As the Women Told Us, Alleluia! by Father Nathan Monk

As the Women Told Us, Alleluia! by Father Nathan Monk

'As the women told us! Alleluia!'

In the eastern Church, the Paschal greeting and reply is 'Christ is Risen'/'He is risen indeed! Alleluia!'

In light of the clear need to come to terms with centuries old resistance/denial to women as witnesses, evangelists, and priests, former Orthodox priest Nathan Monk proposes a new liturgical response. He writes: "Instead of 'He is risen indeed. Alleluia.' I think we should change it to, 'As the women told us. Alleluia!'"

In longer text he writes:

The fact that women are barred from the priesthood is absurd on multiple levels, beginning with that Mary, the Mother of Jesus, is quite literally the first priest and original chalice to carry the body and blood of Jesus and that the first blood Jesus spilt was in conjunction with the Theotokos when the umbilical cord was cut.

The whole function of the priesthood is to bring forth the body and blood of Christ. I wonder who did that first? Mary’s womb first held the body and blood of Christ. The priest is supposed to present the body of Christ to the people, and, you guessed it, Mary did that first, too.

But one of the most bizarre head-scratchers of them all is the story of the resurrection.

Jesus dies on Good Friday, and his disciples scatter. Judas betrayed Jesus and then made an early exit. Peter flat-out denied even knowing the guy, not once, but THRICE! (Ew, Peter!) The entire apostle boys club hides out for fear of what might happen to them (Mark 14:50, Matt 26:56, John 20:19). They are literally cowering behind locked doors, afraid that at any moment, they too will be arrested.

This isn’t novel information, most of us were told in Sunday School that Jesus’ friends abandoned him after his death, but this isn’t true. His fair-weather friends abandoned him, but those who truly cared stuck it out.

Enter the first Evangelist of the Gospel: Mary Magdalene.

While the fishermen turned fishers of men are holed up in some bunker sh+tting themselves, the women folk are reading to go face down the Roman guards at the tomb to anoint Jesus’ body. I can not stress enough that the dudes are literally hiding from the cops, and these ladies are hiking up their skirts and just walking right into the thick of it.

The women arrive at the tomb, and Jesus isn’t there. At first, there is some commotion, but eventually, Jesus is all, “jk, it’s me; I’ve come back from the dead. Go and tell everyone I’m alive.” So Mary Magdalene and all the other Marys head to go tell the apostles. Which, I assume, means they had to do all their secret knocks so that these cowards open the door, and they are all, “Good news: Jesus is alive!”

(sidebar: Mary Magdalene was not a prostitute. Not that there is any problem with being one; SW is real work. But it’s just factually inaccurate. Long story short, some Pope mistakenly attributed this profession to her, and it stuck. In reality, Mary Magdalene was an independently wealthy woman and a benefactor of Jesus.)

Now, here is the kicker: they don’t believe them. Yes, eventually, Peter and John have a running contest to see who can get to the tomb first, but overall, the first reaction is disbelief. This whole disbelieving thing just keeps moving around even to the most notorious of disbelievers, poor ol’ Thomas (we will get to him later in the series).

But what really grinds my gears about the whole Easter story is that after a woman is the first priest and women who are the first evangelists and preachers, these no-good hiding, backstabbing traitors have the audacity to turn around to these women and essentially say, “alright ladies, we will take it from here” and then just straight up cut them out of the whole priesthood thing.

If Mary Magdalene had listened to the likes of Paul with his whole, “I do not permit women to preach blah blah blah my wife left me, so I’m taking it out on all women” nonsense, then not a single motherf+cker would even know Jesus was alive. But thanks to Mary Magdalene, we do know. This earned her the title: Apostles to the Apostles. [sidebar: Paul didn't come around until later. He was not a follower of Jesus at the time of the resurrection.]

For nearly two thousand years, Christians have celebrated Easter; for most of that time, it has been exclusively men standing behind the pulpit and altar proclaiming the Good News that Christ is risen, but they only know that because of a woman.

The body of Christ is only present because of a woman. If anything, every Easter Sunday service around the world should be exclusively preached by women.

This Easter, as you walk around saying “Christ is Risen,” I would like to propose a new liturgical response other than, “He is risen indeed. Alleluia.” I think we should change it to, “As the women told us. Alleluia!”

- Father Nathan Monk

————————————-

Nathan Monk, activist, author, and former priest, writing on the issues of social justice, religion, theology, and philosophy.

After eight years as a pastor and priest, working on homeless rights initiatives along the Gulf Coast, he stepped down as a member of the clergy in support of LGBT rights.

He is a husband and father of three children, and is currently working on his first full length book examining the issues of human sexuality and interaction.

Trailblazing Female Theologian Says Church Holds Back Women by Lucie Sarr

Trailblazing Female Theologian Says Church Holds Back Women
by Lucie Sarr
La Croix Ivory Coast | 01 March 2023

In the run up to International Woman’s Day on March 8, La Croix Africa asks women on the African continent how they see their place in the Church.

The culture of patriarchy and hierarchy found in African society and the Catholic Church tends to keep women from decision-making positions, says Sister Sahon Solange Sia, the first woman from Ivory Coast to earn a doctorate in theology.

"The prevailing attitude is that women cannot lead," says the religious, a member of the Congregation of Our Lady of Calvary in the West African country.

"The attitudes of resistance towards women coming from conservative groups that are very attached to cultural traditions are as much about the African cultural milieu as about the Church milieu; they come from men as well as from the women themselves," she says .

Sister Sahon Solange Sia | Photo by Guy Aimé Eblotié

A member of the theological commission of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) and currently director of the Center for the Protection of Minors and Vulnerable Persons at the Catholic Missionary Institute of Abidjan, Sister Sahon Solange spoke with La Croix Africa's Lucie Sarr about the obstacles facing women in the Church.

La Croix Africa: What do you think about the place of women in the Church?

Sister Sahon Solange Sia: To speak of women implies specifying which category she falls into. The place she may occupy will sometimes depend on whether she is illiterate, single, married, religious, intellectual, housewife, businesswoman, rural or urban, etc. Women are very present at all levels of Church life in prayer groups, in services for material and economic support, in movements and ecclesial associations.

But, in general, women are not very present in positions of responsibility and decision-making in the Church. The hierarchical and patriarchal organization of the Church does not facilitate their access to certain bodies.

Moreover, on the rare occasions when such positions are proposed, the women sometimes decline the offer because they consider themselves incapable. Some women often block themselves because they have often been blocked; they inflict upon themselves their own rejection or incapacity.

How do cultural constraints influence the role and place of women in the Church?

The constraints influence the role of women, and these come from both the African culture and from the ecclesial culture as it has developed over the course of its history. The attitudes of resistance towards women coming from conservative groups that are very attached to cultural traditions are as much about the African cultural milieu as about the Church milieu; they come from men as well as from the women themselves.

In these circles, the prevailing attitude is that women cannot lead. Historically, these opinions have been reinforced by the upheavals that Africa has experienced. It comes down to the arrival of Christianity, Islam, and colonization. Their principles and doctrines have often relegated women to the background and established male supremacy. The constraints are perpetuated by education, and girls are taught to be guided by men. All these socio-cultural constraints are transmitted by the socialization process through the family, the school, the religion, the village...

The majority of people have developed the culture of the submissive, incapable woman, relegated to the background. A good woman is the one who stays at home and takes care of the housework. In the church, the responsibility for sacred things has been taken away from them.

Although some African cultures attribute a preponderant role to women in the management of social affairs, these constraints limit women to pre-established and delimited spheres. Social stereotypes slow down their momentum.

What can be done to ensure that women hold more positions of responsibility in the Church?

Women have begun to occupy some positions of responsibility in the Church, but in the Church of Africa there is still a long way to go. In order to achieve this, training must be a priority in order to enable women to acquire the competencies, to understand ecclesiology and to engage with ease and dynamism. In order to occupy positions of responsibility, leadership must be developed in women's cycles so that women have confidence and boldness.

Women must also be encouraged to take their rightful place in institutions. Increasing the economic power of women is a way that can help them become more involved in the management of the church, even at the level of positions of responsibility.

Finally, it is necessary to fight for a balance and a better future for humanity by raising awareness, so as to change backward mentalities.

Read more at: https://international.la-croix.com/news/religion/trailblazing-female-theologian-says-church-holds-back-women/17382?fbclid=IwAR0f4h18dehbV_rplTuS8ljUQFcsbCcBPdOBcCuaXgInu1bwWAcr_bpmRtY

Cristina Moreira, the First Woman in Spain to Officiate Mass by Domingo Diaz and José Verdugo

Cristina Moreira, the First Woman in Spain to Officiate Mass
by Domingo Diaz and José Verdugo
El Español | 20 August 2022

Cristina Moreira, the First Woman in Spain to Officiate Mass and Is Also Married to a Priest. The presbyter, married to the priest Victorino Pérez, opens the doors of her particular parish for us: "We are going to create an inclusive LGTBI chapel"

As soon as you get out of the elevator on the fourth floor, there is a gloomy corridor and four wooden doors. In one of them there is a sign: Parish of San Pablo. It's not there. If you turn left, you catch a glimpse of the only blue door on this floor and, above it, a name: Codeli (Book Cooperative). There it is. This is where Cristina Moreira, the first Roman Catholic woman priest in Spain celebrates her Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Mass whenever she can.

She welcomes us to this unusual house of God. There are at least two dozen chairs around an office table. ‘This is our altar,’ says the priest as she places a tablecloth on top and prepares it for the service. Christ on the cross, Pope John XXIII, his counterpart Francisco or the Virgin Mary are some of the paintings that decorate the white walls of this space where the Galician Catholic community of Home Novo meets.

Do you feel like a rebel for saying those words?

—I feel the dissidence of course. I have no other choice because I am working against what is done and what is commonly accepted as correct in my institution. Rebel, certainly. If someone puts one foot in front of me and prevents me from being who I am, saying it and doing it, I have to rebel in my own right, to defend my sovereignty and that of all people who are like me. My priesthood basically consists in facilitating, providing the means and welcoming everyone, everyone, every being who wants to be welcomed. I am not the one to hinder anyone or reduce and narrow the path that leads to God. My job is to point the way,to open up, embrace, welcome unconditionally as God who is my Master does, without labeling or asking anyone who they are or how they are or how they love. If that places me in rebellion and disobedience, then blessed disobedience, because that is how I have understood the Gospel. This is what I understand in my prayers when I speak with Christ, who throughout his ministry has been welcoming sick, people considered sinners, women who were not in their proper place in society and constantly healing the person who was. If I don't do this job --I can resign right now -- I wouldn't be doing the right thing.

Canon Law punishes those women who are ordained priests with excommunication. However, Moreira assures that nothing has come to her. ‘The first ordained women did receive the document. [The Vatican] doesn’t even bother anymore. They just say: consider yourselves excommunicated. And we are amused because communion is held with these hands and I celebrate it here every Sunday. And more days if I feel like it. No one can separate me from this sacrament because I am a minister of this sacrament".

Moreira is not hiding so as not to be excommunicated. Far from it. She asserts that ‘in Rome they receive our letters and we have been there clothed in our vestments.’

God's call

Cristina speaks with certainty of what she says. She has support. She knows that she is not alone. She knows that she is not doing something crazy. However this was not always so. She was barely a teenager when she felt the call. ‘I told a priest and he didn't listen to me. That's where my reflection began: if I were a boy, they would have rolled out the red carpet for me. They would have sent me to the Vocations Commission or whatever it was in the bishopric. They would have thought to focus everything correctly’.

So she start living it in silence and alone. She told a friend and later a new priest. ‘His exact words were: I firmly believe that this is a true vocation. But I tell you that you have to shut up and you have to keep this in silence and live it as a sacrifice before the Lord, because you know that it is forbidden. And that even the people who listen to you could be in danger. Women cannot be ordained. The church is what rules and you have to obey.’

Moreira becomes silent. ‘I realized that there was a baptism for men and another for women. A feminism that is also deeply rooted in the Gospel is born there. I am a feminist by the grace of God, and this is true, not a formula.’

The passing of the years did not make Cristina change her mind. Adolescence passed, she married, had a daughter, her marriage was declared void. She was working in the Church when she fell in love with the parish priest Victorino Pérez. The attraction was mutual. They both officiated their civil and also Catholic wedding. The official Church does not recognize the marriage because he continued to be a priest in a canonical irregularity. He did not ask for secularization or seek dispensation from the archbishop which is required by Canon Law.

She told him of her vocation to be a priest. The final step would not come until years later. ‘Benedict XVI released that famous decree condemning the priests who abused children and classifying it as the most serious crime that can be committed in the Church. Taking advantage of it, he added a clause to that same decree saying that ordaining a woman or that a woman celebrating mass is just as serious, entails the same punishments, the same penalties. When I read this, I decided that this is the day to pick up the phone and stop being an accomplice of that system. I no longer have a place in an institution where I am equated with a child rapist if I am ordained as a priest. So yes, now is the time to go for the dignity that I was, for what I am and give everything more than anything, too in solidarity with the victims of abuse, among whom are many women".

Spain’s first Roman Catholic Womanpriest, Cristina Moreira Celebrates Mass. Photo Jose Verdugo

A stole in jail

Obviously, the official Catholic Church does not take kindly to the ordination of a woman. However, that does not mean that Cristina and the Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests continue to have a relationship with Rome and the Pope. The last time Moreira visited the Vatican, the stole she wears today was confiscated. ‘I love my stole very much. It has been in jail for me.’ The stole was later returned to her, but not without Moreira being given a hard time with some ecclesiastical representatives. ‘These are the relationships we have with the institution. I sincerely believe that they are afraid of us.’

-About what? What damage could you do to the institution?

—They tremble because they often say that our actions can divide the church and break it. It's curious. My reflection on this is the following: the church can allow itself to be broken, that is, to leave aside women, married priests, all marginalized groups such as LGBTI and others who are not completely heteronormative, binary, cisgender, Married people using birth control, all the people who have failed in a first marriage and have been lucky enough to find a second chance...’

—The Church acts as if it can afford to lose a lot of people, even in its own ranks, dispensing with the entire contingent that appears now of women willing to work in the institutional Church. That can be allowed. That's not a loss, that doesn't hurt. But suddenly, it is a problem in case all those who are resistant to ordaining women, to allowing priests to marry, leave the Church. This tells us where the power is. And this must be said. The power is in the hands of those who can tell the institution Church this, do not do it, because if we do not break the Church. The de facto break has already happened. There are many who are like me and a lot of other people who have been and are on the margins. And they should be thankful the margins exist for many others are already outside the margins and have left the Church forever. Fortunately, some have found a welcome in the Protestant churches. But many do not want to go to the Protestant church because the Catholic Church is their home. And they are not welcome into their own home.

Moreira calls for coherence in all the issues that the church addresses and a balance between the gospel and Canon Law. ‘I understand that there must be this set of rules to govern the institution. But when they collide with the gospel they do not listen to people, the words of Jesus do not count. She comments on abortion. ‘We have a clearly official doctrine that is anti-abortion, for the protection of life and an endless number of arguments that I respect and value. And then I hear stories of priests who make women or nuns pregnant and the church government’s response is that they abort to preserve the priest and that there be no scandal. I am asking for consistency’.

The priest believes that the institution must be reformed from top to bottom. ‘Because evil is systemic, because its own functioning is encouraging abuses to occur and that they occur with impunity,’ she says.

“We answer to God.”

— Cristina Moirera, Spain's First Roman Catholic Womanpriest

Among the reforms that she proposes is the opening to all the people of God when it comes to making decisions, participation, the end of the prohibition on married priests and ordained women who can officiate the sacraments. ‘Women can provide healing, common sense, care... They have instilled it in us since we were little. The patriarchy has formatted us for these things, you have specialized us, tamed us for certain tasks. Emilia Pardo Bazán already said that when women are not educated, they are tamed. Well, while we're at it, why don't we take advantage of that?’

Women and Catholicism

Mary was the mother of Jesus. ‘The boss, the only one who can tell about my body and my blood. Christianity began with the announcement,’ says Moreira. Mary Magdalene also had a fundamental role in accompanying Jesus. ‘She was able to accompany him to the cross, where the men did not gather. If she had not believed in the resurrection, we would not be here. But history has decided to forget her because men have usurped the role of leadership and government from women since the time of the first Christian communities.’

Moreira also speaks of nuns who are even ‘more oppressed’ than lay women who are ordained. ‘There are nuns who are ordained but they have to leave the convents. And some do not want to lose their community because they are their life.’

At the moment, Cristina is the only ordained priest in Spain. She hopes that more women will join her soon. For now, the female role has taken a small step. In rural Spain there are already women who read the word of God or can offer communion, previously consecrated by a male priest. These cases have been seen, for example, in Tarragona, a diocese that refused to participate in a report similar to this one with this newspaper.

What do you think of this situation?

