The People Speak Out

Local voices connecting globally

This is important: to get to know people, listen, expand the circle of ideas. The world is crisscrossed by roads that come closer together and move apart, but the important thing is that they lead towards the Good.  (Pope Francis)

Canon Law 212 calls upon the laity to speak up:

2 - The Christian faithful are free to make known to the pastors of the Church their needs, especially spiritual ones, and their desires.

§3. - According to the knowledge, competence, and prestige which they possess, they have the right and even at times the duty to manifest to the sacred pastors their opinion on matters which pertain to the good of the Church and to make their opinion known to the rest of the Christian faithful, without prejudice to the integrity of faith and morals, with reverence toward their pastors, and attentive to common advantage and the dignity of persons.

Women in the Church articles

Down the ages men have been perceived to be the sole recipients and transmitters of divine messages. Women on the other hand, have been socialized by patriarchal religious structures and practices to passively accept religious teachings as interpreted by men.

These androcentric and patriarchal interpretations have defined and shaped the social and cultural contexts of women resulting in their disempowerment and second class status.  

The key of women’s involvement with religion is hidden in women’s bodies. Women in fundamental ways are locked in their bodies, and their exercise of power is at the pleasure of men, whether in the family or in the religious sphere. Thus, religion is not just about spirituality, beliefs and practices alone, but it is also political. These political practices however, belong to structures of the mind that are not inviolable. They can be broken by recovering the spiritual and humane. It is on this recovery that women’s survival and unfolding as humans hangs. (Extract from Statement of National Consultation, Hyderabad, 2016)

What is your experience of the Roman Catholic Church’s treatment of women?

MEDIA RELEASE:

29th November 2018

Voices of Faith convened an historic event entitled “Overcoming Silence – Women’s Voices in the Abuse Crisis” in Rome on 27th November, 2018 featuring diverse voices of women experts, some of whom have personal experience of clerical abuse in the Catholic Church. Three key recommendations for the February meeting of Presidents of Bishops' Conferences were formulated as a result of the event.

Read more: Catholic Women Speak up about Sexual Abuse and Call for Change

Indian Christian Women’s Movement 1st National Convention ‘Women Take Wing’

PRESS RELEASE 13th August, 2018

About 100 women including nuns and ordained women from churches all over India strongly condemned the weak institutional response of the church to gender violence faced by women in the Church.

The women were attending the first National Convention of the Indian Christian Women’s Movement (ICWM) at Jnanadeepa Vidyapeeth, Pune, on the theme ‘Women take Wing’.

In her keynote address, Prof. Vibhuti Patel, Advanced Center for Women’s Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, traced the history of Indian women’s movement and the importance and relevance of ICWM in this larger context.

The delegates, cutting across age, region and Christian denomination expssed dissatisfaction at the lack of voice, role and decision making for women in Church structures, and declared their determination to struggle for justice equality, dignity and rights for women, children, Dalits, Tribals, Transgender people and LGBQIA.

They resolved to work together to enhance women’s participation, representation, decision making in the Church and related structures.

In the new normal of sexual violence and polarization in the country, and the abuse of women’s and children’s bodies to settle political and communal scores, the ICWM resolved to partner and work in solidarity with civil society groups and movements in the ongoing battle for justice for survivors and their families.

Noella D’Souza
Convenor, ICWM

Virginia Saldanha
Secretary, ICWM

 

Recent statements by Pope Francis and top Vatican officials support the need to bring more lay women to top leadership positions at the Roman Curia. However, Voices of Faith is concerned about the apparent difficulties and lack of transparency in regard to how those women are chosen and the process undertaken to appoint them. In an extensively quoted interview with Reuters on June 17th 2018, Pope Francis is reported saying, “I don't have any problem naming a woman as the head of a dicastery." At the same time, he talks about difficulties in finding the right candidates and convincing curial officials to accept women for leadership positions. The Prefect of the Dicastery of Laity, Family and Life, Cardinal Kevin Farrell, stated that the Vatican is "overloaded with clerics" and that "administrative functions within the church can be done by anybody" including laity.

Read more: Transparent policies and accountability needed if the Vatican is serious about bringing more women...

by Clyde Christofferson

This Crux article confirms what NCR reported yesterday: the new CDF head ‐‐ who is soon to be given a red hat, and who is head of the papal commission to study the question of women deacons ‐‐ will state that JPII's 1994 teaching against ordination of women is "definitive". He said, "To hold that it is not definitive, it is argued that it was not defined ex cathedra and that, then, a later decision by a future Pope or council could overturn it ... Sowing these doubts creates serious confusion among the faithful, not only about the Sacrament of Orders as part of the divine constitution of the Church, but also about the ability of the ordinary magisterium to teach Catholic doctrine in an infallible way."

This is an embarrassment to the People of God. On the one hand, it is clear as a bell that this treatment of women by the institutional Church is not "part of the deposit of faith". As Vatican II asserted in Dei Verbum , the deposit of faith is defined by God's self‐revelation in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is a significant shift from the pre‐Vatican II habit of equating revelation with a series of propositional statements, some drawn from scripture and some drawn from tradition. The question is not "what does a long accepted propositional statement say about an all male priesthood?" To take that answer at face value is to risk (if not outright commit) idolatry.

The better question is "what does God's self‐revelation in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit say about calls to priestly ministry?" This requires the same kind of discernment that Francis describes in Amoris Laetitia. It is plain that the Spirit continues to call people to priestly ministry without regard to gender. When Paul VI in 1975 rejected the offer of the Archbishop of Canterbury to join the Anglicans in considering the issue of women's ordination, an opportunity was missed. The Church was on doctrinal autopilot set in place before Vatican II. It's a very human mistake. The Church has dug itself a deeper hole.

