Vatican: Women Priests To Be Excommunicated

May 31st, 2008 By: Michael van der Galien | Tags:

Reuters reports that the Vatican has announced that women priests, and those who (try) to ordain them, will be automatically excommunicated. ‘The decree was written by the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and published in the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano,’ meaning that it immediately went into effect.

Excommunication means that the person cannot receive the sacraments, nor that he or she can participate in acts of public worship. For Catholics, then, excommunication is very, very serious.

According to Rev. Tom Reese, a senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University, the decree ‘was meant to send a warning to the growing number of Catholics who favor admitting women to the priesthood.’ “I think the reason they’re doing this is that they’ve realized there is more and more support among Catholics for ordaining women, and they want to make clear that this is a no-no,” Reese said.

It’s interesting to see that for all the talk in the West, about how all the others are backwards, living in the Dark Ages, etc., the biggest Church isn’t exactly living in the 21st century either, when it comes to this issue at least.

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  1. Albino Luciani
    May 31st, 2008 at 18:13
    Reply | Quote | #1

    http://www.bishop-accountability.or/abusetracker for daily verified coverage, domestically and globally, on why no Roman Catholic laity should be donating any monies to the Church, until hundreds of pedophile enabling, aid and abetting Cardinals (Mahony. Law, Egan, George, Pell, River, Hummes, Sodano, McCarrick, Levedea, Maida, Rigali, Bertone, etc.) and Bishops, are each removed from office, each canonically censored, and each placed under life time house arrest like proven pedophile founder of the Mexican cult Like Legion Of Christ, or are each alternatively EXCOMMUNICATED, at a minimum.

    The USCCB internal numbers actually put donations DOWN by over 43% in the last year, and the miters are beginning to run scared; hence to PR Stunt Damage Control Tour Of the Pope In NYC & DC (which failed and no actions have resulted other than Egan transferring dissenting priests before he leaves office under the cloud of GAY LOVER law suits).

    To date, at a minimum, just in the USA, the costs have exceeded $2.8 BILLION DOLLARS in diverted laity monies, with no end in sight, law suits filed daily still, and no punishment of the guilty, while child endangerment continues.

    At http://www.amazon.com, there are over 90+ recently published, and all 100% accurate books on the criminality that continues throughoutthe curia, from such salient and cogent authros as: Cishop Jeffery Robinson, Bishop Thomas Gumbleton, Jason Berry, Dr. Leon Podles, Richard Sipe, David Yallop, and Fr. thomas Doyle, OP.  

    No Curia Accountability?  No Laity Monies!  It’s That Smple!

    Reporting From Hevean, where my successor John Paul II is no where to be found (if you’a catch’a my drift), who appointed 99% of these evil red hats and miters, which are a mligent cancer in the Body Of Christ and must each be REMOVED.

    You hold the POWER laity!  STOP DONATING!

    Pace e ciao,

    Albino Luciani

  2. A. A. B.
    May 31st, 2008 at 19:00
    Reply | Quote | #2

    Maybe we should think about extending anti-discrimination laws to religious congregations.

  3. Michael van der Galien
    May 31st, 2008 at 19:18
    Reply | Quote | #3

    Maybe we should think about extending anti-discrimination laws to religious congregations.

    I oppose legislating this kind of thing. Let reforms come because people - of a religion for instance - want them, not because the government forces the changes upon them.

    Laws don’t change hearts.

  4. SMPTURLISH
    May 31st, 2008 at 19:43
    Reply | Quote | #4

    “Monsignor Angelo Amato of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said the Vatican wanted to provide bishops with a clear response on the issue.”
    Monsignor Angelo Amato
    Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith
    Holy See
    Vatican City, Italy
    Dear Monsignor Amato,
    How about providing a “clear response on the issue” of the rape of children by coming out with a statement saying:
    ALL CREDIBLY ACCUSED AND OTHERWISE KNOWN CHILD MOLESTERS AND RAPISTS BELONGING TO DIOCESAN CLERGY OR RELIGIOUS ORDERS IN UNITED STATES AND AROUND THE WORLD, BE THEY PRIESTS, BISHOPS OR CARDINALS ARE HEREBY EXCOMMUNICATED FROM THE HOLY ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH.
    ALL CHILD ABUSE IS A ‘CRIME’ AND MUST BE DEALT WITH AS SUCH.
    “SO-CALLED ORDINATIONS’ OF ANY OF THE ABOVE INDIVIDUALS ARE HEREBY REVERSED, THEY ARE LAICIZED AND MAY NOT REPRESENT THEMSELVES AS PRIESTS IN ANY PART OF THE WORLD.
    Pope Benedict XVI has visited the United States and made a number of prescient statements on the sexual dysfunction of clerics, including but not limited to the sexual abuse of children, rape, sodomy etc. Now he is home in Vatican City but nothing has changed in the attutudes of the United States Bishops.
    When may we expect that to change?
    Sincerely,
    Sister Maureen Paul Turlish
    Victims’ Advocate
    New Castle, Delaware

