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PDF versionAnglicans expect exodus to Catholic church
Jul. 13, 2010
Archbishop Rowan Williams of Canterbury, head of the Anglican Communion, arrives with Cardinal Walter Kasper for a vespers service at the Caravita oratory in Rome in this Nov. 20, 2009, CNS file photo.
LONDON -- The largest Anglo-Catholic group in the Church of England is expecting an exodus of thousands of Anglicans to Catholicism after a decision to ordain women as bishops without sufficient concessions to traditionalists.
The Church of England's General Synod on Saturday (July 10) rejected a compromise proposal by its top two bishops that would have allowed individual congregations to “opt out” of having women bishops. The vote came after nearly 12 hours of debate.
The move was an embarrassing setback for Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and his chief deputy, Archbishop of York John Sentamu, who had hoped to head off a defection of traditionalists over the issue of women bishops.
The rejection of the two archbishops' plan effectively leaves the church on the same path to the eventual consecration of women bishops -- but not until 2014 as “the earliest possible time.”
Stephen Parkinson, director of Forward in Faith -- a group that has about 10,000 members, including more than 1,000 clergy -- told Catholic News Service in a July 13 telephone interview that a large number of Anglo-Catholics are considering conversion to the Catholic faith.
A July 12 statement from Forward in Faith advised members against hasty action, saying now was "not the time for precipitate action."
"This draft measure does nothing for us at all," said Parkinson. "We explained very carefully why we could not accept women bishops theologically.
"We explained what would enable us to stay in the Church of England, but the General Synod has decided to get rid of us by giving us a provision that does not meet our needs," he said. "They are saying either put up or shut up and accept innovations, however unscriptural or heretical, or get out."
Parkinson said he expected thousands of members of Forward in Faith to consider accepting Pope Benedict XVI's offer of a personal ordinariate, issued last November in the apostolic constitution "Anglicanorum coetibus," in which a group of Anglicans can be received into the Catholic Church while retaining their distinctive patrimony and liturgical practices.
"Many, I expect, will be exploring the provisions of Pope Benedict's apostolic constitution. We have got 10,000 members, so clearly we are talking about thousands," he added.
A number of breakaway national Anglican churches, in communion with the Traditional Anglican Communion rather than the much larger Worldwide Anglican Communion, have already written to the Vatican to accept the pope's offer.
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The defection of thousands of mainstream Anglican traditionalists from the Church of England would represent the largest single block.
The controversy over female bishops dominated the five-day gathering of the General Synod, the church's national assembly, in York. The compromise was seen as a last-ditch attempt to avoid a schism.
Parkinson said developments were unlikely within the next six months, however, adding that until women bishops are ordained, Anglican traditionalists had a "couple of years" to think about what to do.
The Forward in Faith statement said the proposals must be considered by provincial synods in September and the outcomes could be debated a month later when Forward in Faith holds its annual meeting.
The diocesan synods have now been asked to scrutinize a scheme where women bishops would have the authority to make alternative arrangements for objectors through a statutory code of practice. The Anglo-Catholic group of the synod had wanted episcopal visitors, or "flying bishops," to minister to their members instead, but their requests were rejected.
If the resolution is supported by a majority of the diocesan synods, it will be returned to the General Synod for ratification in 2012.
Archbishop Williams told the General Synod that its vote illustrated that the Church of England was "committed by a majority to the desirability of seeing women as bishops for the health and flourishing of the work of God's kingdom, of this church and this nation."
"We are also profoundly committed by a majority in the synod to a maximum generosity that can be consistently and coherently exercised toward the consciences of minorities and we have not yet cracked how to do that," he said during the July 12 debate.
The Church of England first voted to ordain women as priests in 1992, a move that led to about 500 clergy defecting to the Catholic Church.
Since 1994, when the changes came into force, more than 5,000 women have been ordained as Anglican priests. In 2005, church leaders approved, in principle, the idea of women bishops. Work on legislation to codify women bishops began two years ago.
Last year, the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales set up a committee of bishops to liaise with Anglicans interested in a personal ordinariate, which will resemble a military diocese in structure, and also with the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
On July 5, Catholic Bishop Malcolm McMahon of Nottingham met about 70 Anglican clerics to discuss the possibility of an English ordinariate.
