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Q: Why can we not have women priests in the Church?
– Janice
Dear Janice,
The role of women in the Church has received much attention over the last thirty years or so, both from society in general and from the Church herself. The Second Vatican Council stated in 1965:
"The hour is coming, in fact has come, when the vocation of women is being acknowledged in its fullness, the hour in which women acquire in the world an influence, an effect and a power never hitherto achieved. That is why, at this moment when the human race is undergoing so deep a transformation, women imbued with a spirit of the Gospel can do so much to aid humanity in not falling." (Council's Message to Women: Dec. 8th, 1965)
In the 1970s, Pope Paul V1 set up a special commission to study problems relating to "the effective promotion of the dignity and the responsibility of women". He wrote:
"Within Christianity, more than in any other religion, and since its very beginning, women have had a special dignity, of which the New Testament shows us many important aspects...; it is evident that women are meant to form part of the living and working structure of Christianity in so prominent a manner that perhaps not all their potentialities have yet been made clear".
In 1988, Pope John Paul II wrote:
"The Church gives thanks for all the manifestations of the feminine 'genius' which have appeared in the course of history, in the midst of all peoples and nations; she gives thanks for all the charisms which the Holy Spirit distributes to women in the history of the People of God, for all the victories which she owes to their faith, hope and charity: she gives thanks for all the fruits of feminine holiness." (Apostolic Letter on the Dignity and Vocation of Women, August 15, 1988)
During this same period following Vatican II, three women were declared Doctors of the Church: St. Teresa of Avila (Sept. 27, 1970), St. Catherine of Siena (Oct.4, 1970), and St. Therese of Lisieux (Oct. 20, 1997). 'Doctor of the Church' is a title given to the most outstanding writers in the Church, people of remarkable learning and sanctity whose work has greatly enriched the Church.
Over those same years, however, while much was done in the Church to highlight the importance of women, the Church reaffirmed her position restricting ordination to men, declaring this to be an unalterable teaching to which believing Catholics must assent. The arguments, a summary of which follows, are set forth in considerable detail in the document Inter Insigniores , published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 1976, and elaborated on by Pope John Paul II in his 1994 apostolic letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis .
"The Church believes she does not have the authority to change what has become part of Sacred Tradition, which is everything handed down to us from the Apostles through the Church. (See the full definition of Sacred Tradition on the Evangelization section of the Veyo website) Christ himself, though surrounded by women of exceptional faith and character, including his Blessed Mother, the woman "exalted above all the angels and men to a place second only to her son" (Dogmatic Constitution on the Church), chose only men as Apostles, a practice that was continued by the Apostles themselves.
Some have argued that Jesus chose only men in order to conform to the practices of the time, but the Church points out that Jesus broke with custom on a number of occasions, and would not have confined ordination to men just to satisfy cultural prejudices. On one occasion, for example, when the Apostles went to fetch food, they returned and "were surprised to find him talking to a woman" (John 4: 27); in fact, holding one of his longest recorded conversations, not just with a woman, but one who was a Samaritan, a people with whom the Jews "had no dealings" (John 4: 9-10) because they looked down on them as foreigners. Jesus displayed the same disregard for custom when confronted by scribes and Pharisees who wanted to stone to death an adulterous woman (John 8: 3-11), and when he affirmed the indissolubility of marriage in contradiction to the Mosaic Law which allowed a man to "put away his wife" (Mark 10: 2-12).
The notion that Jesus came under the influences of his time and compromised his beliefs in order to make some kind of cultural accommodation is just out of the question. Instead, when we look at the priesthood, it is we--both men and women, both priests and people--who must examine our own attitudes as shaped and formed by the modern age in which we live. Do we view the ministerial priesthood with the eyes of the world, simply regarding it as a position of authority or influence, a branch of management, if you like? Or do we view the ministerial priesthood with the eyes of faith, where authority is transformed by, and measured against, "the model of Christ, who by love made himself the least and the servant of all." (Catechism: 1551). It is in this context of love and service, which are to be exemplified by both priest and people, that we fully experience the true and perfect equality bestowed on us by our baptism:
"It therefore remains for us to meditate more deeply on the nature of the real equality of the baptized which is one of the great affirmations of Christianity; equality is in no way identity, for the Church is a differentiated body, in which each individual has his or her role. The roles are distinct, and must not be confused; they do not favour the superiority of some vis-a-vis the others, nor do they provide an excuse for jealousy; the only better gift, which can and must be desired, is love (1 Cor. 12-13). The greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven are not the ministers but the saints". ( Inter Insigniores , 1976)
We should not ignore or dismiss, though, the desire of many women to serve God in the priesthood, a desire expressed by St. Therese of Lisieux:
"I feel in me the vocation of the priest. With what love, O Jesus, I would carry You in my hands when, at my voice, You would come down from heaven. And with what love would I give You to souls! But alas, while desiring to be a priest, I admire and envy the humility of Saint Francis of Assisi and I feel the vocation of imitating him in refusing the sublime dignity of the priesthood." (Letter to her sister)
Indeed, as St.Therese speaks here of celebrating the Eucharist, she touches on the sacramental nature of the priesthood, where the priest himself acts in persona Christi --in the person of Christ, a role which affirms, says the Church, the sacramental appropriateness of the male priesthood:
"The Christian priesthood is therefore of a sacramental nature: the priest is a sign, the supernatural effectiveness of which comes from the ordination received but a sign that must be perceptible and which the faithful must be able to recognize with ease. The whole sacramental economy is in fact based upon natural signs, on symbols imprinted upon the human psychology: "Sacramental signs," says Saint Thomas , "represent what they signify by natural resemblance." The same natural resemblance is required for persons as for things: when Christ's role in the Eucharist is to be expressed sacramentally, there would not be this "natural resemblance" which must exist between Christ and his minister if the role of Christ were not taken by a man: in such a case it would be difficult to see in the minister the image of Christ. For Christ himself was and remains a man". ( Inter Insigniores , 1976)
It is unlikely that this answer will bring full comfort to those women, who like St. Therese, have a holy desire to celebrate the Eucharist, but no doubt, again like St. Therese, such people are totally engaged in fulfilling "the call to holiness addressed to all the baptized." (Catechism: 941). We must be on guard, however, against those others, both men and women, many of them not Catholic nor even of religious disposition, a number of whom are in the media, who seek to frame the issue in political terms, using it as a wedge issue to attack the Catholic Church at her very foundations.
God bless,
Father Norbert