Reflecting on Justice During Lent

[jburnetti]

The Pope suggested that we all reflect on justice for Lent. My qn. Is it just that half the flock is ineligible for the positions of highest authority in the Church (women)? Furthermore, is it just to exclude married men from those positions? How come men who were married whose wives have died are suddenly eligible. Was it their association with living women that made them ineligible? What would Jesus say about this?

(Male) Bishop O’Hara Grad

 

[Moscati]

This is obviously a loaded question . . . so I’ll just respond to your question about the celibacy of Latin Rite priests.

My priest told me that the strict discipline of celibacy first arose because their were issues with nepotism and property disposition in the Western church. Some priests (and monks) acted more like feudal lords than men of God. When a pope who was a true monk was elected, he put a stop to all of it by requiring strict celibacy for Latin priests. It is not a requirement in Eastern Catholic Churches, and there are former Anglican priests in the Latin Rite who are married.

And. . . married men whose wives have died are not “suddenly eligible” for the priesthood. It takes many of years of training to become a priest.

 

[Marie5890]

Im guessing OP hasnt read the Bible or studied the ECF.

 

[jburnetti]

Spent 12 years in Catholic schools. Have read the Bible. Can find no reason for the current rules. Wonder if Pope Teresa might have had an even bigger impact than Mother Teresa. Wonder what will happen if the Holy Spirit is female, and doesn’t like the treatment her fellow females are getting. Male, by the way.

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

So then I guess that it is a matter of Justice that men can not be mothers, that they can not carry and give birth to a child.

It is the same why women can not be priests, it is not within their nature, as carrying and giving birth and being a mother is not in the nature of being a man.

By definition, the Laws of God can not be unjust.

When the pope asks us to reflect on justice, he is speaking of true Justice, not this sort of thing.

You must have a rightly formed conscience before you can reflect on justice, read what the Church Teaches and truly understand it rather than putting forward some politically correct idea.

Men and women are equal but different. Equality does not mean that they are the same.

 

[Marie5890]

Spent 12 years in Catholic schools. Have read the Bible. Can find no reason for the current rules. Wonder if Pope Teresa might have had an even bigger impact than Mother Teresa. Wonder what will happen if the Holy Spirit is female, and doesn’t like the treatment her fellow females are getting. Male, by the way.

Well you obviously were not well formed in the faith. Catholic schools or otherwise.

I suppose if Christ had been born female, your disordered thinking process would have a better argument to make.

But feel free to point me to the scriptures you feel support a theology that female priests and bishops are fine.

I see you use the word “rules”. Im more interested in the word “theology”
Thanks!

 

[Marie5890]

I should add , as a Catholic convert coming from a different faith tradition that was very serious about Bible study, that I find most Catholics pitifully ignorant of the scriptures and what they say.

And that includes those who have gone thru the Catholic school systems. I have been unimpressed with their knowledge of the scriptures.

I would be surprised if you are any different.
But feel free to post the scriptures that you feel support your view (which does seem very distorted based on what the scriptures say)

Im always willing to listen to anyone who feels that they can at least have some Biblical support of what they think “should” be.

 

[jburnetti]

Feel free to point out where in scripture it says that women or married men cannot be priests. We seem to be bending that rule now with our recruiting of Episcopalian priests. As far as celibacy to weed out nepotism - why don’t we just evict the crooks?

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

Feel free to point out where in scripture it says that women or married men cannot be priests.

This makes me wonder if you are really a Catholic. The Catholic Church is not a Scripture alone Church. We also have Tradition.

Also, these are two totally different issues, one is a dogma of the Church (no priestesses) and the second is a matter of discipline. There are married men who are priests within the Latin Catholic Church which is done with a dispensation from Rome, it is the norm many of the Eastern Catholic Churches to ordain married men to the priesthood.

As for Scripture, Christ only picked men to be the Apostles.

Still awaiting a response to my earlier reply.

 

[Marie5890]

Feel free to point out where in scripture it says that women or married men cannot be priests. We seem to be bending that rule now with our recruiting of Episcopalian priests. As far as celibacy to weed out nepotism - why don’t we just evict the crooks?

I knew you would validate my observations. The Catholic school systems really do a poor job of biblical studies and theology.

Have a blessed Lenten journey, jburnetti. I’ll be praying for you.
Sounds like you have a chip on your shoulder when it comes to your education. I

I can understand that.

 

[jburnetti]

So, no one can quote scripture to show that I’m wrong, and if the men create the tradition, of course the tradition is no females allowed? Didn’t Jesus have female followers - e.g. Mary Magdalene? Don’t pray for me - show me the citation in scripture that you suggest I should be able to find, but you can’t point to. Why waste the talent of half of the human race?

