Efforts Rising to Ordain Women as Roman Catholic Priests
- Thread starter Nick the Pilot
- Start date
Actually, the church's reasoning can be tracked back to the time of Jesus, who chose 12 men (13 if Judas Iscariot is included), to be his apostles to represent him in his absence. Of course women were chosed to represent Jesus as well, but their responsibilities were different (not any less, just different). This is followed up by Paul's writings in 1 Timothy 2:12, wherein he states women should not teach or exercise authority (in the church environment), over men. This was not because women were (or are), considered second class, but rather due to the rank of command and authority God created, as noted in Genesis 2.
God creates man first, then woman. God instructs man. Man instructs woman according to God's ways. Woman teaches family according to God and Man's instruction. All is well.
In Genesis 3, however something changes. Woman is taught by other than God or man. Woman then teaches man, and both do what is not according to God's instruction. All is no longer well. Mankind is knocked out of balance with God.
Is it woman's fault alone? Nope. Is it man's fault alone? Nope. Is it both? Yes. However, had man chosen not to listen to woman, the arguement is that we might not be in the situation we currently endure (however, it is also possible that had man not listened to women in Genesis 3, he might have ended up with a new wife/mate...).
That was then, in any event and this is now. We have grown, and are maturing in many respects, regressing in others.
It can also become quite a complicated balancing act for a woman priest, considering the current way of things concerning life, abortion, pro-creation, etc.
I doubt the Catholic church will ever condone abortion or artificial birth control, yet that flies in the face of the desires of a great deal of women. So what stand does the priestess of the Catholic church take? The Vatican's, or the women's stand?
If she takes the Vatican's view, she alienates womanhood and women's rights. If she takes the secular view, she alienates the church's stand...
Nothing is easy here.
v/r
Q
Ironically, Before the Catholic church of the middle ages, it was well known that the Sun was the center of the solar system, the earth was round, and there were other stars and planets, similar to our own. It was the burning of the city of Alexandria that caused that general knowledge to be lost (the library/repository was destroyed along with all the vast recorded knowledge of the known world/universe).
Various power plays by clergy with less than honorable intentions continued to keep the common man in the dark concerning knowledge. And ironically, it wasn't the Catholic church that taught the populace that women were to be seen and not heard, but the Moores...as they swept across Europe in their quest for domination and conversion (when the vanquished are laughed at and told their downfall was in part to listening to their women, and the church itself makes similar statements to its male parisheners...).
In general, western women lost their proper authority circa 1152 A.D. (A.C.E.), with the exception of those countries that had queens for absolute monarchs. Even then, the queens weren't always sympathetic to their sister countrymen.
Nick the Pilot
Well-Known Member
Q,
I am glad to hear that the church believed in a helocentric (sun-centered) solar system before it through out such a teaching so thoughlessly. (It would have been so easy for the Pope to issue an 'infallible' encyclical ensuring the teaching of a helocentric solar system, yet he chose not to. Why?) I also know that the Chinese have believed in a helocentric solar system for thousands of years.
You said,
"Various power plays by clergy with less than honorable intentions continued to keep the common man in the dark concerning knowledge."
--> I have discussed elsewhere how the church even discouraged people from reading the Bible at one time!
The Moores may have brought in male chauvinism, but the church certainly did not have to go along with it. But it really doesn't matter, the only thing that matters now is that the church continues to pursue its present-day male chauvinism.
I am glad to hear that the church believed in a helocentric (sun-centered) solar system before it through out such a teaching so thoughlessly. (It would have been so easy for the Pope to issue an 'infallible' encyclical ensuring the teaching of a helocentric solar system, yet he chose not to. Why?) I also know that the Chinese have believed in a helocentric solar system for thousands of years.
You said,
"Various power plays by clergy with less than honorable intentions continued to keep the common man in the dark concerning knowledge."
--> I have discussed elsewhere how the church even discouraged people from reading the Bible at one time!