I wish there was a way to
I wish there was a way to make money betting against "an exodus of thousands of Anglicans to Catholicism".
(Notice the new fad for bishops, Anglican AND Roman Catholic, to wear their pointy hats tilted back at an angle, rather than straight up? How silly they all look. Women will look silly, too, in mitres.)
I bet Jesus didn't wear his
I bet Jesus didn't wear his pointy hat pointing backwards. You are absolutely correct, nobody is doing it right now-a-days.
Isn't it about time that the
Isn't it about time that the Anglicans demonstrate that they can play religious "geo-politics" just like the Romans?
With the Catholic hierarchy bleeding profusely from self-inflicted wounds of compromised morality, complicity in child rape and sodomy, and decades of corruption, this would be a good time for the Anglicans to offer respite and solace to millions of their Catholic brothers and sisters around the globe who are fed-up, disgusted at their betrayal by their leaders in the hierarchy.
Can you imagine the looks of horror contorting the faces of the curial politicians? Can you imagine the shrill cries of "anathema" and "excommunication" that would emanate from the Roman curia if Anglicans (and especially their American relatives, the Episcopalians) were to invite millions of Catholic men and women to find a religious and spiritual shelter under the Anglican umbrella? That would be something you could sell tickets for!
In my own judgement, I now have come to the conclusion that Benedict and his minions in the curia are actually trying to ignite a new schism. I believe they are attempting to drive all of the disaffected Catholics out of the Roman Church. The Roman hierarchs hope to be able to tend the remaining Catholic sheep as they graze their lives away, heads down, munching on the same old stale grass of submission and obsequiousness.
For the next several centuries until the hierarchs get over their hissy fit, the Anglicans could have a "Catholic" branch, just like they now have an US Episcopal branch. In the meantime, mature, modern Catholics would have a spiritual and religious home in which they could live out the Beatitudes, baptize their children, marry whom they love, bury their dead, all the time ministered to by priests and bishops of their own choosing.
Perhaps, in time when the Roman hierarchs rid themselves of their child rapists and sodomizers, and their corrupt feudal oligarchs, and make peace with human sexuality, we may even be inclined to give them some financial support again.
Now is the time brother and sister Anglicans and Episcopalians to come to the aid of your brother and sister Catholics!
If you really want to leave,
If you really want to leave, just leave.
There is no Catholic opposition to liberals upping tent and going over to the dying Episcopalians. Heck, its a wonder why they're even still here.
as for the Church, as She is comprised by more than just a few savagely evil prelates and bumbling bishops, She will continue on as She has for the past two thousand years. She has survived the Great Schism, wars with Moslems and Mongols, Napoleon and Stalin. She will certainly survive the futile rage of nihilistic postmoderns.
So, put up or shut up.
The point is, JonathanR., in
The point is, JonathanR., in case you missed it, the Roman hierarchs are the ones have left the rest of us long, long ago. Now essentially without the "good shepherds" that Jesus told us about, we just have to fend for ourselves for now on.
If you could break away from the thrall of Holy Mother Church for a few moments, you'd notice that She is not doing so well these days, staggering around after some of those historical bumps and bruises you mentioned. JonathanR, the rape and sodomy of children and harboring their perpetrators is about as low as you can go.
By the way, the horror and atrocities of the "wars with Moslems and Mongols," a.k.a. the Crusades, still reverberate badly among us to this day. That's one of the reasons Osama bin Laden gave for 9/11. Then there is the apartheid in Gaza and the West Bank.
How come you fail to mention what I would expect someone like yourself would see as one of Her greatest achievements, the Inquisition? You having second thoughts about all that savage blood letting, torture and fiery immolations? Kinda gives a new dimension to the thought, "What would Jesus do?"
There is nothing futile nor nihilistic about our anger. Augustine in the 4th century wrote: "The twin daughters of HOPE, are ANGER and COURAGE."
JonathanR., you are right about "put up or shut up." Couldn't agree with you more. But even here, the tide is beginning to rise.