 

[japhy]

Is it just that half the flock is ineligible for the positions of highest authority in the Church (women)?

Because Jesus Christ instituted an all-male priesthood; just as the Aaronic and Levitical ministerial priesthoods of Judaism were male, so too the Christian ministerial priesthood is male. This is not a decision that the Church can change: the Catholic Church has no power to ordain a woman. This is a matter of doctrine which is irreformable.

Jesus Christ is the bridegroom, the Church is the bride. Priests minister in persona Christi, in the person of Christ, and so it is fitting and right that priests are males. (This is also why marriage must between one man and one woman: because a married couple is an image of Christ and the Church.)

Furthermore, is it just to exclude married men from those positions?

Married men may be ordained as deacons and priests. (Married priests are more common in the Eastern Rites than in the Western Rites.) Clerical celibacy is a discipline, not a doctrine, and it can be changed. Whether it will is another matter.

How come men who were married whose wives have died are suddenly eligible? Was it their association with living women that made them ineligible?

Being married is a major obligation. The Church values celibacy among her clergy so that they can be undivided in their attention to their spiritual spouse, the Church.

What would Jesus say about this?

We know what Paul said about it, and since Paul’s writings are sacred Scripture, inspired by the Holy Spirit, we can be sure they are in accord with the teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ. I would suggest reading 1 Corinthians 7 and Ephesians 5:21-33.

We also know what the Second Vatican Council said about this matter. I would suggest reading the following: Optatam Totius 10, Presbyterorum Ordinis 16, and Perfectae Caritatis 16. Of particular note is this passage from that first document: “Students ought rightly to acknowledge the duties and dignity of Christian matrimony, which is a sign of the love between Christ and the Church. Let them recognize, however, the surpassing excellence of virginity consecrated to Christ, so that with a maturely deliberate and generous choice they may consecrate themselves to the Lord by a complete gift of body and soul.” (… perspiciant autem virginitatis Christo consecratae praecellentiam…)

Can find no reason for the current rules.

That’s what faith is all about: even when we cannot understand, we can still believe. Faith is not opposed to reason, but supplements and even surpasses it.

Wonder what will happen if the Holy Spirit is female…

God is neither male nor female. God is the origin of male and female, and God exhibits traits we consider “masculine” and “feminine”. But God has also revealed Himself as a Trinity of Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And the Church sees in the Holy Spirit the spouse of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Feel free to point out where in scripture it says that women or married men cannot be priests.

We’re not a sola scriptura Church.

We seem to be bending that rule now with our recruiting of Episcopalian priests.

That’s disgusting language: “recruiting Episcopalian priests”. First of all, there is no rule that married men may not be priests; see my above comments. (Note, however, that in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, married men may not be bishops.) Second, the gesture to the Anglican communion is not one of desperation to solve the current vocations crisis: it is about the salvation of souls, of bringing people who are so close to the Catholic faith that one last step, into the loving arms of Holy Mother Church.

 

[japhy]

Didn’t Jesus have female followers - e.g. Mary Magdalene?

Yes, but why should it follow that those women, such as Mary Magdalene and even the Blessed Virgin Mary, should be priests? If God were going to permit women priests, why on earth wouldn’t the Blessed Virgin Mary be the first such woman-priest?!

Why waste the talent of half of the human race?

Who says their talent is being wasted? And why do you consider this a matter of wasting human talent?

I recommend you read Ordinatio Sacerdotalis of Pope John Paul II. It’s really quite short – two pages or so, printed. There’s also the somewhat longer Inter Insigniores of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, from 1977. The least you could do, jburnetti, is become acquainted with the Church’s reasons for adhering to the doctrine of an all-male priesthood.

I would also suggest you become acquainted with the Church’s reasons for a celibate priesthood, too.

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

So, no one can quote scripture to show that I’m wrong, and if the men create the tradition, of course the tradition is no females allowed? Didn’t Jesus have female followers - e.g. Mary Magdalene? Don’t pray for me - show me the citation in scripture that you suggest I should be able to find, but you can’t point to. Why waste the talent of half of the human race?

Are you going to reply to the two posts of mine or not?

Is this what you call a discussion?

Seems like you just came here with a close minded agenda and do not wish to discuss anything.

I will pray for you.