However, we should not expect a change in this mistaken Vatican position, for the simple reason that the necessary predicates have not yet been laid. But they are being laid, even as we speak. It is clear that the sensus fidei is in the process of reexamining this misbegotten doctrine, and withdrawing its reception. The limited purpose of such doctrinal statements is to direct our gaze (a word Francis like to use) to Christ, who by the power of the Holy Spirit is the fullness of God's self‐revelation. That limited purpose is no longer being served by this doctrine, which is misbegotten on its face whatever its historical pedigree. Even its historical pedigree is cast in doubt by the brazen 11th and 12th century attempts to suppress the evidence that the sensus fidelium was coming to a different conclusion.

In any event the injustice remains and is only going to become more widespread. The Spirit is having little patience with this unrepentent and intemperate doctrine. In such circumstances two things need to happen. First, the injustice must be called out. People must speak from their own hearts. There will be those who defer to the magisterium, but that deference has a long history and is part of the messiness of life. Second, we must work toward recovering the foundations for a "sense of the faithful" that was so rudely stifled at the time of the Gregorian reforms. This is more than calling out injustice. We need to enable and promote an examination of conscience by the institutional Church on this matter. And this will be futile unless we also find a way of conceptualizing Church history so that such an injustice can be admitted without compromising the integrity of the institution.

Vatican II has already enabled an examination of conscience by conceeding ‐‐ quite properly ‐‐ that the institutional Church's own mistakes have contributed to strained relations with other religions, the "separated brethren" in particular. More importantly, Dei Verbum refocuses God's self‐revelation on Jesus Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, effectively repurposing doctrine, even "definitive" doctrine, so as to direct our gaze to Christ. This redirection opens up the possibility that "loving one another" will be seen to take precedence over this gender based rule, leading eventually to a better understanding of Christ's Spirit at work and to a doctrinal formulation that better directs our gaze to God's self‐revelation. Ironically, the current doctrinal formulation on this issue is causing consternation as well as injustice.

What remains is work toward a "sense of the faithful" on this issue. Historically, the people have been passive. Many are in the habit of relying upon the "definitive" pronouncements of the magisterium, which prior to Vatican II systematically cultivated such reliance. But there are indications that the people may be developing participatory structures and practices on their own, structures and practices that may overcome the traditional deficits of unruly democratic processes. The key is precisely the same remedy that Vatican II applied to revelation in Dei Verbum : a shift in focus toward Christ, toward discernment of Christ's Spirit in the human heart. This discernment is a skill that has been neglected. What is needed are structures and practices that support and foster the learning of this skill.

The Spirit is alive and well, so discernment is evident widely in communities across the globe where people are gathered in prayer, and for reform of the Church. And one reform minded group of people, in particular, is currently planning a program that will send participants back to their home communities to use a "listening circle" technique to support this discernment process for people who are struggling with the kind of tension that arises when doctrines of long standing become so self referential that they are less and less able to illuminate what God is revealing in Christ by the power of the Spirit. It is hoped that this lay led initiative, planned for October 12‐14, 2018, in Dallas, Texas, USA, will spawn a series of local "listening circles" that can give structure and discern direction for a "sense of the faithful" on matters currently in tension. The structures and practices being set up can be applied to such matters generally, including the call of women to priestly ministry.

In L’Osservatore Romano on 29 May 2018, Cardinal-designate Luis Ladaria, Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, wrote an article in which he said,

Christ wanted to give this sacrament to the twelve apostles, all men, who, in turn, communicated it to other men. The Church has always recognized herself bound by this decision of the Lord, which excludes that the ministerial priesthood can be validly conferred on women. ... All (Episcopal Conferences), without exception, have declared, with full conviction, for the obedience of the Church to the Lord, that she does not possess the faculty of conferring priestly ordination on women. 

Clyde Christofferson responded on CCRI's Face Book Group saying:

 This is an embarrassment to the People of God. On the one hand, it is clear as a bell that this treatment of women by the institutional Church is not "part of the deposit of faith". As Vatican II asserted in Dei Verbum, the deposit of faith is defined by God's self‐revelation in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is a significant shift from the pre‐Vatican II habit of
equating revelation with a series of propositional statements, some drawn from scripture and some drawn from tradition. The question is not "what does a long accepted propositional statement say about an all male priesthood?" To take that answer at face value is to risk (if not outright commit) idolatry.

The better question is "what does God's self‐revelation in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit say about calls to priestly ministry?" This requires the same kind of discernment that Francis describes in Amoris Laetitia. It is plain that the Spirit continues to call people to priestly ministry without regard to gender. When Paul VI in 1975 rejected the offer of the Archbishop of Canterbury to join the Anglicans in considering the issue of women's ordination, an opportunity was missed. The Church was on doctrinal autopilot set in place before Vatican II. It's a very human mistake. The Church has dug itself a deeper hole.

Clyde recommended two actions:

  1. The injustice must be called out. People must speak from their own hearts. There will be those who defer to the magisterium, but that deference has a long history and is part of the messiness of life.

  2. We must work toward recovering the foundations for a "sense of the faithful" that was so rudely stifled at the time of the Gregorian reforms. This is more than calling out injustice. We need to enable and promote an examination of conscience by the institutional Church on this matter. And this will be futile unless we also find a way of conceptualizing Church history so that such an injustice can be admitted without compromising the integrity of the institution.

Organisations around the world have joined in:

Women's Ordination Worldwide

We Are Church International

We Are Church Ireland

Women's Ordination Conference

 

Pray Tell Blog

Iglesia Descalza