"In the meantime, mature,
"In the meantime, mature, modern Catholics would have a spiritual and religious home in which they could live out the Beatitudes, baptize their children, marry whom they love, bury their dead, all the time ministered to by priests and bishops of their own choosing."
They don't need the Anglican Church to do this. Better to obtain validly ordained bishops from other schismatic groups and start the Roman Orthodox Church. Leave B16 and his myopic, faltering museum piece of a Church perpetually living in the Roman Empire to wither away in the west,and move on to Africa and Asia. They can play their old papal roadshow there to a new audience. It's all over for them in the western world.
As a member of a family of
As a member of a family of converts and as a person whose lived places with very small Catholic populations, I've simply never met a submissive and obsequious Catholic. When I read the comments, I am continually surprised by the angry tone that one groups of Catholics have towards another group--possibly a non-existent group.
Obviously you're not familiar
Obviously you're not familiar with events in the Canadian Anglican Church--not to speak of the US Episcopal Church's ordination of homosexuals. That is why most sensible Anglicans are keeping quiet on the sexual abuse mess: We live in a world surrounded by this illness. The difference is that the Anglican Church seeks to bless all kinds of diseases.
Mature, modern Catholics do
Mature, modern Catholics do have a spiritual and religious home in which they can live out the Beatitudes, where they can baptise their children, marry those whom they love, and bury their dead.
It’s the Catholics who seem to view things in terms of power and politics, who would like us to cast off God’s revelation and make a church in their own image, who seem to have the problem.
Yes the scandal and abuse is horrendous and unconscionable but this is not what the Church stands for. This is a failing (a falling into sin even) by some of its members (both religious and lay I’d like to point out), and if you would use the failures of a few to condemn the entirety then how are you any better than this morally compromised group whom you rail against?
It's a silly hat to begin
It's a silly hat to begin with. Change it or get rid of it. A simple purple beanie with a propeller on it would be more appropriate.
While I agree with Pope
While I agree with Pope Benedict in allowing the Anglicans to come in with a new rite to escape the barbarism of the Anglican Communion at present, I do hope that those entering will accept the whole Deposit of the Faith.
I'm sure there is enough soul searching going on in that troubled traditional wing of a church which has lost her soul but the answer for some may not be the one true Church of Christ, the Catholic Church. Unless a former Anglican accepts all of the Catholic teachings & not just those which deal with the abomination of priestesses & the sin of sodomy which is one of the sins that cries to heaven for vengeance, then they should not enter the Catholic Church.
Perhaps the answer for those who can't make the swim completely across the Tiber is to unite together in a body & form a completely new Anglican Church. Either way, I wish them well & hope the liberal Anglican rump church just dies out since it is an affront to Almighty God!
I try not to comment here as
I try not to comment here as an Anglican, even though I'm a regular reader. However, "paulte" sir or madam, your regularly vitriolic, uncharitable and generally mean spirited tripe is so unchristian. Talk about "abomination" (one of your favorite words); pot meet kettle. Must get lonely at that SSPX seminary where I suspect you dwell. Aren't there enough spittle-flecked lip-curled angry white men on the Internet already? If you're a U.S. resident isn't there a Teabagger rally with racist signs where you can spend your time?
Rather than engage in an orgy of self-righteous triumphalism mocking my church, why not reflect maturely and calmly on the MANY schisms and divisions in your own church? So a few hundred C of E (and no more--for financial reasons alone,no pension, no stipend for the family etc.) Anglo-Catholic priests will go to Rome. Big deal. How many hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, (Pew Research study; Catholic Univ. study) of your fellow RC laity are now "nothing". A few thousand others (and many thousands in Latin America) are now fundamentalist evangelicals or pentecostals. Fewer in number, like me, are now Anglicans. I'd worry more about your own church (and your soul) than casting stones if I were you.
....wow, you sound as bitter
....wow, you sound as bitter as the person you were responding to.
On reflection, I should have
On reflection, I should have been less personal and forgiving. However, "paulte" reflects a kind of baroque sixteenth century fortress Counter-Reformation Catholicism perfectly at ease in mocking and attacking non-RC Christians. I unreservedly state that the RCC has legions (no not the Legionaries!) of Christ-like clergy, consecrated women and men and laity working in the vineyard of the Lord. Would "paulte" admit that Anglicanism (or Lutherans or Methodists) also have such people and that the BCP is godly and orthodox?