 

[Friar_David_O.Carm]

So, no one can quote scripture to show that I’m wrong, and if the men create the tradition, of course the tradition is no females allowed? Didn’t Jesus have female followers - e.g. Mary Magdalene? Don’t pray for me - show me the citation in scripture that you suggest I should be able to find, but you can’t point to. Why waste the talent of half of the human race?

By the way, the burden of proof lies with you, not us.

This is a 2000 year Tradition of the Church. Please show us where in the Scriptures that says that Church should ordain priestesses.

 

[Marie5890]

(More eloquently written by another I quote…and Now I am waiting for your Biblical understanding that would suggest Jesus wanted female priests…I await your theological and Biblical understanding in this matter. …)

Jesus clearly called only 12 men to be His apostles. Judas
abandoned his call; when he was replaced, as described in Acts 1,
it is interesting to note that no women were considered for his
position, even though there were many women who would have fit the
bill as faithful followers. Instead, Matthias was chosen. Mary Magdalene, His own Mother, Martha werent even considered.

It is notably and especially remarkable that Mary was not chosen:

The FACT that the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God and
Mother of the Church, received neither the mission proper to the
Apostles nor the ministerial priesthood clearly shows that the
non-admission of women to priestly ordination cannot mean that
women are of lesser dignity, nor can it be construed as
discrimination against them. Rather, it is to be seen as the
faithful observance of a plan to be ascribed to the wisdom of the
Lord of the Universe.

(Why would His own Mother be denied the priesthood if He was fine with female ordination???)

 

[jburnetti]

The Church has been slow in the past to adapt to scientifically demonstrated truths. Galileo and Copernicus were shunned for their belief that the Universe was not earth-centered. Darwin’s theory of evolution was considered heretical. Some day, the Church will recognize that a human being having two X chromosomes has nothing to do with the state of their soul, or their capacity to serve God and the Church in any manner.

 

[japhy]

Galileo and Copernicus were shunned for their belief that the Universe was not earth-centered.

Nor is the universe sun-centered. (Although the universe could very well be earth-centered or sun-centered or Mars-centered. It’s all frame-of-reference when you get down to it.)

Darwin’s theory of evolution was considered heretical.

From Pope Pius XII’s 1950 Encyclical Humani Generis:
36. … the Teaching Authority of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and discussions, on the part of men experienced in both fields, take place with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter – for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God. However, this must be done in such a way that the reasons for both opinions, that is, those favorable and those unfavorable to evolution, be weighed and judged with the necessary seriousness, moderation and measure, and provided that all are prepared to submit to the judgment of the Church, to whom Christ has given the mission of interpreting authentically the Sacred Scriptures and of defending the dogmas of faith. Some however, rashly transgress this liberty of discussion, when they act as if the origin of the human body from pre-existing and living matter were already completely certain and proved by the facts which have been discovered up to now and by reasoning on those facts, and as if there were nothing in the sources of divine revelation which demands the greatest moderation and caution in this question.

1. When, however, there is question of another conjectural opinion, namely polygenism, the children of the Church by no means enjoy such liberty. For the faithful cannot embrace that opinion which maintains that either after Adam there existed on this earth true men who did not take their origin through natural generation from him as from the first parent of all, or that Adam represents a certain number of first parents. Now it is in no way apparent how such an opinion can be reconciled with that which the sources of revealed truth and the documents of the Teaching Authority of the Church propose with regard to original sin, which proceeds from a sin actually committed by an individual Adam and which, through generation, is passed on to all and is in everyone as his own.
   The Church believes in the “special creation” of man. And evolution does not (and cannot) account for the soul.

Some day, the Church will recognize that a human being having two X chromosomes has nothing to do with the state of their soul, or their capacity to serve God and the Church in any manner.

The Church does not believe that have two X chromosomes affects the state of a person’s soul. But a woman is a woman, and a man is a man. There are inherent differences between the two. Men and women are equal in dignity, not vocation.

 

[jimcav]

Hey jburnetti,

Please do us a favor and fix the spelling you used in your heading. It’s Catholic, not Catlic!

That seem’s to be a mistake a Catholic wouldn’t or shouldn’t make…

 

[JReducation]

The Pope suggested that we all reflect on justice for Lent. My qn. Is it just that half the flock is ineligible for the positions of highest authority in the Church (women)? Furthermore, is it just to exclude married men from those positions? How come men who were married whose wives have died are suddenly eligible. Was it their association with living women that made them ineligible? What would Jesus say about this?

(Male) Bishop O’Hara Grad

Yes it is, because Jesus did not authorize the ordination of women. Since this is according to the Will of God and God’s will is never unjust, then the answer is that this is a just situation.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF