The Reformed Episcopal Church is not against women but is against women's ordination.

What the issue is:

(1) It is contrary to all branches of the Church for 2,000 years, and has only become an issue when feminism came to the fore in the twentieth century.

(2) The Bible forbids it, for a qualification for ordination is to be "husband" of one wife, which in biblical terms eliminates women since “husbands” are males (Titus 1:6; 1 Timothy 3:2). God has given each a role in His creation, and part of the man’s role is to lead and to love his wife as Christ loved the Church. Part of the woman’s role is to lead other women (1 Tim 5) and to rear godly children (1 Tim 2:15).

What the issue is not:

(1) It does not concern the value of women, who are equal to men, but have different roles assigned by God. In the chain of command, God gave to men to rule the Church. In persons, men and women are equal. In authority, God gave man the authority in the Church, just as He did in the home (Ephesians 5:22ff).

(2) It does not concern spiritual gifts, for many woman are highly gifted by God for service in His Church in other ways than in teaching men (1 Timothy 2:12) or in pastoring a church.

The issue is not difficult.

Objections:

(1) Does not the Bible say that in Christ there is neither male nor female? Not exactly, but here is the full quote:

For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise. (Gal 3:27-29).

The idea here is how one comes to know God, which is through faith in Christ, and in this there is no difference in how one is saved, whether Jew or Gentile, slave or free, or male and female. But when Paul specifically speaks to the church situation, he forbids women to be ministers.

(2) Does not the Bible allow women prophetesses?

Perhaps the reason a woman was allowed to be a prophetess and not a priest is that as a prophetess she represented God to the people. Since she is also equally created in the image of God as a male was, thus having characteristics of God, she could represent the words of God to His people. Whatever the reason, it is clear that the prophetess was the exception, not the rule.

The priest, however, represented the people to God. The characteristics of the Church were feminine (the bride of God), covenant sinfulness, and in need of a savior who could represent her. For the feminine (priestess) to represent the feminine (church) would be a form of spiritual lesbianism. A male (priest) could represent the female (Church) as covenant head with consistency. The priest is like Christ, a husband to the Bride. Thus when the priests represented the people to God, only males were allowed.

Other reasons for only male priests seem to be typology and representation. In typology, since Messiah was to be a male, the Old Testament priests could only be males.

In the representation in the New Testament, the ordained priest/pastor stands in the position of Christ to the Church. As priest, the male represents Christ to the people and leads the people in the worship of God. Since the Church is the bride and Christ the groom, only a male priest can properly represent the male Christ to His female bride, the Church (Eph. 5:22ff). Furthermore, there was the sinfulness and culpability of the Church. The covenant representative must be like the one who caused the fall (Adam): male. By man came sin and death so by man came righteousness and resurrection (Rom. 5:12ff). Man was more culpable than the woman, as Paul indicates (1 Tim. 2:14), so he must be the representative. He must reverse the problem. He was the covenant head of the woman in the garden, the first church, and he must be the covenant head in the Church. There is not one example—not one—of a female priest in the Old Testament or in the New Testament.

Furthermore, in the Church the woman is not allowed to have authority over the man, as that would be contrary to the creation order and to Paul’s instructions based on creation (1 Tim. 2:11-15). As far as I know, no prophetess exercised authority over a man in the formal Church setting. (1 Cor 11:5 is outside the formal worship, which begins in 1 Cor 11:17 and continues through chapter 14.) If a woman were priest, she would have such authority, especially as seen in the high priest who had enormous authority (see the NT passages). For one function of a priest was (and is) to fence the Lord’s table, to allow some and not others to come, which is authoritative.

An appropriate question if a married woman is allowed to be a priest is this: If she is the boss at church, who is the boss at home? When does the husband get to exercise his headship, especially his spiritual headship at home? According to Scripture, the most appropriate time for men to exercise their leadership is at church as he leads his own family in the worship of God. Such a contradiction of being submissive to his wife at church and yet being the head at home turns the biblical order on its head. Paul specifically