"Brothers and sisters in the body of Christ are in partnership, not competition" said Moore College Principal John Woodhouse at the launch of the Priscilla & Aquila Centre this week.
Dr Woodhouse and the Centre's director Jane Tooher officially opened a conference, which was the Centre's first event.
He described its core business as “the encouragement of the ministries of women in partnership with men.”
Dr Woodhouse expressed the hope that the centre "will enrich, multiply and expand the ministries of women."
Complementarian viewpoint
The Moore College Principal said the centre will work from a “Complementarian” understanding of the relationship between men and women.
He told the group "For some years 'Gender Complementarity' has been included in the formal statement of the 'Values' held by Moore College:… the fundamental equality and mutual dependence of men and women as image bearers of God, while recognising proper differences in roles and responsibilities in life and Christian ministry."
This position, Dr Woodhouse said "needs to be explained more fully than that, it may need to be re-examined, perhaps reformulated, probably defended. Its goodness and value need to be investigated and its practical implications worked out. The Centre will be doing all this, but in a less defensive way than may have been necessary in the past."
Centre aims
The Founding Director, Jane Tooher, provided a glimpse of the origins of the Centre and some of her hopes for its work.
"I think generally within Complementarian circles, whether here in Sydney or more broadly, we can do a lot more serious and creative thinking about the application end of Complementarianism. e.g. We can at times too quickly separate men and women’s ministries – many times this is helpful – but sometimes it might be best to do more things together."
"We can at times have our church services look almost exactly the same every week – What is appropriate for women to do upfront in the service? What appropriate teaching is there? And not just in the church service. The application end of Complementarianism has so much potential for good."
Before a range of speakers addressed the conference topic "Male and Female He Created Them’, Jane Tooher told the delegates that she hoped the Centre would encourage and strengthen the training of women for ministry anfd promote a wide range of ministries by women, in genuine complementary partnership with the ministries of men.
She also hoped it would encourage and support women to pursue postgraduate theological study at Moore as well as to write and publish at both a popular and academic level.
The speakers acknowledged the support and funding help of the Anglican Deaconess Institution.
Photo: Jane Tooher, Gillian Davidson (ADI) , Archbishop Jensen, John Woodhouse and Karin Sowada (ADI)
