The debate about the ordination of women bishops in the CoE is being discussed again Rob highlights pro petition and john a case against, and Maggie notes the issue raised in the house.

Having just come out of a day teaching on community organising and change a few thoughts went through my mind. Firstly how the issue of power is so pertinent to many of the anti arguments, the issues of power and control are not explicit in the writing, but bubble under the surface and can be seen by the way names and titles are used, the magic power (as community organisers would call it) as jargon and quotes are couched into the arguments, that bedazzle the reader. Although this can be also seen in some of the pro posts read although to a lesser extent.
The second issue is the general tendency to avoid too much tension and how the strategies for change employed such as petitions are quite weak. There seems to be bit of a lack of imagination in the process for change, (maybe this is why is seems to be taking so long) perhaps because of the avoidance of tension. Creative methods to promote change will need to accept that tension may be caused, but organisers would happily live with this as all action is in the reaction.