Talk:Ordination of women and the Catholic Church

Misquoting the Pontifical Biblical Commission
This Wikipedia article states that the Pontifical Biblical commission once made the following claims: "that the New Testament does not settle in a clear way... whether women can be ordained as priests, [that] scriptural grounds alone are not enough to exclude the possibility of ordaining women, [and that] Christ's plan would not be transgressed by permitting the ordination of women." The footnote on this summary leads to Simone Pierre's book "The Struggle to Serve," a book on women's ordination. I have checked the source; the words are not Simone's; he himself quotes them exactly as they appear here, and sources his quote to one John Donahue in an essay entitled "A Tale of Two Documents" as quoted in the book "Women Priests: A Catholic Commentary on the Vatican Declaration" by Leonard Swidler and Arlene Swidler (pages 25-34).

That essay is available online, and we should link directly to it, rather than to Simone's book, since it is what Simone himself gets his summary from. Of course, if someone has access the Commission's specific study, that should be linked to first, rather than a summary; I have discovered where the primary document can be found, though: the Pontifical Biblical Commission's report was published in the magazine Origins, Volume 6, Number 6 (July 1, 1976), p. 92-96.

It is also noteworthy that in the same Pontifical Biblical Commission document, they say, "The masculine character of the hierarchical order which has structured the church since its beginning thus seems attested to by scripture in an undeniable way." The National Conference of Catholic Bishops pointed this out to support their contention that some have taken the Pontifical Biblical Commission's statements out of context. They also cited the significant remark in the Pontifical Biblical Commission's original report that "the first [Christian] communities were always directed by men exercising the apostolic power."

The article will be revised in accordance with these observations.

74.5.167.25 (talk) 20:33, 6 December 2010 (UTC)dmar198


 * I've finally found the original document -- it is available here, and it does not say what Mr. Donahue claimed in his article (which is, until today, the cited explanation of the text). The last three propositions in the article were these:
 * "It does not seem that the New Testament by itself alone will permit us to settle in a clear way and once and for all the problem of the possible accession of women to the presbyterate."
 * "However, some think that in the scriptures there are sufficient indications to exclude this possibility, considering that the sacraments of eucharist and reconciliation have a special link with the person of Christ and therefore with the male hierarchy, as borne out by the New Testament."
 * "Others, on the contrary, wonder if the church hierarchy, entrusted with the sacramental economy, would be able to entrust the ministries of eucharist and reconciliation to women in light of circumstances, without going against Christ's original intentions."

On these points, the vote was 17-0 in favor of the first point, 5-17 against the second point, and 17-5 on the last point.

The article will be revised in accordance with these considerations.

74.5.167.25 (talk) 12:29, 11 May 2011 (UTC)dmar198 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dmar198 (talk • contribs)

Inter Insigniores
There should perhaps be an article on the document Inter Insigniores, which was written in 1976, before the 1994 document Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. ADM (talk) 21:21, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

has not been promulgated as doctrinal
How can the first paragraph contain the statement the "requirement that only males can receive ordination to the diaconate has not been promulgated as doctrinal by the Church's magisterium" when the third paragraph states that "In 1994, Pope John Paul II declared the question closed in his letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, stating: 'Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance…I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful.'"?

Wimania (talk) 20:45, 1 March 2010 (UTC)


 * The Pope declared that "priestly ordination" cannot happen for women. Ordination to the Diaconate would not be priestly ordination. There are three orders in the Sacrament: diaconate; priesthood; and bishopric. Ordination to the Diaconate would not qualify as "priestly ordination," and hence escapes that particular Papal declaration. The possibility of women deacons is, however, excluded in a different document, Inter Insigniores: "...the Apostle's forbidding of women 'to speak' in the assemblies (cf. 1 Cor 14:34-35; 1 Tim 2:12)...the prohibition solely concerns the official function of teaching in the Christian assembly." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.5.167.25 (talk) 17:30, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Memorandum 2011: Church 2011
Over 260 catholic theologians, particulary from Germany, Switzerland and Austria signed in January/February 2011 a memorandum Church 2011. They want ordination of women in catholic church 92.252.93.210 (talk) 20:21, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Memorandum:Church 2011
 * at the end of memorandum 311 catholic theologians, who work at universities, signed that memorandum. 188.118.139.189 (talk) 02:15, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Lots of meaningless text
> Deaconesses and female deacons

This section of the article argues something vaporware, with deaconess-ship proposed as a kind of slippery slope into full woman-priesthood. That is all un-important, because catholic priesthood is not about robes or titulars. The only question what matters is whether any woman can do the "miracle" part of the holy mass, where bread and wine are trans-substantiated. If she cannot, she is not a priest. The church has always held that, on top of formal priestly ordination, only a genitally fully-formed adult man can successfully imitate Christ during the mass, so that the Holy Spirit will descend on his word and place the Almighty's true presence in the altar's offerings.

