Gemma Rose and others with similar thinking: please consider at whom your anger is directed.
As John Paul II stated in ORDINATIO SACERDOTALIS (1994): “In order that all doubt be removed . . . in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren, I declare that the Church has NO AUTHORITY WHATSOEVER to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitely held by all the Church’s faithful.” This means that this teaching is infallible. Which means it has come to us from the Holy Spirit.
No Pope now or in the future or majesterium has the authority to change the doctrines that were given us by Christ Himself. All that they may do is apply Catholic teaching/doctrine to new situations, such as stem cell research, surrogate pregnancies, etc. The doctrines dont’ change, only how to apply them as we learn more as people about God’s design.
Those who have Holy Orders have no ability to change the Church given us by Christ, and as such, if you were able to be ordained, you would not have that ability either.
(1) The very action of Jesus Himself, in sending and appointing Mary Magdalen as “apostle to the apostles” should, in and of itself, open the door to women being ordained to the diaconate. Just as a condition for the diaconate is that if a man’s wife dies he may not re-marry, so a condition could be put upon a woman’s ordination to the diaconate that they could not go on to the priesthood.
(2) The words of Jesus Himself in Matthew 19:12 should be the basis of consecration as a Sacrament, available to both men and women.
Your anger over not being allowed to be a priest is sad, because it is anger at Our Lord who made this decision in accordance with the Father. Anger is a destructive thing.
Please don’t tell me with whom I am angry or even that I am angry.
(1) I am not angry at our Lord, nor have I any reason to be angry at Him. HE treated women with dignity and respect, unlike those who came after Him.
(2) I am not angry at the Church. I am disappointed in it that after 2,000 years of patriarchy, it still treats women as second class citizens.
Jesus loved Mary, His Holy Mother and also many great women who supported his ministry. It was not for solely social/cultural reasons that He did not choose them for apotles. It was His Father’s will.(Acts 1:2) If He did not choose them then, it is pride that makes some women feel today that they should be choosen for their own reasons over that of Our Lord. You do an injustice to the women throughout the ages who have been mothers, holy martyrs, and virgins, who have given their lives for the Faith and passed it on to the next generation in accordance with God’s plan.
How is it an injustice to wish (a) that the Church would recognize that being a mother is not a women’s sole dignity, and (b) that the Church would treat with a modicum of equality those “holy martyrs, and virgins, who have given their lives for the Faith…”
I hate to point this out, but as an RN, I see new parents on a daily basis, and more than a few fathers verbalize (in a type of envy) their deep amazement of what women do to give birth and breastfeed their babies. Men cannot give birth (don’t even start on the preg. woman who calls herself a man on Oprah!), and I suppose there are some men who might feel cheated in that, but for the most part men recognize that as a good design of the Almighty and find fulfillment in their roles as fathers.
I agree that the miracle of pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding are such wonders that the word “miracle” doesn’t quite cover it. However, women are more than just their reproductive organs.
Catholics are called to embrace all of our doctrines, not just the ones that are easy for us or those we agree with.
There is a difference between obeying and embracing. A Catholic husband and wife might totally disagree with NFP and truly believe that other forms of contraception for spacing the birth of their children works better, yet still embrace NFP in order to be faithful to the teachings of the Church.
In the same way, I might totally disagree with something, yet remain obedient, as opposed to others who have left the Church or participate in such things as a “women’s only” “Mass.”
The Lord loves obedience. Remember… which of the sons did the father’s will - the one who said “Yes! I will go work in the fields,” and did not go, or the other son who said, “No, I will not go,” yet thought the better of it and complied with his father’s request?
Vocations come from God. They do not come from quasi-political/cultural movements without or within the Church. They don’t come from anger. They don’t come from pride. They come from prayer and a willingness to put Our Lord’s plan before our own, in His grace and in His Church.
Yes, I agree that vocations come from God, and those to whom God has given a vocation know it deep within their souls.
May I become less, that He become more. It is His Church, you know.
And we all, male and female, are its members.