Paulte said in reference to
Paulte said in reference to Anglicans entering the Catholic Church, "I do hope that those entering will accept the whole Deposit of the Faith."
Paulte, let's not hold Anglicans to hopelessly high standards most cradle Catholics don't meet either. Accepting the basic tenets demanded of all in the Mystical Body of Christ (in Christ's gospel) is far more important than meeting the narrow conflicting and contradictory standards demanded in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
We have too many strange and totally outdated practices. Protestants converting to Catholicism are expected to make oaths of unquestioning allegiance and fealty to the bishop of Rome as part of their acceptance into the Church, or at least at one time they did. Let's hope that has changed.
It makes no sense whatsoever. No Roman Catholic or his/her godparents made any such an act of fidelity when they were baptized, or confirmed. You renounced the devil and accepted the Creed. That's that.
The Roman Church and it's stalwart and unquestioning sheep continues to live in the Middle Ages. Acts of fealty, coats-of-arms for bishops, cappa magnas, etc. It's little wonder the Church is being rejected in the west.
Wow, I resent your comments
Wow, I resent your comments regarding us U.S. residents. WE "OVER HERE" know that Jesus was a white skinned, blonde hair, blue-eyed "dude." I bet you Angel people didn't even know that.
On the serious side, may I comment about RC laity... a small joke... what do you call a person who has gone to 12 years of Catholic School (at least in America) --- an ex-catholic. Thought you would like that.
If JC only knew what his followers were doing he would have a heart attack... as one of those ex-catholics, I don't mock your church at all...
Very well deserved criticism
Very well deserved criticism of paulte's diatribe. There are as many Romand Catholics who have moved to the Anglican communion that there are Anglo-Catholics who have joined Rome. Within the Anglican communion today the two groups within the Church, loosely termed Evangelical and Anglo-Catholic are feeling alienated from the direction of the church for two very different reasons. They evangelicals, represented by Holy Trinity Brompton are deeply alinated over the question of gays in the church and while the Catholic sector is worried over the gender issue, coming to a head with the impending consecration of female bishops. The solution might be for the evangelicals to move over to the Methodists, which is what they virutally are and the Anglo-Catholics to Rome or the Eastern Church and let remain those who still observe Richard Hookers 3 pillars of Anglicanism: Scripture, Tradition and reason.
We shouldn't assume as so
We shouldn't assume as so many Catholics and former Catholics seem to do that all supporters in Anglicanism of women priests and the ordaining of openly gay men and women to the priesthood and the episcopate is a phenomenon limited to just EVANGELICALS. The situation in Anglicanism here in the USA and the British Commonwealth countries is much more fluid and definitely more complex than that.
There are evangelical and "low church" Anglicans who love the pomp, smells, and bells, but tolerate what is basically Free Thinking within the church. There are Anglo Catholics who would love to swim the Tiber to Rome or to Constantinope, but never will precisely because of Catholic and Orthodox opposition to ordaining women openly professed gays to the priesthood. There are many gradations of High, Low, and Broad church opinion. There are no neat little, carefully defined slots Anglicans fall into either. Any more than do Catholics as the Church hierarchy is discovering more and more each day.
The era of a Catholicism defined, made to order, with it's teachings consistently taught and embraced as such by the entire world has ended. The Church has NEVER been united in it's theology.
You can attribute this break-up of the historic Church and the decline of the pope and hierarchy as the architects of the faith to the role of the internet, the Devil, the rising educational level and secularization of Catholics who have fallen victims of this "sensate, decadent, self-centered life-style of the west" etc. to your heart's content. But the fact remains, this colossal 2000 year old enterprise of the inerrant conservator of the European past is over. Like the Anglican Church, Catholicism and all other branches of Christian thought and praxis become a universal debating society of the saved and the damned.