The problem is, the visible "colours" of the eucharistical offerings usually do not change during the trans-substantiation act (in fact only changed visibly on circa 7 occasions, throughout the entire history of catholicism, the so-called eucharistic miracles, most notably that of Lanciano in Italy). Therefore it is not possible to decide the question of womanly priesthood by simply testing if a lady, after undergoing a formally complete priestly ordination ritual, can change a wafer into heart tissue, using nothing but the words of the mass book, like it happened in Lanciano.

However, the Church has always taught that only male men can do the above priestly task of imitating the Son, Jesus Chirst, so women do not become priests, even if they undergo a formally complete priestly ordination ritual.

On the other hand, theoratically there is no problem with women being deaconesses and doing such chores, like handling and distributing ALREADY trans-substantiated offerings to the laicite e.g. at the end of the Holy Mass. That is in line with the privileges of Virgin Mary, who was able to carry and deliver the Son, even though she did not originate him, but YHWH did. Therefore a morally wholesome catholic woman, if allowed by Rome, could carry the Eucharist (which is true Son) even though she did not originate it, but a man priest did by invoking the Holy Spirit.

The Pope could wake up tomorrow and decide during breakfast that impeccable catholic ladies may become diaconesses and put that into effect by sunset. Yet, that has no effect whatsoever on making woman into trans-substantiating priests, what apparently even a full ecumenical synod could not achieve!

Besides that, there is a somewhat frivolous-sounding aspect. It is, I think, somewhere in Leviticus, where the Old Testament explicitly spells out that a person, even if qualified by familiy linage, cannot be a priest of YHWH, in case the tip of his manly meatrod reaches below the knee. That unexplained "red heifer type" regulation strongly supports Y chromosome bound priesthood as a souvereign decision of YHWH and that decision was later re-inforced by Him sending the Son to serve as the most supreme high priest. 91.82.39.212 (talk) 21:36, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

History
Under the insert containing the quote from Gen 3:16 the line says: "after Eve ate the forbidden apple." In the biblical passage there is no mention of the apple; instead, there is only "fruit." The apple is only a much later interpolation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.253.215.47 (talk) 01:01, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

Material removed from the 'Ordination of women' article
The material below is slightly adapted from Ordination of women as it was at one point on the 10th Dec 2013.

Roman Catholic women's ordination efforts
It is argued that the probition on women's ordination is due to the example set by Jesus and his twelve apostles who were also males and that the apostles then had male successors. There is also a view of God and Jesus in the Roman Catholic Church that depicts them as masculine which some argue suggests that women are not equal to men but have a different duties in the Church.

Arguments for ordination
The push for women’s ordination correlates with forms of feminism dealing with the oppression of women in politics and society. This became evident in the United States when the movement for women’s ordination increased in the 1970s at a time when feminism was prevalent. Some forms of feminism challenged the belief system of why things are the way they are, which is the reasoning behind discursive politics. Discursive politics can be used to explain the relationship between women’s ordination and other acts of feminism. The goal of discursive politics is to “reinterpret, reformulate, rethink, and rewrite the norms and practices of society and the state”. Women started to rethink the reasoning behind why they are not allowed to be ordained to the priesthood and held conferences to talk about how they would bring about change. Some women began to shift their attention from only the issue of women's ordination to include a larger systematic change that would challenge the ideas behind prohibiting them from becoming ordained. For this reason, much of the progress made by women feminists can be traced back to the idea of women trying to be ordained. This illustrates that although these feminists did not accomplish their goal of getting women ordained, they were able bring about some changes in the Church. The idea of sexuality has undergone changes in the Church which can be seen through this movement.

