There are two primary reasons why conservative evangelicals within the Church of England might object to the new Archbishop of Canterbury. They may object due to gender and due to theology
Let’s deal with them in turn. The gender issue is the more complex and in fact should be the lesser in importance. It’s important to be clear about what this is and isn’t about. It’s not about men being better than women at leadership, bring superior in any sense, though you might not get that from how at times it has been argued. Its about whether women can be elders and so would argue it’s about can, not should, a bit like could they be husbands or fathers? What this means is that there should be ways in which women are able to fully utilize their gifts within the church and be part of leadership. Now interestingly, there is a case of you hold to a continuing small ‘a’ apostolic role to argue that it’s possible for a woman to be the archbishop of thsts the type of role, there do seem to have been women as part of those apostolic bands in the NT. However, the polity of the CofE treats Bishops more as equivalent to elders. So complementarian Evangelicals might object on this ground.
The second reason is theology. As Evsngelicals we are clear that Scripture is the ultimate, true and reliable authority, without error. We, from that have a clear understanding of what the Gospel is, as Scripture teaches . Now, to be honest I don’t know much about the Archbishop so I can’t comment, however most people I’m hearing from are indicating that she is theologically liberal. If that’s so, then that means vicars and bishops are asked to submit to someone who does not believe God’s word and is not able to teach it. This is the crucial reason.
Now, here is the problem. First, that the CofS had already made its decision on complementarianism You can’t keep pushing the issue up the hierarchy for ever. To quote Jungle Book they have now “reached the top and had to stop.”
In any case, on the crucial matter, the CofE has already decided that sound doctrine, the Gospel and authority of Scripture don’t matter. They’ve done that by consistently accommodating liberalism and catholicism. They have done so by appointing those who don’t believe God’s word as vicars, theology lecturers, bishops and previous Archbishops. I think people are entitled to ask you what your real priorities are if you happily stayed in a church that had Runcie, Jenkins and Williams among its bishops and archbishops but only really object when the liberal archbishop is also a woman
Now, I appreciate that these are uncomfortable words for many Anglicans to hear but we need to ask how long can they delay and waiver. It’s time to choose who you serve. In fact it is long long past time.
Faithroots 