—All rivers flow into the sea. Anything that is for progress, it seems good to me, and each one will progress with the steps they can take. They are positive, but those small arrangements that are being made by women who give communion, who read the sermon written by the priest at mass, who celebrate these celebrations of the word... Those actions, if we analyze them carefully, what are they doing? ?

-Tell me

—They are favoring and accepting even more the patriarchal oppressive system that we have inside, because first they are accepting to be subsidiaries. That is to say, that they are accepting that they themselves do not have the dignity that is needed to be there. For this ministry there is a sacrament called the diaconate. This is what allows you to read the Gospels, bless and distribute communion. There is that paper. I have had it. I have been ordained a deacon. But the official Church won’t include women in this ministry. Why don't they include women in the diaconate? We continue to accept a subdignity, a subrole, a submission. We continue to accept that the dominant scheme prevails.

—And I say it in feminine because there is enough feminine submission. We are in female overbooking in submission and in male overbooking, not to say unanimous in the dominant position. So, these actions, as long as they do not touch the established schemes that I have just described, are admitted. And that is what is serious, because the issue of baptismal dignity is not being addressed, the issue of the equality of all the sons and daughters of God is not being addressed. Look, I'm not God's niece. Neither a distant cousin nor a sister-in-law. I am your daughter. Same as you. Don't deny me my dignity. I have been baptized with holy water, just like you. Therefore, I have a legitimate right first to feel called by God, among other things because God does what God wants and loves who God wants. And second, we answer to God.

Cristina is outraged: ‘I cannot go to the Code of Canon Law to look at what God's will is for me. I have a direct connection with God. And I learned it with great difficulty, realizing that God was calling me to ask me to remember God and to break bread and distribute wine to my community or to God’s other sons and daughters’.

These premises are based on the theology of liberation which grew in South America for the most part. Hence, with Pope Francis [he is from Argentina] there was great hope in ecclesiastical reform. Now they know not to, even if they start to listen to them, and they leave everything in God's hands: ‘He has his times, his manners and his way. When he has something between his eyebrows, he complies with it.’

Matter of faith

‘How can you believe in the Church when it rejects you?’

—A part of the Church rejects me. But the Church, the people of God, the immensely colorful, multifaceted and plural people of God does not reject me. It welcomes me and I feel deeply at home. We only hope that this cry that comes from below, which right now is being heard from the Synod consultations, for example, reaches the top. And that like a tide, that here we are in Galicia and we know what the tide is, I came to overflow and bring its effects.

—'How did you come to have your Community?'

—I belong to Home Novo in A Coruña, which has been in existence since the 1970s and was founded by the priest Manuel Espiña, of revered memory among us because he is the one who brought about all this. I asked the members of the Community what they would think and if it could contribute something to have me as a priest with my husband and they said yes. I have done the reverse path, which is not to impose a community named by someone above, but from within.

‘Is this a parallel Church?’

—No, it is a church within the Church, but it has ignored certain points of the internal regime, of the Internal Regulations, because we consider them unjust and the unjust law must be conscientiously violated.

—'Have you ever been told that this is a sect?'

-No.

‘And if they did? Sometimes it is done with orders outside the church like Jehovah's Witnesses.'

—The definition of the sect is a place where people are in a certain way against their will because they have been manipulated, coerced and they do not have their freedom and their means, their resources completely. Here people come and go when they want, how they want. We are not interested in their private lives other than to be able to help and we do not ask them for anything. Of course, we do not coerce anyone, nor do we manipulate anyone, nor have we brainwashed anyone.

Currently, the community that accompanies Cristina Moreira in A Coruña is small, about 15 people. ‘But we have projects to broaden our sights. For example, after the murder of Samuel Luiz here in A Coruña, LGTBI people called us to find a place to meet God in peace. So in September we will create an inclusive chapel so that everyone the world can come here and no one feels rejected.’

Politics and religion

Moreira defines herself as a person of the left. ‘I am of proletarian origin, I come from a working-class family, I grew up in a neighborhood in the north of Paris, where I was born and lived until I was an adult and moved to Spain. I am the daughter of republican, secular schools and from the outset I am quite satisfied with my position on the left, which is the place for rebels, dissidents and people who seek a better world and are willing to put their meat on the grill to work for that better world.’

—Was Jesus Christ the first communist?

—Today communism is like a forbidden word, a mixed bag where so many things fit that I no longer know what it means. When communism was understood with that utopian value of people who want a better, more egalitarian world, where wages are fair, where there are no longer exploited people, where the rights of all people are respected. When communism was thought like this, from that vision that many people still think about it, I did think at some point that the values ​​that Jesus has brought and that the Gospel possesses could perfectly collaborate with that dream and that utopia, because they are very similar. Of course, Jesus, attentive to the poor, to the little ones, to the marginalized people, to the people who suffer, who ask that the naked be clothed, that the hungry be fed, that the sick be visited, that they take care of themselves who is wrong They are verbatim words of him.

—What do you think of the relationship of the Catholic Church with the extreme right?

With a faction of the Catholic Church.’ A very specific faction, with very specific values ​​that I certainly do not share, because they hold macho, classist, often racist values, and oppressive values ​​that seek to dominate others and say I command, you obey and I do not accept that. So my reaction is, from the outset, to reject that alliance and say that those Catholics do not represent me.

—Do you miss that the left is related to the Catholic Church?

—I don't know what we are talking about, maybe that we can of these parties that have gone together, a little out there. Many people in those parties and in those groups, in fact, are Christians. Another thing is that I am not taking communion with the Archbishop of Madrid or with the Archbishop of I don't know where, just as I am not taking Communion either, because I cannot make statements that prevent me from being consistent with that discourse. But that is full of Christians and Christians, perhaps disappointed by their institution.

And would we have to get them back?

-No. They are sovereign in knowing what they will have to do. My role is not to recover anyone, nor to promote proselytism, nor to go looking for people. What worries me is going to look for people who are lying down in case they think they might need me. That is why we are going to create the inclusive chapel. Let them know that we are here. Of course, I am concerned that the people of Coruña, in a case as dramatic as this, have called Madrid asking if there was a place in Coruña where they could meet to pray. Here is a place and there are people. If you believe in Christ, this is your home. You will not be asked anything else. And even if they don't believe in Christ, it's also their home.

---

https://www.elespanol.com/reportajes/20220820/cristina-moreira-primera-espanola-oficiar-catolica-izquierdas/691430993_0.htm

It is Time for Women to Participate in Decision Making in the Church [Including Ordination]

It is time for women to participate in decision-making in the Church [including ordination]
by Lucie Sarr | La Croix Africa
24 February 2023

Question of faith: What do African women think of their place in the Church? As a prelude to International Women's Rights Day celebrated on March 8, La Croix Africa gives the floor to 12 African Catholic women who express themselves freely about their place in the Church.

Among them, Marie Angélique Sagna Savané, sociologist and Senegalese politician, former director for Africa of the United Nations Population Fund, feminist activist and committed Catholic.

La Croix Africa: Can you be a feminist and a Catholic?

Marie Angélique Savané: I am often asked this question. I don't think feminism and the Catholic faith are irreconcilable. It all depends on the angle from which you approach things. For me, everything was easier because during the period of my pure and hard feminist commitment, I was far from the Church. As a result, I did not have to suffer the wrath of the ecclesial authorities with regard to my positions.

When I returned to the Church (what I call my conversion), my feminism and my political involvement rather helped me to deepen my spirituality. For me, the Church is an institution but I give more importance to the interpersonal relationship with God, that is to say spirituality. I start from the principle that the teaching of Jesus is addressed to all, women and men.

We must not lose sight of the fact that Jesus lived in a patriarchal era and that he carried out very strong acts towards women and through women. Several miracles were performed by Jesus through the faith of a woman. We also too often neglect the tutelary figure of Mary Magdalene and yet it is she whom Jesus chose to announce his resurrection.

We can also go back to the book of Genesis, in the story of Creation, where it is said that "God created them male and female". But patriarchy, which is an ideological system of power, has rewritten the history of male and female relations to suit itself to justify the domination and subordination of women mainly through religions.

Saint Paul, in the Epistle to the Galatians, will return to the equality of man and woman before God. So for me in principle there is no justification for the inferiority of women in the divine plan. And Jesus Christ imposed for his time women in his entourage, asked to respect them. It is religious practices in institutions that have relegated or even erased the presence of women to make them auxiliaries. Today we must reflect on the place of women in the Church.

La Croix: When you observe the place and role of women in the Church in Africa, what thoughts do you have? Is there a balance between their commitment and their place in the decision-making process?

Marie Angélique Savané: Many priests think that I am too critical or too harsh because I dare to say what I think having always held positions of responsibility. The fact that a woman speaks with confidence sometimes disturbs in the parishes.

Saint Paul, in the Epistle to the Galatians, will return to the equality of man and woman before God. So for me in principle there is no justification for the inferiority of women in the divine plan. And Jesus Christ imposed for his time women in his entourage, asked to respect them. It is religious practices in institutions that have relegated or even erased the presence of women to make them auxiliaries. Today we must reflect on the place of women in the Church.

La Croix: When you observe the place and role of women in the Church in Africa, what thoughts do you have? Is there a balance between their commitment and their place in the decision-making process?

Marie Angélique Savané: Many priests think that I am too critical or too harsh because I dare to say what I think having always held positions of responsibility. The fact that a woman speaks with confidence sometimes disturbs in the parishes.

I am impressed by the quality of the nuns we have but unfortunately they are not valued enough in the Church. However, in Senegal, the best schools are run by nuns. The health structures they manage have an excellent reputation. But we do not feel their influence in the decision-making spheres of the Church. Pope Francis is innovating in this direction.

In our parishes, when it comes to organizing celebrations and buying or selling fabrics, we always turn to women. But in the parish councils, how many women are there? And those who are there, are they chosen for their competence or just because they are in Catholic movements? It is time that women who are aware of the realities of today's society can intervene in parishes and contribute to decision-making. Parishes can also develop income-generating activities for women and young people.

“Are you for the ordination of women? Yes, of course I am for the priestly ordination of women!”

— Marie Angélique Savané

La Croix: Are you for the priestly ordination of women?

Marie Angélique Savané: Yes, of course I am for the priestly ordination of women! I am also for the marriage of priests! I also disagree with the institutional Church regarding the total rejection by African priests – headed by Cardinal Robert Sarah – of the Maputo Protocol (1). The main reason is that this text calls for the legalization of medical abortion in cases of rape, incest or in cases where the life of the woman is in danger. I find their attitude unfair and sexist because they are men who speak notwithstanding the physical and mental health of the female victims!

Regarding contraception and family planning, I do not agree with the Church's view because natural birth control methods are not reliable. They are too risky for women. If we want to avoid or reduce the cases of abortion, the best way is to promote modern means of contraception.

(1) The Maputo Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights was adopted in July 2003 by the African Union. The signatory states are committed to guaranteeing the rights of women to participate in the political process, to benefit from social and political equality with men, but also from improved autonomy in their health decisions. It also puts an end to female genital mutilation.

---

https://africa.la-croix.com/il-est-temps-que-les-femmes-participent-a-la-prise-de-decision-dans-leglise

Annette Jantzen believes that "it is not enough to turn 'Mr' into 'Ma'am'" "God is also our Mother": A theologian's struggle to feminize the language of the liturgy by José Lorenzo

Annette Jantzen believes that "it is not enough to turn 'Mr' into 'Ma'am'" "God is also our Mother": A theologian's struggle to feminize the language of the liturgy
by José Lorenzo
Religion Digital | 02 March 2023

Theologian Annette Janzen

Annette Jantzen wants to feminize the language of the liturgy. She considers that it is too patriarchal, which is why this German theologian, married and mother of three children, who works in the Bishopric of Aachen and accompanies women in vulnerable situations, offers texts and prayers on her blog for women to enter into that another dimension that has been obscured for centuries, as she shares in an interview with Katho.de.

"At mass I notice again and again how one-sidedly masculine and patriarchal the language in the liturgy is. God is spoken of as Lord, as Ruler and Almighty. Many women find it difficult to pray with images of that language and my task is to allow that women celebrate services in such a way that they can find their way to prayer," she says.

A language to rule

Jantzen considers that "liturgical or theological language is used too often to govern others. Because when I speak of God as sovereign, king and all-powerful, this clearly conveys an image of God who knows everything and no longer questions anything." And behind those words and images, she adds, "there are patriarchal ideas of power and omnipotence."

These texts, according to the expert, "emphasize not only authoritarian, but also violent conceptions of God," for which she wonders how to imagine from there, "the work and intervention of God." "Isn't he also like a loving and protective father or a caring mother?" he wonders.

"Most of God is Lost"

"All images of God are always more unlike God than similar. So they always show only a small part of God. They miss most of God," adds Jantzen, who immediately states that "the more I limit myself to a few few, always the same images of God, the more I miss God".

Therefore, it has been proposed to "enlarge the images of God", because "the few images of God that we currently use in the Church shape our faith, and a shaped faith is good and valuable. But they are not everything, they are not God It's not enough to turn 'Mr' into 'Ma'am'. You miss out on the opportunity to discover other sides of God."

Although she acknowledges that she receives many positive comments "from women who have long yearned for a more feminine prayer language," she acknowledges that there are also priests who "get nervous." But she stresses that "my texts are an offer to reconsider and reformulate your own prayer and thought. Because I am convinced that the language of the liturgy can also be an important key to greater gender justice in the Church"

In this sense, she considers that "if the men who are leaders in the Church openly say that it hurts them personally that women are excluded from the offices, who knows, maybe things will change", and she believes that a more "feminine" language in the liturgy can help change the perception that exists in the Church on this matter. Because "as long as God is not for us more than Lord and Father, we will hardly find a genuine community."

---

"Dios también es nuestra Madre": La lucha de una teóloga por feminizar el lenguaje de la liturgia

Why Sister Monika Amlinger Wants to Be a Priest by Madeleine Spendier 18 January 23

Bonn: Sister Monika Amlinger feels called to be a priest. The trained pastoral officer lives as a hermit in Osnabrück [Germany]. In an interview with catholic.de she talks about her vocation and what makes it difficult for her.

At the age of 25, Sister Monika Amlinger became a Benedictine. Even then she felt the desire to be a priest. But at first she repressed it. Today she has the certainty that God wants her vocation. In an interview, the 41-year-old theologian talks about her longing to be ordained and why it is exhausting for her to feel called.

Question: Sister Monika, what exactly do you feel called to do?

Sister Monika: I deeply long to be a priest in the Catholic Church. I have worked in parishes for several years and am currently a hospital chaplain. My work fulfills me. I like being there for people. But I long for more. I would also like to be able to celebrate the Eucharist. That would be my heart's desire. For me, heaven always opens up a bit in the celebration of the Eucharist. I am moved by the request that the Holy Spirit descend on the gifts and transform them so that Jesus is present among us. I would like to say the Eucharistic Prayer, especially the words of institution. I like being a pastor but I also want to be able to communicate God's closeness to people in the sacraments. In the hospital the anointing of the sick would also be important to me.

[article continues below photograph]

Sister Monika Amlinger lives as a hermit in an apartment in Osnabrück, Germany. There she has set up a prayer room where she spends a lot of time in prayer and silence every day.

Question: When did you begin to hear this calling?

Sister Monika: During my theology studies in Munich I entered the monastery and became a Benedictine nun. I was 25 years old. In the monastery I was a sacristan. During the services, I had tasks similar to those of an altar server. For example, I brought the hosts to the altar during Mass. It was then that my love for the Eucharist grew. During this time, I felt God's call to be a priest. But I initially pushed this desire away and repressed it.

Question: Was there a moment when you realised your vocation as a priest?

Sister Monika: During my time in the monastery, I was on a pilgrimage on foot. I had a long conversation with a woman who is a theologian. She told me she felt called to be a priest for a long time. I had never heard that from a woman before. That was the first time I spontaneously said that I also felt called to be a priest. I was surprised by my words. It was like a flash of inspiration, an inner clarity. After that, I prayed a lot and also wrestled with God. I asked, 'God, what does this mean? Why do you put such a calling in my heart, such a deep longing when women cannot even be priests in your Church? What should I do?'

Question: Did you get an answer?

Sister Monika: At first I did not know what to do. Most of the people I spoke to about it were helpless and silent. Now I am connected with other women who are called and feel that God has plans for me and for us. Prayer gives me a lot of strength and joy. I have set up a small prayer room in my apartment. Here I spend a lot of time in silence. I feel that God is guiding me. The conversations with my spiritual director, a Jesuit, also help me to find the next steps.

Question: How do you determine whether a spiritual vocation is genuine?

Sister Monika: Ultimately it is difficult to prove definitively whether or not someone is called - man or woman. But there are proven ways of testing: personally for oneself in prayer and in spiritual guidance, but also in the external perception of the people with whom one lives and for whom one is there. You can clearly feel a calling inside. Again and again people have told me that I am a good pastor. Some also address me as 'Frau Pfarrerin' or tell me that I would make a good priest. I think that if the feedback from outside goes together with what you feel inside, there is a good probability that the calling is genuine and wanted by God.

