The long road to women’s ordination in Poland
“I wept when I had to hear the Synod’s decision in April 2016,” recalls Agnieszka Godfrejow-Tarnogorska (44) of the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in Poland (hereinafter – ECACP). Her church had just decided that deacons are permitted to administer Holy Communion – that is one more step closer to full ordination of women.
Yet it was a bittersweet victory. Initially the Synod voted on women’s ordination, and although a majority voted in favour, it failed to obtain the required two-thirds majority needed to change church law. Agnieszka Godfrejow-Tarnogorska regards this improvement on the matter of deacons as a compromise. “It is good that there are different levels of ministry in the congregations,” she says, “but I am completely convinced that my personal vocation is to be an ordained pastor.”
The LWF assessment of gender equality
Delegates from the women’s pre-assembly meeting in Windhoek, Namibia, discussed at their gathering the question of ordained women, as well as the question of gender equality.
Following the LWF’s introduced Gender Justice Policy (GJP), the Communion office began a baseline assessment entitled “Participation in the Ordained Ministry and Leadership of LWF Member Churches.” The results were published in 2016; one of the findings of the assessment showed that 82% of LWF member churches ordain women.
The long road to women’s ordination
Godfrejow-Tarnogorska’s church is one of many examples of those travelling the long road to women’s ordination. Since 1963, women who had graduated in theology were permitted to teach, to lead church worship services and to provide pastoral care. In 1999 the ordination of women as deaconesses was introduced. From that time women could conduct charitable and missionary services, lead worship, weddings, funerals and celebrate the sacrament of baptism, as well as assist in the distribution of Holy Communion. Despite this, women were not allowed to lead a congregation, and until 2017 were not permitted to consecrate Holy Communion.
In 2014, the Polish bishop Jerzy Samiec began a process entitled “Woman in Ordained Ministry.” The process concluded with the April Synod of 2016, when 38 members voted in favour of admitting women to full ordained ministry, 26 against, 4 abstained; 48 votes were needed for the vote to pass.
A long history of service to the church
Like the majority of other women in Poland, Godfrejow-Tarnogorska completed her theology studies at the Christian Theological Academy in Warsaw in 1997. Since then she has worked in her church in several positions, from time to time on a voluntary basis. “I use every opportunity to strengthen my ecumenical and international ties,” she says. After much hard work and personal difficulties, she was close to seeing her dream come true – 19 years after obtaining her theology degree. Despite the Synod’s decision, Godfrejow-Tarnogorska does not intend to give up her dream. Her current position allows her to advance the issues of gender equality and to foster understanding in her church of the gifts that women can offer. “I want to be ordained,” she says, “and I want my pastoral work to be recognised.”
Source: Lutheran World Federation
Photo: LWF/Brenda Platero
Photo with Agnieszka Godfrejow-Tarnogorska: Kościół Ewangelicko-Augsburski w RP