Guys I'm upset: My cousin pastor wrote a HARSH piece on the Catholic Church (sex abuse)

[kainosktisis]

I don’t agree, & if the day should ever come where women are ordained in the Catholic Church, I will leave because, that, to me, is a church in open rebellion with God.

 

[adgloriam]

OK. What’s your point?

Simple. Certain issues somehow get over-hyped in the US. Let me give a few examples:

V2, not an issue.
LGBT, not an issue.
Anti-celibacy, not an issue.
Pro-woman ordination, not an issue.
“Trad”, not an issue.

Yes, church stands against “same-sex matrimony”, and also stands against “gay adoption” (tough topic btw). Otherwise, no issues.

My point?! When I read through some of this stuff on CAF it’s usually “firsts” for me, and I bet over 97% of Europeans never heard or thought about any of it. I’m still amazed how the average layman finds himself entangled and propagating all those debates. It’s like they say: “only in the US”.

 

[PJH_74]

That is satisfying for people like me. I love bringing in the other apostolic churches. Even today, I did so for defense of the Assumption of Mary.

I’ve respected your outlook on religion, especially from a Catholic perspective. I also often appreciate your posts.

I’m married to this situation. My spouse is a Lutheran Pastor,. We know many Female Pastors. Some have been told their congregation was going to hell because of them. Others have been sexually assaulted or told they shouldn’t look too pretty lest they distract males church members. Many are assigned the less desirable congregations with lower salaries while the men often end up with the more stable larger better paying congregations.

So while this my feel turned up to 11, and maybe to some degree it is, but female pastors face the same opportunity limitations as women in the general work force. Indeed these limitations are baked into our Constitution and categorically denied in a huge majority of the pastoral positions available. An Aunt and a couple of cousins belong to the WELS Lutheran branch (3rd largest), stated specifically in their doctrines is that women are not allowed to have authority in both theological or temporally within the church. You might well see where the anger and resentment come from…it is real.

I’m going to go our on a limb here and guess that most Female Saints are so because of chastity or selfless care of the sick or poor. I doubt you will find any or more than a few that are Saints for their theological contributions and there’s no reason they can’t be. A little food for thought.

 

[kainosktisis]

Sts. Teresa of Avila, Thérèse de Lisieux, Clare of Assisi, & Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (aka Edith Stein) come to mind. And they weren’t pastors.

I should add Sts. Catherine of Siena & Hildegard. Of the saints named above, these 4 are called Doctors of the Church: Sts. Teresa of Avila, Thérèse de Lisieux, Catherine of Siena & Hildegard.

 

[kainosktisis]

Others have been sexually assaulted or told they shouldn’t look too pretty lest they distract males church members.

I’m a sexual abuse survivor. The BVM was no doubt modest. Why wouldn’t anyone want to emulate her?

I am picking up from the description given that female pastors take their vocations as cash & status opportunities - am I correct? Not religious callings of service?

 

[ATraveller]

Willow Creek Community Church.
It’s a megachurch that ordains women and has women as elders.
And guess what happened? The founder had affairs and sexually harassed women. Disabled boys were sexually abused. These happened despite the fact women were in leadership roles.
It isn’t men or women being in charge or what jobs they have that can allow abuse to occur, it’s the lack of knowledge of handling cases, nepotism, cronyism, having a distorted view of forgiveness, etc.

Willow Creek's Entire Elder Board, Pastor Heather Larson Resign Over Bill Hybels Scandal, Failings

The entire elder board of Willow Creek Community Church, including executive pastor Heather Larson, have announced that they are resigning over the Bill Hybels sex abuse scandal

www.christianpost.com

Willow Creek Megachurch Paid $3.25M in Lawsuits Over Sex Abuse of Disabled Boys

Willow Creek Community Church in Illinois reportedly paid 3 5 million in lawsuits over the sex abuse of two developmentally disabled boys

www.christianpost.com

While I’m open to ideas on curbing abuse, blaming this vague patriarchy boogeyman accomplishes nothing. That’s like blaming clerical celibacy for the abuse cases. Both are unsubstantiated and have nothing to do with why abuse occurs or why cover ups happen. I find them to be distractions from the real underlying reasons, some of them listed above.

 

[somecanadian]

1. Patriarchal is not necessarily wrong and does not mean women are disrespected, hated or mistreated.
2. Women in the Catholic Church do not need to be ordained, it would go against our theology and destroy the meaning of everything we believe.
3. If you want to be a priest and you are a woman, there are other churches that will take you. But I would argue if you’re a woman and you want to be ordained… you aren’t Catholic to begin with. (hardline).
4. Your personal feelings aren’t fact. I feel sad when I hear how women have been abused but those experiences don’t negate truth and the truth is… women shouldn’t be priests. Ever. I say this AS a woman who was NOT raised in the Church and who used to attend churches where women were leaders (pointing that out to make it clear I haven’t been 'brainwashed… or whatever people figure).

 

[PJH_74]

Of the saints named above, these 4 are called Doctors of the Church: Sts. Teresa of Avila, Thérèse de Lisieux, Catherine of Siena & Hildegard.

That’s my basic point, 4 of 36 (11%) Doctors of the church and not one until modern times in 1970; it still is a very male dominated world.

I’m a sexual abuse survivor. The BVM was no doubt modest. Why wouldn’t anyone want to emulate her?

