Church of England consecrates first female bishop

LONDON, United Kingdom — The male monopoly in the leadership of the Church of England ended Monday, as the 500-year-old institution consecrated its first female bishop.

The Rev. Libby Lane became the eighth Bishop of Stockport in a service at York Minster. Her consecration comes after the church ended a long and divisive dispute by voting last year to allow women to serve as bishops.

“My consecration service is not really about me,” she said. “With echoes of practice which has been in place for hundreds of years in the church, it is a reminder that what I am about to embark on is shared by the bishops around me, by those who have gone before me and those who will come after.”

The traditional service was interrupted by a lone protester, the Rev. Paul Williamson. He stepped forward and objected when the congregation was asked if it was their will that Lane be ordained. Williamson said “No!” and asked to speak, arguing there was no precedent in the Bible for women bishops.

Lane remained stoic. The archbishop of York, John Sentamu, seemed prepared and answered with a prepared statement, a nod to the controversy that led to this moment.

Sentamu then simply moved on, asking the packed church once again if they approved. This time, the response was a thunderous “Yes!”

Dozens of bishops then huddled around Lane. They placed their hands on her head — or on the shoulders of the bishop in front of them — creating an enormous circle tinged with the red of their vestments.

Williamson said later he regretted that his intervention was not heard.

“It would have been gracious and courteous to allow me to say my piece,” he said. “But no.”

A saxophone player and soccer fan, Lane was one of the first women to become a Church of England priest.

Her husband, also a priest, sat beside her.

source: newsinfo.inquirer.net

Pope: Concern for the poor is Gospel–not communism

VATICAN CITY—Pope Francis is insisting that his concern for the poor and critique of the global economic system isn’t some novel, communist-inspired ideology but rather the original and core “touchstone” of the Christian faith.

Some US conservatives have branded the first Latin American Pope a Marxist for his frequent critiques of consumerism and focus on a Church “that is poor and for the poor.”

But in an interview contained in a new book, Francis explains that his message is rooted in the Gospel and has been echoed by Church fathers since Christianity’s first centuries.

“The Gospel does not condemn the wealthy, but the idolatry of wealth, the idolatry that makes people indifferent to the call of the poor,” Francis says in “This Economy Kills,” a study of the Pope’s economic and social teachings, excerpts of which were provided on Sunday to The Associated Press.

Specifically, Francis summarized a verse from the Gospel of Matthew that is the essential mission statement of his papacy: “I was hungry, I was thirsty, I was in prison, I was sick, I was naked and you helped me, clothed me, visited me, took care of me.”

“Caring for our neighbor, for those who are poor, who suffer in body and soul, for those who are in need: this is the touchstone. Is it pauperism? No. It is the Gospel.”

He cites Church fathers dating to St. Ambrose and St. John Chrysostom as expressing the same concerns, and noted somewhat wryly that if he had said the same “some would accuse me of giving a Marxist homily.”

“As we can see, this concern for the poor is in the Gospel, it is within the tradition of the Church, it is not an invention of communism and it must not be turned into some ideology, as has sometimes happened before in the course of history,” an apparent reference to the Latin American-inspired liberation theology.

“This Economy Kills,” by two seasoned Vatican reporters, comes out this week in Italian.

source: newsinfo.inquirer.net