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| June Osborne, Dean at Salisbury Cathedral (getty) Source: Telegraph |
Already displaying a taste for purple, the bishop designate of Llandaff is the Dean of Salisbury, the Very Rev June Osborne. Announced on Twitter on the heels of a tweet by the Rev Peter Ould there will no doubt be considerable shock in Llandaff, still the most Anglo Catholic diocese in the Province despite the former Archbishop's attempts to eradicate it in favour of nonconformity.
Dean Osborne was tipped to become the first woman bishop in the Church of England. Instead she is the second woman bishop in the Church in Wales with possibly a third next year if +John Davies retires.
Ironically June Osborne is only three months younger than +John. She was involved in an 'unholy row' with a plan to move Salisbury Cathedral School from its home in the Bishop's Palace which created "divisions between parents and the church hierarchy" so Llandaff should feel like home from home. No doubt we shall be hearing more about the Osborne Report too, some solace for the gay community which was known to be desperate to avoid a woman bishop.
When he became President of the USA Lyndon Johnson was asked why he hadn't removed J Edgar Hoover as head of the FBI. With typical command of the vernacular he replied, "I'd rather have him inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in." Having been forced from the tent, Dr John's bladder must be at bursting pointa
ReplyDeleteHe may have tried to 'eradicate'Anglo Catholicism in Llandaf diocese in favor of nonconformity, but one senses that nonconformity prefer to eradicate Him instead.He is now a hasbeen.God bless 'Grecian 2000'.
ReplyDeleteSigh.
ReplyDeleteWill the last person to leave the Church please turn out the lights before they go.....
It can hardly come as much of a surprise that the Bench continues to stick two fingers up to those who refuse to accept priestesses.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how long it will be before we are subjected to more cries of "homophobia!" because she's not a lesbian?
ReplyDeleteA reminder of the activities of the lady herself in full flow:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.facebook.com/spirefm/videos/vb.123993850962952/1330343006994691/?type=2&theater (scroll to around 3.45)
Fantastic - a people person, someone willing to roll up her sleeves and be alongside people who feel marginalised and demeaned. You are right, Flossie - here is Dean June in full flow - not ashamed to count herself as one alongside those on the margins of the church.
DeleteI am overjoyed that the Bench have appointed June as our Bishop.
Can someone explain why women priests look so odd?
ReplyDeleteMrs. Osborne looks like a school dinner lady or a cuddly lollipop lady.
She will officially take up her post on Bastille Day-which may be remarkably apt ; CinW revolution!
The new Bishop of Llandaff, Hyacinth Bucket.
DeleteChildish and utterly misogynist.
DeleteWell, hell ... why should women priests be any different from men priests? Fun game to play over your gin & tonics: pick a random male priest out of any line-up and ask yourself "would I want to crawl in bed with him after a drink or two?" Do it a few more times, till you have an statistically meaningful sample, and then work out the percentages.
DeleteInteresting game to consider with the bank holiday coming up. I'll have to order in some Gin.
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DeleteThese are dark days to which the lemmings have brought a once noble Church. The bells of heaven are not ringing tonight. Empty churches with empty pews punctuate what were once our parishes. Disarray and smiling assassins stalk every cathedral close and have scattered the flock. The faithful have departed.
ReplyDeleteWhat utter rubbish
Delete@The Watchmen: what sound judgement .
DeleteWell, there we are. Good luck to the bishop-designate. Significant that no candidate with direct, recent experience of ministry in the Diocese, nor the Province, was appointed.
ReplyDeleteMason
A fresh start with a Bishop who will bring experience as a Dean and is in her own right a sharp theological mind
DeleteAnother (Welsh speaking) "best person for the job"? - and so soon after the last one!
ReplyDeleteI don't think so.
No one up to the job in Wales? Or no one with any self respect willing to touch it with a barge-pole?
As she exultantly told the BBC, Wales now has a higher proportion of bishopresses than any other province in the Anglican Communion. What chance of alternative episcopal provision for those in the two biggest dioceses who are not interested in the Ordinariate? The second time the choice has gone to the Bench sitters, it just confirms their contempt and complete absence of pastoral care for cradle Anglicans.
Or with at least a smattering of Welsh......why not Jenny Tilston?
ReplyDeleteQuite so Anonymous Mason. I can hardly wait for the Sunday morning Radio Cymru programme when the Reverend John Roberts compounds the deception by getting her to read a script in the Welsh language in an attempt to deceive us that she is competent in the language. It did not work in the case of the Michelin Man from St Asaph or the Wench of Abergwili. Do you know of a single English Bishop who can not speak English?
