Why doesn't God want women to be priests?

[Raxus]

How and when did He do this?

Through Jesus, with the Apostles.

Jesus had no issues with going against the norms of his day when it came to doing what he needed to do; if women could be priests, we would have had them from the start. But we didn’t, and they can’t, just as men can’t be nuns.

It’s a matter of matter; the Sacrament of the priesthood requires a man in the same way that the Eucharist requires specific bread.

 

[jochoa]

God has shown us that it is best for the Father and the Son (Joseph and Jesus) to lay down their life for the Mother, as well as the Holy Spirit by overshadowing her, therefore women should permit men to lovingly overshadow them, so as to make the brilliance of humility shine brighter.

 

[Lea101]

IF” is an illusion, it does not exist.

The bottom line though is that neither scenario will happen

That’s such a cop out in response to my main point.

 

[Zaccheus]

Since God has already ‘bound’ priesthood to men,

How and when did He do this?

How? By His authority. He is the Most High.
When? From eternity.

But we see it happening in time when Christ ordained the Apostles. He chose only men to be priests.

 

[Zaccheus]

By that reasoning, he only chose “white” men so therefore only “white” men can be priests.

Bad logic. All the Apostles were Jewish, but that doesn’t mean only Jews can be Catholic priests.
All the Apostles had hair but that doesn’t mean bald men are excluded from the priesthood.

Also what makes you think the Apostles were white men?
Israel is part of Africa.

 

[stpurl]

No it isn’t. If your post was holding out hope that the Church would allow women priests, the only possible answer is No it won’t, not, “oh gee when”.

 

[stpurl]

At the very beginning. He prefigured this through the Jewish male priesthood of the Old Testament. Catholicism is Judaism, fulfilled. Furthermore, He gave the Church authority to ‘bind and loose’ but, and this has been absolutely stated in ‘our’ generation’, He did NOT give the Church the authority to ordain women.

What does this mean? Well, take ‘bind and loose’. Does that mean that God gives the Church the authority to change what He has already decided? By no means. It means that the Church has the responsibility to uphold what God has taught. Just as God does not make a square circle, for that is logically impossible and God is not illogical, the Church does not change God’s teaching and then announce that the change is to be considered God’s teaching instead.

Can you show me a statement of God’s whereby He says women can or should be priests?

 

[JimR-OCDS]

Only a cop out because you have nothing to refute it with.

 

[goout]

Let me first start of by saying that I 100% assent to the church teaching that woman cannot be priests and I’m sure there’s a good reason behind it. Jesus didn’t ordain women after all. I am just curious as to why this is so. I know God created men and women to be different, and there surely is some reason why He chose the priesthood to be for men. I have found that not just knowing what the church teaches, but also understanding why it teaches what it does has been extremely helpful to me for growing in faith. I always accepted masturbation and contraception were wrong, but when I came to truly understand why the church teaches they are wrong, it made a lot more sense. Is there a similar good explanation for why God doesn’t want women to be priests?

You might explore the concepts of human nature, differentiation, ontology. God has created the world, and it has an order. And God reveals God’s self as we can understand and incorporate that revelation. Interesting, the word incorporate. Has to do with a body.
Also, incarnation. In the flesh.

God is incarnate in Christ. The flesh, and our human nature, are not throw-aways. They are integral to who Christ is, and who we are. Our physical makeup is an integral part of who we are, and we find our full identity and meaning, as well as the fullness of revelation, when we look at that whole context.

We are not merely spirit-people, just as Christ is not “the Great Spirit dude”.

 

[Gorgias]

That’s such a cop out in response to my main point.

Isn’t your “main point” a counterfactual, and one without any substantiation at that? Would the Church be more ‘progressive’ if women were able to be ordained priests? It seems that the dynamic works the opposite way – in response to progressive currents in their ecclesial communities, some allowed the ordination of women as ministers. (Note: not ‘priests’, but ‘ministers’, by and large.). It’s societies and people who are progressive, not ‘churches’ as such.

 

[Lea101]

No it isn’t. If your post was holding out hope that the Church would allow women priests, the only possible answer is No it won’t, not, “oh gee when

That was not my view at all. Not even close. This is why y’all gotta read the conversation fully.

 

[Lea101]

Isn’t your “main point” a counterfactual, and one without any substantiation at that? Would the Church be more ‘progressive’ if women were able to be ordained priests?

Don’t be so defensive.

My point was merely that one should be careful, as such language implies that there’s something about women that would lead the Church astray.

