Women have been able to serve as priests in the Anglican church for quite a while now - but not every Anglican accepts this. Some still reject the authority of female priests and of course female bishops. In Australia, one bishop (Ross Davies, Bishop of The Murray in South Australia) is insisting on re-ordaining any priests originally ordained by a female bishop.

The Age reports:

Bishop Davies said the new proposal, with a "minimalist" plan for alternative oversight for those who can't accept women bishops, would create new difficulties. "All I can do is put on the record that I would need to reordain any man purportedly ordained before a woman bishop before I could license him," he said.

Bishop Davies, whose diocese is strongly Anglo-Catholic, told The Sunday Age: "I made these comments because I wanted to be some sort of voice for those who are opposed to the ordination of women. My opinions are in accord with the majority of Anglicans worldwide. The centre of gravity is in Africa and Asia. But I'm not a self-appointed leader - we are a very small corner of the world." AdvertisementAdvertisement

“Purportedly” ordained? Davies doesn’t consider an ordination by a woman to be a “real” ordination — no more “real” than if I were to pretend to ordain someone. The status of female priests continues to split many in the Anglican Communion and I assume that it will continue to do so for a while longer, at least so long as the status of gay priests isn’t distracting.

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• Episcopalians
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