Isn't it time to ordain women to the diaconate?

 

Image credit: National Catholic Reporter

Franciscan Fr. Daniel P. Horan is the director of the Center for the Study of Spirituality, and professor of philosophy, religious studies and theology at Saint Mary's College in Notre Dame, Indiana. Under the headline, "Enough already. It is time to ordain women to the diaconate" he writes in National Catholic Reporter:

At the risk of stating the obvious, it is clear that the Roman Catholic Church (or at least many of those entrusted with the highest levels of leadership) has a serious problem with women. Pope Francis has made great strides in some aspects of extending invitations for greater involvement by and representation of women in some aspects of church leadership, including the appointment of several women to significant posts in Vatican dicasteries and expanding voting rights at the synod to all participants, which includes lay and religious women. 

But the way the pope often speaks about women in abstract ways doesn't sound much different from Pope John Paul II's "separate but equal" complementarianism, which argued for keeping women in "traditional" familial and ecclesial roles and praising their "genius." A decade ago, journalist David Gibson compiled a list of seven examples of Francis talking about women in what the kids might call "cringy" ways. And these came just from the first year of his pontificate.

You can read the full article in National Catholic Reporter here.

Personal Reflection on Women's Issues, Synodality and Clericalism

The Cappa Magna

It is my considered opinion that a denied misogyny, thinly camouflaged by exaggeratedly lauding great female saints such as Teresa of Avila and Mother Teresa, while stressing the traditional roles of women and showing orthodoxy by promoting traditional pious practices, is at the root of not only the lack of progress with the ordination of women to the priesthood but also with a reluctance to discuss women deacons and the insistence upon celibacy for priests. In my opinion, the beast that cultivates, and is animated and fed by that misogyny, and that devours all discussion on women's issues at a synodal level, is clericalism. 

Clericalism as about clerics defending their position and lording it over everyone else below them in the hierarchy, verbally and symbolically.

I realize that I sound like a conspiracy theorist. Nevertheless, I am convinced that until we make clericalism unfashionable among a critical mass of clergy influencers and Catholics in general, I fear we will not make any meaningful progress in the synodal discussion on women's ordination or married priests. My point is that while I believe that we have to fight on all fronts that are occasions for ecclesial misogyny, our critical fight has to be with clericalism which is the ritualized bastion of ecclesial misogyny. We have to identify it and expose it. But how?

Simply being angry and casting stones will not be effective. I think that one of the foundations supporting clericalism is the beaten, defeated and compliant world view of the average lay man and woman Catholic who accepts and supports the presumption of clericalism. Those who are not beaten down, defeated and compliant have mostly left the Church - beaten, but now indifferent.

I leave you with two Scriptural quotes.

But everything exposed by the light becomes visible — and everything that is illuminated becomes a light. This is why it is said: “Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” Eph. 5:13-14

And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another... Heb. 10:24-25

What is clericalism? This is clericalism.

 

Image: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/rheal-forest-residential-schools-1.6121886

Winnipeg Catholic priest accuses residential school survivors of lying about abuse for money

Why did I not read anywhere about the congregation walking out during this 'sermon'. Silence will be construed as assent. When are lay Catholics going to take a stand against clericalism? I hear many Catholics today objecting to being tarred with the brush of what happened 'historically', but silence in the face of 'sermons' like this makes us complicit.

So, what makes this clericalism?

I see this as a classic case:
1) a member of the clerical hierarchy is defending the clerical institution;
2) doing so from a position of institutional authority, namely the pulpit, during the Sunday liturgy over which he presides;
3) he exonerates the priests and nuns;
4) he blames the lay workers;
5) he trivializes any abuse as to be expected in "any institution";
6) he shows not one drop of empathy for victims;
7) he accuses victims of lying to get more money;
8) he angrily accuses "the media" of propagating "fake news";
9) according to the CBC article, the only other outrage he expresses is toward vandals who paint graffiti on a church building.

Any single one of these constitutes clericalism. To get so many in one event is quite an achievement.

In disavowing and apologizing for the priest's statements, the Archdiocesan spokesperson said, "We very much regret the pain they may have caused to many people..." MAY have caused? How polite! Why not, "they obviously MUST have caused...?"

The first and immediate response from the archdiocese was damage control: a polite apology, and preventing this priest from making any further public statements. And that is how it will be perceived and what will be remembered: damage control for the sake of the institutional church.

What about the victims? A subsequent statement from the Archbishop did acknowledge the victims, but by then the damage had been done and the clericalism exposed.

How many steps forward and how many steps backward?

The scandalous minutiae of clericalism

 

The other day, the first reading for mass of the day was the giving of the "Ten" Commandments from Exodus. I was reminded of a day-dreaming moment in class in grade 9 (who knows what subject?) when I wondered why God decided upon THOSE ten commandments. Testosterone driven, I considered how much more fun and how much less guilt I would have if certain commandments simply weren't there. In my understanding, the Ten Commandments were arbitrarily decided upon by an all powerful God. And then there was the Church: the priest and catechism teachers who put an even stricter interpretation on an already restrictive set of "Thou shalt not's".

It was not until adult years that I came to appreciate the beauty and desirability of the Ten Commandments in terms of love, happiness and the Two Great Commandments phrased by Jesus. But the more I have grown in that appreciation, the more I have been confounded and frustrated by certain people in the Catholic Church (clerics and laity) who appear preoccupied with the minutiae of "churchy" stuff that sometimes appears to run counter to Christ's Law of Love. I think of issues such as the "correct" way of celebrating the sacraments, Latin or vernacular language, the role of women in the Church, the place of LGBTQ+ Christians, Pro-Life versus pro-life issues. Then there are the scandals that have been met with defensiveness instead of humble acknowledgement and repentance: the scandal of child sexual abuse over a century or more by priests and other Church representatives and, more recently, the freshly resurrected scandal of the Catholic Church's role with Indian Residential Schools.

From boyhood through to adulthood I was taught to defer to the priests in everything concerning doctrine, faith and spiritual practice because the priests knew best , having spent 7 years or more studying theology. Prior to Vatican II lay people were discouraged from reading the Bible because "only the priest knew" the correct way to interpret the Sacred Scriptures. These are the hallmarks of clericalism - defined as "an expectation, leading to abuses of power, that ordained ministers are better than and should be over everyone else among the People of God." 

In the past, bishops saw avoiding scandal as taking priority over protecting victims of abuse by priests. This was blatant clericalism and ultimately resulted in even greater scandal. Clericalism still happens today, in my opinion, when Catholics, lay or clergy, become defensive over the role of the Church in the Residential School scandal, when we hasten to point out that other denominations also ran residential schools, that it was a government program, that not all the graves are those of children, that most of the children likely died of disease such as tuberculosis, that "the pope has already apologised." Clericalism is defensive and ultimately arrogant and self-serving. Its defeat has to include humble acknowledgement, repentance and restitution.

Fortunately the Holy Spirit is God's self-giving gift to the whole Church - not just the clergy. Fortunately, also, we have a pope who is calling everyone, clergy and laity, to take a stand against clericalism.