Ultimately, it is the ministers in the church, especially the bishops, who recognise a vocation on the basis of these experiences. This has not been the case for us women so far. I sometimes find it very exhausting to be called.

Question: Why?

Sister Monika: It is deeply painful for me to know that I am not allowed to live my vocation as a priest in the full sense. I am excluded from this ministry by the responsible men in the Church.

Question: You contributed your vocation story in Sister Philippa's book "Because God wants it that way"...

Sister Monika: Yes, 150 women and also individual non-binary persons from Germany, Switzerland and Austria wrote about their vocations in this book. They want to be deacons or priests and many would like to be ordained. Even though they suffer from many of the systemic and human problems that are massively evident in the Catholic Church at the moment.

Contributors have met many times online and once in person. We are now well connected. It was liberating to hear that other women also feel this calling from God. Many have been ashamed for years to even think or express the desire for it. They thought it was all in their head or that they were alone in it. There are hardly any female role models for us who could strengthen or encourage us on our way. Some of us who spoke out were ridiculed, faced with obstacles or pressured to remain silent. We in the 'Network of Women Who Are Called' no longer want to be silent. We want to talk about our vocations and our experiences with other women, men, non-binary women, deacons, priests, bishops and maybe one day with the Pope. Dialogue will be elementary.

Question: Pope Francis recently reaffirmed his no to the ordination of women to the priesthood...

Sister Monika: I personally find this backward and it hurts. There are women called to priesthood all over the world and not only in Germany, Switzerland or Austria. At the Amazon Synod, some bishops said, 'Why do we men still deny sacramental ordination to these women who already do so much for our communities by presiding over baptisms, burying the dead and assisting in marriage?' That was about the ordination of deaconesses and that would be the first important step. Statements like this give me hope. It also makes me happy that some German bishops are seriously interested in supporting women who are called. On the Synodal Way, the basic text on 'Women in Ministries and Offices in the Church' was adopted. It recognises that in earlier times there were women like Therese of Lisieux, who felt a calling to priesthood.

It is imperative that women's callings be examined in the same way that men's are. It is a great step for the German Church and for women who are called that this is included in the text. We can now say that we women have many bishops behind us. Also important is that in the worldwide synodal process it is clear that the topic of women's ordination is pressing in many countries, not only here.

Question: What do you wish for your vocation?

Sister Monika: I would like to be ordained so that I can serve people in the sacraments and to communicate the closeness of God to them. However, I don't know if I will live to see that.

According to today's understanding, the priesthood would also have to change for women who are not celibate like me, but have a family and children or who are queer. We are also concerned with strengthening the diaconal dimension of the priesthood. That means it is about accompanying people on their way, not only about short-term sacramental action. In no way do we want to continue with clericalism. We want to be able to celebrate the sacraments because we as women also hear the call to be priests. Because we feel that this is what God wants!

The 'Network of Women Who Are Called' at a meeting in Stuttgart. Sister Monika Amlinger (2nd from right in front Row) is part of the Network’s four-person coordinating team.

To the right of Sister Monika is Angelika Fromme who for many years served as the German Delegate to Women's Ordination Worldwide.

---

This article originally appears in katholisch.de Warum Schwester Monika Amlinger Priesterin sein will

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis - a misogynistic and faulty apostolic letter of Pope John Paul II, which does not deserve acceptance and recognition: Ida Raming and Stephan Rohn, Imprimatur 4.2022

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis - A Misogynistic and Faulty Apostolic Letter of Pope John Paul II which Does Not Deserve Acceptance and Recognition
by Ida Raming and Stephan Rohn
Imprimatur 4.2022

On September 9, 2022, at the Plenary Assembly of the German Synodal Path (Synodaler Weg, www.synodalerweg.de/english ), the foundational text ‘Women in Ministries and Offices in the Church’ was adopted by a large majority of 92% (82% of the bishops). The text is preceded by the question (p. 2):

The doctrine of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (OS) is not widely accepted and understood by the people of God. Therefore the question must be addressed to the highest authority (Pope and Council) whether the doctrine of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis needs to be examined: In the service of evangelisation, it is a matter of enabling the appropriate participation of women in proclamation, in the sacramental representation of Christ and in the building up of the Church. Whether or not the doctrine of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis binds the Church infallibly must then be examined bindingly at this level.

I. Faults in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis

On this occasion, the reasons given in the apostolic letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (OS) of 1994 for the exclusion of women from the priesthood are given below and their faultiness is shown.

1. ‘Christ called only men as his apostles’ (OS 2)

In reference to the 12 patriarchs/tribal fathers in Israel (in the OT), Jesus called 12 men (according to Lk). In this respect, Jesus acted according to the patriarchal structure of his time in ancient Israel. He could not have appointed women to this office because of their social status at that time.

For example, women had no right to testify in court. Their public word had no meaning whatsoever and would therefore have been completely ineffective in preaching. In fact, sending women out into the world as missionaries would probably have led to her death sentence.

Jesus could also not have abolished the slavery that prevailed in Israel at that time, for it was an entrenched legal institution. To assume that Jesus acted „in a completely free and sovereign manner“ in this respect, i.e. that Christ's ‘way of acting was not based on sociological or cultural motives of the time; (OS 2), fundamentally misjudges both the social reality of the time and Christ's practical options for action.

2. ‘Constant practice of the Church’ which imitated Christ in choosing only men (OS 1)

A ‘constant practice’ or tradition of excluding women from the priesthood has not been scientifically proven to date and is a mere assertion. In view of the underprivileged social position of women, the question of women's priesthood was not relevant for a long time.

Many texts prove this. Here is an example (ca 3rd-4th century) : ‘The woman must veil her head because she is not made in God's image. In order that she may be visible as subservient, and because sin has its beginning through her, she must wear this sign, and in the church, out of reverence for the bishop, she should not wear her head freely, but covered by a veil; likewise, she does not have authority to speak, because the bishop embodies the person of Christ. As, therefore, before Christ the Judge, so let her conduct herself before the bishop, because he is the Vicar of the Lord; for the sake of original sin she must show herself submissive.’ (Ambrosiaster's Commentary , ch. 19, Corpus I.C. , ed. Friedberg I 1255f., Ambrose was long considered the author; the above text is quoted in: I. Raming, Der Ausschluss der Frau vom priesterlichen Amt. Gottgewollte Tradition oder Diskrimierung? Diss.; Cologne-Vienna 1973, p. 61f).

Incidentally, there is evidence in church history of the opposite of such a ‘constant practice’. There were women with a prominent position in the church. Since the Middle Ages, for example, these were the abbesses such as the well-known Hildegard of Bingen who was even elevated to the status of church teacher.

For early Christianity, there is significant biblical evidence for women in Church leadership responsibility, well-known names are Junia (Rom 16:7), Deaconess Phoebe (Rom 16:1-2) and Prisca (Rom 16:3-5).

Last but not least, the centuries-old tradition of venerating and representing Mary as a priestess is an indication that the claimed ‘constant practice’ does not exist. The self-evidence of a mulier sacerdotalis (a priestly woman) expressed in the Marian tradition was obviously perceived as a threat to the clerical patriarchy with the rise of the women's movement, so that the depiction of Mary in liturgical priestly vestments was prohibited in 1913.

3. Mary, the mother of Jesus and ‘mother of the Church’, did not receive ‘the missio proper to the apostles’ (OS 3)

Like all women, Mary was subject to the patriarchal structure of society at that time. Therefore, Jesus could not have sensibly called her into the circle of the twelve. He knew that he would not have been able to realise God's plan of salvation this way and, moreover, would have endangered his own mother. This important circumstance is not mentioned in the Pope's letter, which with this omission once again proves to be out of touch with reality and unconvincing.

4. Christ is represented only by a man (OS 2)

Even if one assumes the necessity of the representation of Christ in the priestly ministry, today it can only be a matter of making the risen Christ present. After his resurrection, Christ no longer has a gender in the hereafter. Therefore, gender can also no longer play a role in the representation of Christ today and remains open (cf. Mt 22:29-32).

However, if Jesus Christ were to remain a man in the hereafter, as the declaration 'Inter insigniores' claims, it is not yet clear whether a specific gender is required for representation. The priest is to ‘make present’ Christ and thus the ‘Lord and Saviour’. The likeness to him required for this representation is doctrinally tied solely to the physical characteristic of maleness. This reductionist view emphasises manhood in a hypersexualised way and elevates it above womanhood in violation of the Bible. This is explicitly stated in the well-known Bible passage in which Paul addresses the Galatians (Gal 3:26-28):

‘You are all sons and daughters of God in Christ Jesus through faith. For all of you who were baptised into Christ have put on Christ. There is no longer Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus’.

“Not the Church, but God calls to the priesthood, as the Apostle Paul makes clear in Corinthians: ‘God’s Spirit apportions to each one, as God’s Spirit wills’ (1 Cor 12:11). This means that God chooses and does not allow himself to be dictated to only call men to the priestly ministry. Correctly, therefore, it should read: The Church has no authority to deny women access to the priesthood on principle.”

5. The Church has ‘no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women’ (OS 4)

Not the Church, but God calls to the priesthood, as the Apostle Paul makes clear in Corinthians: ‘God's Spirit apportions to each one, as God's Spirit wills’ (1 Cor 12:11). This means that God chooses and does not allow himself to be dictated to only call men to the priestly ministry. Correctly, therefore, it should read: The Church has no authority to deny women access to the priesthood on principle.

Church doctrine denies that there are any vocations of women to the priesthood; they disrespectfully deny them generally. Many examples of women who credibly testify their vocations to the priesthood speak against this denial of reality. Numerous testimonies are documented in the book ‘Weil Gott es so will’ - Frauen erzählen von ihrer Berufung als Diakonin und Priesterin, published by the Benedictine Philippa Rath in 2021.

These callings should finally be recognised and appreciated. Disobedience to God's Spirit is unacceptable. The persistence of unchristian patriarchy prevents the men's church from recognising the Spirit-led callings of women.

“The persistence of unchristian patriarchy prevents the men’s church from
recognising the Spirit-led callings of women.”

6. Infallibility of the exclusion of women?

It is disputed what binding effect OS has, in particular to what extent the Apostolic Exhortation can claim infallibility. According to Peter Hünermann, this is not a dogmatic declaration: ‘Formally, the Pope does not present an infallible dogmatic definition. This is clear from the genus litterarium, the carefully delimited choice of words to characterise the authority of the office and the act of declaration itself’ (Peter Hünermann, Schwerwiegende Bedenken. An Analysis of the Apostolic Exhortation 'Ordinatio sacerdotalis', in: Walter Groß (ed.) : Frauenordination - Stand der Diskussion in der katholischen Kirche, Munich 1996, pp. 120-127, here: p. 123).

His judgment is based, among other things, on the vote of the Papal Biblical Commission which, in the run-up to the publication of Inter insigniores, had been asked whether the New Testament findings precluded the ordination of women to the priesthood. Their vote in 1976 was that from the New Testament ‘there are no discernible obstacles to admitting women to priestly ordination’ (op. cit. p. 125). This vote of the Biblical Commission did not suit the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, although it had commissioned the corresponding study itself. It was consequently not published by the Vatican. In the book edited by Walter Groß "Frauenordination" (op. cit. pp. 25-31) it is, however, made accessible.

“If one classifies OS in terms of church history, it shows a clear step backwards. The Church was already further ahead in terms of gender justice, especially at the time of Vatican II.”

II. Theological Regression

If one classifies OS in terms of church history, it shows a clear step backwards. The Church was already further ahead in terms of gender justice, especially at the time of Vatican II.

1. Pacem in Terris

In the encyclical Pacem in Terris (PT) written by Pope John XXIII in 1963, the Roman Catholic Church explicitly opened up to human rights for the first time. Pope John XXIII praised the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 as ‘a clear proof of the farsightedness’ (PT 143) and concretised human rights according to which ‘men and women enjoy equal rights and duties’. He stated that people had the ‘inviolable right’ to ‘choose for themselves the kind of life which appeals to them: whether it is to found a family or to embrace the priesthood or the religious life’ (PT 15). With this, Pope John XXIII opened the door to admit women to the priesthood in the future. He saw it as a divine sign of the time („characteristic of the present day“) that women play an evident part in the political life. ‘They are demanding both in domestic and in public life the rights and duties which belong to them as human persons’ (PT 41).

“In the spirit of Gaudium et Spes, the conclusion is inescapable that discrimination within the Church is also to be condemned and that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is ‘contrary to God’s intent.”

2. Gaudium et Spes

The Church's openness to women's equality is even more evident in the Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes (GS), the last document of Vatican II published by Pope Paul VI in 1965: ‘Every type of discrimination, whether social or cultural, whether based on sex or ... is to be overcome and eradicated as contrary to God's intent.’ (GS 29).

The demand explicitly includes only ‘social and cultural’ rights, but not ecclesiastical rights. This follows from the context in the Pastoral Constitution, the chapter ‘The Community of Mankind’. But can the Church demand something from the societies of the world that she herself is not prepared to give? That would rightly be criticised as a double standard. Therefore, in the spirit of GS, the conclusion is inescapable that discrimination within the Church is also to be condemned and that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is ‘contrary to God's intent’.

The plea for gender justice comes to a head in the following socially critical indictment: ‘For in truth it must still be regretted that fundamental personal rights are still not being universally honored. Such is the case of a woman who is denied the right to choose a husband freely, to embrace a state of life or ... equal to those recognized for men.’ (loc. Cit.).

Such progressive Vatican statements could also be seen in a different light: In view of still continuing ecclesiastical discriminations, many people today may ask themselves whether the demand for human rights is or was not just a sanctimonious hypocrisy. However, this would not apply to the Council Pope John XXIII.

“Ordinatio Sacerdotalis will probably go down in church history as a sign of weakness. With its demand ‘that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful’, it is a defensive act of the Church which tries to stop the inner-church consequences of the equality of men and women - which follows from the dignity of the human person. ”

3. Classification

Thirty years later, OS is clearly falling behind the values proclaimed as Christian in the 1960s. With this backsliding, the resurgent patriarchal mindset in the Catholic Church is failing to recognise the ‘signs of the times’. At the same time, the Church - disregarding scientific findings - is alienating itself from the world and its social development, to which explicit reference was made in PT and GS, unlike in OS.

It is true that OS is often seen as an insurmountable obstacle to internal church equality with the women's priesthood. But this overestimates this Apostolic Exhortation to this day. OS will probably go down in church history as a sign of weakness. With its demand ‘that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful’ (OS 4), it is a defensive act of the Church which tries to stop the inner-church consequences of the equality of men and women - which follows from the dignity of the human person. The spirit of freedom and equality can no longer be banished with arguments, but obviously requires repressive means such as the use of authority and power. OS thus documents the helplessness of a Roman basta policy that has become empty. It is an anti-synodal relic and thus a double step backwards: in terms of content and church policy.

“The reasons given by Pope John Paul II in OS against the ordination of women are all untenable. Obviously, they only serve to prevent the necessary reforms regarding the position of women in the Catholic Church and to maintain the discrimination of women within the Church. Thus, this teaching not only endangers the future of the Church, but ultimately also leads to an erosion of the priestly ministry in the Church.”

III. Conclusion

The reasons given by Pope John Paul II in OS against the ordination of women are all untenable. Obviously, they only serve to prevent the necessary reforms regarding the position of women in the Catholic Church and to maintain the discrimination of women within the Church. Thus, this teaching not only endangers the future of the Church, but ultimately also leads to an erosion of the priestly ministry in the Church.

Sixty years after the opening of Vatican II, OS today seems like a desperate but ineffectual attempt by Pope John Paul II: to petrify Church teaching beyond his own death and to put shackles on his papal successors,

Translation of the article: Ida Raming, Stephan Rohn, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis - ein frauenfeindliches und fehlerhaftes Lehrschreiben von Papst Johannes Paul II., das keine Akzeptanz und Anerkennung verdient. Published in: Imprimatur 4. 2022, Trier/Germany 14.12.2022, pp. 228-232, online: http://www.imprimatur-trier.de/2022/Imprimatur-2022-
04_9.pdf . Translated by Raming, Rohn based on DeepL

---

About Ida Raming:

Theologian, pioneer in Women’s Ordination Movement, one of the founding mothers of Women’s Ordination Worldwide, one of the Danube Seven, personally excommunicated by Cardinal Josef Ratzinger (as he then was).

Ida Raming, Pioneer of the Women’s Ordination Movement and One of WOW’s Founding mothers

Theologian Ida Raming is one of The Danube Seven: seven women who were ordained to Roman Catholic priesthood on 29 June 2002.

Ida is a pioneer of the women’s ordination movement who together is Dr. Iris Mueller drew up a published submission to the Second Vatican Council in 1963 challenging the exclusion of women from priesthood.  

