A priest becomes a stand-in for Christ. Christ in his human form was male…end of story. Its not about what males and females can do…it’s about who Christ was.
See the thread under the Sacred Scripture heading on the Ordination of Women Priests for a recent and ongoing thread on this topic.
Perhaps it’s because you’re approaching the question from the wrong end. You should ask rather, why should women be priests? :yup:
And that is even more evidence that they did not experience a true vocation. Even a man who thinks he has a vocation goes through a long period of discernment and formtion. At any point he may decide it’s not his true vocation OR the diocese/order could decide that he is not in the right place.
I can recall when there never were women readers at mass, nor girl altar servers, etc. In my home town nuns (many of them then, all gone now) were treated with 1/5 the respect priests received. In fact, priests were revered as though they were superhuman, could do no wrong. They appeared to think that, too - at least some priests. They could be kind but also extremely autocratic. Wasn't there some rule about how close women could approach the altar - that is, behind the communion rails that once were in every church? I never did learn the details.
As for scripture, Paul does say that women should be silent in the churches and that they should not teach men. Wow! The church certainly tossed those verses to the breeze. Or, consider Mother Angelica. She may oppose ordination of women but she is a good example of women who are not silent and who teach people of both genders and all ages. So, the Church can change and has. In fact, when I look at it today and what it was like when I was a young child, one may be inclined to think of Catholicism as a different religion - well, certainly when it comes to worship. I recall that we were forbidden to speak out loud in church, apart from liturgical responses, of course. Was that a rule or just the tradition in the church in my small, rural village?
I like the changes. They reflect a more democratic tradition and place less emphasis on the impact that medievalism had upon the church. Whenever I watch some major event on EWTN and see all those bishops etc processing in, dressed in those matching ancient vestments - not a female among them - I have to wonder, and cringe a bit.
But, that's just one point of view. I think it could be a majority view among American Catholics but certainly not here in CAF.
God bless and guide everybody - no exceptions. Let's trust in God.was thinking the exact same thing.
Indeed.
My guess is that Jesus foresaw danger that following him brings and honored the life vessels that women are. Sometimes we have to take a look at the Church in the whole 2000 year perspective and not just from a modern American perspective. All of the popes in the first 300 years of the Church were martyred, during World War II Catholic priests, Bishops and Cardinals were sent to Dachu. Now let’s leave American shores where members of the clergy aren’t being persecuted and go to South Sudan where a priest was just recently crucified not with nails but with ropes but he was hung on a cross. Being a priest is a dangerous job in many parts of the world today and has been since Jesus himself was crucified. It’s also probably why priests are not allowed to marry. If persecutors are going to go after priests they aren’t likely to leave their wife and children alone either.
I couldn’t give it up either!!!
Christ’s heart, mind, and soul were male. What you are doing is saying that Christ’s body was male but Christ was not male. This is not true. Christ is his body, and his body is Christ.
The all male priesthood was a Jewish custom. If Christ had intended to end it, he would have.
You will find the discussion of their exclusion in the writings of the early church fathers. I suggest you read the documents yourself and decide for yourself what to think.
Women were very important in the gospel and VERY important in the Church. What is a family without a mother?
This is the most unfortunate misunderstanding that I think happens. The priesthood is not a ‘calling’. Men (and women) are called to the religious life. The bishop is the one who institutes a man as a priest. Unfortunately, today there is such a lack of people responding to vocations that being called to be a religious is equated to being called to be a priest for men.
Any woman who loves her spouse would not leave him. What is sad is that such women do not realize that their calling is to be a mother in the church, not a father somewhere else.
And not the liberal American jet-set “in” philosophy of the day.
:extrahappy:
The priesthood did not start with the Apostles. It was fulfilled with the Apostles. Why can’t women be priestess? Only God can answer that question. It is God who began the priesthood with Aaron. His sister Marion would have made a good priestess according to the standards of men but God only appointed the men of the tribe to be priest. This was done even though the culture that surrounded them had priestesses. God ordained men only. Jesus fulfilled that priesthood with the Apostles again men only. You can have all sorts of theological reasoning but boiled down it comes to the Will of God. God left the Church with the Holy Spirit to guide it. The Spirit has inspired the Church to declare that they have no power to ordain women. If God wanted women to serve as priestesses it would have been done at the beginning not in the age of political correctness.The word “deacon” comes from the Greek word “diakonia”. It was used for anyone who served. For example, when Jesus washes the feet of his apostles, the early Church Fathers spoke about it as diakonia. We know that Jesus was not a deacon. He is the high priest.
Br. JR, OSF