Calvin Robinson has emerged as one of the boldest Christian voices in the United Kingdom. This has been the case as he has gone viral for defending the biblical stance on marriage and for being canceled from a British news channel. The Anglican Priest took some time to admonish Papists and others offering pushback against women’s ordination specifically calling out the female priests being ordained.
Just a glimpse of today’s indescribable joy pic.twitter.com/DIUbf1vnaM
— Josie Godfrey (@Josie_Godfrey) June 29, 2024
Robinson’s response to the picture was as follows:
Catholic Twitter needs to take a break.
These photographs mark the happiest day in Josie’s life. She chose to serve God in a way her Church allows.
To those Catholics who would tweet “come home” and think it sufficient: if you truly want to evangelise, try living in Christ. Faith, hope and charity. Not mockery, ridicule and insults. It is easy to tweet “come home”, it is far more difficult to demonstrate why your home is a better place than where one currently resides, especially if you produce such little good fruit.
No, I do not recognise Josie’s orders. Even as an Anglican I would not have. But there is no need to publicly mock and ridicule her, or turn her celebration into a viral tweet. It is uncharitable and unjust.
Instead, appeal to the Church of England to repent for having the audacity to believe it can unilaterally decide to ordain women. Call on the bishops to repent for disregarding both Sacred Scriptures and Sacred Tradition.
The job of the Christian is to disciple the nations. Tearing into a young Christian woman on social media is not going to advance the Kingdom. If anything, you will turn people away from the Church.
Calvin Robinson is specifically addressing Papists, but his criticism is similarly applicable to Evangelicals. Calvin Robinson mistakenly endorses the faith of a female priest who openly opposes biblical sexuality and is serving the heretical Church of England.
It must be said that women like Josie are and intend to be false teachers. Calvin Robinson wants to divorce the sin of the individual from the heresy of the institution. But this is morally untenable. Women’s ordination does not attract godly women.
Moreover, Calvin Robinson resorts to tone policing online conversation, as though the goal of debate is to convince the other side as opposed to shifting the Overton Window as well as the indifferent to one side. Mocking the woman for celebrating her feminist ordination serves multiple edifying purposes for the body of Christ.
First, it is intended to engender shame in the person celebrating as well as those who would follow in their footsteps. Stigmatizing what is evil works and should be done more often, not less.
Secondly, it forces onlookers to consider the issue. Ridicule is effective as well as the perceived popularity of a position. People love to be on the winning side of an issue. Moreover, many Christians have not seriously considered the issue of female pastors and why it is both heretical and dangerous to the church. Inflammatory rhetoric forces a person to take a position more than NPR rhetoric.
Calvin Robinson is actually capitulating to feminism here by being unwilling to call a woman out on her public sin especially as it hinders the ability of the Church of England to come to repentance.
One Response
being english and suffering with this church here is my take: the church of england is the default state religion here. most people of my age will have been baptised into the church and will have had most of their family wed in a CoE church. however the church itself is effectively dead. those marriages, funerals and baptisms which it carries out are merely symbolic, as most of the population are irreligious and the church just offers a means of getting these traditional rites performed for atheists so they can have a nice photo of a given occasion.
when i refound Christ some years ago i checked out the local anglican churches and saw a plethora of women “vicars” and gay-accepting/promoting (and in some cases marrying) churches. i have visited catholic churches here – and while they might not have women priests (yet) they are also very woke. i am sure that in another 10-20 years they will have female “priests” and be performing gay “marriages”.
the only bible believing (and practicing) remnant exists in small independent churches (which however are growing). the anglican church was effectively destroyed in the post-war years by continued progressivism and a congregation which often had little biblical understanding and saw the church as a traditional sunday pastime, rather than anything truly spiritual. if anything – outside of a few relatively minor theological positions – anglicanism and catholicism are effectively the same thing, if anything anglicanism is just catholicism 20 years in the future.