Paulte does throw a few
Paulte does throw a few zingers on occasion to others but you're piling it on pretty thick to me are you not? Contrary to what you say I do have respect for the Anglican tradition prior to its descent into despicable liberalism. I also have respect for those Anglicans today who are trying to keep their tadition alive whether by entering the Catholic Church (the one true Church) or by forming another Church or for those who have already split from Ramsey's abominable rump. The notion of priestesses is completely despicable to anyone with a shred of orthodoxy in their being!
Also, if you read enough of my posts you will know that I am not a defender of the Catholic Church as institution per se. The Church is both human & divine. The divine part needs no defense but the human part will always be defective since humans are sinful. I believe that the Catholic Church is in need of reform today in the wake of the misguided & ambiguous Council termed Vatican II.
Paulte, Since when do your
Paulte, Since when do your opinions on moral theology define those of Almighty God?
JR
We're on the same wavelength.
We're on the same wavelength. The Lord knows his own. He enlightens my intellect. You've heard of Predestination, haven't you? However, if I step out of line slightly He slaps me down good & proper. So I try to stay on the straight & narrow as much as possible!
How in the world do you do
How in the world do you do you have the nerve to speak for God, to announce to the world, that YOU have the authority to speak for God? sounds like more than a little bit of hubris to me.
Paulte is part of the
Paulte is part of the neo-Gnostic Catholic uber Jansenism sweeping through the radical right-wing crew of Benedict's sinking medieval church. The last gasps of a dying breed of purists who have set themselves up as paragons of orthodoxy. Judging the saved from the damned.
This pernicious sect will largely die out in time. They always do, but for the time being they'll remain peering below the surface like elves in some forest,or like some scoffing little demons lurking through the vines of a sculptured 12th century ambo.
This is quite a propos, and
This is quite a propos, and poetic. I am relieved of having to go into great depth about the evils of this kind of thinking, and religion. It is bracing to find so many rational voices among the insane.
"like some scoffing little
"like some scoffing little demons lurking through the vines of a sculptured 12th century ambo." What a great line.
Paulte is not really part of
Paulte is not really part of anything except the group of orthodox Catholics who post un-Christian things.
"Purists" will not die out, sorry. If that were the case, TLM attendance would be down while NO Mass attendance would be soaring. It's actually the reverse.
His Holiness is setting up for the time when those alive for Vatican II are no longer in power, thus permitting the actual implementation of the documents and not some bizarre progressive pseudo-Catholic use of them.
"TLM attendance would be down
"TLM attendance would be down while NO Mass attendance would be soaring. It's actually the reverse." Like all novelties the TLM is attractive to the uninitiated. Wait a while. We'll see how much time they'll give it once the the new Roman Missal and the Anglican Use liturgy become more attractive alternatives to the TLM.
Vatican II tried to accomplish two contradictory objectives: a multi-lingual liturgy for the universal Church while at the same time encouraging the preservation of the all Latin Mass. That was the genii the Council allowed to escape from the bottle. It will never return to that bottle no matter how often you think it will. It is the latter that will die out in large part while a reformed, and very much improved vernacular NO will in time still be the preferred mode of celebration. It is simply wishful thinking by romantic neocons yearning to live again during the Council of Trent and the Catholic Counter-Reformation to believe otherwise.
That Catholic Church is dying fast, certainly in the western world.
I don't know what churches
I don't know what churches you've been attending, but most of the novus ordo liturgies I go to have a very good cross section of people from all age groups, all income levels, all educational levels, and all degrees of wealth.
I keep hearing the boasts from the SSPX,Sedevacantist ilk, and Fr. Zuhlsdorf's faithful followers talking about those wonderful days when contemporaries of Vatican II have "died off", and how those stout-hearted, "Benedictine" loyalists are going to take over. When the world will embrace the traditional Latin Mass of 1962, etc. etc. LOL LOL LOL
Something tells me there will be plenty of folks left who love the Vatican II liturgy, and are ready to dance on the graves of these Gnostic traditionalists living in the 16th century, salivating over the prospect of seeing yet another bishop Slattery in his cappa magna . LOL LOL
What people like you want is
What people like you want is for the Catholic Church to genuflect before the world, the flesh & the devil! Am I 12th Century since I don't believe that the sin of sodomy which cries to heaven should be honored in a sacramental union? And lesbians aren't even capable of any form of intercourse, so what exactly is ther union based on? Just like Queen Victoria, I can't figure that one out!