Ida’s own groundbreaking doctoral dissertation on the history of the church’s discrimination against women from early Christian writings through the Middle Ages conclusively proved the church’s exclusion of women from the priesthood is based on concepts of the essential and ethical inferiority of women. These notions rest upon the second creation story found in Genesis saying woman was created from the first man’s rib, and the alleged first sin of the mythical Eve. These mythical concepts are the foundation stones upon which the church’s continuing discrimination against women rests.

Raming points out that the church law restricting ordination to only baptised males (Canon 1024) is itself illegal because it establishes two classes of baptism. The Church law is contrary to Holy Scripture and the church’s earliest history in which women played prominent roles and were ordained deacons, priests and bishops.

Ida’s influential research, published in English in 1976 as The Exclusion of Women from the Priesthood: Divine Law or Sex Discrimination, has been republished in an updated edition edited by Bernard Cooke and Gary Macy for Scarecrow Press as the second volume of a series on the history of women’s ordination.

Ida Raming has also authored many scholarly articles on the ordination of women.

A very brief testimony of Ida’s call to priesthood is found here: Ida Raming

Czechoslovakia's Secret Church Receives Herbert Haag Foundation Award: The Tablet, 9 April 2011

by Christa Pongratz-Lippitt
The Tablet - 9 April 2011

Bishop Felix Davidek

Throughout the 41 years of Communist rule in the former Eastern bloc country, an underground network of groups and individuals kept the Catholic faith alive, even to the point of ordaining married men and women. Last week, their achievement was belatedly honoured It was at a moving ceremony at Vienna’s UN-City Church on Saturday last week, 21 years after the fall of the Iron Curtain, that the largest and best-known underground circle in the former Czechoslovakia – called “Koinótés” and founded by the late Bishop Felix Maria Davidek – received the Herbert-Haag-Foundation Award for Freedom in the Church, which is bestowed annually on persons and institutions “for courageous actions within Christianity”.

Although a disputed and controversial figure, Felix Maria Davidek’s charisma and his extraordinary gifts have since been recognised by many Catholic churchmen, including bishops and cardinals. Davidek recognised the signs of the times and his response was prophetic.

Desperate situations, in this case severe persecution by one of the most relentless atheist regimes, merit desperate remedies and Davidek ordained married men and women to the Catholic priesthood. The survival strategies he undertook illuminate the Church’s potential for reform, which never ends with the death of the reformers.

Already before the Communist takeover in 1948, Davidek was fascinated by Teilhard de Chardin’s idea of an evolutionary progression towards greater and greater consciousness. He was convinced that, as well as studying philosophy and theology, seminarians should have a broad university education and also study the humanities and sciences.

While he was a seminarian in Czechoslovakia under German occupation during the Second World War, he dreamed of founding a Catholic university. After ordin­ation in 1945, Davidek continued with his university studies. He read medicine and eventually acquired a doctorate in psychology. At the same time, he founded the “Atheneum”, a preparatory course for young Catholics, men and women, who had not been allowed to attend secondary schools during the German occupation, with the aim of preparing them for matriculation and thus enabling them to study theology.

In 1948, however, the Communists took power. Davidek continued with his Atheneum courses in secret but soon came under police scrutiny and was imprisoned. Fellow prisoners say he was a particularly audacious and trucu­lent prisoner who frequently rebelled and consequently spent long periods in isolation. During his 14 years’ incarceration he jotted down on bits of lavatory paper his meticulous plans for the Church’s survival in an atheistic, Communist dictatorship.

The 1950s were the worst period of church persecution in Czechoslovakia. The theological faculties at universities were closed. Only two Catholic seminaries were allowed to remain open and both were put under state control. The bishops had forbidden seminarians to attend these state-controlled seminaries and soon many of them were imprisoned. One see after another became vacant and the secret police watched all church activities closely.

When he was released in 1964, Davidek immediately began to put his plans into action. He was soon able to gather many committed Catholics around him. They called their group “Koinótés” (derived from koinonia, the Greek word meaning community) and met regularly in secret at night and at the weekends as it was compulsory to have a job in the daytime.

Davidek taught a wide range of subjects and secretly invited prominent churchmen as guest speakers. Thanks to friends who had smuggled them in from abroad, he was also able to study the conclusions of the Second Vatican Council and the works of Karl Rahner, Yves Congar, Henri de Lubac and other well-known theologians of the time with his pupils.

The biggest challenge was to secure a sufficient number of dependable priests who could be relied on not to collaborate with the regime. Up to 1967, candidates were sent abroad to be ordained clandestinely in Germany or Poland. Both Archbishop Karol Wojtyla of Cracow, later to become Pope John Paul II, and Cardinal Joachim Meisner of Cologne, then Bishop of Berlin, clandestinely ordained Czechoslovak priests at that time.

Davidek knew he would never get permission to leave the country, so he sent Jan Blaha, a young chemist who attended conferences abroad and was a member of Koinótés, to Augsburg where he was clandestinely ordained by Bishop Josef Stimpfle. A few months later, in Prague in October 1967, Blaha was consecrated bishop by Bishop Peter Dubovsky, a Slovak Jesuit, who had himself been clandestinely ordained. Bishop Blaha then consecrated Felix Davidek. All these ordinations and consecrations have since been fully recognised and declared valid by the Vatican.

From then on, Koinótés became the nucleus of a clandestine network of committed Catholic groups in Czechoslovakia. Davidek was convinced that the Church could only survive and fulfil its mandate in small entities and that, as in the early Church, each group should have its own bishop, so he soon ordained a considerable number of them. After Soviet tanks destroyed the short-lived Prague Spring of 1968, Davidek lived with the fear that the Communists might at any time attempt to liquidate the Church ­altogether by deporting all clerics to Siberia, and so he consecrated stand-by bishops, in reserve as it were, to take over should such a situation arise.

He also ordained married men, at first for the Greek-Catholic rite, where it is the custom. The Greek-Catholic Church had been dissolved by the Communists and forcibly incorporated into the Orthodox Church and both its bishops imprisoned. Many of its ­members became martyrs but some escaped and went underground. Koinótés worked closely with these.

Later, Davidek also ordained Latin-rite married men as bi-ritual priests who were permitted to celebrate in both rites. He even consecrated one married bishop. One of the chief reasons for these initiatives was that the authorities were highly unlikely to suspect married men of being priests in Latin-rite Catholic Moravia.

Davidek also went so far as to ordain a small number of women. For some time now, he had been discussing women’s role in the Church at the Koinótés meetings. He was convinced that as women had baptised, distributed Communion to the sick and had their place as women deacons in the Church’s hierarchy in the first millennium, they were only excluded from the priesthood for historical and not dogmatic reasons. His main reason for ordaining women was pastoral. Women in women’s prisons, especially women Religious who were imprisoned on a large scale and often exposed to horrible sexual torture, had no one to care for their spiritual needs, whereas in men’s prisons there were usually several priests among the male ­prisoners.

In December 1970, he called a special ­“pastoral synod” to discuss women’s role in the Church, but when he put women’s ­ordination to the vote, half of the Koinótés members who attended voted against it. The issue split the community and became a benchmark in its history. A few days later, nevertheless, Davidek ordained Ludmila Javorová, a prominent member of Koinotes, and later made her his vicar general, which she remained until his death in 1988.

I remember discussing Bishop Davidek and his ordination of married men and women with the late Archbishop John Bukovsky in Vienna in the late 1990s. Bukovsky, who had by then retired, told me that the Vatican had sent him on a fact-finding mission to Czechoslovakia in the summer of 1977. He had been able to talk with Bishop Davidek for several hours, he said, and knew that Davidek had ordained both married men and women. “I was most surprised to be welcomed by his woman vicar general dressed in white and wearing a cross,” he added. The ordinations were illicit but valid, he underlined at the time, and said that Rome had been fully informed.

When the Iron Curtain fell in 1989, many clandestinely ordained priests and bishops, especially those from Koinótés, at first had high hopes that Rome would allow them to form a special personal prelature so that they could continue with their work. It took years to sort out their ordination status, as ­clandestine ordinations were rarely set down in writing. Most of them had to agree to be conditionally reordained in case their ­ordinations were not valid. A number of ­married priests were then taken over by the re-established Greek-Catholic Church.

Ludmila Javorova

In 1992, those who refused to be re-ordained were forbidden to practise their priestly ministry under threat of excommunication. And all this time, of course, Ludmila Javorová and her women colleagues were completely ignored. At the award ceremony she said: “The work has been begun. Others must continue it. Even if the Vatican considers the matter closed, it is my firm belief that at some point in the future this dossier will be reopened.”

For years after 1989, whenever I met any of these underground priests, which I did and continue to do on a regular basis, they still hoped against hope that Rome would change its mind. They would beg me not to publish interviews and refused to criticise the ­powers-that-be in Rome in any way in case this would damage their cause. Gradually, as the older ones died and their numbers diminished, they realised that they had been left to their fate. And yet they have remained what they were from the beginning – committed, humble and loyal Catholics.

Ludmila Javorova

At the prize-giving ceremony in Vienna, Bishop Davidek’s Koinótés was for the first time publicly recognised for what it was – a valiant effort to assure the Church’s survival under persecution. In their laudation, the Swiss theologian Professor Hans Küng of Tübingen University, Professor Hans Jorissen, a former professor of dogmatics at Bonn University and probably the leading connoisseur on the clandestine Church outside the former Czechoslovakia, and Professor Walter Kirchschläger of Lucerne University, all deplored the potential that had been lost. As Professor Jorissen said, “The concept of a missionary re-evangelisation in the Czech Republic, which today is one of Europe’s most secularised countries, could have used the experiences of the clandestine Church, which was, and could still be today, a model for re-evangelisation.”

This message is repeated in a new book on the clandestine Church in the then Czechoslovakia, Die verratene Prophetie (“Betrayed Foresight”), edited by Erwin Koller, Professor Küng and Peter Krizan, and ­published in German by Edition Exodus of Lucerne.

Bishop Dusan Spiner, who was also Davidek’s vicar general, said at the award ­ceremony: “The secular world is not a continent of barbarians and heathens to whom we must take the gospel message. It is our world and our heritage and it is in this world that we must courageously live as a church community.”

Bishop Spiner and Ludmila Javorová came to Vienna to receive the Herbert-Haag Foundation Award on behalf of Koinótés. They received standing ovations, especially when they announced that they would use the money for the birthday celebrations of Bishop Davidek, who would have been 90 this September.

-Christa Pongratz-Lippitt, The Tablet - 9 April 2011

Statement of Indian Women Theologians' Forum: 28 April - 1 May 2019

Annual Meeting, 28 April to 1 May 2019

We, the members of Indian Women Theologians Forum, gathered for our annual meeting from 28th April to 1st May 2019 at Good Shepherd Convent Bengaluru, and deliberated on the theme, “Towards a Gender Just Church”.

In India, and across the globe, we see more and more women reclaiming their voice and agency in the secular sphere. Their subjugation, marginalization and exploitation are increasingly being exposed, countered and challenged. Inclusion and diversity are now an essential part of any discourse on gender. The emergence of new movements like the #MeToo campaign, the moves for temple entry, the triple talaq debate and the many initiatives by ecumenical churches that are creating platforms for a collective assertion of the rights of women and sexual minorities are indicative of the decisive steps taken by women on the path towards greater freedom and affirmation of their personhood.

The notion of gender justice still remains an ambivalent concept or, more accurately, a mismatch within the framework of the institutional Church. While the Christian doctrine affirms equality between women and men on the biblical foundation of the creation of humans ‘in God’s image’(Gen.1: 26-28), women’s experience of discrimination, silencing and exclusion within the ecclesiastical sphere point to the contrary. We note with pain the indifference and silence on the part of Church leadership to victims/survivors of sexual abuse such as children and women, including religious women down the ages, even when it is brought to surface in the recent times. We are deeply disturbed by the double standards by which the survivors and their supporters are further victimized while the alleged offenders are supported and defended in various ways.

This context impelled us to explore critically the various manifestations of ecclesiastical patriarchy. We reflected on religious life and questioned whether it is lived as a prophetic call or remains merely an establishment preoccupied with survival and security concerns. The servitude that is the lot of a great majority of women betrays male privilege that is normalized in families and in the Church. This situation makes us interrogate whether the ‘Gender Policy of the Catholic Church in India’ acclaimed as the first of its kind, has remained a failed promise even after 10 years of its existence.

Engaging in critical conversations on the predicament of women in the Church and in society, we are challenged by Spirit/ Sophia to address the situation with a sense of urgency.

Gathering the liberative voices of biblical women and examining its significance for today’s Church, we resolve to create alternative spaces to exercise our theological and spiritual leadership as ecclesia.

Speaking truth to power like the Syrophoenician woman of the Gospels, we reclaim our position, voice and rights as disciples of Jesus in the Church.

Stepping beyond the boundaries of gendered identity constructions that have devalued us over the ages, we wish to retrieve our full humanity as persons created, graced and commissioned by the empowering God to build a new Church and social order which is egalitarian and inclusive.

We resolve to continue our struggle to build a GENDER JUST CHURCH by exercising our collective agency and networking with individuals and communities committed to realizing the vision of the Reign of God in this world.

https://www.catholicchurchreform.org/216/index.php/news/around-the-world/india/295-statement-of-the-indian-women-theologians-forum-iwtf

Women in the Bible and the Lectionary: Ruth Fox, OSB

Women in the Bible and the Lectionary

by Ruth Fox, OSB

Remembering the Women is a book that embraces what has been omitted by the two major lectionaries of western Christianity. This book contains both the stories that are told in church and the ones that are forgotten.

Discover hundreds of sciptural passages witnessing to the presence of women in the Bible. Find stories that use feminine images of God, stories about named and unnamed women, stories that use imagery based on the physical life of women, and stories that refer to the female figure of holy Wisdom. Also included are essays by Jean Campbell, OSH, Ruth Fox, OSB, and Eileen Schuller, OSU, that further explore the topic of women in the Bible and in the lectionary.

You are invited into the beautiful and inspiring, sometimes difficult and painful, women's stories of heritage, stories that allow our community to see itself as a whole people once again.

Remembering the Women is ideal for groups praying in common, for inspiring sermons and homilies, for preparing liturgies for which specific reading are not prescribed by the churches, and for personal reflection and discussion.

At the conclusion of a four-hour presentation I recently gave on "Women of the Bible," one of the participants exclaimed, "I never knew Jesus had women disciples!" She was puzzled as to why she had never heard this before, since she had been a devout, church-going Catholic for all her 35 years. She heard the Sunday scripture readings and listened to homilies week after week, yet her admission confirmed once again that the revisions of the lectionary mandated by the Second Vatican Council suffer a serious flaw.

The revision of the lectionary was mandated by the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy: "The treasures of the Bible are to be opened up more lavishly, so that richer fare may be provided for the faithful at the table of God's word" (#51). In 1969, the Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship promulgated a new order of readings for use at Mass. From this directive, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops in the United States authorized the publication of a new lectionary for use in our churches effective Palm Sunday, 1970.

Thus many more books and passages of the Bible were made available to Catholics through the scripture readings at Sunday and daily Mass. Homilies based on the readings were to illustrate the relevance of these passages to the daily Christian life, and for more than 25 years, pastors, liturgists and Catholics in the pews have been rejoicing at this increased exposure to the word of God. The widely-held assumption has been that the lectionary faithfully presents the essence of the Bible, with the omission of only a few troubling or gory passages.

This satisfying assumption has recently been controverted by shocking evidence to the contrary. A careful analysis of the lectionary reveals that a disproportionate number of passages about the women of the Bible have been omitted. Women's books, women's experiences and women's accomplishments have been largely overlooked in the assigned scripture readings that are being proclaimed in our churches on Sundays and weekdays. In this article I will point out some of the significant biblical passages about women that are omitted altogether, are relegated to weekdays, where only a small number of churchgoers will hear them, or are designated as optional. I hope to illustrate how some of the lectionary's readings are used to reinforce what some believe to be the weaknesses or proper roles of women. Then I will make a cursory review of the imbalance of the saints recognized in the lectionary. Finally, I will offer some suggestions for liturgists and presiders to rectify the deficiencies.

First Testament Women

A survey of the lectionary reveals that the account of the two brave midwives, Shiphrah and Puah of the Book of Exodus, is omitted entirely from the lectionary. The weekday reading of Exodus 1:8-22 (lectionary #389, Monday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I) skips from verse 14 to verse 22, thus excising the story of these valiant women who put their own lives at risk by defying the pharaoh's law of death in order to uphold God's law of life.

Deborah, named a prophet and judge of Israel and recognized as a mother of Israel, also is passed over in the lectionary. As prophet and judge, Deborah advised her people, planned a military strategy against the Canaanites, appointed a general and then led the victorious battle. Deborah's song of victory in Judges 5:1-31 is considered to be one of the most ancient extant compositions of the Bible, but it is not used in the lectionary. Although Gideon, Jotham, and Jephthah from the Book of Judges find their way into the weekday lectionary, Deborah is left standing outside the gate.

