The essential legal point in yesterday’s decision on ordination is not one about women’s rights.
The judge who originally refused the injunction to prevent the ordination, Justice Rogers, thought that this was the key issue. In refusing the injunction he said federal anti-discrimination law would prevent him from ruling that the ordinations be prevented.
That ruling was overturned by the NSW Court of Appeal. It said then that the issue was not a question of women’s rights. It was a question of whether some members of an organisation could enforce in the courts the rules of the organisation against other members. It granted, several days after Justice Rogers’s decision, an injunction to prevent Bishop Dowling from going ahead with his proposed ordination until a full hearing on the merits could be held.
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