Women Priests – Why not?
May 17th, 2010 | By Tim A. Troutman | Category: Blog PostsIn my recent article on Holy Orders, I gave a condensed explanation of the male-only priesthood in footnote #233. For further reading, I’d like to recommend the following recent posts on the topic:
Jeffrey Steel: Women priests? A Marian Church in a fatherless and motherless culture, by von Balthasar
Dr. Edward Feser: God, man, and masculinity
This is too perfect. I lead an adult faith formation group at my parish. We’re going through John Salza’s “Biblical Basis for the Catholic Faith.” We came to the section on the sacraments and because of the media frenzy around priests, we jumped to Holy Orders. The week we talk about celibacy, Called to Communion addresses that. Now, the week we are going to talk about women and the priesthood, you provide this. I also reccomend, “Women and the Catholic Priesthood” by Sister Sara Butler. Thanks for such an amazing in depth look at the Catholic faith. By the way, one of my groups is very interested in going through,”The Crucified Rabbi” after I showed it to them.
Ashley – thanks for sharing this. It’s always neat to see God’s providence at work. (And here I thought it was by chance that I came across those articles last night and decided to link to them!)
Good lookin’ footnote, man. :)
My question betrays good deal of ignorance, but is this issue particularly hot in sectors of the Roman Catholic Church? Egalitarianism’s done a number all around.
Well it’s actually a closed issue but some Catholics don’t realize that. And you’re right, the modern egalitarian philosophy rears its ugly head in some Catholic circles. This is another battle we Catholics and conservative Protestants can join forces to fight. We are really allies on many issues – I hope we don’t forget that.
I think these arguments are probably lost on those Catholics who reject the Church teaching – they’re not interested in truth to begin with. But there are a number of Catholics who accept the Church’s teaching on this issue out of faith but do not understand the reason. I think these sorts of arguments are most helpful for those people.
I totally agree that opposition to egalitarianism is some common ground, not just for the Tims, but for all who profess Christ and are baptized into his body.
It seems probable that Protestants are far worse than Catholics on this issue. Throw a rock and you’ll hit two or three Protestant women pastors and three times as many women preachers.
Tim Troutman: “This is another battle we Catholics and conservative Protestants can join forces to fight. We are really allies on many issues – I hope we don’t forget that.”
I totally agree. I’m a joyful signer of the Manhattan Declaration.
Tim Prussic: “It seems probable that Protestants are far worse than Catholics on this issue. Throw a rock and you’ll hit two or three Protestant women pastors and three times as many women preachers.”
Yep. I’d acknowledge that there have been some/many wayward Protestants who’ve opened the Pandora’s Box to Women’s Ordination and egalitarianism.