The Book of Ruth gains only two weekday readings (#423, Friday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I, and #424, Saturday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I). The first is the famous "Wherever you go" passage that shows her devotion to her mother-in-law, and the second is the passage that exalts her bearing of a son for her husband Boaz.

Huldah the prophet, who made history in 2 Kings 22, is excised from weekday reading #373 (Wednesday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time, Year II). This woman, a seventh century BCE contemporary of Jeremiah and one of the few women or men literally labelled a prophet, was consulted by King Josiah, the reformer. When an old scroll (now thought to probably have been the original form of Deuteronomy) was found in the temple by the priest, Hilkiah, the king ordered, "Go, consult the LORD for me, for the people, for all Judah, about the stipulations of this book that has been found...." (2 Kings 22:13) The royal delegation took the scroll not to Jeremiah but to Huldah, who verified the authenticity of the scroll and, as a prophet, spoke God's warnings to the king. The verses referring to Huldah (verses 15-19) are neatly sliced out of the middle of the lectionary passage (2 Kings 22:8-13; 23:1-3) .

Esther, a great heroine in a time of oppression, is proclaimed only in a Lenten weekday reading (#228) that records her prayer appealing to God for strength. No account of the bravery with which she saved her people from annihilation is given anywhere in the lectionary. Three other passages from the Book of Esther are found in the lectionary (in the Common of Saints, #737; and in Masses for Various Occasions, #821, #876), but not only might these passages never be used in the parish, all three are accounts of the prayer of Esther's uncle, Mordecai.

Judith, another heroine who jeopardizes her life for her people, is recalled in just two passages: Judith 13:18, 19, 20 (lectionary #709) is an optional responsorial psalm for the Common of the Blessed Virgin ("You are the highest honor of our race"), and lectionary #737, in the Common of Saints (Judith 8:2- 8), praises the recluse Judith's asceticism and physical beauty; it is recommended for proclamation on the memorials of saints who were widows. Judith's initiative, determination and great courage in saving her nation are nowhere presented in the lectionary.

The heroism of the Maccabee brothers is recounted on the Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time (#157), but the passage stops short of the tribute paid to their mother, who encouraged their bravery. Although the mother's valor is recognized in the Bible as "most admirable and worthy of everlasting remembrance" (2 Maccabees 7:20), she is actually remembered by the church only on Wednesday of the Thirty-third Week in Ordinary Time (#499) and only in Year I! The sons and their brave mother are again separated in the Common of Martyrs (lectionary #713.2 and #713.3 deal with the sons, while #713.4 deals with the mother).

Second Testament Women

Two of the most obvious exclusions of women from Second Testament scriptures are found in different readings from the daily lectionary. In the continuous reading from Romans, verses one and two of chapter 16 are omitted from lectionary #490 (Saturday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time, Year I): "I commend to you our sister Phoebe, who is a deaconess [the Greek word is "deacon;" the revised NAB uses "minister"] of the church of Cenchrae. Please welcome her in the Lord, as saints should. If she needs help in anything, give it to her, for she herself has been of help to many, including myself." Thus churchgoers will never hear in our liturgy of Phoebe, a woman who was a deacon. Another overt omission of a verse about women's spiritual influence is made in 2 Timothy 1:1-12, which is assigned to Wednesday of the 9th Week in Ordinary Time, Year II. Lectionary #355 neatly excises verses 4 and 5, including: "I find myself thinking of your sincere faith--faith which first belonged to your grandmother Lois and to your mother Eunice."

There are also noteworthy omissions of women from the assigned gospel passages. It seems incredible that the Magnificat, the beautiful and revolutionary song of Mary in Luke 1:46 - 56, is never proclaimed on a Sunday; it is found on a weekday before Christmas (#199) and on two feast days of Mary, the Visitation (#572) and the Assumption (#622). But by not assigning it to a Sunday, the lectionary seems willing to risk that not many Catholics will hear this marvelous song of praise attributed to Mary.

The Gospel of Luke is the only one that narrates Jesus' healing of a woman who had been crippled for eighteen years (Luke 13:10-17); yet this pericope is assigned to Saturday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time (#479). Although Jesus recognizes her with the unusual status of "daughter of Abraham," this touching story of her faith and Jesus' breaking of the Sabbath law in the synagogue to heal a woman is not proclaimed on any Sunday.

It is well known that Jesus' women disciples, led by Mary Magdalene, according to all the gospels were the first witnesses to the resurrection. Easter Sunday's gospel in the U.S. lectionary (#43), however, stops just at the point of the beautiful story of Jesus' appearance to Mary Magdalene in the garden and his important commission to her: "Go to my brothers and tell them..." (John 20:17; the newer Canadian lectionary rectifies this problem by adding verses 10--18.) In fact, this appearance of Jesus to Mary Magdalene does not rate any Sunday of the Easter season but is assigned to Easter Tuesday (#262) and is used again on the saint's memorial (always a weekday, never a Sunday) in July (#603). Peter and John's race to the tomb in John 20:1 -9 (#43), though, is retold every Easter Sunday, and Jesus' appearance to Thomas in John 20:19-31 (#44) is read on the Second Sunday of Easter every year.

While it is only natural that the gospels for the Sundays of Easter should proclaim the appearances of the risen Lord, the gospels assigned to the fourth through the seventh Sundays of Easter use excerpts from the prayer of Christ at the Last Supper, ignoring Christ's appearance to and dialogue with Mary Magdalene in John 20:11-18 for Sunday proclamation. Similarly, the gospel for Easter Monday (#261) gives Matthew's account of the women finding Christ risen (Matthew 28:8-15). Whereas Matthew 28:1-10 is read at the Easter Vigil in Year A, Matthew 28:8-15 would make an excellent follow-up Sunday gospel--but is relegated to Monday. The first reading for each of the Sundays of Easter is taken from the Acts of the Apostles. The selections focus on the sermons and activities of Peter, Paul, Barnabas and Stephen. The women leaders found in the Acts of the Apostles--Tabitha, Lydia and Priscilla--are given second place in the weekday readings of the Easter Season.

Making Women Optional

Throughout the lectionary, some of the assigned gospel passages that are quite lengthy have optional cutoff points to make the readings shorter and supposedly more acceptable to the Sunday assembly. The presider is authorized to read the whole passage or to cut it short. Several of these passages set aside by parentheses as optional and expendable relate the experiences of women.

February 2, the feast of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple, is assigned the passage from Luke 2:22-40. When Mary and Joseph presented Jesus in the Temple, they were met by Simeon and the prophet Anna, both of whom recognized the infant as the Savior. In the lectionary (#524), the verses about the prophet Anna may be omitted. This same gospel is read on the Sunday after Christmas in Year B (#17), but both Simeon and Anna are considered optional here. The prophet Anna might never appear to witness to Jesus in our churches.

Jesus' healing of a woman with a hemorrhage is significant for Jesus' disregard for the taboos against women (speaking to a woman in public, being touched by a woman or being made unclean by the touch of a bleeding woman). Yet this miracle with all its implications can be sliced out of the gospel (Mark 5:21-43) in the optional short reading for the Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time in Year B (#99). If the presider decides not to read it in Year B, it is never heard by the Sunday assembly. Matthew's and Mark's complete versions of this story may be heard on a weekday (Tuesday of the Fourth Week in Ordinary Time, every year, #324; and Monday of the 14th Week in Ordinary Time, every year, #383), but Luke's version is omitted altogether in Year C.

The Gospel of Matthew is used for the passion reading on Palm Sunday, Year A (#38). Although this passion account begins with the anointing of Jesus on the head by a woman, the lectionary omits these verses (26:6-13). The optional short version of this reading also concludes just before the mention of the faithful women who had followed Jesus to Jerusalem from Galilee. The gospel reading for Wednesday of Holy Week (#260) begins again with Matthew 26:14, repeating the story from Sunday of the betrayal by Judas and excluding again the anointing by a woman.

For Year B. the Palm Sunday passion reading is from Mark (#38). Only the optional long version includes the anointing of Jesus on the head by a woman and the witness of the women at the cross. Thus the role of Jesus' women disciples is again excluded for those who might hear only the short version.

In the Gospel of John, the anointing of Jesus is performed by Mary of Bethany at a banquet served by her sister Martha. This version of the anointing story (John 12: l-8) is read only on a weekday, on Monday of Holy Week (#258). It is not included in the reading of the passion on Good Friday, which is taken from the Gospel of John.

One might ask: Is any account of the anointing of Jesus by a woman familiar to Catholics? Of course, the sinful and penitent woman of Luke 7:36 - 50, who washes Jesus' feet with her tears, is presented on the Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time in Year C (#94) and every year on Thursday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time (#446); but the lectionary does not give us the same familiarity with Mark's and Matthew's versions, in which a woman--not identified as a sinner--assumes the role of a prophet in anointing Jesus on the head. It is to this woman that Jesus promised (in vain?), "I assure you, wherever the good news is proclaimed throughout the world, what she did will be spoken of as her memorial." (Matthew 26:13).

Luke's gospel also includes a passage (8:1-3) that notes some of Jesus' women disciples: Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Susanna and others who go unnamed. These three short verses are attached to Luke 7:36-50 when it is read on the Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time in Year C (#94). But why? By association with the woman in Luke 7:37, are the women named in Luke 8:2-4 also assumed to be sinful? These verses are marked as optional, but if they are omitted, Joanna and Susanna may go unknown except for a weekday mention (Friday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time, every year, #447).

One of the few feminine images of God in the gospels, "the reign of God is like yeast which a woman took...,"(Matthew 13:33) is optional on the only Sunday it appears (the Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A, #107). Matthew's and Luke's parables with this image plus the parable of the mustard seed are found on weekdays (Monday of the Seventeenth Week in Ordinary Time, lectionary #401, and Tuesday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time, lectionary #480). Probably only few Sunday homilies present the image of a bakerwoman God to balance the image of the farmer God.

When women are not overlooked or rendered optional in the lectionary, sometimes passages containing positive references to them are left out while those containing negative references are retained. Take, for example, Exodus 15:20-21, in which Miriam (sister of Moses and Aaron) is identified as a prophet and leads a liturgy of thanksgiving after the crossing of the sea; this passage is omitted from the lectionary. These verses could easily have been attached to the Easter Vigil reading (#42) that exalts the role of Moses, particularly in light of modern scholarship that has pretty much proven that the older scriptural tradition is that of Miriam leading the liturgy of thanksgiving. The account of Moses leading the song of victory was added later, borrowing from the Miriam story. Miriam's weaker side, however, is revealed later, in the story of her envy and punishment with leprosy (Numbers 12:1-13) in a weekday reading (Tuesday of the 18th Week in Ordinary Time, Year I, #408).

Another disturbing tendency is the editing of texts according to gender stereotypes. One of the most convincing examples of this is the editing of Proverbs 31 for the Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A (#158). The lectionary omits verses 14-18 and 21-29, which praise the woman's initiative, business acumen, dignity and wisdom: "Like merchant ships she secures her provisions from afar....She picks out a field to purchase; out of her earnings she plants a vineyard. She is girt about with strength....She makes garments and sells them....She is clothed with strength and dignity." The lectionary does, however, include the passages that praise the woman for serving her husband and being his "unfailing prize." The gospel for this same day is Matthew 25:14-30, which is about the three servants who are given silver pieces. Only with the reading of the complete passage of the industrious woman will listeners be able to find a connection to the industrious male servant of the gospel.

The tragedy of the sacrifice of the daughter of Jephthah is read on Thursday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time, Year I (#422). Her father, having made a rash vow to sacrifice "whoever comes out of the doors of my house to me when I return in triumph" (Judges 11:31), felt obligated to fulfill his brazen promise. The lectionary augments the tragedy by succeeding this reading with the response "Here am I, Lord; I come to do your will" and Psalm 40. Does this imply that God approved of Jephthah's impulsive vow or that parents have unlimited, life-threatening authority over their children? Victims of violence should surely never be expected to sing "Here am I, Lord" on the table of sacrifice. Those who sing this song may well ask, Where is the God who rescued the son Isaac from his father but did not rescue the daughter from her father?

On Holy Family Sunday, the Sunday after Christmas, one would hope to find readings portraying the family of Mary, Joseph and Jesus as a model for contemporary families. The first reading from Sirach does refer to respect for mothers as well as fathers (Sirach 3:4, see lectionary #17), but the responsorial psalm that follows, Psalm 128, is addressed to men and reflects the psalmist's view of the ideal role of women: "Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine in the recesses of your home." The second reading clearly puts the family relationships in similar perspective: "You who are wives, be submissive to your husbands" (Colossians 3:18). Credit must be given to the U.S. bishops, who requested and received permission from the Vatican in June,1992, to omit that verse and the following three verses from public reading. A similar permission was requested and received to shorten Ephesians 5:21 -32 to omit "Wives should be submissive to their husbands..." on the Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B (lectionary #123), on Tuesday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time, Year II (lectionary #480), and at weddings (lectionary #775). One wonders if liturgists and pastors are aware of these permissions: See the Newsletter of the Bishops' Committee on the Liturgy, June, 1992.

The first reading on Pentecost Sunday (#64) is Acts 2:1-11. The opening verse as given in the Bible (NAB) reads: "When the day of pentecost came, it found them gathered in one place" (emphasis added). Those who were gathered are named in Acts 1 as the eleven and "some women in their company, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers." In the lectionary, the opening sentence is interpreted and modified to read "When the day of Pentecost came it found the brethren gathered in one place" (emphasis added). Although "brethren" theoretically may be an inclusive noun, it is not heard as such in this selection. Have homilists revealed that Mary and other women received the Holy Spirit on Pentecost along with the men?

The Calendar of Saints

An important part of our Catholic liturgical experience is the remembrance and celebration of the holy men and women who have been faithful to Christ unto death. From the time of the early martyrs, liturgical tradition has brought the saints to our attention for veneration, inspiration and encouragement. The 1970 lectionary, of course, follows the revised calendar. But the revised sanctoral cycle has an unbalanced ratio of 144 male saints to 28 female saints. (The U.S. bishops have since added 10 men and 7 women to the roster.) The month of June alone brings 19 men before the church for veneration, and no women! Days in the sanctoral cycle are ranked in the descending order of solemnity, feast, memorial and optional memorial. Celebrations in honor of Mary, Joseph, John the Baptist, Peter and Paul are given the status of solemnities. Feasts also are assigned to these five again, as well as to 14 more men. The highest rank in the calendar that any woman besides Mary has achieved is that of memorial. Even though Mary Magdalene has been recognized through the centuries as "apostle to the apostles" (see John Paul II, "On The Dignity and Vocation of Women," # 16), she ranks below the Twelve in the liturgy.

Further study of the lectionary reveals that 42 male saints have at least one proper reading assigned for their day, while only 8 female saints (not counting Mary) have a special reading. Of these, only Mary Magdalene, Theresa of the Child Jesus and Anne (who shares a memorial with Joachim) are assigned a proper first reading and gospel. Memorials without proper readings may use readings from the appropriate set of "common" readings (Common of Martyrs, Common of Saints and so on). However, for days ranked below feasts--which include all the memorials of women--liturgical guidelines recommend the use of the daily continuous readings from the lectionary.

Memorials of both men and women saints use both the Common of Martyrs and the Common of Saints. But only memorials of men use the Common of Pastors and the Common of Doctors. Furthermore, only memorials of women are assigned to the Common of Virgins, even though many of the male saints are in fact virgins, too (i.e. celibate or vowed religious).

The memorials of the only two women ever named "doctors" of the church--Catherine of Siena and Teresa of Avila--each do have proper first readings, but the gospel is chosen not from the Common of Doctors but from the Common of Virgins (for both Catherine and Teresa) or the Common of Saints/ Religious (for Teresa)!

Women and men who are looking for spiritual nourishment from the stories of our ancestors, both male and female, are finding that the diet is very meager at the table of the liturgy. Invaluable Manifestations

The rationale used for choosing the scripture texts for the lectionary is found in the introduction to the lectionary, especially in #7 and #8. Omitted passages are those of lesser importance; they contain serious literary, critical or exegetical problems; they will not be understood by the faithful; they are not essential to the meaning of the text; they have lesser spiritual value; they have little pastoral worth; and they contain truly difficult questions. Certainly all of us would agree that not all passages of the Bible are suitable for public reading in the liturgy; and an analysis of the lectionary similar to mine would reveal than many stories of men also are omitted. But given the already limited focus on women in the Bible, it would seem that lectionary editors would begin to choose to be more inclusive of women - if they wished the liturgy to speak to women. But it is not just a matter of speaking to women. Just as men are held up as spiritual models for women (how many sermons have we heard on the faith of Peter?), so, too, men's spirituality is enriched and aided with feminine patterns of holiness.