Examine your own thinking & then see how far removed from orthodox Christianity you really are!
To quote you, "I don't
To quote you, "I don't believe that the sin of sodomy which cries to heaven should be honored in a sacramental union?"
So now you are God. Whoever said sodomy was a sin, much less "cries to heaven?" You realize, of course oral sex is included in the definition of sodomy? How many husbands and wifes will burn in hell based on your judgement?
Jesus certainly never made this judgement.
Peace in our Blessed Mother,
Brother Luke
St Thomas Aquinas says so!
St Thomas Aquinas says so! The CCC says the practice of homosexuality (sodomy) is a sin which cries to heaven. And since heterosexual couples can practice sodomy as well as homosexuals can, then they too are also practicing a sin which cries to heaven.
Homosexuality is a condition or an orientation. This is not a sin. It is only the sin part (sodomy) which cries to heaven for vengeance. And since God is fair minded like me, it would logically apply to heterosexuals as well.
As late as 1964 all the states in the USA had laws against sodomy which applied to both sexual orientations. Something against the civil law could hardly be acceptable in the Catholic Church! The civil law is always less restrictive than the moral law.
Barbarism? An affront to God
Barbarism? An affront to God Almighty? "Judge not lest you be judged," as Jesus said.
Nice phrase, but out of
Nice phrase, but out of place, and quite cliché. If we Catholics truly believe our faith, then we must believe that it contains All revealed truth. Otherwise we are not Catholics. Did Jesus mean by this statement that we cannot make rational judgements? Should I go 95 mph in a 25 mph zone just because I shouldn't judge? As Catholics, we have the right to judge according to our faith's doctrine. We do not have the right to judge the state of a person's soul, and whether they will end up in heaven or hell. We know that our faith is true. That leaves the very logical judgement that faiths contrary to ours are false in the points in which they are contrary. I hope this helps you to be less cliché.
Well, paulte, you certainly
Well, paulte, you certainly will not achive the Beatific Vision based on your charity. Quite the grand inquisitor.
No, I'll have to take the
No, I'll have to take the truth telling, liberal bashing route to that particular venue!
Oh great - just what the
Oh great - just what the Catholic Church needs - more misogynists!
Maybe some Catholic women will find the Anglican Church more appealing.
Before I could write my
Before I could write my comment, I noticed that you said it all!
Why wait?
Why wait?
Benedict is so divisive!
Benedict is so divisive! He's entering a family quarrel and taking sides without his own church's decision to welcome these traditionalists. So like the RC church -- decisions from the top down. I hope that the Anglican communion is as welcoming of the many women who will leave the RC church in protest. At least the Anglicans get to vote as to whether or not they wish to help usher in the kingdom with or without women. The RC church, or at least this pope, wants nothing to do with women!
The Anglicans also happen to
The Anglicans also happen to have great looking churches, educated liberal clergy,and wonderful church music and choirs. They receive communion under both forms and celebrate the Tridentine rite, in some cases in Latin as well as English, better than we do.
So,what's not to like? Why stick with a bunch of whiney gay and women bashers sinking below the waves like the Shakers. Why? Because the whole world has seen through the veil of secrecy, prevarication, and deception resulting from centuries of sexual abuse and clerical corruption. With cases from around the globe soon to be brought against the Roman Church.
This pope may have had a
This pope may have had a dominating mother and more than likely hated her. The guys who revel in dressing up like mom often do.
Well liberal dont go away
Well liberal dont go away mad, just go away
I wouldn't feel very proud of
I wouldn't feel very proud of that remark.
I personally know two
I personally know two Catholic families, one from Massachusetts, the other from Alabama, who have already left for the Episcopal Church, not wanting their daughters to grow up damaged by Catholicism. I am sure there must be many many other such families.
I'm on my way as well.
I'm on my way as well.
Anglicans have a lot of
Anglicans have a lot of people hung up on ritual purity. They can be a real pain too. They're worse than the hyper Tridentinists who've never intellectually progressed beyond the Council of Trent.
