At Crisis there is a well-drafted piece by Monica Miller which effectively destroys the feminist claim that women can receive the Sacrament of Holy Orders.
Miller gives a round up of ancient sources which describe the ministries of widows and deaconesses as well as modern theological reflection and historical research (e.g. Deaconesses: An Historical Study by Aime G. Martimort). She discusses the unity of Orders (cf Lumen gentium): since episcopacy and priesthood can only be receive by men, hence also diaconate). She explains the nuptial relationship of the ordained (masculine) to the Church (feminine).
On the other hand, Miller demolishes the shallow feminist gripe about the Church’s “naïve physicalism embedded in arguments against the ordination of women” This notion would strip maleness from Christ in a reduction to mere humanness, in order to establish that females can also be “icons” of Christ in an identical way as men and, therefore, they should be capable of receiving ordination. This would mean that, as Miller explains, human sexuality would have no sacramental meaning. That flies in the face of not only the creation of man as male and female but also every covenant God instigated and how Christ relates to the Church confirmed through all of Sacred Scripture and the continuous teaching of the Church.
Finally, Miller says that, yes, there could be an installed ministry of women as “deaconesses” (some might call them “nuns”) but not an ordained ministry.
The only place where Miller puts her foot wrong, in my opinion, is when at the end she states that woman already have “all sorts of ministries” and can even head up “certain Vatican departments”. Firstly, the opening up of the installed Novus Ordo lector and acolyte roles to women was a serious mistake. If we admit the nuptial aspect of the Church’s liturgical life, then the sanctuary is properly the realm of the male ordained and those who substitute for them. They should also be male: obviously. Next, because the role of Prefect of a Roman Curial dicastery is precisely to exercise the jurisdiction of the Roman Pontiff in a particular sphere of the Church’s life, that Prefect must also be in Holy Orders. A lay person can’t do that. While it makes a lot of sense to have capable women serving in the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life (aka Religious) because of the large number of institutes for women, nevertheless when it comes to jurisdiction the top spot must be filled by someone in Holy Orders.
Bottom line: Female ordained diaconate was, always has been, is now, and forever shall be… impossible.
Loading ...
Good points. One question: why do we need so many titular archbishops and bishops in Rome? OK a Cardinal could (and should) be prefect of a major Roman discastery, in orders. Prior to Vatican II, the Cardinals were not ordained bishops but were priests. OK I can see auxiliary bishops for the Diocese of Rome but I cannot understand the large number of bishops floating around Rome.
She explains the nuptial relationship of the ordained (masculine) to the Church (feminine).
This is also precisely why only women can be Consecrated Virgins, which, when understood correctly, is complementary to the priesthood. It’s also the highest calling a woman can receive in the Church.
Consecrated … NOT ordained !!
Can’t remember where I first heard this, but when defending the priesthood I like to say something to the effect of: “Christ had his Mother, the greatest of all creatures and perfectly obedient Mother of God who could’ve been an apostle, or the devout St. Mary Magdalene, yet he only chose men to be apostles.”
If women can fulfill the same roles as men why did God even bother to create two sexes?
Obviously, these folks clamoring for this stuff think God messed up.
So, is it an established historical fact that in the Roman Catholic Church there have never been ordained female deacons? That, whilst there may have been some women described as “deaconesses”, they did not receive the sacrament of Holy Orders and did not perform the liturgical roles assigned to deacons?
If so, I wonder why the Church doesn’t simply make a definitive statement that no-one of the female sex can receive any degree of Holy Orders, thus settling the question once and for all time.
@Simon_GNR
I think they do not, because most of those in charge don’t have a clear perception of Holy Orders. It doesn’t help that the Minor Orders, and the Major order of sub-deacon, have all been “suppressed” by being collapsed into the diaconal ordination. (If anyone says that besides the priesthood there are not in the Catholic Church other orders, both major and minor, by which, as by certain steps, advance is made to the priesthood, let him be anathema. Can. 2)
More Trent:
“But since the ministry of so holy a priesthood is something divine, that it might be exercised in a more worthy manner and with greater veneration, it was consistent that in the most well-ordered arrangement of the Church there should be several distinct orders of ministers, who by virtue of their office should minister to the priesthood, so distributed that those already having the clerical tonsure should ascend through the minor to the major orders. For the Sacred Scriptures mention unmistakably not only the priests but also the deacons, and teach in the most definite words what is especially to be observed in their ordination; and from the very beginning of the Church the names of the following orders and the duties proper to each one are known to have been in use, namely, those of the subdeacon, acolyte, exorcist, rector and porter, though these were not of equal rank; for the subdiaconate is classed among the major orders by the Fathers and holy councils, in which we also read very often of other inferior orders.”
All that talk about returning to the “early Church” in the past century was, of course, nonsense. If we had done so we would be in alignment with the Tridentime understanding.
Good points. One question: why do we need so many titular archbishops and bishops in Rome? OK a Cardinal could (and should) be prefect of a major Roman discastery, in orders. Prior to Vatican II, the Cardinals were not ordained bishops but were priests.
As I understand it, while there were cardinals who were not bishops, there were also many cardinals who were active bishops of dioceses. Pius IX was bishop of Spoleto. Leo XII was bishop of Perugia. Pius X was archbishop of Venice. etc.
Cardinals are by office designed to facilitate the Pope’s governance of the Church, and some of that governance requires the application of the fulsome use the Church’s governmental authority, which bishops have as successors of the apostles. So the heads of dicasteries (congregations) need to be bishops.