We love a pageant and the Church of England always pulls out the stops when it comes to putting on a good show. Recently the world stage has sought to overshadow the performance that we had in mind. It is quite clear that our agenda is to get the framework sorted out for Women Bishops before marching on to the next matter.
It was a tremendous relief to many that the debate settled the way it did in July. It was probably unrealistic to have a single clause with a voluntary code of conduct. More importantly it would have been disastrous to have had legislatively enshrined non-geographic dioceses. Imagine splitting like an amoeba at every contentious issue. It would not be long before the permutations would be too many to count. And, anyway, who would be able to conjure up enough different names for the different flavours.

The rest of the world is an issue but it mustn’t deflect us from the current activity. Let us nail some basics on the head.

• The Church of England has no theological objection to the ordination of women
• Headship is a creation order issue and if it were to be a deciding factor we shouldn’t have any women in senior positions in either secular or religious roles
• Women’s episcopacy is not a snub to other forms of women’s ministry – it enhances the number of ways in which God’s call can be recognised and answered.
• Ministry is incarnational and requires us to be able to respond to where people are. Our job is to bring people to Christ – not put up artificial barriers which they can’t understand.

So let us look forward with enthusiasm to February and the next steps. Let us remember that the Church is ours to steward – not to own.