Option

Principal features

Advantages

Disadvantages

• No provisions

N/A

• Ecclesiological clarity
• Women’s ministry fully recognized
• No need for legislation for special pastoral provisions for those opposed

• Departure from principles of 1988 and 1998 Lambeth Conference resolutions, and the Eames Report, and the General Synod’s 1993 legislation re women priests
• Likely to lead to significant defections, with possible high short-term cost of special financial provisions
• Even if acceptable to the General Synod, questions would remain as to whether the Ecclesiastical Committee of Parliament would find such a Measure expedient

• Code of Practice agreed by the House of Bishops

• Similar to ‘extended episcopal ministry’ model but without formal synodical provision

• Avoids the requirement for formal synodical agreement
• Potentially more flexible

• Dependent on episcopal goodwill
• Probably not regarded as adequate provision by those opposed (see also considerations above)

• Extended Episcopal ministry

• Parishes would petition their diocesan bishop for extended episcopal ministry
• Diocesan bishop remains the ordinary

• Follows precedent of the 1993 Act of Synod
• Does not break with jurisdiction of diocesan bishops

• Might not fully meet the pastoral needs of those opposed, especially as they would need to accept the canonical authority of women bishops (and the basis on which bishops providing such episcopal care were consecrated)
• Would perpetuate the pastoral strain of the current arrangements

• Extended provincial episcopal ministry

• As above but parishes would petition the archbishop of the province (with the permission of the diocesan bishop who remains the ordinary)

• Reduces potential difficulties arising if the diocesan bishop is a woman

• Dependent on recognition of the archbishop’s authority, even if he consecrated women bishops (would not work if either archbishop were a woman)
• Does not sit easily with the ecclesiological model of the diocesan being the ordinary (see also first bullet point above)

• ‘Third (or Free) Province’

• Parishes would – by some new synodical provision – petition for alternative episcopal oversight
• Episcopal care would be outside the framework of territorial diocesan jurisdiction

• Meets perceived pastoral needs of some of those opposed
• Might remove a source of friction within the ‘mainstream’ Church of  England

• Those opposed would still need to remain in communion with the See of Canterbury to remain Anglican
• Break with traditional Anglican ecclesiology re the territoriality of dioceses: perception that it would be legislating for schism
• Potential practical and legal difficulties re finance, administration, etc.
• Sets a precedent for separate jurisdictions on other issues