When basically, what happened is that when the Church makes changes to be progressive, you’ll start to see other changes made. In this case, the change was women’s ordination which then led to other stuff. If you’d look back before that, it would be other things like softening its stance on birth control, abortion, etc. That was why I said that if God ordained women from the very beginning, you wouldn’t see the Church falling in the way it would have today if they ordained women now, because the issue isn’t ~women~ in those positions, it’s the Church going against their teachings to be progressive which will lead to more things being changed. There have been Catholics who have argued against women priests because women are too sensitive and that it will lead to them approving of things that are against the Church. My posts are basically clarifying that. I literally said nothing about wanting women to be priests but I’m pretty sure this will fall on deaf ears as usual.

 

[Gorgias]

Don’t be so defensive.

Defensive? I didn’t think that’s what I was doing. (As I type this, I’m chuckling, remembering Martin Short’s character in a SNL skit about ‘60 Minutes’ - “defensive? I’m not being defensive!”)

My point was merely that one should be careful, as such language implies that there’s something about women that would lead the Church astray.

It’s a reasonable point. Yet, I don’t think we could say “we would be more like this” or “we would be less like that”. I think those assertions go a bit too far.

I literally said nothing about wanting women to be priests

True, and I don’t think I’ve seen anyone accuse of that, no?

 

[Lea101]

It’s a reasonable point. Yet, I don’t think we could say “we would be more like this” or “we would be less like that”. I think those assertions go a bit too far.

Depends on the context.

In this case, I believe you’re referring to my guess that we wouldn’t be soo progressive today if women priests were already a thing.

This is because feminism was a reactionary movement and I’m guessing if women were already leaders in top ranks, there would have been less to yell about (that is, many glass ceilings would not exist), as feminism started out with unhappiness that women have no say/leadership. This was meant to emphasise the point that it’s the changes made to appease people that is the problem (the culture), not something about female leadership.

I’m not claiming to be a prophet so covering one’s ears and saying ‘God doesn’t want women to be ordained’ when that’s not remotely close to the point I’m making would be a cop out.

True, and I don’t think I’ve seen anyone accuse of that, no?

Someone thought I was holding out hope.

 

[Lea101]

I have nothing to refute it with, because your response had nothing to do with what I was saying silly. I didn’t say God wanted women to be ordained.

If you’d read my posts, you would know that I wasn’t disagreeing with you but was elaborating on your point because your initial post was akin to past misogynistic perceptions of women priests (that women priests - - → crumbling of Church’s teachings bc…something about women). Unless that was your point, which would be unfortunate!

 

[stpurl]

I said your post might ‘hold out hope’, not that you yourself were articulating that as your position.

In fact, I think we’re actually agreeing with each other in that we both see the danger of people perceiving something by the whole concept of women’s ordination that just isn’t there, but that would be presumed due to cultural changes.

 

[JerryZ]

Actually Israel, the state does have dark skinned people, which is not strange considering that the 12 tribes did diversify genetically.
The majority of these are called Ethiopian Jews.

Peace

 

[Zaccheus]

You got so many things wrong. You cannot know that all the apostles had hair. Israel is in Asia, not Africa. I consider Jews to best described as “white” which I put in quotations marks since it is how most people would describe their appearance, as opposed to black African which you imply.

You tried to refute the ‘male priests only’ argument by claiming that by that reasoning if all the Apostles were White then non-Whites could not be priests.
I refuted that by pointing out that by your reasoning if all the Apostles were Jews that would exclude non-Jews from the priesthood. If all the Apostles had hair that would exclude bald men.

You said “I consider Jews to be best described as white”
Judaism is a religion, not a racial group. There are Caucasian Jews, Black African Jews, African-American Jews, Asian Jews.

In any case I have shown that your logic was wrong.

 

[JanR]

I don’t need to know why God doesn’t want female priests. He doesn’t want them. That’s good enough for me.

 

[Neithan]

We’re not entirely sure: a precise reason has not been divinely revealed. There is a lot of theological reasoning, though, some of it more authoritative than others. Another possible reason is becoming more evident in the current day, as we’re seeing an aggressive attempt to blur any distinction among the sexes, that leads to a denigration of the body.

Christianity, like Judaism, emphasized the importance of the body to our identity, compared with pagans who believed our bodies are mere shells to be shed at death (a release from “the hard service of the flesh” as Marcus Aurelius described it). The distinction of male and female in the priesthood was an affirmation that there is some deeper meaning and purpose to our bodies beyond mere temporary vessels for reproducing (and/or reincarnating) spirits.

Probably this is something we are meant to learn over time and through human history, as we see the different errors that cultures and societies fall into. Many doctrines have been defined that way.