Special Hearings — Faith Community Hearings — 1997-11-17

MS JOYCE SEROKE: Bishop Michael, I would like to through you, commend the CPSA   for coming to grips at last after a long and painful process of accepting women   as priests in the church, but I would like to know what is the church doing   to empower those women for meaningful participation with in the church?

BISHOP MICHAEL NUTALL: Do you mean women priests or clergy, or women at large?   Women clergy. Thank you. Chairperson, as you will know this is a fairly recent   development within the life of our church. It goes back to 1992. Perhaps we   should have made that decision long before, but like so many other churches   in this respect throughout the world, we have been on a journey and all of us   have had to come to a profound change of mind when we've come to the point of   accepting women clergy should be as free to operate within the life of our church   as men clergy. So, we've only been involved in this for the past five years.   We now have something like 23 women clergy out of 120 within the diocese, which   I'm part of. I like to think that increasingly we are making space for them   to participate fully in our affairs. We already have one of these priests as   an Archdeacon and as a member of the advisory body to the Bishop and the diocese   of finance and trustees. So perhaps the progress has been reasonable within   the short time in which we have enacted, but there's still a very long way to   go, and part of that long way to go is the need for the mindset to change because   so many of us across the board, this is not a white or black phenomenon, but   across the board, so many of us particularly those of us who are male but not   only men, have got to make a major inner adjustment to this new reality within   the life of our church. But as I said just now, I think that a new liberating   process is underway for men and women alike in this process.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you. Thomas?

THOMAS MANTHATA: Bishop, I'm not asking any new question. This has been raised   by Brigalia when she was addressing the issue of poverty. It was raised by ICT   and it was raised by Virginia and Joyce. That is the issue of education and   the moral decay. My simple question is does the Anglican church consider reviving   or establishing schools at community level because that is where this country   will begin to address the issue of moral decay. It is at that level that we   can begin to address even issues of crime. Does the church begin to say we can   revive church schools at community level? We quite appreciate what we have already,   that is the St. Johns, St Marks and Barnabus and so on. To me they are valuable,   they perform sterling work, but they are few and far between.

BISHOP MICHAEL NUTALL: Chairperson, I think that what Mr. Tom Manthata has   raised is of enormous importance. I am not sure what the pattern is throughout   the life of our church, but certainly I think there is a desire to move in this   direction. We have recently in the diocese that I come from, seen the establishment   of half a dozen schools at local community level, initiated by parishes as a   result of a synod resolution asking for exactly that to take place. Together   with the foundation of two new bigger ventures than local community ventures,   schools more like the ones that you have just mentioned. So we are following   up on that tradition and the whole idea is to try and fill that vacuum that   has existed ever since the Bantu Education Act came into being and we lost our   schools for one reason or another as a result of that legislation and a sense   of the need for the church to re-engage in a whole new creative way in the whole   education process. And certainly that will be one of the areas in which we will   try to exercise our influence in regard to the spiritual and moral life of the   nation. May I just add in that regard that for me in regard to moral reconstruction,   one of the most crucial things as I see it is for people to helped, young and   older people alike, particularly the young, to be helped in this new dispensation   of freedom in which we find ourselves to make responsible choices. There are   some who seem to want to return to earlier tyrannies and censorships of the   past. I say no. We need to accept the reality of the new atmosphere of freedom   under which we now operate. But it lays upon us an even heavier responsibility   to assist one another, and particularly the young, in the making of responsible   choices and earning and living by those choices. And so there are a new set   of r's. We talked about the three r's of reading, writing and arithmetic. The   three r's of rights, responsibilities and relationships. Rights with responsibilities   exercised in the context of affirming relationships. That is where the making   of responsible choices really begins to come in and have some impact. And certainly   as part of that process we need to be engaging as much as we can with the schooling   process.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. I had hoped that in the very moving submission   that you made, that we might have had an opportunity of a description of one   of the extraordinary moments when God just manifests God's self at that synod   when one person got up to confess our complicity in apartheid and it started   off with a white person and before the end of that session, virtually everybody   in the synodbut I don't think we have the time to do that now. I just   want to say thank you very much to both of you for the contribution that you   have made to the particular process and might I use the privilege of being the   Chairperson to pay my own particular tribute to you Michael, who was my, as   you said, my number two to Tutu, when you were the Dean of the province, for   your incredible support in those days made possible my own ministry. I just   want to say thank you in this particular gathering. But also to say thank you   to all of those in the synod of Bishops and in the CPSA who gave support at   times when it wasn't so popular to give that support. Thank you very much. You   may stand down.
We call on the representatives of the Church of England in South Africa. My   dear brothers, Bishop Retief, you will introduce your colleague, but we want   to welcome you very warmly and say thank you for the witness of your church,   and especially of St. James in Cape Town after the horrendous thing that happened   there. I am sure there will be some reference to that but we just want to say   that we were proud of what you and your congregation did and said in response   to that and we welcome you. Thank you for coming. Do you want to introduce them   first so that we know who are taking the oath, if 
they are taking the oath?

BISHOP RETIEF: Thank you Chairperson for your kind comments and warm welcome.   Our presiding Bishop is unable to be with us today and our delegation consists   of myself, the area Bishop of the Cape area, and next to me is Bishop Martin   Morrison from Gauteng, then the Reverend Elias Majozi, who represents Bishop   Jeremiah Ngobani from Bekethembi, and Mr. Noel Wright is the General Secretary   of the Church of England in South Africa. We have another representative sitting,   Reverend Ernie du Plooy, sitting up there in the audience, but he is there to   cheer us on.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much. Would you then stand to affirm or take the   oath? 
ADMINISTERS OATH.