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Workbook for the Church’s Future
edited by Constance F. Parvey
Faith and Order Paper
105
World Council of Churches, Geneva, 1980
Preface
1
Introduction: How This Book Came To Be
3
PART ONE: EXPLORING THE
CONTEXT
I
The Partners in the Discussion
7
II
The Continuing Need for Dialogue
20
III
For Those Engaged in the Debate: the Pro and
Contra
29
PART TWO: NEW STARTING
POINTS
Introduction
41
IV
Balancing the Theological Past:
Male and Female
Imagery
43
V
Women and Men as Living Images of God:
New Initiatives
of Women in Ministry
48
VI
Dialogue: a Starting Point for Partnership in the
Church
54
VII
Workbook for the Church's Future
60
Postscript
65
Appendix I: The Preacher and the Priest:
Two Typologies
of Ministry and the Ordination of Women
67
Literature
75
Acknowledgments: Special thanks are extended to all the participants in
the Klingenthal consultation,, particularly for their helpful comments in
shaping the final draft of this document; to Stephen Cranford, Glenys Huws and
Jean Scott for their help in preparing the initial outline; to Bonnie Arends
and Claire Robert for their work on the bibliography; to colleagues at the
Ecumenical Centre in Geneva who gave helpful criticism and editorial
assistance; to Karen Foget who designed the cover; to Yvonne Itin and Isa
Schmidtkunz for their staff support throughout the entire consultation process;
and to Brigalia Barn and Lukas Vischer whose previous work on the debate
tutored mine.
Preface
Ordination of Women in Ecumenical Perspective: Workbook for the
Church’s Future is a book about ministry. It is not another work of
academic scholarship on the issues of the ordination of women, and should not
be approached as such. It is occasioned by an ecumenical and international
consultation of women and men in ministry. Though the paragraphs may appear
“smoothed out”, there is commitment, purpose, conflict and passion
behind and between the lines. The threat is that the issue of ordination of
women endangers the goal of unity; the challenge is that it calls the churches
to become an instrument of true reconciliation where real division is
identified.
In
the ecumenical movement, learning to understand and to respect the diverse
origins and experiences of one another is the only way towards finding common
starting points. The research and dialogue on which this work is based reflects
attempts to reach out to one another, understand, pull back, clarify and try
again. The process is painful, yet continuous and necessary. The purpose of
this volume is to foster this discussion among the churches by:
-
providing a workbook to aid them in their dialogue on this issue;
-
helping the women and men in the churches that do and do not ordain women to
appreciate its ecumenical context and its challenge;
-
helping those engaged in the debate to further their understanding of each
other and to be mutually corrected and enriched;
-
making a contribution to the background materials on ministry for the ongoing
Faith and Order work on “One Baptism, One Eucharist and a Mutually
Recognized Ministry” and to the “Community of Women and Men in the
Church Study”.
Designed as a workbook to promote the goal of Christian unity by facilitating
the way, it can be used in bilateral and multilateral settings and, on local
levels, as the basis for conferences, discussions, courses in seminaries, etc.
A single church, confessional family or independent researcher can also use it,
together with the bibliography, as an aid in reflection on the ministry of
women and men in the light of the larger ecumenical context of ministry, global
and local human needs, and the search for Christian unity within the unity of
all humankind. There can be no Christian unity that divides person from person,
male from female.
Finally, this book, stimulated by a challenge within and among the churches,
can be instrumental in helping enlarge both the vision of ministry and the
vision of true community by pushing the ecumenical partners to learn beyond the
borders of their immediate space and time. The issues stretch further than the
limits of our present institutional Church life and further than the time
frames of past and present in which we mostly live. The nature of the issue
forces us to glimpse, by way of our ecumenical association, that promise of God
for the Church that it is, and can be, a reconciling community.
Introduction:
How This Book Came To Be
“Ordination of Women in Ecumenical Perspective” is the title of a
consultation held at Château Klingenthal, near Strasbourg France, in
August-September 1979. Sponsored by the Community of Women and Men in the
Church Study of the World Council of Churches, the consultation was the first
of three specialized meetings planned for the study by the Faith and Order
Commision, of which it is a part.(1) At the invitation of the Lutheran Church
of Alsace and Lorraine, 30 participants - theologians, pastors, biblical
scholars, church leaders, administrators, students -gathered at the eighteenth
century château, as guests of the Goethe Foundation, owner of this
cultural centre. The host was the centre’s director, Dr Marie-Paule
Stintzi. Nearby on the mountainside, overlooking the village, was the
pilgrimage site of the patron saint of the area, Saint Odile, a ninth century
holy woman who brought the Christian faith to the people of this part of
Europe. Also nearby, and taking a keen interest in the proceedings, was Mme
Marie-Louise Caron, presiding superintendant of this Lutheran jurisdiction and
the first woman pastor to hold such a post in the Lutheran churches of the
world.
The
consultation's purpose was to seek a common approach to the controversial issue
of women’s ordination in an ecumenical context, this within the overall
search for a true partnership of women and men in the Church.
The
Community of Women and Men in the Church Study was recommended at the 1974
Accra meeting of the Faith and Order Commission. The study desk was set up in
Faith and Order in January 1978, to work in cooperation with the Sub-Unit on
Women in Church and Society.
Among
its specialized, tasks, outlined at the Loccum Meeting of the Faith and Order
Standing Commission in 1977, were to
- a) search for a
sign of unity;
- b) explore
issues of theological language, symbols and images;
- c) participate
in the “Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry” consensus process with
attention to the section on the ordination of women.
The
document which follows represents one step towards fulfilling this mandate.
Footnotes
(1) The Community of Women and Men in the Church study is
a ACC programme, located in the Faith and Order Commission and carried out in
cooperation with the Sub-unit on Women in Church and Society. The three
specialized consultations of the study deal with “Ordination of Women in
Ecumenical Perspective”, “The Bible and the Community of Women and
Men in the Church Study”, and “Towards a New Theology of the
Human”.
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