No sects please, we’re Anglicans

Monday, 15 February 2010
The Rev. John P Richardson

When I first heard a few years ago the proposal advanced at our Diocesan Synod in Chelmsford that the Episcopal Ministry Act of Synod 1993 should be abolished, I genuinely felt a cold chill. This was not because it presaged the arrival of women as bishops. Rather, it was because it heralded the potential end of the Church of England as I knew, and loved, it.

I argued then, and I am convinced now, that such a move would give the Church of England the character of a sect, by introducing preciseness of belief and practice in this one area, in a way comparable to nothing else that has recently been discussed or debated.

This was brought home to me by the recent experience of a friend who is being interviewed for possible ordination. One of his interviewers asked him what he thought about women bishops. My friend answered that personally he disagreed with it, but that the Church of England allowed for different points of view. the rest