Women's progress in the Church
In more recent decades Catholic women have become more active participants in ministry and leadership. Today women make up around 60 percent of eucharistic ministers and around 50 percent of lectors. In the past, women did not normally participate as liturgical ministers at Mass. One explanation for the rise in women performing roles typically performed by males in the church is the lack of activity by males. Some areas of the world exhibit this more than others such as Chile which has a priest shortage. Women have taken over the role of administrators of parishes who perform many of the same responsibilities as priests except the women are not ordained. These new roles are viewed as a bridge between women becoming ordained and performing passive, feminine roles in the church. To go straight from having no power in the church to becoming priests would be challenging; but to move from being lectors, eucharistic ministers, and administrators of parishes to priesthood is more realistic. Women were allowed to become administrators of parishes and be a part of what is called “priestless churches” due to Vatican II. In 1965, after the Vatican Council ended, women were permitted to enter schools of theology to be trained as ministers, which they were previously forbidden from doing. Training in theology has helped enhance women's chances of obtaining positions of leadership that were previously held by men, such as canon lawyers and chancellors of dioceses. According to Wallace, the changes instituted by the Vatican Council show that the rules limiting women's leadership in the church are not God-given, but rather a social construction of gender ideologies performed by the men who hold positions of authority in the church. Mary Katzenstein took a similar position in Discursive Politics and Feminist Activism in the Catholic Church, arguing that the reasons against women’s ordination when looked at through the lens of discursive politics was a much larger systematic ideology that holds men in charge.

Women's groups for ordination of women
One group today that practices ordination of women into priesthood is the Roman Catholic Womenpriests. They are activists who take it upon themselves to have the right to get ordained. Their validation of ordination is “Yes, we have challenged and broken the Church’s Canon Law 1024, an unjust law that discriminates against women. Despite what some bishops may lead the faithful to believe, our ordinations are valid because we are ordained in apostolic succession within the Roman Catholic Church”. This group has been removed from the Roman Catholic Church by the Pope, and although they affiliate themselves with the Church they are actually an independent group. Another religious group pushing for the ordination of women is The Women’s Ordination Conference. They focus on the ordination of women as priests, and also as deacons and bishops. Their mission is to “Renew church governance to be inclusive accountable and transparent, bring about justice and equality for Catholic women, and incorporate women-centered theologies into every-day Catholicism”. This group is more reserved than the Roman Catholic Womenpriests because they do not ordain themselves. These two groups are examples of groups that will be around if or when women are ordained. Some people argue that these groups are created from women who see the prohibition of women’s ordination as oppression. These feminist groups may, on the surface, look to be trying to getting ordination, which they are, but it is a reflection of their opposition to the domestic, feminized role that society places on them. By becoming ordained into priesthood they could obtain a masculine role because they would have the power to preach. There are some central arguments that are used by women in general to become ordained into priesthood. The first is that women would get to feel the “rightness” by seeing a woman on the altar at mass. The second is that it would correct the ideology that God is male, and women would be able to add a new dimension to priesthood that includes the nurturing and intimate side of God. The third argument is that women would add new elements of leadership that would be accepted by more people because the church would symbolize general acceptance of women’s sexuality. Another argument is that women could provide further insights into the nature of God that would not be found alone by men. The belief is that men and women working together equally would provide maximum output in spirituality. The argument itself uses the gender ideologies of women being feminine, which is the reason for men prohibiting their ordination as the reason for them to get ordained. This argument could appeal to men because even though it allows for women to get ordained into priesthood, it does not bring woman into a masculine role that could threaten their dominance.

Opposition to women's ordination efforts
The Roman Catholic Church has stood firmly behind Canon Law 1024, which prohibits women from becoming ordained to the priesthood. In 1994 Pope John Paul II issued a statement reaffirming that women were not permitted to become ordained as priests. The Pope did, however, make some changes in 1995 which were supposed to account for the world’s “modernization” in which women were given more rights in the Church. Pope John Paul II’s statement against women’s ordination created a precedent that is followed today. On July 29, 2013, Pope Francis used Pope John Paul II’s statement to justify the reasoning behind further prohibiting ordination of women. Pope Francis stated that the “church has spoken and said no”. The Women’s Ordination Conference argues that the church is just not made up of Popes, but rather, the “people of God” and that Pope Francis should have looked at all the people in the Roman Catholic Church that support women’s ordination to make his decision rather from precedent.



