Bad tidings

I was at my local Catholic Bookstore today, and one of their newer books was "The Catholic Priesthood and Women: A Guide to the Teaching of the Church". I was surprised in paging through it to find that it actually seemed to lay out the Catholic position. Maybe someone should send them a copy of the book, or maybe just a copy of Ordinatio Sacredotalis with highlighting in it.

I assume that the reference is to the new Unitarian Archdiocese of Los Angeles? The one that has a resident Ministry of Choreography and Modern Dance. Perhaps Phyllis Zagano has aspirations to be a holy roller?

I'm shocked. SHOCKED!!!!!, to find such drivel in the Tidings . . . . Actually, I'm not.

If your Diocese includes Hollywood, expect stuff like that.

Hope springs infernal in the woman's breast.

The Tidings' approach to this question is closely related to the "rupture" approach to the Second Vatican Council. The demand for female ordination will not go away. Eventually it will cause a schism in the Church, with the Rupturists going their own way, and the orthodox remaining. This already has occurred, witness the series of river boat "ordinations" in recent years.

In the L.A. Diocese they are only concerned with the majority of the flock, remember. They think the majority of the flock doesn't care what the Magisterium says, so neither do they. If the 'lost' sheep want to follow the Pope and the Magisterium, well then let them be lost. Give the people what they want and don't let Jesus get in the way.

I guess some people really dont understand the difference between things properly reserved for the priest qua priest, and things that are priest qua administrator. A priest may delegate some responsibilities as his faculty of a pastor, but they are not things that are related to the sacraments which are exclusive to a priest. Some people seriously are silly.

My impression is that the diaconate is what the article implied. While "women deacons" were certainly present in the early church, that vocation quickly developed into the consecrated life of women religious. And although it is these women who have historically ministered directly to the PHYSICAL BODY of Christ (through hospitals, schools, missions, contemplative prayer and the like), that sort of vocation isn't manly enough for our feminist betters.

From: Kansas City.Com

For Catholics, women’s ordination may be here sooner than you think

By PHYLLIS ZAGANO

Yes, I know all about the chances of snowballs surviving in the netherworld, but I still think Pope Benedict XVI is moving toward ordaining Catholic women.

Three times in the last year or so, the pope’s comments leaned in that direction. The telltale words are “governance” and “ministry.” Each is technically reserved to the ordained.

In the flood of ideas coming from the scholar-pope, the theme of charity stands out. Would a pope turning 80 on April 16 ordain women to minister in charity?

A year ago, a Rome priest publicly asked Benedict if women could be included formally in Church governance and ministry. Surprisingly, Benedict said yes. He said so again on German television last August.

Then, on Valentine’s Day, he threw a bouquet to women, recognizing their discipleship in the early church. Before 20,000 people in the Vatican’s General Audience Hall, Benedict recalled that Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha, as well as Mary Magdalene, were close disciples of Jesus. He reminded the crowd that Thomas Aquinas called Mary Magdalene the “apostle to the apostles.” She did, after all, announce Jesus’ Resurrection.

The pope acknowledged St. Paul’s conflicting sentiments: In Christ there is neither male nor female, yet women should keep silent in church. Conflicting? Yes. Decided? No. That, Benedict said, should be left to biblical scholars.

And biblical scholars know well what women did in the early church.

Benedict did not use the word “diaconate” (the ministry of deacons), but he leans in that direction, coinciding with the historical record of women’s ministry. Women once were deacons. That is a historical fact.

Does history matter? Well, Benedict is a theologian with an eye for history. He knows that what the church once did, it can do again. He, too, knows about the piles of historical documentation of women deacons.

When Benedict talks about women, he always begins by deflecting the idea of women priests, pointing out that Jesus chose male apostles from among his men and women disciples. Such is the Catholic Church’s fundamental argument against women priests.

But that has nothing to do with women deacons. In fact, Benedict has now — three times — reiterated that women were actively engaged in Jesus’ ministry. And “ministry” is the key word when we’re talking about deacons.

Ministry is what deacons do: They minister in and through the word, the liturgy and charity. Deacons preach. Deacons participate in the Mass. Deacons manage the Church’s charity, or at least they used to.

Deacons watched over the stores and treasures of the early church. They cared for the poor and the orphaned, for the homeless and the widows with church funds, properties, and possessions. They even paid the salaries of the priests.

That may not be the case today, but it begs the question: why not? As Catholicism is increasingly bereft of priests it is concurrently flooded with deacons — there are over 15,000 in the United States alone. These are capable men, able to run a parish plant, manage Catholic charities, or oversee the cemeteries or the various aid societies of a parish or a diocese. They can free priests to do priestly — rather than diaconal — ministry.

