If church leaders are all men, can women be heard – A Presbyterian debate.

Here are two recent comments from Aussie Presbyterians – from a church which has only male ministers, and in VIctoria and Queensland, only male elders. A move to have only male members in NSW is in limbo as their Assembly works through a worker health and safety complaint. (Am I allowed to say limbo about Presbyterians?) The Presbyterian Church of Australia can fairly be regarded as the largest consistently complementarian church in Australia that has a national spread.

The first comes from an interview in the AP magazine –Tasmanian Minister Mark Powell asked Murray Capill, Dean of Ministry Development at the Reformed Theological College how to “to consult and engage with particularly women in our congregations? From your experience and observation, what are some really good and constructive ways of doing that on a practical level?”

Capill responds “Well, let me start off just honestly saying from my experience and observation, lots of us don’t do that well. And I think it’s almost like the more strongly committed we are to complementarianism, the less complementarian we’ve been. It was a very essence of a complimentary theology is that men and women compliment each other. And so whilst the elders are called to lead the church and take responsibility for that, we need to find ways of constantly engaging the wisdom and insight and perspective of women. And I don’t think we should have the view that women only do women’s ministry. Women do ministry. Women are great at discipling and understanding and opening up God’s word. I mission evangelism. There’s so many areas where an eldership team needs the input of good value women in the life of the church.” 

The second comment is from an AP article by Lauren Riske, who writes opposing “some”shadow elders” – suggestions such as committees including women for elders to consult. Riske makes a rigorous defence of the principle of an all-male eldership. The principle of “If elders are not doing their job properly and are not engaging with the women in their church (or any other congregation member for that matter!), the solution is not to formalise female leadership.  The solution is for elders to get back to the biblical pattern as outlined in the New Testament, address their blind spots, and be better elders.  If elders cannot themselves submit to the biblical guidelines for eldering, then they should resign.”  

Riske and Capill at least suggest a possibility things are not working well in some places at least.

Their comments continue a discussion around On Men and Women in Ministry and Leadership in the PCA, a report to the Presbyterians General Assembly by the Women’s Ministry Committee of the PCA.

The report found that many women felt they were not heard.

“More than 50% of people in our churches cannot affirm the statement,‘Women trust the elders in this church with issues specifically related to women (e.g. domestic violence, sexism)’.

“Less than 50% of women believe that women:
• are consulted by the elders regarding the direction of this church.
• are encouraged to develop their theological training in their local church.

“More than 30% of women in our churches feel limited in what they can do in church.”

“Sessions,” bodies made up of local church elders and ministers, are recommended by the GAA to consider:

• Setting up a women’s advisory group whom they liaise with on specific issues.
• Inviting key women of their church to its Session meetings for a discussion that would inform its decision-making.
• Choosing to appoint some key women in their church to a ‘co-worker’ position and give them the privileges of an associate while Session sits. 
• Prioritising a female staff worker in the early stages of growing a pastoral team.
• Providing training for women in ministry and discipleship skills 

But formal structures to involve women in session meetings have received strong pushback such as Riske’s piece, with advocates preferring a system called “Fixed orders of the day” In October the Victorian assembly passed an overture/motion to “Encourage all Sessions, Presbyteries and the Assembly’s Business Committee to make use of fixed orders of the day in hearing from women in local and wider church ministry.” The Other Cheek takes this to mean that these commitees can invite women to take part in meetings on an ad hoc rather than continuing basis. That is to comment byt note vote.

A new piece by Mark Powell “Presbyterian Men and Women” is a follow-up to Riske. Despite describing his church as having a woman evangelist and “inviting women to meetings” Powell argues against permanent women’s committees: “The session here regularly invites women to its meetings to talk about their respective ministries, Powell writes. “We also have a number of women deacons (as well as our Board of Management) who care for the practical needs of the congregation.”

But he strongly opposes the Women’s Ministry Committee of the PCA’ proposals listed above.

“First, any “women’s advisory group” in the life of local congregation would be a female version of session, albeit without the power or authority to make any decisions. This is tokenistic at best. What woman would only want to advise a session, Presbytery, State or even a national Assembly? Alternatively, which one of these bodies would have the courage to ignore their advice so as not to appear misogynistic?

“Second, the deeper problem with these proposals is they misunderstand the nature of Christian leadership. Elders are not elected to represent the views and interests of various groups of people in the congregation. They are appointed as Christ’s under-shepherds to represent Him. To care and tend to the flock for whom they will be held accountable. Accordingly, men are not represented by male elders.

“Third, to formally ‘associate’ someone to a session, who is not ordained to a similar office, is problematic. This is done with people who hold a similar position in another church court. While the WMPCA wants to uphold male eldership, it is advocating a position which will have the effect of paving the way for women to be ordained as well. Ideas always have consequences. And the suggestion of associating a woman to the session will have the effect practically of normalising a situation which is abnormal to Presbyterian polity.”

An issue raised in the debate is whether male-only committees will succeed in giving women pathways to raise issues of domestic abuse or clergy abuse. All churches were served notice on this question in the religion section of the final report of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse.

“In some religious institutions, the absence or insufficient involvement of women in leadership positions and governance structures negatively affected decision-making and accountability, and may have contributed to inadequate institutional responses to child sexual abuse. Leaders of both the Catholic Church and the Anglican Church told us they believed that the involvement of women in leadership positions would contribute to making their institutions safer for children.”

The PCA, with its male-only eldership in two of its stronger state branches, Victoria and Queensland and NSW, attempting to move in that direction, could be seen to be unresponsive to that suggestion.

However, In NSW, Tasmania, WA and ACT, the Breaking The Silence organisation is a PCA response to Abuse, training and assisting people to report abuse. Victoria has their Safe Church Unit.

Churches that do not wish to have permanent positions for women in leadership will need to demonstrate how they plan to be effective in combatting child sexual abuse. Both Capill and Riske – with their different opinions about whether the PCA needs standing committees to make sure women are heard – can be seen as urging the church to do better.