York Friend comments on ordination
Barbara Windle spoke to Radio Five Live about the ordination of Libby Lane
Barbara Windle, of York Area Meeting, spoke on Radio Five Live on 26 January about the ordination of the Church of England’s first woman bishop.
Presenter Adrian Chiles asked Barbara for her thoughts, as a Quaker, on the ordination.
She said: ‘The Quakers are in the fortunate position, if I can put it that way, of not feeling the need for any ordained ministry at all. We have had a very strong testimony to equality, since the start, in the seventeenth century. Women have for a long, long time, been absolutely equal in the Quaker movement…For instance, our chief executive officers have just as often been female as male, and the people who hold – just for a short time, because we only hold posts for a short time – voluntary posts, are again equally divided between men and women. We’ve not had a problem with that.’
Adrian asked Barbara whether the ordination of bishop Libby Lane seemed ‘rather archaic’.
‘I’m delighted for them, that they’ve made this first tiny step, but it does seem rather amazing that in this day and age people haven’t got further,’ she replied.
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