If Catholicism were to return to its older tradition, that would add women to the mix. Then women could oversee church money and properties on behalf of the pastor or the bishop. What if women watched where the money went? Perhaps then there might be more money around for the poor and maybe fewer financial scandals.

And what if women deacons ministering in charity could preach each Sunday? Would not the church hear more about the way the gospel functions in the real world, here and now, in the 21st century?

It’s just a thought, but it might be Benedict’s idea too.

(c)Religion News Service Phyllis Zagano is senior research-associate-in-residence in the religion department of Hofstra University and author of Holy Saturday: An Argument for the Restoration of the Female Diaconate in the Catholic Church.

Sorry, Ms. Zagano, but some of the bigger embezzlers and financial finaglers I know of in my diocese have been "church lady" bookkeepers (pillars of the church who never take a day off) and nuns who keep money in their sock drawers. And why on earth would women be better able to preach how the gospel works in what you call the real world? You're a woman and I must say that to me, another woman, your musings here don't sound real world at all. Coming from a pulpit (or, more probably, from the steps of the sanctuary where you'd be roaming about with a mike in your hand) they'd be just as out of it as the preaching by male priests that you seem to be complaining about.

Hey Phyllis Zagrano-does '1994' ring a bell for you?

Rome said 'NO WOMEN PRIESTS'....ipso facto, causa finita est!

What part of that don't you understand?

Friends, Take a look at the documents--they do not address women deacons, only women priests. There is a real difference, historically and theologically. Take it easy and please don't be so nasty. Civil discourse is a good thing.

What a lack of charity here! Having spent an hour and a bit reading entries and comments, I am very sorry that you are members of my church. This is the kind of hypocrisy that drives people from the church - charity, love, service...but not for the people we don't like and especially not for nuns who are not in habit! This is such a poor witness.

I guess you meant it as a joke, like Sheryl Crowe.

Alice,

Thank you for your charitable musing that "I am very sorry that you are members of my church." I will try to be as charitable as you.

Phylis,

I think your argument is a little off since your article wishes for women priests and that somehow women deacons would be the crack to open to get there. Your wishing for women priest shows that you do not "definitively hold" a teaching of the Church and as per Vatican II.

LG 25: "Religious submission of mind and of will must be shown in a special way to the authentic Magisterium of the Roman Pontiff even when he is not defining, in such a way, namely, that the judgments made by him are sincerely adhered to according to his manifested mind and will, which is clear either from the nature of the documents, or from the repeated presentation of the same doctrine, or from the manner of speaking."

As for Deaconesses your article is deficient in the historical mention of them in Church documents. You refer to returning to the action of the early Church, yet the statement of the early Church are quite contrary to this.

Council of Nicaea I
Similarly, in regard to the deaconesses, as with all who are enrolled in the register, the same procedure is to be observed. We have made mention of the deaconesses, who have been enrolled in this position although, not having been in any way ordained, they are certainly to be numbered among the laity (canon 19 [A.D. 325]).

Council of Laodicea
[T]he so-called "presbyteresses" or "presidentesses" are not to be ordained in the Church (canon 11 [A.D. 360]).

Epiphanius
It is true that in the Church there is an order of deaconesses, but not for being a priestess nor for any kind of work of administration, but for the sake of the dignity of the female sex, either at the time of baptism or of examining the sick or suffering, so that the naked body of a female may not be seen by men administering sacred rites, but by the deaconess (ibid.).

The Apostolic Constitutions (400 AD)
A widow is not ordained; yet if she has lost her husband a great while and has lived soberly and unblamably and has taken extraordinary care of her family, as Judith and Anna—those women of great reputation—let her be chosen into the order of widows (ibid., 8:25).

A deaconess does not bless, but neither does she perform anything else that is done by presbyters [priests] and deacons, but she guards the doors and greatly assists the presbyters, for the sake of decorum, when they are baptizing women (ibid., 8:28).

The other major problem with your article is that many of the things you list that deacons do can be done by the laity. Visit the sick and the homeless does not require a deaconal ordination. You can preach all you want outside of Mass.

You folks need to remember that there is a difference between a preist and a deacon, and that there is something called the "permanent diaconate" in the Catholic Church. As a matter of fact, both the 1976 and the 1994 documents on women priests explicitly left the question of returning to the tradition of women deacons aside for further study. I am ingnoring your disrespectful coments about Phyllis Zagano, who is one of the best-known conservative theologians in the country and a founding editor of Crisis magazine.