Ludmila Javorová
Ludmila Javorová claims to have been secretly ordained as a Catholic priest in Czechoslovakia during 1970 by a friend of her family, Bishop Felix Davídek (1921–88), himself clandestinely consecrated, due to the shortage of priests caused by communist persecution. Her claim was made after Davídek’s death and she is not recognized as ordained by the Catholic Church.

Dissent
Some dissenting scholars (for example, Father Robert W. Hovda, Robert J. Karris and Damien Casey) have written in favor of ordaining women. Furthermore, 12 groups have been founded throughout the world advocating for women's ordination in the Catholic Church. Women's Ordination Worldwide, founded in 1996 in Austria, is a network of national and international groups whose primary mission is the admission of Roman Catholic women to all ordained ministries, including Catholic Women's Ordination (founded in March 1993 in the United Kingdom ), Roman Catholic Womenpriests (founded in 2002 in America ), Women's Ordination Conference (founded in 1975 in America ) and others. The first recorded Catholic organization advocating for women's ordination was St. Joan's Alliance, founded in 1911 in London.

Since 2002 Roman Catholic Womenpriests has attempted to ordain women as Catholic deacons, priests and bishops, claiming that these ordinations are valid because the first ordinations were done by a validly ordained Catholic male bishop (Romulo Antonio Braschi, who left the Roman Catholic Church in 1975 ) and therefore they are in the line of apostolic succession. However, these ordinations have been rejected by the Catholic Church and considered invalid and all those involved have been excommunicated.

Experts please check
Experts should check how much would improve this article. Proxima Centauri (talk) 13:08, 1 January 2014 (UTC)

Clarification needed
In the lead: "The question of whether only males can receive ordination to the diaconate has not been definitively ruled out by a document of the Magisterium (i.e., the pope, the Roman Curia, and the bishops), although it is considered that there is a fundamental unity between deacons, priests, and bishops in the single sacrament of Holy Orders, which is currently interpreted to mean that women cannot validly be ordained as deacons.[3][4][5]"

This makes no distinction between the major diaconate (part of Holy Orders) and the subdiaconate or minor diaconate (not part of HO). Women are definitively unable to receive any form of HO, but the subdiaconate is theoretically possible. Suggestions on how to clear this up?  Deus vult (aliquid)!  Crusadestudent (talk) 19:16, 25 May 2016 (UTC)

Subdeacons are no longer a thing in the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church.

"Prior to the reform instituted by Pope Paul VI with his motu proprio Ministeria quaedam of 15 August 1972, the subdiaconate was regarded as the lowest of the major orders of the Latin Church. He decreed that "the major order of subdiaconate no longer exists in the Latin Church" and that the functions previously assigned to the subdeacon are now entrusted to the acolyte and the lector; he also decreed that, where the local episcopal conference so desired, the acolyte could be called a subdeacon.[7]" - Subdeacon --Nosehair2200 (talk) 16:53, 22 March 2024 (UTC)

WP:POVPUSH
To make editors aware of why I added the maintenance tags.

Copied from Talk:Roman Catholic Church: While I realise the talk page of the other article is technically the proper forum to discuss issues within said article, it doesn't appear to receive much traffic, so I'm mentioning it here. I just took a more extensive look at the article Ordination of women and the Catholic Church, and there are some serious issues in the article. Mainly, using the original research of the advocacy and WP:FRINGE organisation Roman Catholic Womenpriests as a reliable source. (Note that the organisation is not technically Roman Catholic, but a schismatic group of a few women priests who received ordination outside the church. It's similar to the situation of sedevacantist organisations, though unlike the sedevacantists, they actually number only a few people). In other words, the group is patently fringe by any definition, and reliable only as a source for their own opinion, properly attributed. Otherwise, they're not RS.

The organisation's original research is based on their own synthesis of cherry-picked quotes from certain theologians. This OR from their website is then in turn used in the voice of Wikipedia to present their claims as actually representing a large minority opinion; it isn't. Note the weasel word phrasing such as "some theologians believe"). They're using a few sentences from their own sources, followed by their own analysis, as the actual opinion of those sources, and then weaving them all together in the manner of WP:SYNTH. Their novel opinion is then used to make claims in Wikipedia's voice, as I said, and thus present the opinion of a fringe group as a reliable source. Due to the way they're attributing opinions to their sources that they might not actually hold, and then the following way it's used on Wikipedia, this could actually create some potential WP:BLP issues.

