do better?

Tish Harrison Warren has written an article about this in Christianity Today, where she says this: "This rule, in its most pristine form, renders male-female friendships impossible. However unintentionally, it communicates to women that they are fundamentally dangerous. And it bars men from meaningful mentorship or pastoral care of women and vice versa."

I have some great male friends. Some of them are married, some are not. If they are married, I always make sure that I get to know their spouse too. In most cases I know and am friends with both, and see both together. Sometimes though, I might spend time with just the man. There's my friend who I sometimes go out with for curry and beer. He's basically the big brother I never had. We have a laugh, and set the world to rights. He's got a brain the size of a planet, and is right an annoying amount of the time (but not as often as he thinks he is!). I adore his wife too, and his kids, but sometimes I just want to go for a curry with him.

It's right and proper, of course, to be careful about how this all works. With my big-brother friend mentioned above, I'd always want to make sure that his wife knew when we were going out. I also have a rule that I wouldn't ever stay overnight in a house where there was only a man, or have a man on his own come to stay here. That seems to me to just be sensible. Plus there's also something about what others see - I don't want the neighbours' curtains twitching! Recently I was due to see some good friends after a conference, have dinner with them, and stay overnight. At the last minute, the wife had to go away. So I still went to the conference, still had dinner with the husband, and then got the train home. Would it have been perfectly safe and chaste and above board if I'd stayed overnight? Absolutely. Was it the right decision to come home? I think so. Because it's important to have rules, and boundaries, and to be wise.

There have been numerous occasions in my life when I've had a one to one meeting or conversation with a man. Some of these have been about pastoral care (one way or another). Some have been about supervision (likewise). Some have been planning meetings. Some have been to do with mentoring/counselling/spiritual direction. Some have been social events. My life (and, dare I suggest, their lives) would have been much poorer had those meetings and conversations never taken place.

So I definitely think it's wise to have some boundaries, and to have thought them through in advance so that everyone's clear. But for me the problem with the BG/MP rule is that it says 'fire is bad' and so removes not just matches and lighters from the house, but also all paper, cardboard and wood. And then it douses the whole place in water.

Honestly, I find it offensive. I am offended that a man would think that half an hour alone with me in a car or a meeting room or a restaurant would mean he'd immediately be led astray. (Ha! Maybe I should be flattered instead!)

I'm offended on behalf of all of the women who have been denied access to meetings and conferences, left out of the old boys' network, and missed out on mentoring opportunities. That's where it leads, I think, at least today, in its modern incarnation. It leads to women being denied a place at the table because everyone else around the table is male.

I'm offended on behalf of single women, since I feel like we get the raw deal here. I need friendships with couples, and I need friendships with singles. I need friendships with women and I need friendships with men. As a single woman I'm not actually attracted to every man that I meet (sorry guys!). Please don't treat me like a threat.

But I'm also grateful, and I'm hopeful. I'm grateful for the extraordinary number of good, holy, Godly, honourable, wise, funny, kind men I know, men who are friends and colleagues and mentors to me.

And I'm hopeful that we might learn to live better together. To live lives which are pure and chaste, which honour one another and honour God. To show the world a model of loving friendship which knows that there's more to life than sex.