Since Vatican II we have been reminded again and again that "the liturgy is the summit toward which the activity of the Church is directed; at the same time it is the fountain from which all her power flows" (Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, # 10). The liturgy is meant to be a source of holiness and a celebration of union with God for all God's people. If liturgy is to be authentic, then, it must speak to the experience of women as well as men. Because "sacred scripture is of paramount importance in the celebration of the Liturgy" (CSL #24), the scripture readings should represent the totality of salvation history and human experience. Because the homily is to be drawn mainly from the scripture readings, it follows that if the readings overlook women or present negative stereotypes, homilies will also. The full history of God's intervention in the lives of women and men needs to be made known if the celebration of the liturgy is to "pertain to the whole body of the church." (CSL #26).

Pope John Paul II has himself called for the recogtnition and appreciation of the historical gifts of women: "The church asks at the same time that these invaluable 'manifestations of the Spirit,' which with great generosity are poured forth upon the 'daughters' of the eternal Jerusalem, may be attentively recognized and appreciated so that they may return for the common good of the church and of humanity, especially in our times." (On the Dignity and Vocation of Women #31).

Practical suggestions for liturgists and presiders

by Ruth Fox, OSB
accompanying the article, "Women in the Bible and the Lectionary"

A revised lectionary was recently approved by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and sent to Rome for confirmation. However, the Vatican has withdrawn its initial confirmation of one translation (the New Revised Standard version) and has ordered a reworking of another (the Revised New American Bible) because of the use of inclusive language. My understanding is that there were no substantial changes in the selections of readings in this forthcoming lectionary, so we can anticipate little change in the content even when or if the revision is approved. There are, however, some actions that presiders and liturgists can take to use the lectionary to its maximum potential and correct some of the deficiencies noted above.

1. Choose to read the long versions of the gospel whenever a short version is provided. If that will seem to make Mass too long, perhaps something else could be shortened, such as the homily.

2. At the beginning of Mass, the commentator or presider could call attention to verses that have been omitted from the lectionary readings. This information also could be supplied in the bulletin.

3. Preach on the full biblical text, paying special attention to the omitted verses.

4. Include the omitted verses in the assigned reading, either by retyping the full passage and inserting it in the lectionary or by reading the complete passage from the Bible itself -- the Bible was used for proclamation before the lectionary ever came into being. (For more on the legality of adding verses to the lections, watch for the forthcoming book from canonist John Huels, More Disputed Questions on the Liturgy to be published this fall by Liturgy Training Publications.)

5. Use scripture passages about women that are neglected by the lectionary on other occasions in parish life -- on evenings of formation or reflection, or for the commissioning of ministers, for example. For catechists, Anna the prophet, Priscilla and Acquila, Lydia, Lois and Eunice; for musicians, Miriam or Judith leading the singing with tambourines; for lectors, Huldah, the prophet; for ministers of hospitality, the women who welcome prophets in 1 Kings 17 or 2 Kings 4; for ministers of communion, Martha's confession in John 11.

6. Use the Magnificat or portions of Esther's and Judith's prayers to open or close parish meetings until people come to learn them by heart.

7. For communal anointings of the sick, add an extra reading from Mark or Matthew on the woman anointing Jesus on the head to prepare him for his passion; or refer to it in the homily.

8. At funeral vigils for women, use the full reading from Proverbs 31.

9. For pro-life rallies, use Exodus 1:8-22, including the omitted verses 14 - 21 on the midwives.

10. Celebrate all the optional memorials of women saints throughout the year.

Source: May/June issue of LITURGY 90, © 1996,
Archdiocese of Chicago. All rights reserved. Liturgy Training
Publications, 1800 N. Hermitage Ave., Chicago IL 60622-1101
1-800-933-1800.

The Time Is Now For Change In The Catholic Church: Mary McAleese, 08 March 2018

The time is now for change in the Catholic Church
Mary McAleese, President of Ireland 1997-2011
08 March 2018

PDF Version Here

A video of the presentation is here: The Time Is Now For Change in the Catholic Church

Mary McAleese, President of Ireland 1997-2011

The Israelites under Joshua’s command circled Jericho’s walls for seven days, blew trumpets and shouted to make the walls fall down. (cf. Joshua 6:1-20). We don’t have trumpets but we have voices, voices of faith and we are here to shout, to bring down our Church’s walls of mysogyny. We have been circling these walls for 55 years since John XXIII’s encyclical Pacem in Terris first pointed to the advancement of women as one of the most important “signs of the times”.

“they are demanding both in domestic and in public life the rights and duties which belong to them as human persons” [1].[…] The longstanding inferiority complex of certain classes because of their economic and social status, sex, or position in the State, and the corresponding superiority complex of other classes, is rapidly becoming a thing of the past[2].

At the Second Vatican Council Archbishop Paul Hallinan of Atlanta, warned the bishops to stop perpetuating “the secondary place accorded to women in the Church of the 20th century” and to avoid the Church being a “late-comer in [their] social, political and economic development”[3]. The Council’s decree Apostolicam Actuositatem said it was important that women“participate more widely […] in the various sectors of the Church’s apostolate”[4]. The Council’s pastoral constitution Gaudium et Spes said the elimination of discrimination based on gender was a priority[5]. Paul VI even commissioned a study on women in Church and Society[6]. Surely we thought then, the post-Conciliar Church was on the way to full equality for its 600 million female members. And yes-it is true that since the Council new roles and jobs, have opened up to the laity including women but these have simply marginally increased the visibility of women in subordinate roles, including in the Curia, but they have added nothing to their decision-making power or their voice. Remarkably since the Council, roles which were specifically designated as suitable for the laity have been deliberately closed to women. The stable roles of acolyte and lector[7] and the permanent deaconate[8] have been opened only to lay men. Why?

Both laymen and women can be temporary altar servers but bishops are allowed to ban females and where they permit them in their dioceses individual pastors can ban them in their parishes[9]. Why?

Back in 1976 we were told that the Church does not consider herself authorized to admit women to priestly ordination[10]. This has locked women out of any significant role in the Church’s leadership, doctrinal development and authority structure since these have historically been reserved to or filtered through ordained men. Yet in divine justice the very fact of the permanent exclusion of women from priesthood and all its consequential exclusions, should have provoked the Church hierarchy to find innovative and transparent ways of including women’s voices as of right and not in trickles of tokenism by tapping, in the divinely instituted College of Bishops and in the man made entities such as the College of Cardinals, the Synod of Bishops and episcopal conferences, in all the places where the faith is shaped by decision and dogma and doctrine. Just imagine this normative scenario- Pope Francis calls a Synod on the role of Women in the Church and 350 male celibates advise the Pope on what women really want! That is how ludicrous our Church has become. How long can the hierarchy sustain the credibility of a God who wants things this way, who wants a Church where women are invisible and voiceless in Church leadership, legal and doctrinal discernment and decision-making?

It was here in this very hall in 1995 that Irish Jesuit theologian, Fr. Gerry O’Hanlon put his finger on the underpinning systemic problem when he steered Decree 14[11] through the Jesuits 34th General Congregation. It is a forgotten document but today we will dust it down and use it to challenge a Jesuit Pope, a reforming Pope, to real, practical action on behalf of women in the Catholic Church.

Decree 14 says:

We have been part of a civil and ecclesial tradition that has offended against women. And, like many men, we have a tendency to convince ourselves that there is no problem. However unwittingly, we have often contributed to a form of clericalism which has reinforced male domination with an ostensibly divine sanction. By making this declaration we wish to react personally and collectively, and do what we can to change this regrettable situation.

“The regrettable situation” arises because the Catholic Church has long since been a primary global carrier of the virus of misogyny. It has never sought a cure though a cure is freely available. Its name is “equality”

Down the 2000 year highway of Christian history came the ethereal divine beauty of the Nativity, the cruel sacrifice of the Crucifixion, the Hallelujah of the Resurrection and the rallying cry of the great commandment to love one another. But down that same highway came man-made toxins such as misogyny and homophobia to say nothing of anti-semitism with their legacy of damaged and wasted lives and deeply embedded institutional dysfunction.

The laws and cultures of many nations and faith systems were also historically deeply patriarchal and excluding of women; some still are, but today the Catholic Church lags noticeably behind the world’s advanced nations in the elimination of discrimination against women. Worse still, because it is the “pulpit of the world” to quote Ban Ki Moon[12] its overt clerical patriarchalism acts as a powerful brake on dismantling the architecture of misogyny wherever it is found. There is an irony here, for education has been crucial to the advancement of women and for many of us, the education which liberated us was provided by the Church’s frontline workers clerical and lay, who have done so much to lift men and women out of poverty and powerlessness and give them access to opportunity. Yet paradoxically it is the questioning voices of educated Catholic women and the courageous men who support them, which the Church hierarchy simply cannot cope with and scorns rather than engaging in dialogue. The Church which regularly criticizes the secular world for its failure to deliver on human rights has almost no culture of critiquing itself. It has a hostility to internal criticism which fosters blinkered servility and which borders on institutional idolatry.

Today we challenge Pope Francis to develop a credible strategy for the inclusion of women as equals throughout the Church’s root and branch infrastructure, including its decision-making. A strategy with targets, pathways and outcomes regularly and independently audited Failure to include women as equals has deprived the Church of fresh and innovative discernment; it has consigned it to recycled thinking among a hermetically sealed cosy male clerical elite flattered and rarely challenged by those tapped for jobs in secret and closed processes. It has kept Christ out and bigotry in. It has left the Church flapping about awkwardly on one wing when God gave it two. We are entitled to hold our Church leaders to account for this and other egregious abuses of institutional power and we will insist on our right to do so no matter how many official doors are closed to us.

At the start of his papacy Pope Francis said “We need to create still broader opportunities for a more incisive female presence in the Church”[13] words a Church scholar described as evidence of Francis’ “magnanimity”[14]. Let us be clear, women’s right to equality in the Church arises organically from divine justice. It should not depend on ad hoc papal benevolence.

Pope Francis described female theologians as the “strawberries on the cake”[15]. He was wrong. Women are the leaven in the cake. They are the primary handers on of the faith to their children. In the Western world the Church’s cake is not rising, the baton of faith is dropping. Women are walking away from the Catholic Church in droves, for those who are expected to be key influencers in their children’s faith formation have no opportunity to be key influencers in the formation of the Catholic faith. That is no longer acceptable. Just four months ago the Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin felt compelled to remark that “the low standing of women in the Catholic Church is the most significant reason for the feeling of alienation towards it in Ireland today”[16].

Yet Pope Francis has said that “women are more important than men because the Church is a woman”[17]. Holy Father, why not ask women if they feel more important than men? I suspect many will answer that they experience the Church as a male bastion of patronizing platitudes to which Pope Francis has added his quota.

John Paul II has written of the ‘mystery of women’[18]. Talk to us as equals and we will not be a mystery! Francis has said a “deeper theology of women”[19] is needed. God knows it would be hard to find a more shallow theology of women than the misogyny dressed up as theology[20] which the magisterium currently hides behind.

And all the time a deeper theology is staring us in the face. It does not require much digging to find it. Just look to Christ. John Paul II pointed out that:

we are heirs to a history which has conditioned us to a remarkable extent. In every time and place, this conditioning has been an obstacle to the progress of women. […] Transcending the established norms of his own culture, Jesus treated women with openness, respect, acceptance and tenderness….As we look to Christ…. it is natural to ask ourselves: how much of his message has been heard and acted upon?

Women are best qualified to answer that question but we are left to talk among ourselves. No Church leader bothers to turn up not just because we do not matter to them but because their priestly formation prepares them to resist treating us as true equals.

Back in this hall in 1995 the Jesuit Congregation asked God for the grace of conversion from a patriarchal Church to a Church of equals; a Church where women truly matter not on terms designed by men for a patriarchal Church but on terms which make Christ matter. Only such a Church of equals is worthy of Christ. Only such a Church can credibly make Christ matter. The time for that Church is now, Pope Francis. The time for change is now. 

[1] John XXIII encyclical Pacem in terris, 11 April 1963, n. 41.

[2] Ibid. n. 43

[3] Cf. Fr. P. Jordan O.S.B., NCWC News Rome correspondent «Changes proposed in role of women in the Church» posted 12 October 1965. Cf. https://vaticaniiat50.wordpress.com /2015/10/12/ changes-proposed-in-role-of-women-in-the-church/

[4] Second Vatican Council, Decree Apostolicam Actuositatem, 18 November 1965, n. 9 in AAS 58 (1966), 846-.

[5] Cf. Second Vatican Council, Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes, 7 December 1965, n. 29 in AAS 58 (1966), 1048-1049.

[6] It reported in 1976.

[7] 1983 Code of Canon Law, can. 230 §1. Cf. Paul VI, apostolic letter, Ministeria Quaedam, 15 August 1972, n. 2-4; 7, in AAS 64 (1972) 529-534. Formerly called the minor orders of acolyte and lector, they are: henceforth to be called ministries. Ministries may be assigned to lay Christians; hence they are no longer to be considered as reserved to candidates for the sacrament of orders. […] In accordance with the ancient tradition of the Church, institution to the ministries of reader and acolyte is reserved to men.

[8] 1983 Code of Canon Law, can. 1031 §2. In 2016 Pope Francis set up a Commission to look at the question of ordaining women to the Diaconate. The report is believed to have been on his desk for a year as of March 2018.

[9] Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments, letter Concerning the use of female altar servers, 27 July 2001.

[10] Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, declaration Inter Insigniores, On the question of the ordination of women to the ministerial priesthood, 15 October 15 1976.

[11] Written with the help among others of two Irish laywomen, Cathy Molloy and Edel O’Kennedy. For the background to the Decree cf. M.J. Heydt, «Solving the Mystery of Decree 14: Jesuits and the situation of women in Church and civil society» http://www.conversationsmagazine.org/web-features/2015/12/27/solving-the-mystery-of-decree-14-jesuits-and-the-situation-of-women-in-church-and-civil-society

[12] Per UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon in his opening introduction at the UNGA Seventieth Session, 25 September 2015, UN Doc A/70/PV.3, 1.

[13] Francis, apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, 24 November 2013, n. 103 in AAS 105 (2013) 1019-1137. Cf. Francis interview with Fr. A. Spadaro SJ for America magazine in which he repeated these words, 30 September 2013 (as amended online).

[14] P. Zagano, «What the Pope really said», NCRonline 25 September 2013 https:// www.ncronline.org/blogs/just-catholic/what-pope-really-said.

[15] Francis, Address to the International Theological Commission, 5 December 2014. Cf. H. Roberts «Women theologians are ‘the strawberry on the cake, says Pope», The Tablet 11 December 2014.

[16] From a talk entitled “The church in Dublin: where will it be in 10 years’ time?” at St Mary’s Church, Haddington Road, as reported in the Irish Times, November 16 2017.

[17] Response of Pope Francis to a question from a journalist: “Will we one day see women priests in the Catholic Church?” on papal plane returning to Rome from the United States, Sept. 29, 2015. Cf. https://www.ncr online.org/blogs/francis-chronicles/popes-quotes-theology-women

[18] John Paul II, apostolic letter, Mulieris Dignitatem, n. 15 August 1988 in AAS 80 (1988) 1653-1729.

[19] Interview with journalists on board plane on way to Rio de Janeiro 22 July 2013 cf. John Allen «The Pope on Homosexuals. Who am I to judge?», NCRonline https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/ncr-today/pope-homosexuals-who-am-i-judge

[20] Cf. Manfred Hauke, Women in the priesthood. A Systematic Analysis in the Light of the Order of Creation and Redemption, Ignatius Press, 1988.

Clericalism and a New Model for Priesthood - Marie Bouclin

Clericalism and a New Model of Priesthood

Marie Bouclin, RCWP Canada Bishop Emeritus, former International Coordinator of Women’s Ordination Worldwide

Marie Bouclin, Special to The Review | December 15, 2019 — Marie, former Canadian Delegate to Women’s Ordination Worldwide, served as International Coordinator of WOW. She is a member of Canada’s Catholic Network for Women’s Equality and the Roman Catholic Womenpriest movement. She was ordained a priest in the Roman Catholic Womenpriest movement and later consecrated as Canada’s first woman bishop. Today, Marie is RCWP Canada Bishop Emeritus. She is the author of Seeking Wholeness, Women Dealing with Abuse of Power in the Catholic Church. We are blessed to have her with us.
____________________________________________________

In his Letter to the People of God1 , Pope Francis denounces clericalism as the cause of the sexual abuse scandal that is, according to Canon Lawyer Thomas Doyle, O.P.2, the worst crisis in the church since the Reformation. I’ve come to connect clericalism and sexual abuse ever since I heard women’s experiences of abuse of clerical power, particularly stories of sexual abuse, harassment and unjustified dismissals of women by priests and bishops. In fact, it was those abuses, and a need for a new model of priestly service that put me on the path to priesthood. I could see an urgent need to find ways of healing the rape of the soul that is clergy sexual abuse. It became very important for me to understand clericalism so that we, in the women priest movement can be ever watchful lest we fall into its trap.

