Ex-Anglicans will bring new life to our Church

This time, former C of E traditionalists must be allowed to stay together, says Damian Thompson
11 July 2008

"Most of all we ask for ways that allow us to bring our folk with us." Well, you can't put it plainer than that. The Rt Rev Andrew Burnham, Bishop of Ebbsfleet and one of the Church of England's three "flying bishops", wants to lead his people to Rome. And - this time round - Rome seems ready to provide the "ways" that will allow the exodus to consist of more than simply a mass of individual conversions.

On Monday night the General Synod of the Church of England, meeting in York, voted to consecrate women bishops without offering objectors anything more than a flimsy code of practice. "Make no mistake," wrote George Pitcher in the Daily Telegraph, "the Anglo-Catholics were done over." But with love, mind you: as Pitcher nicely put it, the Synod is like a mafia movie "where the luckless are stabbed in the back while they're being hugged". the rest