Subject: Women's ordination
Dear -------,
Thanks for writing to our website. I wish that you had the courage to use your real name.
Contrary to the assertion of the article that you sent, the issue of women's ordination is more than discipline, it is doctrine and it has been settled infallibly. Despite the assertions of dissidents like Fr Richard McBrien, the Catholic Church acknowledges only one authority, the Magisterium (Pope united with his bishops). This appeal to the Holy Spirit has been tried since the early Church by dissenting groups who seek to form the Church in their own image.
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith addressed this issue after Vatican II(1976 Inter Insigniores) and stated that the Church has no authority to change what Christ mandated with his priesthood. Pope John Paul II reiterated this position in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis in 1994 due to continuing problems with dissenters:
"She (the Church) holds that it is not admissible to ordain women to the priesthood, for very fundamental reasons. These reasons include: the example recorded in the Sacred Scriptures of Christ choosing his Apostles only from among men; the constant practice of the Church, which has imitated Christ in choosing only men; and her living teaching authority which has consistently held that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is in accordance with God's plan for his Church(paragraph 1)...Although the teaching that priestly ordination is to be reserved to men alone has been preserved by the constant and universal Tradition of the Church and firmly taught by the Magisterium in its more recent documents, at the present time in some places it is nonetheless considered open to debate, or the Church's judgment that women are not to be admitted to ordination is considered to have a mere disciplinary force. Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church's divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren(cf. Lk 22:32) 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(paragraph 4).
In 1998, a document (Ad Tuendam Fidem) was prepared by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith with the Pope's signature regarding canon law and the levels of Church teaching. The first two levels of teaching are infallible (paragraphs 5-9). The first level includes truths divinely revealed in the Scriptures and Tradition. The second level includes truths definitively proposed by the Church on faith and morals, "Every believer, therefore, is required to give firm and definitive assent to these truths, based on faith in the Holy Spirit's assistance to the Church's Magisterium, and on the Catholic doctrine of the infallibility of the Magisterium in these matters. Whoever denies these truths would be in a position of rejecting a truth of Catholic doctrine and would therefore no longer be in full communion with the Catholic Church(paragraph 6)." In paragraph 11, examples are given for each level of teaching including women's ordination which belongs to the second level:
A similar process can be observed in the more recent teaching regarding the doctrine that priestly ordination is reserved only to men. The Supreme Pontiff (Pope), while not wishing to proceed to a dogmatic definition, intended to reaffirm that this doctrine is to be held definitively, since, founded on the written Word of God, constantly preserved and applied in the Tradition of the church, it has been set forth INFALLIBLY by the ordinary and universal Magisterium. As the prior example illustrates, this does not foreclose the possibility that, in the future, the consciousness of the Church might progress to the point where this teaching could be defined as a doctrine to be believed as divinely revealed.
As you can see,
for Catholics, this issue is closed. The arguments presented in the
article that you sent have been answered before such as Jesus' cultural
conditioning. The fact is, Jesus is the God-man
who transcends culture. God at Mt Sinai formed this culture, rejecting
women as priests in the Old Testament. The problem
today revolves around this modern idea that to be truly equal involves no
toleration of differentiation of roles. Christianity rejects that
notion. Men and women are complimentary not identical. But it is not
Peter who holds the first place in Heaven with Jesus, but Mary the Mother of
God. As Inter Insignores
appropriately states, The greatest in the
I pray that you can come to some understanding and acceptance of this teaching. However, if you are Catholic, note the quote above about not being in full communion with the Catholic Church. You should not take the Eucharist while you persist in your dissent or your soul is in grave danger. I will pray for you.
God bless,
Tim Hope