Questions regarding "female ordination"

[Earl_Simpson]

You seem to be under the misapprehension that Catholics ‘create’ the teachings of their Church, rather than proclaim the eternal truths God gave us. . .

You telling me the Lord bothered saying “if you slap on a johnny your going to hell”?

 

[Earl_Simpson]

Christ came to this world as a MAN.

Priests are in persona christi because Christ works through a man because Christ WAS a man. He cannot work as a Man through a woman it just can’t.

Also, God gave men special callings and women special callings… that’s all one needs to know to understand this issue.

But didn’t God make everyone in his own image and God made women as well so if women are in Gods image why cant he work through them?

 

[dean24us]

No, I just looked it up. I found a very well-cited article on why Deacons (and it’s about Deacons) must be male.

ncregister.com/site/article/only_men_can_be_deacons/

VERY informative article – thanks for sharing!!!

God bless,
Dean

 

[Earl_Simpson]

Worship of YAWAH by our Hebrew bretheren/ancestors is well over 5,000 years old. At no time, until the mid 20th century was their worship led by women…and then it was only by the American Reform Jewish sect, which is barely recognized in Israel and is considered heretical by many orthodox Jews around the world.
The Catholic and Orthodox Churches are the direct successors of the Jewish religion through Christ. Their religious beliefs follows in the traditions of the Jews. In fact, many of the prayers in the Mass and Orthodox Devine Liturgy are from the Old Testament and are still said in Synagogues around the world.
Yes there were female disciples of Christ during His lifetime, but He appointed none of them as His apostles.
Catering to contemporary fashion has never been the forte of Holy Mother The Church. I guess that is why you are Anglican/Episcopal and we are Catholic.

Everything needs to be tweaked slightly over time plus back then men owned their wives and women had hardly any rights plus they wouldnt have been able to go out and get a job in any line of work because they’d be at home with children whilst as nowadays there are loads of working mums. And fyi i was raised an Anglican and thank God the church of england is so liberal, i wouldn’t be able to live with the guilt of how bad my church would make homosexuals and women whod had abortions feel.

 

[Seph]

Cheers Dean but those strict rules like no condoms and the whole no women priests thing is exactly whats putting people of the catholic church, my best friend for example he was Roman Catholic all his life though as soon as he started his catholic secondary school (middle and high school as 1 big school) and had his first R.E lesson he said he was disgusted at how old fashioned the church was on it’s views that he gave up on religion entirely. He was particularly appalled at the churches stance on homosexuality because he said he had a friend whos gay (me) and straight away his teacher said i’d go to hell if i didnt repent.

In other words, you want to do whatever you feel like doing, without anyone judging you; you want a church that doesn’t conform to old fashioned ideas like “objective truth” or “sin”.

As a current catechumen who was attracted to the church precisely because of its unwavering moral principles, and its willingness to stand against your kind of pandering, weak kneed subjectivism, I want to praise God for the fact that no matter how much ill-informed drivel is spouted at the church, she will remain opposed to homosexuality, female priests, and all other flavors of the times, long after I have died, and indeed, until the end of time.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

You telling me the Lord bothered saying “if you slap on a johnny your going to hell”?

Excuse me? What on earth does this question have to do with what I posted?

I’ll repeat. The Church doesn’t go around making up rules on its own like, “Hey, we’re going to limit this priesthood thing to men.”

Did you read my siggy from Ordinatio Sacerdotalis? Do you understand what it means?

The Church has no authority to ordain women.

No authority. Even if every bishop and the Pope Himself wanted to ordain a woman, they don’t have the authority to do so.

Let’s take another example you’re familiar with. The Eucharist is confected of bread and wine. Wheat bread and grape wine. No rice cakes and beer, no tamales and tequila, no cookies and milk.

The Church has no authority to change the substances required to confect the Eucharist.

There is a small minority of people who are celiacs–gluten intolerant–cannot even take a small particle of wheat bread. Another small minority of people cannot drink wine (alcoholism). In the extremely rare case of a alcoholic with celiac disease, the Church does not say, “Well, YOU can have rice and juice”.

God Himself gave us both a Word (Scripture), oral teachings (Sacred Tradition of what didn’t get written in the Bible plus what the Holy Spirit teaches, which Christ speaks of in Scripture), and a Church with authority both to proclaim the Divine Teachings and to make decisions that are within its authority.