I strongly urge interested editors to look at the sourcing for the article (and read the actual source and note the OR), and how it's being used throughout the prose of the article. It's classic WP:POVPUSH. I suspect that at least part of this is due to the involvement of the User:Biscuittin. There are also a few other issues, less prevalent, as well. The article needs some extensive cleanup. Quinto Simmaco (talk) 01:52, 17 November 2017 (UTC) I'm taking an even closer looks at the prose and the sourcing now. There does appear to be a little bit of additional synth in the article itself, but mainly in the prose around where there's this sourcing/pov push problem. These parts need to be pared down, and the claims using specific references (especially Womenpriests) need to be specifically attributed to them. Since they're also a fringe source, the prose needs to be balanced out for weight. Quinto Simmaco (talk) 02:19, 17 November 2017 (UTC)
 * edit, I was mistaken. Biscuittin has only edited the talk page as far as I can tell, and I made an assumption based on seeing his master account here and his knack for stirring the pot. My apologies. Some of the issues appear to be present in the original article as created by blocked user ADM, who was blocked specifically for fringe POVPUSH. Quinto Simmaco (talk) 03:10, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Recent changes
I'm uncomfortable with the big changes made recently to this article. A lot of the new material seems off-topic (explaining wider Catholic processes etc) and very triumphalist in tone. This is a sensitive subjective and requires a balanced and sensitive approach. I am not supportive of amendments that try to reinforce a very heavy-handed viewpoint. Can we reconsider please. Contaldo80 (talk) 21:43, 17 December 2018 (UTC)

Many updates today
I have done quite a bit of work here, including much with the sourcing. Many WP:SPS were cited and they pretty much did not need to be cited, because they are hosting or re-publishing something from a WP:RS already. So I've tracked down the actual publications and given credit where credit is due. In other cases, the SPS were used improperly, and I've been forced to eliminate quite a bit that wasn't salvageable. Copyedits and wording changes. There was a good deal of work on Ordinatio sacerdotalis. I also found something peculiar: the big findings in 1976 by the Pontifical Biblical Commission were not promulgated outside the Vatican, but leaked and published in French by... someone. Therefore, there is a plethora of material quoting the 1976 findings second- and third-hand. I am not real comfortable with that! I am not averse, if someone can find the French publication as it was leaked, to a cautious citation being re-added. There was significant redundancy and I attempted to consolidate that stuff. I did not really touch the structure or ordering of sections, because it seemed to be in OK shape already. What could this article use? More illustrations! There's a hilarious YouTube video floating around. The caption for the mosaic of Theodora is a little tenuous given that I found no viable source for the controversial suggestion, but that should be salvageable. I hope we can move forward, and I sincerely hope that I've left the article in better condition than I found it. Elizium23 (talk) 03:04, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

Presbytera
Elizium you have added this to the section on the early church "The parallel in modern Eastern Christianity is that the wife of a priest is titled "Presbytera" (Greek) or "Matushka" (Russian) according to her role as elder or mother of the parish church" Are you saying the source you've used draws a direct parallel between the title "episcopa" and "presbytera"? If so could you kindly provide this quote so we are clear. Otherwise the inclusion seems odd - why add something about modern day practice in a section of the article specifically about the early church. And to compare two different titles - the only commonality of which I can see is the suggestion that they are feminised terms for clerical titles that are used in an honorific way. Risk of WP:OR or SYNTHESIS if we're not careful. Contaldo80 (talk) 20:50, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Article name
I noticed that other "ordination and women" articles (Ordination of women in the Anglican Communion, Ordination of women in Methodism,‎ Ordination of women in Protestant denominations, etc.) use "in" rather than "and," so this article should probably be moved to conform with the convention. Relinus (talk) 06:29, 18 October 2022 (UTC)


 * I think this is because there is officially no female ordinations within the Catholic Church, in contrast to the other Christian denominations. Veverve (talk) 13:55, 18 October 2022 (UTC)