The Spouse thought I dodged the women bishops question last week, so I wondered aloud on facebook if I should write a mid-week rant. Many said yes, and many contributed their thoughtful two-bits, and I scribbled away, sorting through the mad, the sad, and a confusion of church politics and biblical interpretation. I got a lot of words down. But then I didn’t feel like it anymore. I didn’t want to rage and rant. I still felt immensely saddened for our Anglican sisters, but it didn’t feel like a rant would help anything.
Maybe I’m just not enough of an activist. It isn’t that I feel that the fight isn’t mine. Every Christian woman is implicated in this. Our work – lay or ordained – is a gift from God to the world, just like every man’s work. To insist on the primacy of maleness is to set limits of God’s gifting. A wee bit ridiculous.
And I believe that it is also ridiculous to believe that women should not be in authority over men. That argument should fall apart in the Church of England because, of course, there already is a woman in charge. The head of the church isn’t the Archbishop of Canterbury whoever he might happen to be – it’s the Queen. So there has been a woman in charge of the male bishops for 60 years. A good 40 years longer than there have been CofE women priests.
It looks now like the Archbishops’ Council will “restart” the process to ordain women bishops in July and with a certain sense of urgency. The Council also recognises the “need to affirm all women serving in the church – both lay and ordained – in their ministries.” The political wheels will keep turning on this one, and I’m glad. The Church is richer because of women in ministry – across all denominations, in all sorts of political contexts. And there are times to rant and rage – I won’t deny that – even if it isn’t your own specific context. But this morning, I don’t want to wade that.
It’s hard to escape politics, I suppose. We are political beasts, and our context shapes our perspective. I opened up this week’s lectionary reading, and Luke hammered that home.
Luke 3:1-6
In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness.
What a way to open a chapter. There’s context for you. Seven men of authority are listed and I’m sure they all had funny hats. Luke is meticulous in including the detail of the moment. What year, who is in charge, exactly where the power is situated. He provides us with a balanced picture of Roman and Jewish power. Emperor, Governor, Rulers and Priests. You can’t begin to read this passage and wonder about its historical placement. And yet, despite all this circling of power, the action of the sentence is God’s.
The word of God came to John in the wilderness.
This is why I want to walk through Advent slowly. I can get distracted by the people. There are so many characters and stories, so many political and social headlines and sidelines, so many details and rumours and machinations. Of course, there are. There always are. That’s how we do things. So we need to take it slowly. Get the focus right. Take the time to light the candles so that sentences like this can trip us up as they should.
The word of God came.
And it came outside the circles of power into the wilderness. Outside the rants and the plots and all the voting sytems. Outside politics. Calling for something new.
The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’
Advent slows us down so that we can hear this message of God’s upside-down kingdom, smoothing the rough ways, actively coming into the world. Sure, that means political things because people are involved. But it starts with God’s action. God is acting at the centre of all things. Advent helps to questions our rants, our plots and asks us instead to notice the verbs.
The word of God is coming.
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Another Advent project I’ve committed to this year is the December Photo Project. The challenge is simple: Take one photo each day until Christmas. It’s a chance to see the season with a little more deliberate focus, if you’ll pardon the pun. Each Monday, I’ll post my daily photo here, but you can follow along via the link here.
