Why doesn't God want women to be priests?

[Xarto]

Something we seem to forget as Christians is that the Apostles continued a tradition of a long line of male priests. All the priests in the Old Testament were male…

Exodus 40:15
and thou shalt anoint them, as thou didst anoint their father, that they may minister unto me in the priest’s office: and their anointing shall be to them for an everlasting priesthood throughout their generations.

 

[Raxus]

…you think the Apostles were white??

 

[Raxus]

Closest approximation I would think, though nobody can know.

Then your base statement doesn’t make much sense, does it? shrug

 

[Xarto]

Hmm, let’s see they came from the Middle East so they are most definitely white. Right?

 

[PeterT]

Hmm, let’s see they came from the Middle East so they are most definitely white. Right?

I think the honest answer is that we simply don’t know, and frankly it doesn’t matter one whit what their skin tone(s) were.

Today, many Jews is diaspora have very fair (one might say white) skin, and many Muslim Palestinians have very fair skin too. So there is simply no way to surmise what was the skin tone of the Holy Family and of the Apostles back in the day. And again, it really doesn’t matter what it was, one way or the other.

 

[EugeneCharles]

Hi there, @HopingforGodtohelp!

God has made both of them equally, He loves them equally. Recently, I’ve watched a video where an Anglican woman priest said “Catholics priest are the representation of Christ, while Anglicans, they are the representation of themselves.” She withdrew the priesthood and converted to Catholicism. Jesus is a man and the rest of the apostles are a man. That’s why the Church gives a privilege for women to serve God through following Mary’s example.

 

[matjam]

 

[Xarto]

I agree skin colour doesn’t matter however is just another form of racism trying to “white wash” history? We do not know what colour they were as there are no photos but we can make an educated guess that they were in no way white. Probably looked a lot like the Palestinians and others who occupy those lands now.

 

[PeterT]

I agree skin colour doesn’t matter however is just another form of racism trying to “white wash” history? We do not know what colour they were as there are no photos but we can make an educated guess that they were in no way white. Probably looked a lot like the Palestinians and others who occupy those lands now.

Put that’s my point, not all Palestinians that live in the Middle East today are dark olive skinned. That’s an inaccurate and simplistic stereotype. A good many of them have fair skin that most people would classify as “white” just like how many Jews, their genetic cousins, have fair skin.

Hence, we have no idea if the Blessed Virgin Mary was fair skin or had a darker olive skin. We simply don’t know. It’s never been revealed to us (possibly because it simply doesn’t matter).

 

[PeterT]

Fr. Robert Barron (he hadn’t been yet ordained a bishop when this video was recorded) makes a good point in this video that it appears that many women want to become priests to gain power within the Catholic church.

And that’s absolutely the worst reason why someone should ever become a priest. God calls men to become priests so they can serve others, especially the laity, and NOT so they can rule over others.

Yet those who seek women priests always do so because they view the priesthood as a position of power and not of humble service.

 

[Gorgias]

Put that’s my point, not all Palestinians that live in the Middle East today are dark olive skinned. That’s an inaccurate and simplistic stereotype. A good many of them have fair skin that most people would classify as “white” just like how many Jews, their genetic cousins, have fair skin.

The assertion, though, wasn’t that they were “fair skinned”, but were ‘white’ (as an ethnic term, I took it). The critique, then, is that they’re not Caucasian.

 

[Lea101]

Yet those who seek women priests always do so because they view the priesthood as a position of power and not of humble service

How do you know? It seems pretty uncharitable to generalise it this way. There are Catholic women who are drawn to the priesthood albeit misguided. I know some who reluctantly stepped back and is dealing with the struggle internally, and others who mistakenly believe there’s an error. Not all of these women want ‘power’, the same way how not all male priests are there to serve but some are there for power (and in the worst cases, access to children).

 

[stpurl]

Women can be pedophiles too, actually.

It is true that some women may not think that they seek to be a ‘Catholic priest’ for power. After a couple of decades of indoctrination that women are totally equal to men except deep down superior because for all history men went rogue and oppressed, and women ‘hung on’ and resisted, and now karma has finally allowed them to achieve ANYTHING they choose, a woman who feels she is ‘called’ to be an RC priest has as part of her lived experience, inculcated in her mind, deep in her subconscious, that as a woman is not only equal to a man, she is also entitled to all ‘male’ things as they were ‘denied to her unfairly’. The devil, as usual, is twisting and distorting all things today —everything from male and female itself to family and morality and ways of living. If something is good the devil will twist it; he’ll try to ensure the ‘worst’ men become priests along with the best; he’ll try to ensure that men and women are adversaries to turn them away from marriage; he’ll try to ensure that women turn away from children through contraception and abortion, he’ll try to ensure that men turn away from responsibility and respect, he’ll try to ensure that children turn from their parents, become greedy for material goods and apathetic toward God, etc. What better way to try to destroy Catholic priests and the Faith than by using the engineered ‘men v women’ by first giving us many ‘bad men’ priests and second trying to push for ‘good women’ priests?