Pope Benedict and his liturgy police will have their hands full.
Where will they all go when
Where will they all go when the Catholic Church begins ordaining women?
My guess is they all will be
My guess is they all will be long gone to their Maker. I too continue to hope however.
Well, I can't speak for
Well, I can't speak for "They" but I can speak for myself: the day the Roman Catholic Church raises a women to the order of the priest or bishop is the day I become atheist.
Why? Becasue at that point the Church has said "is" and "is not" at the same time. They infallibly declare that the Church has no authority to ordain women, then turn around and say sorry about that- aparently we are infallibly wrong on that point- now we infallibly declare that the church DOES have the authority to ordain women.
I am not sure but I don't
I am not sure but I don't think the Church has 'infallibly' made a statement on ordination any more infallibly then they did in saying the sun revolved around the earth.
It took 400 years but at least they finally got one of them correct.
I joke but am serious. Could someone please identify the 'formal statement' that says only men can be ordained.
Read Ordination Sacerdotalis,
Read Ordination Sacerdotalis, and read the CDF's response, where they confirm that it was infallible.
Thanks - I did. Out of an
Thanks - I did.
Out of an attempt to have it fully explained I also made a visit to WiKi. In there is a very clear statement:
"In 1998, this was clarified slightly (in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's Doctrinal Commentary on Ad Tuendam Fidem) to state that the teaching of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis was not taught as being divinely revealed, although it might someday be so taught in the future:
“ 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, 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."
Playing the Devil's Advocate it can also be argued that 'the consciousness of the Church might progress to the point where this teaching could NOT be defined ..." and this was exactly why The Supreme Pontiff did not wish to proceed to a dogmatic definition.
I asked in another comment but did not get an answer. Please:
I remember talk many years ago that women and married men were secretly ordained during the Soviet occupation of East European countries. Is this accurate? If so was it 'sanctioned' by Rome at the time as an emergency measure?
As the late Dominican
As the late Dominican theologian, Father Edvard Schilleebbx, once taught, and I recall Hans Kung holds or did hold: any member of the Church may confect the eucharist, man or woman. Of course, as usual, Pope JP2 and his court silenced him. The radical reactionaries and preservers of the privileges of the sacerdotal priestcraft in B16's court, together with their incessantly bleating followers still have convulsions even contemplating such a possibility.
Please see the article on
Please see the article on this website that was released yesterday (7/15/10) titled "Vatican revises church law on sex abuse." Attempted ordination of women is now a 'grave crime.'
And hey folks, WWJD? I doubt it would be this.
Don't worry, the true Church
Don't worry, the true Church will never ordain women! There could be some trouble though. We could end up with the Anti-Christ in Rome. If a Pope ever approved such nonsense, we would have prima-facie evidence that he was not the true Pope.
But the true Church will survive the fires of hell. You know the expression "Hell hath no fury as a woman scorned!"? This is a very true statement. Right now the devil is working through these feminists & their neutered male allies. This is a fire of hell & scripture teaches us that the gates of hell will not prevail against holy Church. The 6 headed dragon lady of feminism wil go down to defeat! Do not despair!
Boy, what a great post, paultie! Sometimes I even amaze myself!
PaulT, I can only feel sorry
PaulT, I can only feel sorry for any women in your life, and pray you have no daughters to fill with your hatred. Apparently there's nothing that gets you spewing your bile more than feminism. Your name-calling reflects on you, not feminists -- an axiom any school-age child can master. Why are you so afraid of strong women?
The Catholic Church will
The Catholic Church will never ordain women, because it is against Catholic doctrine, which never changes.
Ordination of women is not
Ordination of women is not doctrine. It is an issue of discipline based upon a faulty reading of history and tradition. That discipline can and in time will change.
Celibacy is a discipline
Celibacy is a discipline which can change. The ordination of women is doctrinal since it relates to the form or matter of a sacrament. The form of a sacrament can never change. Baptism requires water, Matrimony requires a man & a woman, Penance requires the confession of sin, Extreme Unction requires oil, the Eucharist requires unleavened bread & a certain type of wine, Holy Orders requires a male candidate, etcetera, etcetera.