But just as God cannot be simultaneously All-Good and All-Bad, because the two are contradictory, the Church cannot take a revealed Divine Truth and change it around. The Church does not have the authority, for example, to change a revealed Truth like the nature of the Trinity, and declare that “God is a Duo”.

The nature of the priesthood and what is necessary for its validity (just as the nature of the Eucharist and its validity, and marriage and its validity) has been dogmatically decided not by the Church but by God. The Church just keeps on teaching what God has revealed, instead of trying to change those truths into something that is more politically correct.

I have family who are Episcopalians and in the last 10 years most of them have gone from being staunch in the faith (mind you, they range in age from the 30s to the 70s) to simple ‘cultural’ Episcopalians who never go to church at all, to becoming complete agnostics. . .because they have seen their faith go from a proclamation of the gospel to a proclamation of whatever secular cause has been declared to be ‘necessary’ and ‘right’. JESUS is mentioned only in passing if at all. The whole reason for ‘faith’ is to bolster one’s good feelings for wanting to save everything from the environment to the poor beleaguered ‘victim du jour’.

THAT’s what happens (and it happens in other nonCatholic Christian groups, non Christian groups, and among some Catholics as well) when people try to make GOD into THEIR image and likeness by twisting His teachings and trying to justify things which are totally ‘un-Godly’ indeed.

 

[dean24us]

It is not “just because” Christ didn’t do it. A Sacrament must be instituted by Christ (review your catechism for a definition of Sacraments). Since Jesus didn’t institute an order or priestesses, the Church has no authority to do so.
This has been defined infallibly. It is to be held by the Fathful always and everywhere. It is not open to debate.

It seems you are assuming the purpose of my questions was to “debate” the subject. This is not the case – I simply want to understand the reasoning behind the Church’s teachings. After all, isn’t that the purpose of apologetics?

God bless,
Dean

 

[Earl_Simpson]

I would think that a lot of people who find the male only priesthood to be unfair would be appeased by this answer.

Earl Simpson, I’m curious, what are your thoughts to this post by Marc Anthony?

I’m not because that was 2000 years ago things have changed a lot since then and it is unfair that in this day and age women aren’t allowed the pleasure of preaching the word of God in the worlds largest church, purely because they lack a penis.

 

[Daizies]

As a current catechumen who was attracted to the church precisely because of its unwavering moral principles, and its willingness to stand against your kind of pandering, weak kneed subjectivism, I want to praise God for the fact that no matter how much ill-informed drivel is spouted at the church, she will remain opposed to homosexuality, female priests, and all other flavors of the times, long after I have died, and indeed, until the end of time.

That’s one of the big things for me too.

It’s weird because growing up Protestant there was no issue in having female pastors, but it somehow just felt wrong. I just buried that nagging feeling of wrongness - until I became Catholic that is

 

[Iron_Donkey]

You are making an error here. You are assuming that the only differences between men and women is the physical shape of their body. Men are not women in male bodies, and women are not men in female bodies. We are different. Equal in dignity, both in God’s image, but different.

Also, this is at least the second time you’ve said “in this day and age”. What does that have anything to do with anything? If it’s unfair now, it was unfair then. But that would be to accuse Christ of unfairness or sexism, which hardly works.

The teachings of Christ are absolutely perfect - they cannot be otherwise since He is the eternal Word. They are they same now that they’ve always been and they cannot change and do not need to and cannot improve. Granted, the method by which we communicate them and the problems to which we apply them are in and should be in constant flux (and our understanding is in a state of growth). But the teachings themselves are rock (see what I did there?) solid.

 

[Earl_Simpson]

In other words, you want to do whatever you feel like doing, without anyone judging you; you want a church that doesn’t conform to old fashioned ideas like “objective truth” or “sin”.

As a current catechumen who was attracted to the church precisely because of its unwavering moral principles, and its willingness to stand against your kind of pandering, weak kneed subjectivism, I want to praise God for the fact that no matter how much ill-informed drivel is spouted at the church, she will remain opposed to homosexuality, female priests, and all other flavors of the times, long after I have died, and indeed, until the end of time.