  5. C Stanley
    May 31st, 2008 at 19:45
    Reply | Quote | #5

    Quite a leap between "Dark Ages" mentality and a Church’s doctrine which assigns differing gender roles to its religious orders. Can we please save the righteous indignation for cases where it’s actually warranted?

  6. Michael Merritt
    May 31st, 2008 at 19:59
    Reply | Quote | #6

    I think Michael’s point is that people are pointing fingers at the Middle East, despairing the second-class status of women there (different gender roles if I’ve ever seen them, to use your phrase), while here in the West, one of the largest religious groups is denying women the opportunity for the Priesthood.

  7. Augusta Wynn
    May 31st, 2008 at 19:59
    Reply | Quote | #7

    I am really trying to get this straight. Cardinal Levada signs the "absolute and universal" decree which excommunicates women priests. If only he had signed anything at all to excommunicate his pedophile priests. But Cardinal Levada believes in placing pedophile priests in positions of authority, as he did with pedophile Rev. Gregory Ingles ( he put Ingels in charge of the sex abuse policies for the Church he says he loves so much and he made pedophile Salesian Dabbene chief Liason fo the community while he -Levada- was the archbishop of San Francisco.)
    Does Cardinal Levada (and his courtly ilk) really prefer pedophiles to women?
    AW

  8. Michael van der Galien
    May 31st, 2008 at 20:12
    Reply | Quote | #8

    Michael; yes, that’s indeed how I see it.

    Christine, although I understand why you put it like you do, I think that if you ask peole in the middle east about their treatment of women, they would probably use the euphemism you use.

  9. C Stanley
    May 31st, 2008 at 20:27
    Reply | Quote | #9

    Perhaps so, Michael, but can’t rational people see the difference between what I’m saying and what someone might say to excuse wife beating, forced marriages of young girls, stoning of women for adultery, etc, etc, etc?

    There are a lot of instances in society where we still accept gender differences (no women playing in the NFL as far as I know) and no one thinks anything of it. It’s mainly because people outside the Church seem to think of the priesthood as some high honor which women are excluded from (and fail to understand that it not only isn’t that, but it also theologically includes our ideas about masculinity/femininity) that you would even think there’s any problem at all with the exclusion of women from this role.

  10. Jason
    May 31st, 2008 at 20:37

    The idea that religious doctrines should be altered to keep up with whatever is "modern" or "progressive" in secular political circles is just bizarre. I cannot comprehend what provokes non-Catholics to appropriate to themselves the authority to render judgment and condemnation towards Catholics for Catholic doctrines, or non-Mormons to Mormon doctrines, etc. I suspect (know for a fact) that many of them would be outraged if a group they belong to were judged and condemned by outsiders using outside standards.

    To the extent that Catholics want to object on religious grounds to the doctrines that bar women from the priesthood, that is fair and valid internal debate within the Catholic Church. But non-Catholics using non-Catholic secular standards of judgment should butt out of matters where they have no standing.

    The comparison between Catholic gender roles in regards to the priesthood and the practices of stoning or beating women is outrageous on its face.

  11. C Stanley
    May 31st, 2008 at 20:51

    Exactly, Jason. And any women who wish to become priests and are unable to reconcile that calling with the Catholic Church’s practices are free to join the Anglican Church.

    BTW, I wonder why other Christians who feel that gender roles are archaic don’t protest against God sending his Son instead of a daughter?

  12. hrh
    June 1st, 2008 at 04:13

    Augusta Wynn writes, "Does Cardinal Levada (and his courtly ilk) really prefer pedophiles to women?" That WAS rhetorical, n’est-ce pas?

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