Pope Francis describes clericalism as “an assumption of moral superiority” and “a peculiar way of understanding the Church’s authority” which manifests itself in “sexual abuse and the abuse of power and conscience”. 3 The remedy he prescribes is prayer and fasting. Nowhere is there mention of a systemic problem within the structure of the Church nor is there any real call for change. In fact the constant teaching of the Magisterium is so resistant to change that it has made several decisions that have been harmful to the people of God. Consider that in 1968 with Humanae Vitae, all forms of artificial contraception were banned, even for the poorest families who could not support another child. Paul VI dismissed the advice of his pontifical commission which called for a more modern approach to family planning. Then there was the official banning (though not all bishops agreed) of condoms even though the AIDS epidemic took over 35 million lives, mostly in poor countries. And then of course, there is the prohibition on so much as discussing the ordained ministries of women and excluding women from all decision-making positions. Even though women are “naturally” morally superior if we are to believe John Paul II.4

However, a group of women researchers, mandated by Cardinal Cupich of Chicago proposes a much more detailed definition:5

Clericalism is an attitude of entitlement and superiority. It claims the right to making decisions affecting the lives of Catholics based on the “sacred power” conferred by priestly ordination. In the present scheme of things (according to the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church), the priest is endowed with the power to act in persona Christi, that is to say that he speaks and acts in the person of Christ himself. Clericalism is a form of idolatry most manifest when the priest and many faithful believe that clergy actually speaks and acts “as God”.

This attitude of entitlement and superiority has led to very skewed teachings, particularly with regard to women and sexuality. For instance, old celibate men who, again according to Thomas Doyle, have “never had a healthy and honest love relationship in their lives”, claim to have the wisdom to tell young couples how to live their conjugal love, including how many children they will have. Even until now, they taught that sexual intercourse had always to be open to new life.

Then there are the “cheaters” (and their numbers, according to Doyle quoting Dr. Richard Sipe, would be about 90%) who claim they have made a promise of celibacy, i.e., not to marry, but not a vow of chastity. These same men are telling vowed women religious how to live their vow of chastity and how to love Jesus better.

Some chaplains of religious communities believe they are entitled to impose all kinds of mortifications, particularly on young nuns, which would include frequent fasting, corporal penances, deprivations of all kinds, such as sleep, leisure time, family ties, etc. without however, observing them themselves. And this is besides the sexual abuse documented in a recent film by Marie-Pierre Raimbaut.6

There are “princes of the church” who live in luxury but reserve the right to excommunicate women for having had an abortion or tried to have fewer pregnancies because they live in grinding poverty and cannot provide the necessities of life for another child.

Some parish priests have refused the sacraments to women who left a violent and abusive husband (even if their lives were in danger), saying this is the cross women have to bear.

So, if as a renewed model of priesthood, we are to strive to be more faithful to the Gospel, we must recognize that some teachings of the Magisterium, such as article 1563 of the Catechism, simply need to be set aside. For instance, the notion that something special happens, often called “ontological change”, when one is ordained a priest. The ordained man (always a man in the current scheme of things) becomes another Christ (alter Christus). This is not the same as being incorporated into the Body of Christ through Baptism. The underlying theological argument of the alter Christus theory promulgated to priests and laity alike is this: Christ is the second person of the Trinity, “of the same substance as the Father”, to quote the Nicean Creed, and the priest is “configured to Christ”. So, he basically becomes God. And he not only acts and speaks for God (as all real prophets do, for instance), but as God. There is a huge difference.

This is the crux of the problem of clericalism. The priest can claim to know what God wants, can expect to be treated with special reverence, can impose his will as that of God. That endows him with an enormous power which can easily lead to abuse, be it sexual, physical, psychological or spiritual.

The alter Christus theory is also at the root of the current two-tiered membership in the Church. It prompts Vatican reporter Robert Mickens to describe clergy as having

… a privileged and separate caste mentality that makes clerics believe that they are specially chosen, set apart from the rest of people to rule, teach and admonish.7

Consequently, one must belong to this caste to have any decision-making power.

And clericalism is maintained in place by the oath of obedience made by priests and bishops to the Pope. This oath rests on the belief that the teachings of the Magisterium are infallible and also that access to the Divine is always mediated through the clergy. Never mind that experience has taught us otherwise. Some decisions alluded to earlier have been harmful to the People of God, the Magisterium has lost credibility because it has not paid attention to the sensus fidelium nor the advances of science or even biblical exegesis, or even that God has spoken to humanity through the voices of prophets and mystics who have not all been priests. The alter Christus theory has further ramifications. If only clergy are qualified to rule, teach and admonish, they come to believe they are not only morally, but intellectually and spiritually superior. They are entitled to make all decision regarding not only parish and community administration and welfare but also who is worthy, in their opinion, to receive the Sacraments. And all this is enshrined in Canon Law which for centuries now has taken precedence over the teachings of Jesus as recorded in the Gospels.

Our task then, as priests, is to avoid falling into the trap of clericalism and exercise a “new model of priestly ministry”. Here is can be helpful to listen to some of the complaints people have expressed to us about women priests, and questions we can ask ourselves:

Do we listen to the members of our communities? Do we give people a voice via “shared homilies”, for instance, or do we insist on imposing our “superior theological/intellectual knowledge” on people who are often well-informed in the faith and want to raise legitimate theological questions?

Do we insist on titles and insignia as recognition of our “superior status” in the church?

Do we make decisions collegially within our small faith communities, especially with regard to liturgy, or do we accept suggestions gratefully?

Do we resist the temptation to impose our “moral or intellectual superiority” by referring too frequently to our own experiences or to a body of esoteric knowledge that has no bearing on the situation at hand?

What more can we do?8

We may find interesting the suggestions made by Marie-Andrée Roy to the members of L’autre Parole, a collective of Christian Feminists based in Quebec. Their aim is to raise awareness and prevent further sexual abuses by clergy, but can serve our purposes in renewing our vision of church. No single action is going to stem this tide of destruction washing over a Church that cannot be “fixed”, but collective actions may help us in our mission to renew it (or build a new one).

1. We can begin by being radically inclusive, at all levels of our ecclesial communities. We need both women and men in all ministries, as well as people who fit into an imprecise human gender. The first criterion for leadership is that people be reliable witnesses to the Gospel.

2. The current theology of the priesthood, which claims that the priest is another Christ (alter Christus) must be deconstructed and a new theology of ministry must be built on the example of Jesus and those who are dedicated to service to the community.

3. We must set aside an understanding of Church as made up of two hierarchical castes, clergy and lay, where clergy hold the key to salvation and the laity is a flock which simply follows. We need equality.

4. Dispense with titles, be it Reverend Father (or Mother or Sister or Brother). Not to mention Excellence, Eminence, Monsignor (= My lord), Your Holiness. We have parents who are our fathers and mothers. All members of our church community are our sisters and brothers with whom we maintain brotherly and sisterly relationships.

5. Abolish all hierarchies, including those of material means, social standing and education. Every person has value and everyone has a voice.

6. There is no need to dispense with the vow of celibacy per se, but we do not impose it. Celibacy is not a condition to be admitted to ministry. Chastity, on the other hand, which is the holy and healthy exercise of human sexuality, is a precious Christian virtue required of everyone.

7. Insist, however, that Church leaders refrain from pontificating and trying to regulate the sexuality of persons, especially as they relate to contraception, abortion, homosexuality, premarital sex, etc. Rather, speak out on the important issues of respect for the dignity of all persons, openness to the poor and most needy, and loving others as ourselves.

8. Develop a new understanding of the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience (vowed Religious, for example), so that obedience of all Catholics does not become blindly servile and self-destructive.

9. Demand that the current atmosphere of secrecy, silence and submission be replaced by the acquisition and continuously developed processes of discernment, self-esteem and self-confidence – in other words, learn to love ourselves to love others better .

One of our priests has called her ordination the “grace of all graces”. God has indeed graced us with a call to be channels of grace for God’s people by our attentiveness to spiritual and also material needs. Our ordination also calls us to very high ethical standards of behavior. That means respecting the dignity of all human beings we encounter and treating them exactly as we imagine Christ would. Then we would indeed be another Christ.

[Marie Bouclin, Sudbury, ON, RCWP Canada Bishop Emerita]

____________________________________________________

1 Pope Francis, Letter to the People of God, August 20, 2018

2 Thomas Doyle, O.P., Lecture to Futurechurch, March, 2019

3 Letter to People of God, op.cit. #4

4 See John Paul II, Mulieris Dignitatem, 1988 especially #27 and #31

5 From correspondence with Bishop Andrea Johnson, RCWP

6 L’autre scandal dans l’Église, l’abus sexuel de religieuses, Société Radio Canada, 24 avril 2019

7 Robert Mickens, How serious is Pope Francis about eradicating clericalism?,La Croix International, Sept 21, 2018

8 Marie-Andrée Roy, Unpublished notes, Colloque de L’autre Parole 2019

This article was originally published in The Review, RCWP Canada’s Online Magazine|December 15, 2019 . RCWP is a member group of Women’s Ordination Worldwide.

Are Women Substantially Incompatible for the Priesthood? Attempts to Link Maleness and the Priesthood Through the Ages Have Failed The Test: Dr. John Wijngaards

Altar servers are seen as Pope Francis leads Benediction in observance of the feast of Corpus Christi in Ostia, a suburb of Rome, June 3. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)

What do these popes have in common? Nicholas V (1454) authorised Christian conquerors to enslave native peoples. Innocent VIII (1484) endorsed the torture and execution of witches. Benedict XIV (1745) condemned taking interest on capital loans as a mortal sin. Pius IX (1864) declared non-Christians could not obtain eternal salvation. John Paul II (1994) taught that priesthood is reserved only to men.

All defended errors based on a mixture of misread scripture and ill-informed prejudice. The only difference is that whereas the other erroneous teachings have now been discarded by the official church, the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith last month still repeated Pope John Paul II's mistaken view.

Archbishop Luis Ladaria writes: "The impossibility of ordaining women belongs to the 'substance' of the sacrament of order, a fact the Church recognizes. She cannot change this substance. … It is not just a question of discipline, but of doctrine." This is a massive claim that needs to be exposed for the fallacy it is.

Take note: the archbishop asserts that the exclusion of women is not just a practical custom going back to Jesus. A fundamental obstacle is at stake, a trait that makes every woman an intrinsic mismatch to the eucharistic priesthood of Christ. What is he talking about?

Disqualified by birth?

Jesus only chose 12 men in the original band of apostles. This was a symbolic act. He wanted these leaders of the new Israel to match the 12 tribal patriarchs of old. But he never created the 12 as a permanent institution. Nor did he want to establish a permanent norm of male leadership. The intention of instituting a male-only priesthood was only ascribed to Jesus by later generations who projected onto him their own conviction of female inferiority. 

Some women presided at the Eucharist in early Christian communities. But the Hellenistic-Roman context in which the church grew up soon strangled such "anomalies."  The reason? Women were considered mentally and physically inferior. Roman law deprived them of public office. As Augustine succinctly remarked: "Women rank below men by nature and law."

In other words, the substantial obstacle to ordaining women lay in their inferiority as human beings. No one explained this as fully as Thomas Aquinas, heralded by the church as the champion of orthodoxy. "Even though a woman were made the object of all that is done in conferring Orders, she would not receive Orders," he taught, "for, since woman is in the state of subjection, the female sex cannot signify eminence of degree" (Summa Theologica, Suppl. 39, 1).

Why not? Like his contemporaries, Aquinas believed that the whole future child is contained in the male sperm. In procreation, a woman only contributes her womb — which is like a ploughed field in which a grain of seed has been sown (ST II, 18, 1). Every woman is flawed. Aquinas held that at birth the "female offspring is deficient and caused by accident. For the active power of the semen always seeks to produce a thing completely like itself, something male. So if a female is produced, this must be because the semen is weak or because the material [in the womb] is unsuitable, or because of the action of some external factor such as the winds from the south which make the air humid … " (ST, I, 92, 1, ad. 1).  

"God's image in the full sense of the term is only found in man," Aquinas says elsewhere. "Women are created in God's image only to the extent that they too have a mind" (ST, I, 93, 4 ad 1). But women cannot use their brain fully because God "ordered men not women for intellectual activity" (ST, I, 92, 1). To use a metaphor, a woman may look like a luxury car, but she lacks a proper engine.

So is this why Jesus excluded women from his priesthood? Were they simply not fully human? Then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, in his 1977 commentary on Inter Insigniores, rejected women's inferiority as a valid reason. But he did not acknowledge that throughout the centuries this prejudice justified the presumed 'tradition' of barring women from the priesthood.

And if women's inferiority is not the substantial obstacle in Ladaria's view, what can he be referring to? John Paul II provides a clue in his 1988 encyclical Mulieris Dignitatem.

Not in the driving seat?

A commentary on Inter Insigniores by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (1976) had already stated: "Christ is the Bridegroom of the Church, whom he won for himself with his blood. By using this language, revelation shows why the incarnation took place according to the male gender. It makes it impossible to ignore this historical reality. For this reason, only a man can take the part of Christ, be a sign of his presence, in a word 'represent' him in the essential acts of the covenant."

In Mulieris Dignitatem John Paul II expands on this theme. It was God's will from the start, he says, that the incarnation should happen in a man, a male.  "The Bridegroom — the Son consubstantial with the Father as God — became … the 'son of man,' true man, a male. The symbol of the Bridegroom is masculine," he writes.

John Paul II then goes on to explain that we may "legitimately conclude" that this was the reason why Jesus disqualified women from priestly service. He wanted to link the Eucharist to male priests who could represent him in his masculine bridegroom role. He writes, "It is the Eucharist above all that expresses the redemptive act of Christ the Bridegroom towards the Church the Bride. This is clear and unambiguous when the sacramental ministry of the Eucharist, in which the priest acts 'in persona Christi,' is performed by a man." To continue our metaphor, a woman does not qualify for the race for she is not a driver, only a spectator.

Are John Paul II's speculations sufficient ground to claim that the masculinity of the ordinand is substantial to the sacrament of holy orders? He cannot claim real support in tradition. On the contrary, as numerous theologians have pointed out, his view contradicts the overwhelming evidence for the incarnation embracing both men and women. "The Word became flesh," we read in the Gospel of John. The word flesh does not have a gender. As theologian Sr. Elizabeth Johnson points out, if the incarnation was restricted to the male, the female would not be redeemed since the ancient principle applies here quod non assumitur, non redimitur – "what is not taken up [in the incarnation], has not been redeemed."

The truth of the matter is that Jesus did not, in principle, exclude women from holy orders. Attempts through the ages to conjure up intrinsic reasons for linking maleness and priesthood have failed the test. And history delivers the knockout blow. Women have been verified compatible. Enter women deacons.

During the first millennium, tens of thousands of women were ordained deacons. Their rite of ordination has been preserved. It proves that women were ordained like the men, that is, sacramentally, to use the classic term. In other words, they qualified for holy orders. For the diaconate belongs to Orders. As the Council of Trent instructed, "If anyone says that in the Catholic Church there is not a hierarchy constituted by divine ordination, consisting of bishops, priests, and deacons: let him be anathema" (Session IV, Canon 6). So where does that leave the prefect of the doctrinal congregation?

___________________________

John Wijngaards is a theologian and writer, professor emeritus of the Missionary Institute London, and founder of the Wijngaards Institute for Catholic Research.

Full original documentation for all the texts quoted in this article — and many more resources — can be found on John Wijngaards' website womenpriests.org. The site features introductory materials in 26 languages.

John is the founder of Wijngaards Institute for Catholic Research. WICR is a member group of Women’s Ordination Worldwide.

Advent 2019 Appeal to Cardinals from John J. Shea, O.S.A.

Advent 2019

Dear Cardinal Bertello,

This Advent, I write yet again to you as a member of the Council of Cardinals, asking you to address at your coming meeting the church’s tragic decision that women lack the body-and-soul integrity necessary for ordination to the priesthood. This decision so clearly needing reform—ecclesia semper reformanda est—continues to radically disfigures the church’s identity and to thoroughly compromise its mission in the world.

Of all the things that Pope Francis has said and done, his opening of the Synod on the Family in 2014 was quite extraordinary: he told the gathered bishops to speak “freely,” “boldly,” and “without fear.” He actually had to ask his fellow bishops—grown men and the church’s teachers—to speak honestly with each other. Not just a necessary request, of course, this intervention offered the hope that perhaps real dialogue—after years and years of its absence—might finally be possible.

