CHURCHES POSITIONS ON WOMEN ORDINATION

OPINIONS OF CHURCHES

ON WOMEN ORDINATION

The Celestial Church of Christ, Christ Apostolic Church and Church of the Lord (Aladura) are indigenous Churches which share the blending of Christian and Yoruba religious traditions. Their gender doctrines derive from intersecting ambiguities in Western and African gender practices which both empower and disempower women. There is also an interplay of doctrine and institutional history on gender dynamics, and an interaction of cultural legacy and socio-environmental pressures on the ritualisation of the female body in African setting.

Commenting on the issue, Wale Olofinboba, a don, suspected that the restriction on women in some Churches has African underpinnings. “Before Christianity came”, Olofinboba said, “men in the occult saw women as contaminated and fit to be at the background. There was a limit to women ascendancy in the traditional society. This bias crept into Christianity when their generation accepted the Christian faith. The bedrock of this disregard for women is largely sourced from the impurity associated with the monthly period of women. Rather than see it as a natural phenomenon that confers fertility and completeness on women, menstruation is disdained as a minus that disqualifies women from sacred places.” Olofinboba added, “Menstruation is seen as having a negative supernatural aura and power to destroy or violate spiritual powers. Women in their periods are therefore excluded from altars. In some homes, husbands do not share bedrooms with their wives on account of menstruation contaminating their spiritual powers.

WHITE GARMENT CHURCHES

Akindele Adisa, Shepherd at King of Glory Parish, Celestial Church of Christ, Ikorodu, Lagos, Nigeria disagrees, with Olofinboba. The Celestial Church, he enthused, is not a hater of women on account of their monthly flow, but lover of the instructions of God. “As a matter of doctrine,” Adisa said, “we do not ordain women because the pattern Jesus laid is clear. Paul also built on it. If women were to be made Pastors, Jesus had ample opportunity to do so.

The apostles, who took over from Jesus, also had ample opportunity to do so but none of them did. The people causing confusion in Christianity today are the followers of Barnabas who separated from Paul. Why do we call ourselves Christ followers when we refuse to follow the practices of Jesus Christ?”

The shepherd said, “Women are mandated to stay outside the altar. They cannot stand side-by-side with men and preach or translate. They have their own place to stand in the Church, not the altar. Women who have disobeyed this biblical injunction of staying out of ordination or insisting of staying on the altar joke with terrible sickness for the rest of their lives. Such women die untimely because the angels of God don’t tolerate such disobedience.”
He added that the perception that the Celestial Church restricts women from ordination or the altar on the allegation of impurities associated with monthly period is false. “That is how God created them. We are not against the work of God. Menstruation is a vital part of the nature of women. Any woman who does not have it is not complete. We do not restrict women for this, we simply follow the precept of Jesus and instructions of the apostles”.

ALSO READ >>>
* Who is afraid of female Pastors? >>>
* Why women should be ordained >>>

CHRIST APOSTOLIC CHURCH
In Christ Apostolic Church, both biblical injunctions and cultural reasons were adduced for restricting women as Pastors and in the top hierarchy of the Church. Speaking to e-life, the Ketu District Coordinating Council Superintendent, Moses Yusuf of CAC Oke Igbala, Ikosi said, apart from what the Bible said, it is not immediately clear to him why women would not be ordained as Pastors, even though so many women have founded the CAC branches and are prophetesses. ‘Don’t forget that CAC was founded by Africans or Nigerians specifically and I guess the African thing in the leaders crept into their consciousness and this remained so for so many years until now that things are changing. Right now, women preach in the CAC. Women perform great roles, only we have not sorted out the issue of ordination or women wearing collars as Pastors. Women can plant Churches but they would require their husbands to be the heads of the Churches. This is biblical. We are a Bible-based Church and would not contradict the Bible.’

Yusuf added that those who say the CAC is chauvinistic and against women are wrong. “When women have their programmes, women lead them. Women preach. Women participate very well in naming ceremonies. The opportunity for women to rise and lead the Church is not impossible. We should realise that in a cultural society like ours, things take process and time. The sky is the limit for women in our Church. No one is restricting them but we should give it the time it requires. Who says one day, women can’t rise and lead in a dynamic world? The CAC Church is not static.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

The Catholic Church is another denomination that restricts women from ordination as priests and Church leadership. Writing on Gender Bias in the Roman Catholic Church: Why Can’t Women be Priests? Cheryl Y. Haskins traced the exclusion of women from priestly roles and leadership of the Catholic Church to The Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, released by the Vatican under Pope Paul VI in 1977.