Just in case you didn’t know you ignorant old man w$€¥e nobody chooses to be gay, if i had the choice i’d much rather be straight than gay, i wouldnt have had to go through the mental anguish of wondering if something was wrong with me, the fact i cant have a traditional family or partner, the disappointment on your parents face when they realise theyre not going to be grandparents the normal way. You might think we choose it but who would choose a lifestyle like that whilst being bombarded with scornful abuse by backward old child molesting people like yourself!

 

[Earl_Simpson]

You are making an error here. You are assuming that the only differences between men and women is the physical shape of their body. Men are not women in male bodies, and women are not men in female bodies. We are different. Equal in dignity, both in God’s image, but different.

Also, this is at least the second time you’ve said “in this day and age”. What does that have anything to do with anything? If it’s unfair now, it was unfair then. But that would be to accuse Christ of unfairness or sexism, which hardly works.

The teachings of Christ are absolutely perfect - they cannot be otherwise since He is the eternal Word. They are they same now that they’ve always been and they cannot change and do not need to and cannot improve. Granted, the method by which we communicate them and the problems to which we apply them are in and should be in constant flux (and our understanding is in a state of growth). But the teachings themselves are rock (see what I did there?) solid.

Where in the bible does Jesus himself say “women cant be priests” and also don’t you lot belive the holy spirit speaks through your cardinals, well if the holy see were to vote (or whatever they do) in favor of women priests God would have decided to have women priests and they could do the same for gays whilst they were at it.

 

[davidv]

Where in the bible does Jesus himself say “women cant be priests” and also don’t you lot belive the holy spirit speaks through your cardinals, well if the holy see were to vote (or whatever they do) in favor of women priests God would have decided to have women priests and they could do the same for gays whilst they were at it.

Where in the Bible does is say that all specific questions must be answered from the Bible?

 

[Earl_Simpson]

Just in case you didn’t know you ignorant old man w$€¥e nobody chooses to be gay, if i had the choice i’d much rather be straight than gay, i wouldnt have had to go through the mental anguish of wondering if something was wrong with me, the fact i cant have a traditional family or partner, the disappointment on your parents face when they realise theyre not going to be grandparents the normal way. You might think we choose it but who would choose a lifestyle like that whilst being bombarded with scornful abuse by backward old child molesting people like yourself!

Oops forget the paedo bit, i speed read through your thing and i thought u said churchman, never mind, ur still an ignorant pig.

 

[Earl_Simpson]

Where in the Bible does is say that all specific questions must be answered from the Bible?

I dunno, i assumed thats what guy i was quoting was getting at.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

Where in the bible does Jesus himself say “women cant be priests” and also don’t you lot belive the holy spirit speaks through your cardinals, well if the holy see were to vote (or whatever they do) in favor of women priests God would have decided to have women priests and they could do the same for gays whilst they were at it.

Obviously you missed my post.

I’ll repeat:

the Church has NO AUTHORITY to ordain women.

In other words, your remarks above are a fantasy.

 

[nagyszakall]

The whole problem stems from a mistaken understanding of equality.

God did not create us equal in role but in dignity. So, to be a mother you need a womb and to have a womb to be a woman, but to be a father, you need “balls”. Get it?

 

[Earl_Simpson]

Excuse me? What on earth does this question have to do with what I posted?

I’ll repeat. The Church doesn’t go around making up rules on its own like, “Hey, we’re going to limit this priesthood thing to men.”

Did you read my siggy from Ordinatio Sacerdotalis? Do you understand what it means?

The Church has no authority to ordain women.

No authority. Even if every bishop and the Pope Himself wanted to ordain a woman, they don’t have the authority to do so.

Let’s take another example you’re familiar with. The Eucharist is confected of bread and wine. Wheat bread and grape wine. No rice cakes and beer, no tamales and tequila, no cookies and milk.

The Church has no authority to change the substances required to confect the Eucharist.

There is a small minority of people who are celiacs–gluten intolerant–cannot even take a small particle of wheat bread. Another small minority of people cannot drink wine (alcoholism). In the extremely rare case of a alcoholic with celiac disease, the Church does not say, “Well, YOU can have rice and juice”.

God Himself gave us both a Word (Scripture), oral teachings (Sacred Tradition of what didn’t get written in the Bible plus what the Holy Spirit teaches, which Christ speaks of in Scripture), and a Church with authority both to proclaim the Divine Teachings and to make decisions that are within its authority.

