Word: priesthoods
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...admission of homosexuals to the armed forces, euthanasia and that hardy perennial, abortion. Another is that of the ordainment of women in the Catholic Church. In the ardently debated Pastoral Letter on Women's Role in the Church, while liturgical inculturation was encouraged, women were still barred from the priesthood. Can women be expected to be content in an organization which does not allow them full participation...
Exclusion from the priesthood may seem humiliating, a source of suffering to women who feel a calling. But Catholic theology exalts humility as a virtue and teaches that men and women can find redemption through suffering. Bernadette Counihan, a Franciscan nun in Iowa, believes that Christian truth is at stake. "Jesus never said if you want to be my disciple, go out and fulfill yourself. He said take up your cross, deny yourself and follow me." Feminists may nod knowingly, sensing paternalism, or propose that ennobling pain could also be produced by leaving cherished tradition. "Very often, what...
...alienated women. Some 75,000 women offered written and oral testimony, and the first draft in 1988 was filled with accounts of their distress. That version urged rapid study of the idea of allowing women to be deacons, who perform many ministerial functions, and more leisurely consideration of priesthood...
...local women's commissions, which they see as permanent nests for feminist activism. Liberals are far more infuriated, because the bishops' writing panel backed off on allowing female deacons, much less priests; dropped the assertion that inability to relate well to women should bar a man from the priesthood; and even shelved the declaration that sexism...
...also essential for the church's well-being. Last week Anglicanism's world leader made just that argument. "We are in danger of not being heard," declared Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey, "if women are exercising leadership in every area of our society's life save the ordained priesthood...