ReplyDeleteAnonymous
DeleteDa iawn, llongyfarchiadau i'r Watchman. Mae'r gogledd yn rowlio chwerthin dwi'n siwr.
Clifford Williams
Respectfully - "Michelin Man from St Asaph or the Wench of Abergwili" - learn to speak kindly and with charity before you fuss over whether others can speak welsh (or not).
DeleteIt was the only way they could get themselves out of they corner they painted themselves into. Now its Cameron for Archbishop and Jenny for his assistant. No oversight for Anglo-Catholics in LLandaff ( expect a gesture from June)...or even the evangelicals in Gabalfa.
ReplyDeletePS...it could have been worse......the Dean of York..and she doesn't stand any messing. they had a party in Leicester when she moved to York.
ReplyDeleteI have become an enthusiastic doubter about womens’ ordination over the past decade, not least because of Barry Morgan’s mindless ideological stance which has meant mediocrity has triumphed over meritocracy (cf Peggy the Pilate, Wigley, Rowland-Jones, Cyanide Sue and all the rest of them).
ReplyDeleteHowever, I think readers of this blog have reason to be hopeful, despite the potential for nuclear fallout between Anglo Catholics in Llandaff and their new bishop. I lived in Salisbury for four years before returning to Wales a couple of years ago. These are my reasons for saying what I do:
• This is a complete and unequivocal break with the Morgan era. She may appear to be on the same platform as the Golfer (and he will doubtless hail the appointment); but she will have been aghast at many of his underhand methods. She comes with none of the internal baggage of the C in W from the past decade and more. This is a new broom – and an effective one. It won’t be long before Barry Morgan is a distant memory.
• Osborne is rigorously professional, and does not tolerate second-best. If I were the Golf Caddy in the Deanery, I would be sleeping very uneasily. Expect, in due course, a sideways move to ‘another appropriate sphere of ministry’ once she gets her teeth into him.
• She is a Deputy Lord Lieutenant of Wiltshire and understands the Church’s public role. She knows how to speak intelligently to the wider public, and will be able to cultivate relationships with ‘stakeholders’ which Morgan, Peggy, Smith, Capon and the rest of them have singularly failed to do, because they are incapable of functioning beyond the safety of ‘The Church.’
• She will quickly whip the Bench Sitters into shape. She will certainly put Joanna of Dyfed where she belongs. She will also quickly see off Andy Pandy. It’s only a matter of time before we learn that Wales’s biggest excuse for a bishop is stepping aside to spend more time with his jogging shorts.
• She will put an end to the culture of unaccountable opaqueness. She might go through secretaries like a knife through butter, and has a track record of being brutal with colleagues who do not step up to the mark. But she is completely candid.
• She will also address the abysmal pool of talent in the Church in Wales. She will not be impressed by the degree to which there has been a drain of talent throughout Morgan’s time at the helm. Unlike Morgan, she is not threatened by the superior ability of others, and I am confident that Llandaff can expect a wholesale change of culture - and personnel.
• Despite her long years as a campaigner, as part of W(I)ATCH, my sense is that she will be more generous to traditionalists than Morgan or the other Bench Sitters. I may be wrong, but her commitment to minorities, and having lived for many years with the Church of England’s settlement on this issue, may mean she is more relaxed about alternative provision. Let’s see.
Thanks for your in-depth analysis of the new Bishop of Llandaff. If she's as rigorously professional as you say then she will surely waste no time in sorting out the considerable mess in the diocese. I too have heard good reports from Salisbury and she favours hard work and honesty. Both are in short supply at Llandaff Cathedral!
DeleteYou intrigue me Scapegoat. From your posts I suspect that we know each other. Far from being the victim in this unholy mess I believe you to be an instigator and an Arch villain. Coward come out!
ReplyDeleteVictim, who said I was a victim? None of us our victims - it's all a choice in terms of whether we are for charity or whether we wish to adopt the bullish language of wench/fatty.
DeleteFrom Mervyn's blog above this is great news, I don't feel the least bit victimised - never have.
Ooooh You do seem to have got your knickers in a twist dearie. Man up and get out there to deal with the world and the created order as it is.
DeleteWhere are all the luvvies at this early hour of the day in the real world.
"dearie", "luvvie" - I think you have the wrong person in mind, watchman. No knickers in a twist here, no tantrums, just genuinely agree with Mervyn above.
DeleteMy reference to wench/fatty is the unfortunate way you wrote about two of our bishops - I don't think it's acceptable to use language like that and so wanted to call you up on it. No rant, just disappointment in you.