A Return to MASG tradition?

[Andrew Bowles]

Thanks Jereth for your contribution in the previous thread. I appreciate the work that has gone into your reflections.

I realise I'm at risk of becoming the 'now now, let's not fight' guy on MASG (and no-one likes that guy), but I would actually like to suggest that we turn this messageboard back over to its original purpose, which is to discuss Melbourne Anglicanism in the light of its official documents.

Jereth points out that a wise Ridley student advised him that the controversy over women's ministry was beyond the scope of a casual investigation. And so he has done his homework and produced his paper. And Matt has given his own detailed views. Until we can all do the same, bite-sized discussion on an internet messageboard is only going to have the following consequences:

 1) People who should be working together in service of Jesus will start to dislike and distrust each other, and the 'politics' of the evangelical movement will advance over its actual ministry
 2) Aforesaid people will neglect fruitful study and work in order to contribute to difficult and controversial discussions where it is easier and more fun to misunderstand people than understand them
 3) Actual discussion about the issues facing Melbourne Anglicanism as per the stated purpose of this website will not proceed.


Perhaps if people feel the need for a discussion forum on the theological and exegetical issues surrounding women's ministry, another site could be started for this purpose? I suggest bookmarking www.evangelicalbunfightover1timothy2.com


Tim and Wei-Han can obviously tell me that this kind of discussion is fine here, as it is their site and given that it appears to have increased the site traffic about twenty-fold :).

[Jereth]

Andrew,

You are right in saying that we must not allow our differences over secondary issues to distract us from our core duty to preach Jesus. I am conscious of that and have always had this as a worry in the back of my mind even as I've participated in these discussions. I am reassured, however, because on Sunday at church and weeknights in homegroup it is "gospel business as usual". Perhaps having this website available for us all to vomit out our passionate feelings on this issue will help keep it that way?

Andrew Bowles wrote:

3) Actual discussion about the issues facing Melbourne Anglicanism as per the stated purpose of this website will not proceed.

Hey man, let's face it -- women's ordination, women preaching in churches, and the consecration of a woman to the office of Bishop just 1 month ago is a major issue facing Melbourne Anglicanism!!! Surely this topic can only have generated so much interest (over 200 posts and over 1000 views, looking at the stats) because people are burning up about it all over the diocese. We can keep trying to suppress the issue but it will just keep raising its head again and again. So again I say, praise God for this therapeutic opportunity to vomit out our pent up frustration in MASG!   

Jereth

[Andrew Bowles]

Of course women's ministry is a major issue facing the diocese. But 1 Tim 2 and similar passages are not distinctive documents of Melbourne Anglicanism that need to be discussed here particularly. There are all sorts of message boards where people are thrashing this debate out. Maybe you can start your own, which might even help to consolidate and promote the 'conservative voice' on women's ordination in Melbourne. My concern is that the wilder debates on 1 Tim 2 etc. crowd out the space for analysis of subjects such as GAFCON, Alternative Oversight provisions, Mission-shaped church, etc.

[Matt Williams]

Thanks Andrew,

I certainly take your point. I was reflecting earlier today and wondering if it was unhelpful that I took the bait and gave a detailed defense of my position. I shudder when I think of the godly women in ministry out there for whom it can't be easy seeing a bunch of men thrashing about what they can and can't do.

On the other hand, this issue has been bubbling under the surface of this forum for a long time. I am rather hoping this semester-break flurry will clear the air, help each of us clear out the most indefensible parts of our arguments, we will see that we are all genuinely wrestling with scripture, respect one another as evangelicals, and move on to discuss things closer to the heart of what it means to be a Melbourne Anglican.

By all means, please start threads not about women!

Blessings
Matt

[Jason]

Andrew,

Points 1 and 2 regarding the bite-sized responses aren't necessarily the case. It's worth stating we don't always know what kind of work and study people have put into an issue like this; and we're not always sure of their expertise or not on the NT interpretation. So it's worth judging each bite-sized comment based on what it presents.

Having said that, discussions like this are very much limited by the occasional nature of the discussion - after all, it is a discussion and not an essay or paper. So you're not going to find the level of scholarship here that you might find in a book or article on the subject.

One thing I like about a forum like this...the majority of the Melbourne Diocese simply assumes that women's ordination to the priesthood and, now, consecration of women as bishops is a valid and biblical move. And it is very much "culturally" (ie., Melbourne Anglican culture) unacceptable to have a discussion of this nature. So a site like this provides an opportunity for a taboo subject like this to be explored.

[Andrew Bowles]

I certainly don't think we should suppress dialogue on this issue. My personal angle was that I visited this forum for a while and some interesting discussions were happening...and then all of a sudden people were accusing each other of being unfaithful to Scripture and being cowards and not really being evangelicals and we need to separate from each other and others are misogynists and others are conforming to the culture and being hubristic. It reminded me of the Sydney Anglicans forum, where the discussions all seem to consist of people accusing each other of being heretics. That's why I hope that the women's ministry discussion finds its proper place, which may or may not be on MASG.

[Jereth]

Andrew Bowles wrote:

I certainly don't think we should suppress dialogue on this issue. My personal angle was that I visited this forum for a while and some interesting discussions were happening...and then all of a sudden people were accusing each other of being unfaithful to Scripture and being cowards and not really being evangelicals and we need to separate from each other and others are misogynists and others are conforming to the culture and being hubristic. It reminded me of the Sydney Anglicans forum, where the discussions all seem to consist of people accusing each other of being heretics. That's why I hope that the women's ministry discussion finds its proper place, which may or may not be on MASG.

Ummm, with all due respect Andrew I think that is somewhat exaggerated. I think that in general the conversation has been conducted courteously. I strongly disagree with my egalitarian brothers and sisters but I don't harbour any hard feelings towards them. I don't detect an air of hostility here.

[Andrew Bowles]

See, now you're calling me a liar.

I do exaggerate, I am a frustrated novelist and it comes out sometimes. But it has got a bit 'hot' here in certain posts, and we're not anonymous folks on some cyberspace message board, many of us have to work and study together. So care is needed.

[Luke Isham]

The debate will pass naturally as it runs out of steam, everyone says their bit and argues for a while. (Semester Two will put a damper on it as well I think.) It may get resurrected in three months time as new people come to the forum but that's like a million years in Internet time!

I see your points but don't think it's as bad as you make it out to be.  Controversial discussions rarely occur outside private conversations so it's good to be able to like Matt said discuss something that's been under the surface for a while anyway.