But just as God cannot be simultaneously All-Good and All-Bad, because the two are contradictory, the Church cannot take a revealed Divine Truth and change it around. The Church does not have the authority, for example, to change a revealed Truth like the nature of the Trinity, and declare that “God is a Duo”.

The nature of the priesthood and what is necessary for its validity (just as the nature of the Eucharist and its validity, and marriage and its validity) has been dogmatically decided not by the Church but by God. The Church just keeps on teaching what God has revealed, instead of trying to change those truths into something that is more politically correct.

I have family who are Episcopalians and in the last 10 years most of them have gone from being staunch in the faith (mind you, they range in age from the 30s to the 70s) to simple ‘cultural’ Episcopalians who never go to church at all, to becoming complete agnostics. . .because they have seen their faith go from a proclamation of the gospel to a proclamation of whatever secular cause has been declared to be ‘necessary’ and ‘right’. JESUS is mentioned only in passing if at all. The whole reason for ‘faith’ is to bolster one’s good feelings for wanting to save everything from the environment to the poor beleaguered ‘victim du jour’.

THAT’s what happens (and it happens in other nonCatholic Christian groups, non Christian groups, and among some Catholics as well) when people try to make GOD into THEIR image and likeness by twisting His teachings and trying to justify things which are totally ‘un-Godly’ indeed.

Didnt u read my post about the holy see? If God told them to change it they could, and i said that because nobody has quoted where in the bible it mentions birth control.

 

[Tantum_ergo]

The question I’d ask is…what is that reason?
He never specified, so whoever set up the tradition is…guessing? assuming? that he meant no woman, for as long as we live on this earth, should ever, ever be ordained?

It seems logical to me that he picked men because at that time, no one would have listened to the women because of the sexism of the day…or they were traveling in rough terrain with much opposition and it was dangerous…or the women were either pregnant or having their periods and it would have been inconvenient.

All of these are not an issue today, so I’d imagine a rule like that would be updated. In the same way we now have females voting, as doctors, as politicians, owning land, etc, etc…

Of course, there is the argument that women, indeed, were acting as deliverers of Jeshua’s information in the first few hundred years, as people congregated in their homes. I’ve read many books that say that. And somewhere along the way, it was decided they should not anymore.

And, also…well, as many here on this site often, often say…there are a lot of Jeshua’s words and actions that were not included in the official bible. So he may have indeed chosen women for high positions at the time, but information on that was not included when the bible was put together three centuries later…
(for example, the gospel of Mary Magdelena)

The point is, the teaching is already there (The Church has no authority to ordain women. Not then. Not now. Not ever.)

Just as the Church has no authority to declare God is a Quartet.

Or that the Eucharist may be confected with beer and pizza.

Or that marriage may be between a man and a man or a woman and a woman.

Or that sacramental confession can be done ‘on-line’.

Or that we can baptize a child with KoolAid in the name of the Creator, the Redeemer, and the Sanctifier.

The Church does not ‘make up rules’ regarding revealed truths that turn around and change them into what they are not.

And it never will.

 

[Earl_Simpson]

The question I’d ask is…what is that reason?
He never specified, so whoever set up the tradition is…guessing? assuming? that he meant no woman, for as long as we live on this earth, should ever, ever be ordained?

It seems logical to me that he picked men because at that time, no one would have listened to the women because of the sexism of the day…or they were traveling in rough terrain with much opposition and it was dangerous…or the women were either pregnant or having their periods and it would have been inconvenient.

All of these are not an issue today, so I’d imagine a rule like that would be updated. In the same way we now have females voting, as doctors, as politicians, owning land, etc, etc…

Of course, there is the argument that women, indeed, were acting as deliverers of Jeshua’s information in the first few hundred years, as people congregated in their homes. I’ve read many books that say that. And somewhere along the way, it was decided they should not anymore.

And, also…well, as many here on this site often, often say…there are a lot of Jeshua’s words and actions that were not included in the official bible. So he may have indeed chosen women for high positions at the time, but information on that was not included when the bible was put together three centuries later…
(for example, the gospel of Mary Magdelena)

Thank God, someone else who sees that the Catholic church is being sexist.