COE Approves Female "Bishops"

From SkyNews (UK):

Members of its General Synod threw out compromise proposals on females in senior ranks.

All safeguards demanded by traditionalists were rejected.

[...] Sky News correspondent Mike McCarthy said it was a historic and significant moment for the church."The real test now is how many people will leave (the Church). There are certainly going to be many wrestling with their consciences," he said.

The Synod members voted to approve work on a national statutory code to accommodate those within the Church who object to women bishops.

But the Synod rejected compromise plans for new "super bishops" to cater for objectors - and also their preferred option of creating new dioceses.

The decision to go ahead with work on the code came after more than six hours of debate by the General Synod, which saw extraordinary scenes, with one bishop in tears as he spoke of being "ashamed" of the Church of England.

The Rt Rev Stephen Venner, Bishop of Dover, who is in favour of women bishops, said: "I have to say, Synod, for the first time in my life, I feel ashamed.

"We have talked for hours about wanting to give an honourable place to those who disagree."We have been given opportunities for both views to flourish. We have turned down every, almost realistic opportunity for those who are opposed to flourish."

A total of 1,333 clergy have threatened to leave the Church of England if they are not given legal safeguards to set up a network of parishes that would remain under male leadership.

The fat lady has sung. The shark has been jumped. The curtain has fallen. The lights have been turned off. The shootin' match is over. The paperwork is finished. The cleanup is ended. Somebody drape the flag over it and bury it.

From this day forward, any notion of maintaining Anglican orthodoxy in communion with Canterbury - no matter how strained - is finished. Any meaningful dialog with Rome or the East is the stuff of pipe dreams. The Anglican experiment has gone the way of any number of heretical sects and splinter groups since the Church began. Like a rat that has eaten the bait, it is still walking and squeaking, but the Flavored Death it has so eagerly chewed and so greedily swallowed is already at work devouring its innards. Sic transit gloria mundi.