ROME — Masculine authority has been on vivid display at the Vatican during the last week, as the princes of the Roman Catholic Church gather to elect a replacement for Pope Benedict XVI.
The world has watched the all-male college of cardinals lining up to say goodbye to the retiring Benedict, sweeping past hordes of television cameras to enter the cardinals’ pre-conclave discussions, and gathering in the Basilica of St. Peter to pray for the church.
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I grew up in the Roman Catholic Church..12 years of school, etc., but I agree with Cardinal O'Malley...women's gifts need to be used to the maximum. Thus I am reading this while writing my weekly gift to the Church....the Episcopal Church. Bishop Barbara Harris visited our parish years ago for Confirmation. My then 5-yer -old son looked at the altar, where she, our woman rector and a number of girl acolytes were serving, and asked me: Mommy, is it OK to be a boy on the altar? It made me remember being sent to the principal's office for raising my hand when our parish priest asked our first grade class if any of us thought we would like to be priests & I raised my hand. What you see is what you learn.
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Bernard Law is actually able to vote for the pope-this is what is wrong with the Catholic Church. As far as women in the church- I would never step I the church if a nun was elected- I'm so disgusted with the Catholic Church although I'm closer to God when the nuns and priests were running my life!
Pooshky, Cardinal Law is not able to vote for the next pope as you assert. As a Cardinal, he has been able to participate in these preliminary meetings, but as he is over the age of 80, he is not among the 115 cardinal-electors who will be voting on the next pope.
The Globe's caption under the photo of Ms. Sevre-Duszynska is misleading. It claims that she is an "excommunicated female priest." There are two items being mixed up here, the question of the validity of a sacrament and the jurisdictional authority of the Church. The Church has consistently taught that only a baptised male can be ordained a priest, thus the attempted ordination of Ms. Sevre-Duszynska is invalid (not simply illegal). It never accomplished what she thinks it accomplished. She is no more a priest than I am the monarch of the United Kingdom.
Secondly, because the Church recognizes that participating in any ceremony that attempts to say that such an attempted ordination is valid causes a fracture of unity within the Church, she teaches that those who participate incur a sentence of excommunication, latae sententiae (simply by participating in the act). This is done with the hope that those who participate in such an act will recognize their sin and seek to be reconciled with the Church.
Thus, Ms. Ms. Sevre-Duszynska is not an "excommunicated female priest" but an excommunicated layperson.
And, of course, this is why you guys actually have Cannon Law lawyers. You guys have so complicated, and confused, and contorted, and highlacked what is supposed to be a one-to-one speacial relation betweem God and rhe individual, you need special lawyers to figure it all out. Such abject and profound garbage on its very face.
gr8te,
Just as the United States has need of the Constitution and the laws that come from it for maintaining good order and governance, so it is with the Church. If Jesus had desired that religion was "supposed to be a one-to-one speacial [sic] relation between God and rhe [sic] individual" he would not have established a Church, a community of the faithful, on the rock of Peter's confession of faith (see Matthew, 16:18).
Because something is in Canon Law, doesn not mean, necessarily, that it was created by mere men. In fact, Canon Law cannot contradict that which has been divinely revealed, but can build upon it. Sometimes, in fact, something that has been divinely revealed (for example, that only men are the proper subjects for Sacred Orders) needs to be enshrined in Canon Law (see Canon 1024: "A baptized male alone receives sacred ordination validly.") because some either have not yet come to an understanding of what has been divinely revealed, or refuse to acknowledge it. Thus, for the good ordering of the community of the faithful that is the Church, established by Christ, is it included in Canon Law.
The Catholic Church should at least allow priests to marry. It already allows priests to marry in countries where Orthodox Christianity is the most popular Christian religion. Celibate priesthood is merely a custom, not a Church law.
Cordgrass,
The obligation to celibacy for priests in the Latin Rite is, indeed, a law in the Church and not simply a custom. In The Code of Canon Law, Canon. 277 §1 notes, "Clerics are obliged to observe perfect and perpetual continence for the sake of the kingdom of heaven and therefore are bound to celibacy which is a special gift of God by which sacred ministers can adhere more easily to Christ with an undivided heart and are able to dedicate themselves more freely to the service of God and humanity."
This, however, is an ecclesiastical law, one that is established by the Church, and can be changed. That only men are valid subjects for the Sacrament of Holy Orders, is of Divine Law, which comes from Christ himself. As such, it cannot be changed.
Currently, Catholic priests are allowed to marry in Syria and Turkey and other places that are predominantly Orthodox. That has been the rule for centuries. It is little known exception to Canon Law. And of course now Episcopal priest that switch over to become Catholic priests are allowed to be married. In other words, it is a "law" in name only.
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And the Catholic Religon has helped Western Civilization how? Oh yeah, they helped mollify the brutal Roman society. True enough. But the Catholic Church has a horrible history! The Inquistion, the support of the German Nazi's, and the current attempts to destroy the Jews in Israel..need more be said!