on 'unwinnable wars'

I suppose, on hearing the news of the Church of England General Synod rejecting (by a whisker) the ordination of women as bishops, that United Reformed Church members might be tempted to a bit of smugness. After all, the Congregational Church never had any rule that prohibited women's ordination, so when in Oxford in 1919 Constance Coltman asked whether she could be accepted for ordination the answer was "there's no reason why not". Women had been ordained in our sister churches in America several years before.

Of course the Congregational Church wasn't 'out in front', leading the way for women's rights. The struggle for women's emancipation was not led by the churches — we were only following on, and when emancipation finally came it seemed inappropriate not to recognise that society had moved on. For us it is of course now utterly uncontroversial. All my ministerial colleagues are women.

The missionary Paul was absolutely concerned that nothing should get in the way of the proclamation of the Good News of Jesus. His churches should not be the cause of any sort of 'scandal' that would distract from the real scandal of a crucified Messiah. In 1 Corinthians 9:19 we see him willing to adapt to all sorts of society rules ("When in Rome, do as the Romans do . .") in order to press home the central message.

Today, I believe that the Roman and Anglican churches' failure to recognise the authority of women is a real scandal that does immense harm to the Christian cause — in this country. But in Muslim countries where women's religious role is complete subservience, presumably it would be women ministers that would be a scandal in society. So it's tricky : who, actually, sets the agenda here? Does the Church weakly follow society's 'rules', or does it courageously set the trend? Paul's advice only gets us so far.

I think when it comes down to it, the Church just has to decide what ordination actually means, and what love requires. I am far from convinced that the United Reformed Church knows why it ordains Ministers at all. A recent paper agreed at the recent Wessex Synod requiring us to set up groups of churches (or team pastorates or whatever) seems to see no particular distinctive role for Ministers. We're a 'valuable resource' apparently, but we're not there for any particular reason. So smugness is not an appropriate reaction to the women bishops thing.

The other thing that the press haven't picked up is that the big difference between priests and bishops is that bishops ordain priests. Once you've ordained a woman bishop (I suppose the conservatives are thinking) there really is no going back. But there's no going back anyway — not when even the Archbishops of Canterbury make it abundantly clear that women's ordination is here to stay, even if it still has to be men that do the ordaining.

I find myself thinking that, for the conservative minority, this is an unwinnable 'war'. They must know that. This was really about getting the best terms of surrender, and they've managed to delay the inevitable for a bit longer to the great embarrassment of the vast majority. It's a testament to the grace and patience of that majority.

The other unwinnable war is Israel/Palestine. Those Hamas militants that launch rockets against Israel — surely they must know that they can never defeat Israel militarily? (Sadly, that's a rhetorical question — I'm sure they don't, since they've been pathetically hailing the ceasefire as a 'victory'). One of the key conditions of Just War theory is that the war has to be theoretically 'winnable' and this one isn't. Every rocket and every shell achieves absolutely nothing except further delay in what will ultimately have to be a political solution; and every civilian death only makes that solution harder to achieve. The futility of it all — on both sides — is depressing.

We are approaching Advent — that season when we look for true world leadership that will usher in peace with justice (and ask ourselves whether, when that leadership comes, we will be found 'fit for purpose'). We need real world leadership as never before. Will the example of the Messiah Jesus enable us to recognise it? Will it, when it comes, turn out to be the leadership of a woman?