Australian Anglicans Ordain First Women Priests in Perth
Episcopal News Service. March 20, 1992 [92068]
Despite a last-minute attempt to stop the service, Archbishop Peter Carnley of Perth ordained 10 women on March 7 as Australia's first women priests. "Today we ordain 10, but we liberate thousands from the stereotypes with which they have been bound," Carnley told a congregation packed into St. George's Cathedral for the emotional two-hour service.
"Today is the day of expanding horizons and new global perspectives -- for the candidates themselves and women generally, for the church of this diocese and in Australia, and for the world of the future," Carnley added.
The Western Australia Supreme Court rejected a last-minute application for an injunction. Justice Kerry White said in his judgment that it was not a question of whether the church's General Synod expressly approved of the ordination proposals but whether it expressly prohibited them or had rules or laws inconsistent with them.
Last month an injunction by a court in New South Wales did stop an attempt to ordain women in the Diocese of Canberra and Goulburn, and many observers feared that precedent would affect the Perth ordinations.
"Peter Carnley's going ahead now means the beginning of the end of opposition to women priests," said a statement from the office of Australia's Anglican primate, Archbishop Keith Rayner of Melbourne. When the court declined to grant an injunction, Rayner said that the decision "will bring a great sense of relief in the Anglican community across Australia."
Opponents of the ordination of women, on the other hand, said that it was a sad day, that the ordination was "a provocative act," but others predicted that at least five of the 24 dioceses in the Australian church may soon follow suit.
Although this summer's General Synod has the power to nullify the ordinations, Carnley said that he believes the "die has already been cast. I don't believe they can stop it now. It's a very important victory and one I have been fighting toward for 20 years."
The former dean of Perth, David Robarts, described Carnley as an Episcopalian cowboy whose actions would cut him off from the rest of the church. "As the bells of St. George's Cathedral peal out, they will be tolling the death of the unity of the Anglican Church. It's that grim," Robarts said.
"There was a marvelous feeling of joy in there, and it gives younger women the realization that they also have a place in the church," said Joyce Poison, who was ordained after waiting 30 years.
"It was so emotional because it has taken so long," said Elizabeth Arnely, the first of the women to be ordained. "It was an important day for men as well as women."
Carnley said that many of the women ordained had felt the call to priesthood at an early age "but have suppressed it under the pressure of the belief that women, God bless them, cannot possibly be called to such a vocation. The church had "systematically deprived itself of half of its potential talent," he contended.
Marge Christie, former president of the Episcopal Women's Caucus, said that she felt all along that "what they needed to do was find a courageous bishop to go ahead." She drew parallels with the 1974 irregular ordinations in Philadelphia that finally pushed the Episcopal Church "to come to grips with sexism."
"For the women in Australia it has been such a roller-coaster ride of promises broken," Christie added. Sally Bucklee, a member of the Executive Council and current president of the Episcopal Women's Caucus, said that the ordinations were "desperately needed to break the logjam." She added that she hopes other bishops will join Carnley before next summer's General Synod. During her visit to Australia last year, Bucklee said that she detected strong support in the church for the ordination of women.
Presiding Bishop Edmond Browning echoed Carnley's comments when he talked about the American experience with the ordination of women. "The gifts of ordained women have added immeasurably to the life of our church and our ability to carry out our mission." Browning expressed his confidence that "the same will be true in Australia -- and I rejoice with those ordained and with the church." He added, however, that "it has been the experience of our church that our mission is best served when both anger and triumphalism are left behind and we respond to one another mindful of our unity in Christ. It is my prayer that this will be the case in Australia."
Australia now joins a minority among the 28 member churches of the Anglican Communion that ordain women. In addition to the Episcopal Church, the churches in Brazil, Burundi/Rwanda/Zaire, Canada, China (Hong Kong), Ireland, Japan, Uganda, and New Zealand ordain women to the priesthood. England, Scotland, Wales, and South Africa ordain women to the diaconate only.
The ordination of women in Australia is likely to heighten interest in the debate currently raging in the Church of England, mother church of Anglicanism, over the ordination issue. Dioceses have been voting on a change in the laws governing ordination. The final decision will probably be made at the church's General Synod in November.
After a conversation with Carnley, Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey said that it was "regrettable that the Perth diocese had gone ahead on its own because it will increase present tensions, which are already very high." Carey said that he was not criticizing Carnley but commented that the ordinations were "one aspect of how the universal church is wrestling with the gifts of women's ministry."
The ordinations in Perth may actually serve as an incentive for the Church of England to move together on the issue of ordination, according to the Rev. Alison Cheek, an Australian who was one of the women ordained in Philadelphia in 1974. Cheek also expressed a hope that the new priests will "remember their sisters -- the women who are still waiting."