Ordination to be valid
Ordination to be valid ,Paulte, requires everything other the sex of the recipient of the sacrament.
Strange how all the other six sacraments are efficacious for men AND WOMEN, but ordination isn't? What did the Holy Spirit tell the apostles and the disciples about women receiving THIS sacrament--ORDINATION--it didn't tell them about the other sacraments?
Paulte, you need to start thinking for yourself. You're spouting rubbish and nonsense.
How do you come up with your
How do you come up with your first sentence (throwing than in)? Hmm? The sex of the ordinand is not relevant? In my book of dogma, reserving ordination to males is termed "sent certa" which is a doctrine lower than Defide (infallible). Now after JP's teaching (Apostolic Letter - OS) it is Defide.
Talking about "thinking", maybe you should do some of your own! The "logic" of what you are saying leads to the premise that all the sacraments must be be open to each gender. How do you come up with that premise? Is the first & most important principle of Christianity equality? I think not. Your premise is false. There is nothing in scripture, tradition or anywhere which says that all the sacraments must be open to each gender.
In particular, the Eucharist while open to both genders is closed to all unrepentant mortal sinners until they repent. Matrimony is reserved to a man & a woman, not a man & a man or a woman & a woman. The point being the sacraments do have some exclusivity.
Pault, In Christ there is
Pault, In Christ there is neither gentile, Jew, man or woman. You may recall this. Read it. Then you'll have the answer to why women CANNOT be excluded from either the marriage rite or ordination.
Women could hardly be
Women could hardly be excluded from the marriage rite. I'm hardly advocating that! The fact that there is a oneness in Christ for all believers hardly means that women cannot be excluded from ordination anymore than it means that the less intelligent males cannot be excluded!
What cannot be denied is that when God became man, He became a male. This fact contains the explanation as to why there will never be priestesses in the Catholic Church. Start with that premise & then begin to extrapolate by logical reasoning. If you don't like the conclusion then blame God for raining on your feminist parade!
In Christ there are neither dumb people nor smart people as well! Does that mean that dumb males can be ordained? HMM? I'm sure that if they had been much more selective in seminary entrance criteria from the late sixties through the 70s & into the 80s, that the abuse crisis would have been far less devestating. I mean what kind of an "adult" seeks out an intimate relationship with a teenage boy?
Paulte, John Paul's teaching
Paulte, John Paul's teaching was never the mind of the universal Church. Unlike the doctrine of the Assumption or Immaculate Conception to use two examples. He did not uphold tradition, especially one which has such a weak basis in history. The late pope upheld discipline and not faith and morals.
From an ecumenical perspective, the Orthodox churches are also nervous, and should be, because Rome's exercise of primacy and so-called infallibility suggests an over-arching papal overlordship NOT based upon upholding and conserving a sacred tradition. A dangerous exercise of autocracy, instead of a Petrine confirmation of his brethren--his fellow bishops. Paul stuffed his own personal biasis down the throats of the Church by saying my way or the highway.
John Paul's action and the current sexual abuse crisis, together with the larger issue of papal and hierarchical moral authority evaporating as rapidly as it has, have blunted the progress made in ecumenism, and ,perhaps, reversed it by a good 25 years or more.
Orthodoxy is now the moral leader of ecumenisn. The pope and Vatican have so severely blundered, they're influence anywhere is negligible.
and the good sisters and the
and the good sisters and the "The Baltimore Catechism" told you so, right?
Orthodoxy
Orthodoxy
Fortunately, that will never
Fortunately, that will never happen. So they need not go anywhere.
Only a baptized male can
Only a baptized male can validly receive holy orders, see Ordinatio Sacerdotalis.
Esther, now I'll bet you've
Esther, now I'll bet you've memorized the "Ordination Sacerdotalis" as "Our Sunday Visitory" told you to, now didn't you? LOL LOL LOL
The Catholic Church has
The Catholic Church has already begun ordaining women. And the women are sending their CV's to parishes that are being closed for lack of priests... another MEGATREND missed by the Papal Spinmeister in his book.
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