News

Church of England’s treatment of women “shameful”, says Durham University expert

(10 February 2009)

A Durham University expert today said it was “shameful that the Church of England still treats women as a problem to be solved”.

The Reverend Dr Miranda Threlfall-Holmes, Chaplain and Solway Fellow at University College, Durham, spoke as the General Synod was preparing to consider how to introduce women bishops to the church. The decision to ordain women bishops was taken in principle last year but Synod will meet tomorrow (Wednesday, February 11) to discuss draft legislation, including plans for male “complementary” bishops where parishes are unwilling to accept women. Reverend Dr Threlfall-Holmes, General Synod member for Durham and Newcastle Universities, said: “It is shameful that the Church of England still treats women as a problem to be solved. “The draft legislation coming before Synod on Wednesday was always going to be a compromise between gender equality and the desire in the church to ‘protect’ those who disagree with the ordination of women. So in that sense what we have before us is about what was to be expected. “But we will need to be very careful not to be misled into setting up a separate ‘church within a church’ in a misguided attempt to secure unity.”