Giles Fraser says Tuesday's vote could be disastrous for the institution of the church guardian.co.uk

One of the biggest lies the church tells itself is that it doesn't do politics. The General Synod of the Church of England is set up in the round so as to encourage the impression of consensual discussion amongst friends.

That, of course, is profoundly disingenuous. You don't have to be an expert on the novels of Anthony Trollope to know that cathedral cloisters and church synods have long been a poisonous hotbed of plotting and resentment.

Yet those who are seeking scapegoats for the current car crash over female bishops are now pointing to church lobby groups as having introduced an inappropriate element of secular political organisation into church life. If only we would pray more, or be more holy, then all this nasty political stuff would disappear and real peace would break out.

This is a ridiculous form of false consciousness. Those who are too theologically squeamish for overt political contestation simply push politics into the shadows. It then becomes a manipulative business of saying one thing (something that sounds nice and friendly) while meaning something else entirely.

For instance, it is now almost obligatory in the church for us to say publicly that we respect each other's differences. We speak of opponents' "deeply held convictions", but few of us actually believe anything of the sort. What we say in private is utterly unprintable. But for the church, even to admit this is an honesty too far.

Remember, the anti-politics lot say sweetly, Jesus said we ought to love our enemies. To which my response is to point out that he certainly didn't say we ought not to have any.

So, let's forget the theology and talk straightforward politics. What happened at the General Synod is that a dogmatic minority of biblical literalists and an even smaller minority of Roman Catholic wannabes – both of whom, for entirely different reasons, reject women as church leaders – have been appeased in the name of some twisted version of inclusion.

We have been encouraged, not least by Rowan Williams, to feel their pain. For without any sense of irony, they have laughably claimed it is they who are the subject of discrimination. This is simply pathetic.

What this vote tells us is that the church must no longer allow itself to be played by its militant tendency. Rowan Williams has spent his time at Canterbury balancing one faction against the other and it patently hasn't worked. Like the appealingly otherworldly Michael Foot, Rowan Williams has been undone by the better angels of his nature.

I am ashamed to be a part of the Church of England. The suicidal stupidity of voting against female bishops has further discredited an organisation that has been haemorrhaging credibility for years.

But this is not simply a problem internal to the church itself. For as an established church, this decision represents a scandal that burrows deep into our whole political infrastructure: we now have 26 places in the House of Lords deliberately reserved for a male-only club. Before this, it could have been put down to an accident of history. Now it is deliberate.

This is wholly unsustainable. Cries for disestablishment are inevitable – though most politicians will run for cover at the prospect, not knowing what our polity could possibly look like once we start tumbling down that particular rabbit hole. For now, the prime minister was content simply to express his disappointment and urge the church to "get on with it".

But get on with what? It is in no way obvious how things go next. The church is stuck with a hapless decision-making structure which can only amplify the sense of acrimony that is now coursing through its veins.

The legislation that failed represented a real stretch for liberals, with many only just being able to vote for an arrangement that they believed would create a special category of second-class bishops just for women – and was thus already an institutionalisation of misogyny.

With the failure of even this compromise, there is little prospect of liberals playing ball again. They won't say this out loud. But the truth is: next time it is all or nothing. Women must be bishops on exactly the same terms as men or not at all. Forget all that stuff about this not being a zero-sum game. Now it is.

One way forward, short of disestablishment, is to withdraw the Church of England's exemption from the Equalities Act. This may look problematic, as the act exists to protect faiths such as the Roman Catholic church against prosecution for having a doctrinal issue with women priests. And no one is prepared to take on that battle.

But the C of E has already decided that having female bishops is not a doctrinal issue. This must be looked at further. And on another front, Diana Johnson, the MP for Hull North, is planning to bring in a 10-minute rule bill in the new year with a simple clause calling for female bishops. There is little doubt that the majority of the House of Commons, like the majority of churchgoers, strongly supports the prospect of women bishops.

On the positive side – and I am working hard to find a silver lining to all of this – it is unlikely that the Church of England will be able to wield as much clout against the idea of gay marriage. With its moral credibility so badly shot, why should anyone now listen?

Those of us who still care for the Church of England will stay with it, almost as a priest stays with a dying patient, ready to give it the last rites.

Within a couple of hours of the vote being announced, my own church council celebrated the eucharist together then gathered in the pub to sit with our curate and to let her know how much we love her and value her ministry. It felt ever so slightly last supperish. Not least because, like then, we all feel so thoroughly betrayed.