It’s always good to look both at the past, to see where many of these evil roots have been planted and nurtured, and to look toward the future to see what they may have been meant to produce.

 

[goout]

matjam:

Fr. Robert Barron (he hadn’t been yet ordained a bishop when this video was recorded) makes a good point in this video that it appears that many women want to become priests to gain power within the Catholic church.

And that’s absolutely the worst reason why someone should ever become a priest. God calls men to become priests so they can serve others, especially the laity, and NOT so they can rule over others.

Yet those who seek women priests always do so because they view the priesthood as a position of power and not of humble service.

This is the main issue.
In the kingdom of God, worldly power and position does not apply. The priesthood is ontological in that framework. It’s not just another position for ministry, given out according to talents and capabilities, or according to a person’s civil rights.

 

[Lea101]

Women can be pedophiles too, actually.

Lucky for you, because I didn’t say otherwise.

It is true that some women may not think that they seek to be a ‘Catholic priest’ for power.

Like I said earlier, there are some women who feel drawn to the beauty of the priesthood/eucharist and genuinely desire for it, some obey the Church and are quietly struggling with it and others are misguided. It seems countereffective to rant about how they’re all after power instead of showing empathy and reiterating the Church’s teachings with love and logic.

I don’t really get how the rest of your post is relevant to my point, so I’ll end it here.

 

[stpurl]

What I said was germane. You were pointing to possible emotional reasons and I was also pointing to other possible emotional reasons. Again, until ‘modern times’ Catholic women who ‘felt a call to the priesthood’ would have had an experiential worldview which would have recognised that such a call was deceitful. Today due to other societal factors it not only ‘seems’ (operative word, it’s all about perceptions and personal views) to be a glorious opportunity. There is simply no acknowledging, “The Church says this cannot be as God has given it no authority to do so, and while I find this conflicts with my wishes, I humbly submit”. . .it becomes instead, “Why SHOULDN’T I want this? The actions of priests are right and good. I desire only to serve God. Why WOULDN”T He want me to serve Him? I reject the Church’s authority on this and demand that it change.” And yes, you’ll tell me that some of the women you know who want this have submitted. If so, those are the quiet women who don’t even let people know they considered it, or who, in calm tones, explain that they ‘trust the Church more than their own feelings’. But the vast majority of the ‘refrainers’ who write on the blogs or write letters to the editors are far more, “I will submit, knowing that I would be the best priest in the world, and HOPING that the Church will acknowledge and move forward.” It’s a kind of “see me submit while pushing the ideas anyway and making it look as if the Church is a mean oppressor.

 

[OraLabora]

Think marriage. Jesus is the Bridegroom.

Does that make a priest’s “marriage” to Christ a same-sex marriage?

Just askin’!

Hmm… sounds like polygamy to me!

Note that I am not in favour of women’s ordination.

I just think these two arguments are weak.

The best argument IMHO: the priest acts as “persona Christi” at the altar and in sacramental confession. So… would you cast Meryl Streep in the role of Winston Churchill in a movie? As fine an actress as she is (one of my favs in fact), there’s just no way she could act in “persona Winston”… and nor can a woman act in “persona Christi”.

 

[Gorgias]

yankeesouth:

Think marriage. Jesus is the Bridegroom.

Does that make a priest’s “marriage” to Christ a same-sex marriage?

His ‘bride’ is the Body of Christ, not an individual.

Hmm… sounds like polygamy to me!

Except that priests – as priests – are in persona Christi capitis, and therefore, corporately have a singular identity.

That’s why these arguments aren’t weak. Misunderstood? Sure. Mischaracterized? Often. But not weak.

The best argument IMHO: the priest acts as “persona Christi” at the altar and in sacramental confession. So… would you cast Meryl Streep in the role of Winston Churchill in a movie? As fine an actress as she is (one of my favs in fact), there’s just no way she could act in “persona Winston”…

That may have been a good argument in the past, but you’d be taken down if you made that argument today. Actresses tend to want to be called “actors” these days, so that they’re judged by their work and not their gender. Crossing boundaries of race and age is very common these days – I suspect that we’ll soon be back to the standards of the days of yore: remember that, back in Shakespeare’s day, men played the roles of women. We’ll see that happen in both directions before long, I’d bet.

 

[SeekSalvation]

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?

There are some questions you will have to wait and ask God himself.

 

[JimG]

Women cannot be priests because they are not male. Priests are men because Jesus is male. If Jesus had been a woman, priests would be female.