Press release

LSE Library

Archive of the Movement for the Ordination of Women now available to consult at LSE Library Published on 13 September 2016

The archive of the campaigning organisation the Movement for the Ordination of Women has been completely catalogued by Archivist, Fabiana Barticioti, and it is now available for consultation at LSE Library.

The Movement for the Ordination of Women (MOW) operated from 1979 to 1994 and was the major organisation to campaign for women to become priests in the Church of England. The papers in the archives date from the early 1970s to the mid-1990s and cover the organisation’s running, offering a close insight into its campaigning strategy and the struggles encountered by its campaigners.

The controversial legislation, the Priests (Ordination of Women) Measure, was passed by the General Synod on 11 November 1992 and the law was granted Royal Assent on 5 November 1993. The ordination of the first women took place in a ceremony at Bristol Cathedral on 12 March 1994.

At the time, many church goers were not satisfied. The, then Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr George Carey, who had backed the proposal said he recognised the result would not please everyone.

“What binds us together in God’s love as a Church is vastly more important than a disagreement about women’s ordination,” Dr Carey said to the General Synod.

However, his attempts to keep the Church united had a setback because 400 vicars were so opposed to the idea of women priests that they fled en masse to the Roman Catholic Church.

The idea of women priests began to be discussed in the 1920s and the first woman to become a priest in the Anglican Communion was Florence Lim Ti Oi in 1944 in Hong Kong. It was only in 1975 that the Church of England General Synod passed a motion stating it had “no fundamental objections” to the ordination of women to the priesthood. However, a motion to remove legal barriers to the ordination of women was defeated in the House of Clergy at the General Synod meeting on 8 November 1978.

On 21st November in the same year, attendees of a meeting chaired by Dame Betty Ridley decided to set up a national movement to work for the ordination of women. So, the early days of what became the Movement for the Ordination of Women, aka MOW, began.

The archive covers the entire period of MOW’s operations. It contains administrative and financial papers, correspondence, photographs, publicity material, and publications amongst other ephemera. The material covers themes such as gender inequality, intention of vote of members of General Synod and Houses of Parliament, women in the church, campaigning strategies and lobbying.

Some of Fabiana’s favourite items are the letters from MPs to supporters because some of them can be very entertaining. Other highlights include the comprehensive set of papers of AGMs and meetings of the Central Committee and satirical material used in their publications. There are some objects too, including original balloons, badges and colourful banners.

The catalogue of the archive is available online HERE and is available for consultation.

The archive forms part of The Women’s Library collection, and the new catalogue has been greatly welcomed by The Friends of the Women’s Library. The completion of this project was made possible by financial support from the Higher Education Funding for England (HEFCE).

Additional Resources

The Women’s Library collection includes a number of other archives relating to women and the church including Records of St Joan’s International Alliance (2SJA), Records of the Anglican Group for the Ordination of Women to the Historic Ministry of the Church, (5AGO), Records of the Catholic Women’s Ordination (5RCW), Records of the Society for the Ministry of Women in the Church (5SMW) and Records of the Group for Rescinding the Act of Synod (GRAS), amongst others. A full list is found in the 6MOW catalogue.

The Women’s Library collection also includes periodicals for the relevant organisations and some press cuttings relating to women’s ordination (c.1919-1950.) These can be searched using LSE ‘LibrarySearch’     (http://librarysearch.lse.ac.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do).

A blog post by LSE Library’s Academic Support Librarian Heather Dawson gives an outline of resources available at LSE and elsewhere: http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/library/2014/05/08/celebrate-20-years-since- the-ordination-of-women-with-these-research-links-from-the-library/

Official papers of the General Synod are available online from the Church of England website (2000- 2010) and in paper form at Lambeth Palace Library (pre-2000): https://www.churchofengland.org/about-us/structure/general-synod/agendas-and-papers.aspx

Editions of Commons and Lords Hansard, the Official Report of debates in Parliament, are found in the Parliamentary Archives but can be consulted online: http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/

Notes to Editors:

1. London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) is one of the foremost social science universities in the Its research and teaching span the full breadth of the social sciences, from economics, politics and law to sociology, anthropology, accounting and finance. LSE Library was founded in 1896 and collects material from around the world on the subjects studied by the School.

2. The Women’s Library collection is the oldest and most extensive collection of women’s history in LSE became home to the Women’s Library in January 2013.

3. Entry to the Reading Room: Open to all, but pre-registration is For further information see here: http://www.lse.ac.uk/library/collections/featuredCollections/womensLibraryLSE.aspx

Tel: 020 7955 7229 Email: [email protected] Reading Room opening times: Mon to Fri 10:30am-5pm. Travel to LSE Library (Tube): Holborn, Temple, Charing Cross.