Phoenix Arizona Diocese Cathedral Won't Allow Girls Serve On Altar

[StAnastasia]

StAnastasia;8373989:

Sorry for butting in, but ho is your Parish not Catholic, when you said it was run by the Order of Preachers (Dominicans)?

No hay mujeres de mala reputación que trabaja en mi parroquia.

 

[Corki]

Corki;8374186:

It’s abuse that the priests, pastor, and bishop are fine with.

That doesn’t mean it is not still an abuse. The documents of the Church forbid it. So it’s an abuse. It maybe a wide-spread abuse but it’s still an abuse.

 

[StAnastasia]

StAnastasia;8374458:

That doesn’t mean it is not still an abuse. The documents of the Church forbid it. So it’s an abuse. It maybe a wide-spread abuse but it’s still an abuse.

I understand how you feel about it.

 

[Annabelle_Marie]

The reason to use only boys is more valid then to allow girls, as according to Canon Law, male Altar servers are the norm, female altar servers are allowed by indult, at the discretion of the Holy Father, the Bishops Conference, the individual Bishop and of course the celebrant, if anyone along the hierarchy decides they shall not have female servers in the church/province/diocese/parish, then that is there choice, they do not have to explain anything.

They many not HAVE to explain anything…but it would be a good pastorial decision to do so in a kindly, charitable manner…no? When you tell a child NO…without providing explanations, then how does that help anything? If a pastor is making that decision, then they should provide an explanation IMHO as they are also spiritual fathers to the girls as well as to the boys. They shouldn’t leave it up to the parents who may not agree with the decision. Just a thought. It’s not about entitlement but about being a proper father, IMHO.

 

[StAnastasia]

Of course they can

. There is no question that girls and boys *can *serve at Mass IF the Bishop and the priest chose to allow it.

Good.

In this case, the permission is not being given.

 

[Karenfern]

I do not believe everyone should be able to do everything they want; however there is no good reason why women should not be altar servers.

Exactly, I’ve read about this on the site, but is it up to the Church to decide what spiritual gifts are given to individuals?

Once again Phoebe in Rom 16.1-2 is called by the masculine form of Deacon, and there is countless of accounts in oral tradition of women being called deacons.

God is not sexist, Jesus could have been anything he wanted to be. God could have been a woman if He wanted to, but did didn’t because He told the Jewish people how He would come through the prophets. God told the Jewish people how He would come, and if He didn’t come as a man then it would have made him a liar, and God is not a liar. Are you saying God can lie? What I’m saying is God limits himself to his word. Example: Abraham’s conversation with God in Exodus 32:13-14

There were other roles for female deacons. They were charged with making sure children were taken care of and that widows and orphans got their share of the collections being taken in the house churches. The requirements for the women deacons were just as stringent as the requirements for people like St. Stephen. It is just a reflection on how far the Church was from Jesus’s sanity on the issue of women, a sanity born from being raised by an extraordiary one, that women are not considered the equal of men in today’s Church.

 

[rlg94086]

There were other roles for female deacons. They were charged with making sure children were taken care of and that widows and orphans got their share of the collections being taken in the house churches. The requirements for the women deacons were just as stringent as the requirements for people like St. Stephen. It is just a reflection on how far the Church was from Jesus’s sanity on the issue of women, a sanity born from being raised by an extraordiary one, that women are not considered the equal of men in today’s Church.

Can you give an example of where “women are not considered the equal of men [in value and dignity] in today’s Church?”

 

[louis91766]

Can you give an example of where “women are not considered the equal of men [in value and dignity] in today’s Church?”

Men can be ordained and hear confessions and grant absolution, which women cannot do?

 

[Corki]

Men can be ordained and hear confessions and grant absolution, which women cannot do?

Which is not a difference in value and dignity. Care to try again?

 

[rlg94086]

Men can be ordained and hear confessions and grant absolution, which women cannot do?

That is what I think Karenfern and others believe, but this hasn’t changed since the beginning of the Church. Next?

(btw…the priest is acting in persona Christi, so it is Christ who is “granting absolution.”)

Which is not a difference in value and dignity. Care to try again?