The Moores may have brought in male chauvinism, but the church certainly did not have to go along with it. But it really doesn't matter, the only thing that matters now is that the church continues to pursue its present-day male chauvinism.
or maybe about 1,700...
No she cannot be forced to change...but will eventually when riduculed into accepting reality...
And yes every age sees itself as right and then begins to rewrite history to prove it was always right...
tis such a joy is it not?
Nick the Pilot
Well-Known Member
"No she cannot be forced to change...but will eventually when riduculed into accepting reality..."
--> This is why the church stopped teaching that the earth is the center of our solar system, is it not? Ridicule works, even against an 'unchangeable' Catholic Church.
--> This is why the church stopped teaching that the earth is the center of our solar system, is it not? Ridicule works, even against an 'unchangeable' Catholic Church.
bob x
Well-Known Member
No, no, "the church" never believed in heliocentrism. Pythagorean philosophers did, but it was a controversial minority position.
It's worse than that: the Pope DID issue an "infallible" Bull (Speculores Domus by Alexander VI) enjoining on all the faithful, by virtue of his apostolic authority (these are the magic words which, according to Vatican I, define this Bull as "infallible") the duty "to abjure the pernicious Pythagorean doctrine that the Earth is subject to a double motion, a daily rotation about its axis and a yearly revolution about the Sun." The Vatican is not able to repeal this (there is no procedure for getting rid of an "infallible" pronouncement); by the 1830's it had become sufficiently embarrassing that the Church gave its imprimatur to an astronomy textbook detailing heliocentrism with the opening "Modern astronomers now believe..." (that is, it still wasn't OK to teach that it was true, but it was OK to teach that this is what scientists believe), and in the 1890's geocentrism was quietly removed from the catechism, when the Catechism of Bellarmine (Cardinal Bellarmine was Galileo's prosecutor) was replaced by new texts (such as the Baltimore Catechism in the United States). The replacement of the old catechism caused such an uproar among conservatives that the next Pope, Pius X, declared Bellarmine a "Doctor of the Church", an honorific otherwise shared only by Thomas Aquinas, Augustine of Hippo, and John Chrysostom.
1685 years, as of the first Nicene Counsil. However, Constatine legalized Catholic Christianity in 313 with the edict of Milan. Furthermore the Catholic Church teaches the beginning of the Church was 1 A.D. when Jesus appointed the 12 Apostles. After his death, resurrection and ascention, the Pentecost was the starting point of the public ministry of the church.
During Paul's conversion of Gentiles, Christianity began dispensing with Jewish practices and tradidtions, and eventually evolved into a seperate faith. This could be argued as beginning circa 7 A.D. with the execution of Stephen (he was stoned to death, for calling the Jewish clergy "stiff necked"; this prior to Paul's trip to Damascus, where he was blinded on the road by God for three days).
Heady stuff eh? lol
Nick the Pilot
Well-Known Member
"...it still wasn't OK to teach that it was true, but it was OK to teach that this is what scientists believe)..."
--> So geocentrism is still the official Catholic teaching?? Speculores Domus is irrevocable?
--> So geocentrism is still the official Catholic teaching?? Speculores Domus is irrevocable?
Ah ... I do believe it was sound science that prevailed, and not ridicule? In fact, as i have stated above, ridicule doesn't work.
As for heliocentrism. We were wrong. We have apologised. Can we move on?
But let me put this case:
The question why women can't be ordained priests is often confused with the issue of equality. The Church has made it clear that men and women (as far as their sex is concerned) are equal before God (see Mulieris Dignitatem 6).
But equality isn't identity. Priesthood is a male function, for the reason that a priest is an icon of Christ, and Christ is male.
The maleness of Christ is an important sign of His relationship to the Church, which images the relationship of the Divine to the created order.
In cultures were symbolism has ceased to be a communicative language, the metaphysical understanding is lost.
Thomas