I am so sorry to hear that you are a sexual abuse survivor, you of course did nothing to deserve that and I hope you will find or have found peace with that fact. What concerns me a little is that I’m hearing that emulating the the modesty of Mary would have changed things or for women who might be in the future. It’s the abuser’s fault, not what ever modesty the woman does or doesn’t display.

I am picking up from the description given that female pastors take their vocations as cash & status opportunities - am I correct? Not religious callings of service?

No way. Does a Priest do it for status, I doubt it? Female pastors do it as part of a call from God. If you think full time $45k (for a very rural assignment) where you are on call all the time, have few evenings, and no Sundays where you also need a Master’s degree (many Pastors live under crushing debt from their degree) is doing it for the money; then you’d be mistaken. Pastors easily do 50 hours a week (about $18/hour using the example above), about as much as a fork lift operator who can go home and forget about work. Jobs in metro areas pay more, but are very hard to come by, especially full time.

It is a stressful job and takes a lot of people skills to minster to people you may or may not think highly of and to deal with their internal quibbling. The burn out rate is high.

 

[anon98328916]

She obviously doesn’t understand the Catholic faith.

 

[adgloriam]

@catholic1seeks after some reflection I’ll say this: Better not take issue with dumb things certain cousins say.

 

[on_the_hill]

When I read through some of this stuff on CAF it’s usually “firsts” for me, and I bet over 97% of Europeans never heard or thought about any of it. I’m still amazed how the average layman finds himself entangled and propagating all those debates. It’s like they say: “only in the US”.

The vast majority of American Catholics don’t think about these things, either, until they see it on forums like CAF.

 

[on_the_hill]

By far, the worst (and most laughable) defense of the patriarchal system I’ve ever read was, “We value women so much that we want to protect them from the burden of leadership.”

 

[Gorgias]

How do I proceed so I don’t overreact???

Recognize that she’s seeing this through her own personal lens. If you look at a scandal of child sexual abuse, and see it as a dynamic of “men in power over women”, you’ve got an interesting lens through which you view the world…

 

[Fauken]

I doubt you will find any or more than a few that are Saints for their theological contributions and there’s no reason they can’t be. A little food for thought.

No one is canonized for their contributions to theology. The Devil himself is an excellent theologian; expertise in theology does not make a person a Saint.

 

[adgloriam]

until they see it on forums like CAF.

I still recon CAF is probably one of the better places where many of these issues get addressed, and there’s a lovely community of good people on this forum.

 

[theCardinalbird]

It’s time to start ordaining women.

And how will they act in Persona Christi? But anyway its impossible:

The fact of the matter, of course, is that women cannot be ordained to the Catholic priesthood. The Church’s magisterium, or teaching authority, has made that very clear. In an apostolic letter issued May 28, 1994, Saint Pope John Paul II declared:

In order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church’s constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Luke 22:32), I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be held definitively by all the Church’s faithful ( Ordinatio Sacerdotalis 4).

But anyway this is a different topic for a different thread

 

[on_the_hill]

I concur in your findings.

 

[on_the_hill]

But anyway this is a different topic for a different thread

I agree.

The reason I commented on it vis-a-vis the article in the OP is because I believe the abuses in the Church are direct consequences of the patriarchy that excludes half of the world’s population from positions of institutional, administrative leadership. Further, how can I trust the teaching authority’s decisions in light of what’s been going on?

 

[catholic1seeks]

@on_the_hill, for the sake of dialogue, let me be the first to say that there are good and true aspects in Rev Erin’s article. Patriarchy as a cultural attitude, if it abuses power and claims authority over women, is wrong and un-Christian.

I believe the author assumes to much under the title of patriarchy, however, and essential destroys traditional and apostolic Christianity in the process – which is a serious mistake for a fellow Christian to make. Celibacy has always been valued in the Christian Faith, from Jesus and Paul onward. And the male-only priesthood is also apostolic.

That doesn’t mean there have not been or are not now abuses. Clericalism and abuse of power distorts the priesthood into “patriarchy” in the negative sense. But let’s not throw out the baby with the bathwater (again, which I believe Rev Erin is doing).

Also, yes women need to be more involved in the Church, whether in leadership or administrative positions. That this can happen outside the ordained priesthood is very evident — it just needs to happen more often.

One of today’s saints is an abbess from the Middle Ages. An abbess is essentially a woman “bishop” over her religious community. Women have always had leadership roles in the Church; other Christians and the secular world just don’t have the proper context — they think Catholicism amounts to an institution of priests, when it encompasses so much more, even so many more roles and institutional positions.

 

[somecanadian]

Women are in positions of ‘power’ within the Church. They teach, they are seen as moral authorities… I’m not sure why people think we are completely minimized. We aren’t.

In my parish the ONLY people teaching outside the Mass ARE female. Our Bible Studies, RCIA classes, Confirmation classes, etc are ALL female led.

Do we really think men are just so evil that they cannot be trusted in power? Because that’s what this patriarchy is the problem thing feels like to me.

I, personally, feel men are capable of great good and great evil. JUST LIKE WOMEN. And I really don’t understand why people think having women mixed in would guarantee no abuse.

Countless women have stood back and let their husbands rape children, murder strangers and all manner of evil. Having a female presence does not guarantee anything (and we DO have a female presence. MANY popes had respected sisters as confidants).