Women Bishops

Next week the general Synod of the Church of England will discuss the consecration of women Bishops.There are a large number of opponents to the move, citing quotations from the bible such as that in 1 Timothy which seem to oppose the motion.

I have no doubt that like the consecration of gay Bishops, views are sincerely held on both sides of the debate but I wonder if a voice of caution from outside the religious community might be in order.

The reference to scripture as a guide to procedure, is to my mind an unsound foundation for any argument. It is known that the Holy Bible is not really the word of God, in the same way that the Qu'ran cannot be because in truth they are both collated and assembled by man. The established Bible was put togetherin the first century by Church fathers, selecting those work of scripture that best fitted the picture they wanted to portray.The Hebrew Bible of 39 books is the Old Testament, the Christian Bible is 66 books of the Old and New Testament and the Ethiopian Bible has 81 books. That man is responsible for deciding what does and doesn't constitute the Canon, to my mind invalidates any claim to it being Divinely Inspired. Many works such as those found at Nag Hammadi must have been known to the compilers and discounted because they didn't fit their, not God's, vision. I'm thinking of the Gospels of Judah and Mary Magdalene but there are many more known to Gnostics. In the same way, those who compiled the Qu'ran ignored the so called 'Satanic Verse' revelations of Mohammed, because they argued they came from Satan rather than the Angel Gabriel. How very convenient.

Now I know I may be naive and what I'm about to say is possibly trite, but why, if there is an omnipotent God, do the so called Words of God, leave so much confusion. The Islamicists for instance do not know whether they should proceed according to either Shi'ite or Sunnee custom. Both the Bible and the Qu'ran refer and accept the concept of slavery. How could this be? The Words of God should surely be appropriate for all peoples at all times.
If not, perhaps now would be a timely moment for some Divine Intervention to clarify matters. I won't be holding my breath.