 

[louis91766]

Which is not a difference in value and dignity. Care to try again?

Feminists in the Roman Catholic Church disagree with you. They say that it puts women in second place when men can be priests but women cannot.

 

[rlg94086]

Feminists in the Roman Catholic Church disagree with you. They say that it puts women in second place when men can be priests but women cannot.

And, they are wrong. Was Jesus sexist?

 

[louis91766]

And, they are wrong. Was Jesus sexist?

Was Paul sexist when he said that women are to remain silent in the Church?
The feminist theologians in the RCC do not agree with this.

 

[rlg94086]

Was Paul sexist when he said that women are to remain silent in the Church?
The feminist theologians in the RCC do not agree with this.

Was Jesus sexist, when He chose the apostles? Do the feminists oppose Jesus’ choices?

 

[louis91766]

Was Jesus sexist, when He chose the apostles? Do the feminists oppose Jesus’ choices?

You will have to ask the Catholic feminist theologians about this. Of course, as I said, they will probably point ot St. Paul who says that women should keep silent in the Church and note that this has been overturned by Vatican II. For 1900 years the rule of the RCC was that women are to wear headcovering in Church, and then all of a sudden at Vatican II, this rule was changed. Was this a sexist rule or not? If not, then why did Vatican II change it?

 

[rlg94086]

**You will have to ask the Catholic feminist theologians about this. **Of course, as I said, they will probably point ot St. Paul who says that women should keep silent in the Church and note that this has been overturned by Vatican II.

You are the one who brought up feminist theologians, so I figured you would know. I will have to assume you are just guessing or making things up.

For 1900 years the rule of the RCC was that women are to wear headcovering in Church, and then all of a sudden at Vatican II, this rule was changed. Was this a sexist rule or not? If not, then why did Vatican II change it?

I don’t think it was a sexist rule…just custom. Head covering of women was not a de fide teaching - just discipline.

 

[Corki]

Feminists in the Roman Catholic Church disagree with you. They say that it puts women in second place when men can be priests but women cannot.

Well, Blessed Pope John Paul II disagrees with those feminists (this can go on forever, so I just thought I would skip to the top )

Different does not mean lesser.

MULIERIS DIGNITATEM

The significant comparison in the Letter to the Ephesians gives perfect clarity to what is decisive for the dignity of women both in the eyes of God - the Creator and Redeemer - and in the eyes of human beings - men and women. In God’s eternal plan, woman is the one in whom the order of love in the created world of persons takes first root.

While the dignity of woman witnesses to the love which she receives in order to love in return, the biblical “exemplar” of the Woman also seems to reveal the true order of love which constitutes woman’s own vocation. Vocation is meant here in its fundamental, and one may say universal significance, a significance which is then actualized and expressed in women’s many different “vocations” in the Church and the world.

vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_15081988_mulieris-dignitatem_en.html

 

[jerry_joseph]

In my opinion only boys to be allowed to serve in Altar… We can allow girls for readings and to help nuns in decorating Altar, Help them in convents .So that it will be a training for them to know the life’s of Nuns.

 

[louis91766]

You are the one who brought up feminist theologians, so I figured you would know. I will have to assume you are just guessing or making things up.

I don’t think it was a sexist rule…just custom. Head covering of women was not a de fide teaching - just discipline.

That is your opinion. Just a custom. So too do the Roman Catholic feminist theologians speak about the ban on women priests.
Did you want a list of Roman Catholic feminist theologians who are teaching at Catholic schools?

 

[StAnastasia]

StAnastasia;8374458:

That doesn’t mean it is not still an abuse. The documents of the Church forbid it. So it’s an abuse. It maybe a wide-spread abuse but it’s still an abuse.

In that case, we had a beautiful case of abuse today. This was our parish’s first family Mass of the year, with the leadership of the fourth graders assisting the celebrant. They read all the readings, including the Gospel, bought up the offertory gifts, wrote and read the prayers of the faithful, and made up a goodly portion of the choir. It was a wonderful celebration of the Mass. Oh, and another abuse: we didn’t have two candles on the altar - sorry about that!