According to him, the declaration was on the question of Admission of Women to the Ministerial Priesthood. The Declaration stated that the Church, “in fidelity to… the Lord, does not consider herself authorised to admit women to priestly ordination.

The Declaration explains the Church’s position by exploring her constant tradition, the attitude of Christ and the practice of the Apostles. The Sacred Congregation contends that, beyond considerations inspired by the spirit of the times, canonical documents express the essential reason for not allowing women to be priests, namely, by calling only men to the priestly order and ministry, the Church intends to remain faithful to the type of ordained ministry willed by Jesus Christ and maintained by the Apostles. The Church’s tradition has been firm, conforming to the model left by Jesus. The Sacred Congregation maintained that God mandated that only men are to be ordained to priestly ministry. Till date, that is the position of the Catholic Church.

Speaking further on the position of the Anglican Church, Reverend Father Paul Adekoya of the Catholic Church, Magodo, Lagos said the Church stands solidly on Biblical instructions. Citing several portions of the Bible like 1 Timothy 2 and 1 Corinthians 14, supporting these with the examples laid by Jesus and the Apostles, Adekoya said it would amount to error if the Catholic Church goes outside these to satisfy the whims of men. “The catholic Church did not establish Christianity. We were only the custodian of a tradition and teachings gotten directly from the master. We don’t have the right to contaminate it.”

THE ANGLICAN CHURCH

In the Nigerian Anglican Church, women are not ordained as priests though they have their roles in the Church. This is in sharp contrast to the Church of England that resolved to admit women to the episcopate in 2014. The
Church of England’s Synod voted in favour of measures that would pave the way for women to be ordained as bishops. The synod voted 351 members in favour of the measures, 72 opposed and 10 abstained.

The Anglican Bishop of Ngbo in Ebonyi State, Rt. Rev. Christian Ebisike, described the decision as a deviation from Bible’s teachings. Ebisike said: “The Archbishop of Canterbury (Justin Welby) and by extension the Church of England did not do their homework very well and I do not think they consulted widely with other Provinces of the Anglican Communion.

“The Church of England should see itself as a role model for the Anglican Communion, but unfortunately it is not living up to that role.
“From the Bible and Church history, there was no woman apostle.
“Women served as evangelists and teachers in the early church.
“A bishop is a universal figure.
“Where a bishop is not recognized by some parts of the communion, that is not a bishop.
“When you ordain a bishop and he is not recognized by some parts of the communion, that is not a bishop.”

In a publication titled Women Ordination and Church of Nigeria Anglican Communion, the position of the Anglican Church is clearly stated:

• The faith and order of the Anglican Communion are the faith and order of the Church Catholic. We have no authority to change that order by admitting women to the episcopate and priesthood without a consensus of historic Christendom.
• The sexuality of Jesus is no accident; it is the flesh of his incarnation by God’s own act. This male image is continued by Christ’s choice of male apostles, and their choice of apostolic men to succeed them. This cannot be dismissed as “cultural conditioning” without disparaging the Jewishness of Jesus.
• The persisting tradition of two thousand years in church order reveals the mind of the Spirit for the future of the ministry of the church. Christian priesthood has consistently been male through cultures of varying sexual patterns. To obey the Spirit, we must be faithful to this history.
• The priests of the church have no priesthood of their own; they participate in Christ’s priesthood. Ordination is a gift of the Holy Spirit which bestows this participation. It is not the creation of the church to do with as it will. It is to be given only to those congruous with the example of Jesus Christ, the authority of Holy Scriptures and the witness of Christian tradition. There is no right to priesthood.
• If women ordination is allowed in the Church of Nigeria Anglican Communion, it will make the priesthood office a family affair, and that will cause a split and a lot conflict in the Church.
• With the uncertainty of the stand of Church of Nigeria and divergence of perception and opinion, if the Church of Nigeria through her leadership approves the ordination of women as priest, definitely it will erupt serious conflict in that some will quickly ordain women, while others will threaten to pull out or even breakaway from Church of Nigeria in disagreement; because it might result also to bishops ordaining their wives with other discrepancies in order to get the Bishopric throne. It will chaotic and serious conflict will be the end point.

In summary, the issue of women ordination in the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) is a conflicting process since many are on the opposing side and others on the proposing side, thus, the issue has not been brought to a definite conclusion up till now, as it is placed on hold till further deliberations and conclusion.