If women in priesthood is critical—if hierarchy hopping about on one foot is not just hopelessly unbalanced but also, as we know too well, aids and abets devastatingly destructive betrayal of trust and shamefully criminal activity—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If any given woman can provide pastoral care as well as any given man, if nothing in Scripture or tradition keeps women from ordination, and if it is not ad rem to ordination to see women as complementary or as wonderfully extra-human, or in the light of precious patriarchal symbolism I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you find the 1994 letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis:

1. is the fruit of doctrinal fiat and not dialogue;

2. is written directly in the face of—and arguably to cut off—serious scriptural-theological dialogue actually taking place; and

3. is mandating that no dialogue at all—let alone anything fearless or gender-inclusive—is possible going forward, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you find Ordinatio Sacerdotalis an historical-patriarchal gloss on ordination rather than a serious theological exploration and explanation, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you think the still-standing theological explanation of the Vatican in the 1970s and 1980s—that women cannot be ordained because they are “not fully in the likeness of Jesus”—simply would be silly if it were it not heretical, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If there is a reason why women fully created in the image and likeness of the Father are somehow not fully created in the image and likeness of the Son—if Jesus is made to image a Father who is biologically male—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If our church’s liturgy persists in distorting the Three-in-Oneness of our God—if a huge patriarchal log is stuck arrogantly in the church’s eye, worshipping the Father as male, the Son as male, and the Holy

Spirit as male—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you are alarmed that adult faithful leave the church in droves be cause of women judged unworthy of priesthood—if a “patriarchal Jesus” severs the roots of inclusion, respect, trust, and hope for women and men alike—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If it concerns you that banning women from ordination is taken—in the church and throughout the world—as affirming women’s inferiority and justifying sex slavery, infanticide, domestic violence, and many other atrocities, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If bishops, theologians, and the faithful—animated by the Spirit— need to dialogue openly about women’s body-and-soul integrity—letting our obtuse, head-in-the-sand, hard-hearted, patriarchal church come to its senses—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

Cardinal Bertello, is the way our church continues to dehumanize women shameful? “No one,” says Paolo Freire, “can be authentically human while he prevents others from being so.” Are integrity and mutuality a two-way street? Are bishops whole if they deny the body-and-soul wholeness of the women they serve? If you personally fail to see women as fully in the likeness of Jesus, what is it exactly that they lack?

Is this Advent a fitting time for collegial voices to be heard? Like the reformation of inclusion so critical in the infant church, can you and your fellow bishops see, hear, and name what Pope Francis does not see, hear, and name? Will you speak freely, boldly, and without fear?

Sincerely,

John J. Shea, O.S.A.

Copy: Pope Francis

Advent 2019 Appeal to Pope Francis from John J. Shea, O.S.A.

Dear Pope Francis,

I hope you are well and that you are allowed to read this letter. I keep praying for you. Your concern for injustice, the poor, the environment, and administrative reform in the church is inspiring.

Yet again, two letters about the ordination of women: the first I mailed to each member of the Council of Cardinals with whom you soon meet; the second, for background, I mailed at the beginning of Lent in 2014 to each one of the ordinaries of the United States.

When you first spoke about the need for honest dialogue on the issues facing the church, it was quite hopeful. You often said: “dialogue, dialogue, dialogue.” You even said: “dialogue fearlessly.” Unfortunately, there is no dialogue—fearless, gender-inclusive, or otherwise—on the ordination of women. As our Supreme Bridgebuilder, how much longer until you set in motion the one reform most critical for the unity of the church? How much longer must we wait for this blight on the Good News to end, this blight that so dishonors women, the message of Jesus, and the very mission of the church?

How can the church be whole if every woman in it is “not fully in the likeness of Jesus”? Does not the denial of the body-and-soul integrity of women—their imago Dei ignored, disparaged, and nullified—stifle the Spirit and darken the light of the Gospel throughout the world? How long until servant ministry is separated from patriarchal conceit? How long until an intelligent view of gender dawns on an uninformed, inept, inert, loyalty-cast, sheep-droved magisterium? How long until Vatican-championed misogyny—so disrespectful and so immature—ceases to pervert all four traditional hallmarks of our church?

Pope Francis, is this Advent the time for us to wake from sleep?

Sincerely,

John J. Shea, O.S.A.

Copy: Each Member of the Council of Cardinals

___________________________________________

Sidebar: In 2012, Fr. John Shea, O.S.A., an Augustinian priest and theologian, wrote an open letter to Boston Archbishop Sean Cardinal O’Malley, detailing his crusade for women’s ordination and asking the archbishop simply to provide an explanation of the Church’s position on the issue. In his letter, which was published in the Boston College student newspaper, The Heights, Fr. Shea explained how he began calling regularly for a discussion of the topic at provincial chapter meetings of his order in 1986.

In 2010, Shea, who was ordained in 1967, says he “wrote to Father Robert Prevost, O.S.A. in Rome, the Prior General of the Augustinian Order, asking ‘that I be officially recognized as stepping aside from the public exercise of priesthood until women are ordained as priests in our church.’” Receiving no satisfactory response, Shea wrote to Archbishop O’Malley, his Provincial, the Dean of the School of Theology and Ministry at Boston College where he was teaching and his department chairman, informing them that he “was stepping aside from active ministry as a priest until women are ordained.”

The 2012 open letter earned Shea a response, although probably not the one he wished. Boston College decided not to renew the contract of the theologian and pastoral care expert, who had been teaching there for nearly a decade. Shea says he has also received two canonical warnings from his Provincial for expressing his concerns about this issue. However, the author of Finding God Again: Spirituality for Adults (Rowman & Littlefield, 2005) remains undeterred in his quest for a credible theological explanation for the Church’s exclusion of women from Holy Orders.

Advent Appeal to Cardinals from John J. Shea, O.S.A.

Dear Cardinal Nichols,

Blessed Advent! — “Come and set us free, Lord God of power and might.”

I hope you are well and that your staff lets you read the enclosed letters. I write to share a perspective on the explanation we have on the ontological-theological status of women in the church—the status that blocks their ordination to the priesthood.

The bishops remain silent on the status of women in the church— perhaps out of loyalty, or acceptance, or fear, or ignorance, or the need to get along. The priests remain silent on this status—perhaps out of loyalty, or acceptance, or fear, or ignorance, or the need to get along. The mandatum theologians, even if they have the necessary expertise in theology and human development, remain silent on this status—perhaps out of loyalty, or acceptance, or fear, or the need to get along.

It seems rather clear that this complicit silence is helping no one— not women, not the faithful, not the pope and the other bishops, not the priests, not the theologians. Every day this silence keeps the church from honestly addressing the huge global challenges of pastoral ministry. Every day this silence writes off huge numbers of the faithful who leave an archaic, obtuse, deaf and dumb, dehumanizing, self-referential institution which they no longer trust and in which they no longer hope.

If you as a bishop—and as a teacher in the church—can address the body-and-soul status of women in the church—if you know in your heart that this is a wall that needs a door—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

Sincerely,
John J. Shea, O.S.A.

Dear Cardinals: Speak Freely, Boldly, and Without Fear

Dear Cardinal Parolin,

I am writing to you and to each of the members of the Council of Cardinals yet again to ask you to directly address in your Advent meeting the church’s continuing decision to see women as lacking the body-and-soul integrity to be ordained to the priesthood. This decision so needing reform—ecclesia semper reformanda—radically disfigures the church’s identity and seriously compromises its mission in the world.

Of all the things that Pope Francis has said and done, the way he opened the Synod on the Family in 2014 was perhaps the most extraordinary. He asked the bishops to speak “freely,” “boldly,” and “without fear.” This exhortation is quite shocking: he had to ask his fellow bishops—grown men and the church’s teachers—to speak honestly to each other. Given a church so incredibly challenged by dialogue, however, his exhortation was not only necessary but was also, at least at the time, some small sign of hope for the future.

If you believe that the ordination of women to the priesthood is vital for the integrity, the mutuality, the maturity, and the viability of our church, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you find there is nothing in Scripture or tradition that that precludes the ordination of women to the priesthood, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If seeing women and men through a complementarity lens or in light of precious patriarchal symbolism is not ad rem to women’s worthiness of ordination, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you know from your own experience that any given woman is as religiously mature and able to provide pastoral care as any given man, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you find the 1994 letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis: 1) was the fruit not of dialogue but of doctrinal fiat; 2) was written directly in the face of—and arguably to cut off—serious scriptural-theological dialogue actually taking place; and 3) then mandated that no dialogue—let alone anything fearless or gender-inclusive—is allowed going forward, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you see that the letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, is an historical interpretation of ordination rather than one that is theological, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If the theological explanation actually put forth by the Vatican in the 1970s and 1980s—that women cannot be ordained because they are “not fully in the likeness of Jesus”—would be silly if it were it not so heretical, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If seeing women fully created in the image and likeness of God does not mean that they are fully created in the image and likeness of Jesus— if such Trinitarian theology is puzzling, incongruous, or totally bizarre—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If the church’s current stance effectively undermines the Three-in-Oneness of our God—if a huge patriarchal beam is stuck in the church’s eye, worshipping the Father as genetically male, the Son as genetically male, and, of course, the Holy Spirit as genetically male—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you are concerned about the adult faithful leaving the church in droves because women are not worthy of priesthood—if you understand that “a patriarchal Jesus” severs the roots of inclusion, respect, and trust in the church—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If it is clear that the church’s opposition to the ordination of women is taken—inside and outside the church—as affirming women’s inferiority and justifying domestic violence, infanticide, trafficking, and many other atrocities, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you want bishops to work now in a synodal way with theologians and the faithful—under the aegis of a genderless Spirit—to affirm the body-and-soul integrity of women and to heal our stubborn, stolid, and sexist church, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

Cardinal Parolin, how long will the temporizing go on? Is injustice to women to cripple the Christian message forever? Like the reformation of inclusion in the infant church, can you and the other bishops see, hear, and name what Pope Francis cannot see, hear, and name? Will you speak freely? Will you dialogue boldly and without fear?

Sincerely,

John J. Shea, O.S.A.

Copy: Pope Francis

Feast of St. Augustine Appeal to Council of Cardinals by John J. Shea, O.S.A

Dear Cardinal Parolin,

I am writing again to you and to each of the members of the Coun- cil of Cardinals to ask you to directly address in your September meeting the church’s ongoing decision to see women as lacking the body-and- soul integrity to be ordained to the priesthood. This is a critical issue of structural reform—ecclesia semper reformanda. It radically warps our church’s identity and painfully cripples its mission in the world.

Of all the things that Pope Francis has said and done, the way he opened the Synod on the Family in 2014 was perhaps the most extraor- dinary. He asked the bishops to speak “freely,” “boldly,” and “without fear.” This exhortation is quite shocking: he had to ask his fellow bish- ops—grown men and the church’s teachers—to speak honestly to each other. Given a church so incredibly challenged by dialogue, however, his exhortation was not only necessary but was, at lease at the time, some small sign of hope.

If you believe that the ordination of women to the priesthood is vital for the integrity, the mutuality, the maturity, and the viability of our church, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you know from your own experience that any given woman is as religiously mature and able to provide pastoral care as any given man, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you find there is nothing in Scripture or tradition that that pre- cludes the ordination of women to the priesthood, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If seeing women and men through a complementarity lens or in light of precious patriarchal symbolism is not ad rem to women’s worthi- ness of ordination, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you find the 1994 letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis: 1) was the fruit not of dialogue but of doctrinal fiat; 2) was written directly in the face of—and arguably to cut off—serious scriptural-theological dialogue actu- ally taking place; and 3) then mandated that no dialogue—let alone any- thing fearless or gender-inclusive—is allowed going forward, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you see that the letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, is an historical in- terpretation of ordination rather than one that is theological, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If the theological explanation actually put forth by the Vatican in the 1970s and 1980s—that women cannot be ordained because they are “not fully in the likeness of Jesus”—would be silly if it were it not so he- retical, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If seeing women fully created in the image and likeness of God does not mean that they are fully created in the image and likeness of Jesus— if such Trinitarian theology is puzzling, incongruous, or totally bizarre—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If the church’s current stance effectively undermines the Three-in- Oneness of our God—if a huge patriarchal beam is stuck in the church’s eye, worshipping the Father as genetically male, the Son as genetically male, and, of course, the Holy Spirit as genetically male—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you are concerned about the adult faithful leaving the church in droves because women are not worthy of priesthood—if you understand that “a patriarchal Jesus” severs the roots of inclusion, respect, and trust in the church—I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If it is clear that the church’s opposition to the ordination of women is taken—inside and outside the church—as affirming women’s inferiority and justifying domestic violence, infanticide, trafficking, and many other atrocities, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

If you want bishops to work now in a synodal way with theologians and the faithful—under the aegis of a genderless Spirit—to affirm the body-and-soul integrity of women and to heal our stammering, stolid, and sexist church, I ask you to speak freely, boldly, and without fear.

Cardinal Parolin, how long will this temporizing go on? Is injustice to women to cripple the Christian message forever? Like the reformation of inclusion in the infant church, can you and the other bishops see, hear, and name what Pope Francis cannot see, hear, and name? Will you speak freely? Will you dialogue boldly and without fear?

Feast of St. Augustine Appeal to Pope Francis by John J. Shea, O.S.A

I hope you that are well and that your officials let you receive this letter. I pray for you. Your obvious concern for the poor, for the environ- ment, and for reform in our church is more than wonderful.

Enclosed again are two letters about the ordination of women: the first is sent to each member of the Council of Cardinals with whom you are soon meeting; the second is a letter for background that I mailed to all the ordinaries of the United States at the beginning of Lent in 2014.

When you talked about the need for honest dialogue on the issues that we face as a church, it was initially heartening. You kept insisting: “dialogue, dialogue, dialogue.” In fact, you said: “dialogue fearlessly.”

Unfortunately, however, there is not now, nor has there ever been, fearless dialogue—let alone anything gender inclusive—on the ordination of women, even though this issue is arguably the one most crucial.

In your care for God’s people, can the collaboration between bishops and theologians at Vatican II be a model? As our Supreme Bridge Builder can you empower an up-to-date synodal dialogue now so tragically absent and so desperately needed?

How can our church be whole if women are “not fully in the likeness of Jesus”? Not to affirm the body-and-soul wholeness of women—leaving their integrity ignored, disparaged, and denied—is a crushing injustice that stifles the Spirit and gives a lie to the Good News.

Is it wrong to hope that our ecclesial structures—crumbling in stone yet so powerfully ensconced in patriarchal privilege—can come to embrace an intelligent view of gender? Is it possible to see that integrity and mutuality are embodied by grown women as well as grown men?

Pope Francis, can the Vatican’s understanding of women finally take a centuries-leap forward? Can justice and mercy actually wed?

Sincerely,

John J. Shea, O.S.A. Copy: Each Member of the Council of Cardinals

APPEAL BY 12 IRISH PRIESTS (1 November 2015)

Priests call for open discussion on the need for equality of Women in all aspects of Church life, including Ministry.

There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Gal. 3, 28)

In the Catholic Church women, despite being equal to men by virtue of their Baptism, are excluded from all positions of decision making, and from ordained ministry. In 1994 Pope John Paul II declared that the exclusion of women from priesthood could not even be discussed in the Church.

Pope Benedict reaffirmed, and even strengthened this teaching by insisting that it was definitive and that all Catholics were required to give assent to this view.

Pope Francis has said that Pope John Paul II had reflected at length on this matter, had declared that women could never be priests and that, therefore, no further discussion on the ordination of women to ministry is possible. In reality, Pope John Paul II did not encourage or facilitate debate on the ordination of women to priesthood or diaconate before he made his decision.

Furthermore, there was virtually no discussion on the complex cultural factors which excluded women from leadership roles in many societies until recently.

We, the undersigned, believe that this situation is very damaging, that it alienates both women and men from the church because they are scandalised by the unwillingness of Church leaders to open the debate on the role of women in our church. This alienation will continue and accelerate.

We are aware that there are many women who are deeply hurt and saddened by this teaching.

We also believe that the example given by the Church in discriminating against women encourages and reinforces abuse and violence against women in many cultures and societies. It is also necessary to remember that women form the bulk of the congregation at Sunday Mass and have been more active in the life of the local churches than many men, mirroring the fidelity of the women who followed Jesus to the end, to his death on Calvary. The command of Jesus "Go, teach all nations" was addressed to all his followers, and by failing to accept the full equality of women, the church is not fulfilling this commission.

The strict prohibition on discussing the question has failed to silence the majority of the Catholic faithful. Survey after survey indicates that a great many people are in favour of full equality for women in the Church. But it has managed to silence priests and bishops, because the sanctions being imposed on those who dare to raise the question are swift and severe.

We believe that we can no longer remain silent because to do so colludes with the systemic oppression of women within the Catholic Church. So, in the spirit of Pope Francis constant encouragement of dialogue, we are calling for free and open discussion concerning the full equality of women in all facets of Church life, including all forms of ministry. If this were to happen, the credibility of the Catholic Church would gain strength, especially when it addresses women's issues.

Signed: Frs:

Eamonn McCarthy

Sean McDonagh

Kevin Hegarty

Tony Conry

Roy Donovan

John D. Kirwin

Padraig Standun

Donagh O'Meara

Adrian Egan

Ned Quinn

Benny Bohan

Tony Flannery