A shameful thing happened at the national Assembly of Women
Religious (NAWR) of 1971. One religious sister and two laywomen put on a show.
They read the prayers of the Mass that are reserved to the priest up until the
Consecration. This demonstration was intended to highlight the “injustice” of
excluding women from the priesthood. Instead, it exposed the impious radicalism
of certain elements lobbying for the ordination of women. One of the organizers
of NAWR was quoted by Commonweal magazine as saying, "I hope
you are all as disturbed by this as I am." Indeed we are, but not for the
same reasons.
This is just one
example among many of the abuses perpetrated by radical feminists in their
quest for the priesthood. The ordination of women has long been the fervent hope
of dissident elements of the Church. Given false hope by the reforms of Vatican
II, the feminists "re-open" the question of the ordination of women
every few years. I say "re-open" somewhat patronizingly because
Scripture, Tradition, and the Magisterium have all consistently and
definitively closed this question.
Women cannot be
ordained for one simple reason: the priesthood was instituted by Christ and the
Church has no power to change its fundamental nature. Sacred Scripture
makes it clear that God established the priesthood. In the Old Testament,
Abraham was blessed by "Melchisedech, the king of Salem, bringing forth
bread and wine, for he was the priest of the most high God" (Genesis
14:18). Melchisedech prefigures the priesthood instituted by Christ; that is
why the Psalmist says, "Thou art a priest forever according to the order
of Melchisedech" (Psalm 109:4).
Jesus fulfilled
the Old Testament priesthood at the Last Supper when He established the
sacrament of holy orders. Though both men and women followed Jesus, He
specifically chose twelve men as his Apostles. Though some of His closest
disciples were women -- besides St. John, only women stood at the foot of the
Cross -- Christ only ordained the Twelve.
This was utterly
intentional. Christ did not chose men as His priests simply to conform to the
limitations of His time. Any argument to that effect insinuates that God's will
can be limited by human culture. If Christ had willed it, He would have
ordained women. The fact that He did not is ample justification for the
constant practice of the Church. Indeed, the ordination of men alone is a
Tradition that has never varied. The early Church did employ deaconesses, but
even then, there was never a doubt as to the impossibility of their ordination.
St. Thomas Aquinas
treated the issue of women and the priesthood by distinguishing between the
lawfulness and validity of a sacrament. Lawfulness describes whether it was right to administer the
sacrament while validity describes whether it was possible for the sacrament
to be administered. Stealing an example from Matt Fradd, to baptize an infant
whose life is not in danger without the permission of the child's parents would
be unlawful. While it was wrong to
do so, the baptism was nevertheless valid and therefore took effect. It would,
on the other hand, be invalid to try to baptize an animal. Because the creature
lacks an immortal soul, a fundamental necessity for baptism, it is impossible
for the sacrament to occur in the first place.
St. Thomas Aquinas
says that it would be invalid for a woman to receive the sacrament of holy
orders:
"Wherefore
even though a woman were made the object of all that is done in conferring
Orders, she would not receive Orders, for since a Sacrament is a sign, not only
of the thing, but the signification of the thing, it is required in all
sacramental actions.... Accordingly, since it is not possible in the female sex
to signify eminence of degree, for a woman is in the state of subjection, it
follows that she cannot receive the sacrament of Orders" (Supplement to the Summa, Q.39, A.1).
In other words,
women cannot be priests because they lack "eminence of degree," being
in "a state of subjection."
Now drop the
torches and pitchforks, and give St. Thomas a chance to explain what he means
by "subjection." In the first part of the Summa he writes:
"Subjection
is twofold. One is servile, by virtue of which a superior makes use of a
subject for his own benefit.... There is another kind of subjection which is
called economic or civil whereby the superior makes use of his subjects for
their own benefit and good.... So by such a kind of subjection woman is
naturally subject to man" (Summa I, Q.92, A.1).
The "eminence
of degree" Aquinas attributes to men is not the result of medieval
misogyny. Though our culture seems to have forgotten it, there is a difference
between men and women. Part of that difference is man's preeminent
position.
"Superior"
refers to position. For example, an elected official is superior to and
exercises subjection over their constituents. But no one would say that the
official is fundamentally better than anyone who voted for them.
St. Lois de
Montfort writes, "Jesus Christ gave more glory to God, His Father, by His
thirty years' submission to His Mother than He would have done in converting
the whole world by working the greatest miracles." No one would dare say
that by subjecting Himself to the Blessed Virgin, Christ is indicating that she
is fundamentally better than Him. Instead, God-Made-Flesh is obedient to Mary
because she is His Mother.
Thomas is saying
that men and women are designed to play different roles, not that one sex is
"better" than the other. This is no more oppressive than a father's
position as head of the household. In the same way, men alone are called to be
spiritual fathers through the priesthood.
Unfortunately,
dissidents all too easily brush off St. Thomas' arguments as the product of his
time rather than looking at their validity. It is much harder to dismiss Pope
Paul VI's letter to the Anglicans and St. John Paul the Great's Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. When
the Anglican church began ordaining women, Pope Paul VI responded by writing:
"[The Church] holds that it is not
admissible to ordain women to the priesthood for very fundamental reasons.
These reasons include: the example recorded in the Sacred Scriptures of Christ
choosing his Apostles only from among men; the constant practice of the Church,
which has imitated Christ in choosing only men; and her living teaching
authority which has consistently held that the exclusion of women from the priesthood
is in accordance with God’s plan for his Church.”
If that is not enough for you, St. John Paul the Great was even
more firm:
“Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be
removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the
Church’s divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the
brethren (cf. Lk 22:32) I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever
to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be
definitely held by all the Church’s faithful.”
Case closed.
In order to be a Catholic lobbying for the ordination of women,
you must: deny some pretty strong Scriptural arguments; refute St. Thomas
Aquinas, one of the greatest theologians in history; and find a way to explain
how St. John Paul the great, when speaking ex
cathedra, really didn’t mean what he said.
We cannot, however, in defending the restriction of the sacrament
of Orders to men, neglect the instrumental role that women play in the Church.
Even though they cannot become priests, there is indisputably a place for women
in the Church. In the same apostolic letter quoted above, St. John Paul the
Great writes, “The presence and the role of women in the life and mission of
the Church, although not linked to the ministerial priesthood, remains
absolutely necessary and irreplaceable.”
Without being priests, women make invaluable contributions to the
Church. Lay women are lectors, Eucharistic ministers, CCD teachers, professionals
who take Christ’s light into the workplace, and mothers who raise their
children in the faith. Religious sisters sustain the Church with their prayers,
serve the poor, teach in Catholic schools, and perform countless works of faith
and love.
Of course, we cannot forget Mary, Mother of God. How could we? Her
powerful intercessions preserve us from harm, her spiritual motherhood of all
Christians brings us closer to her Son. Anyone who says that the Church is anti-woman
is quite frankly self-deluded. The single most revered saint in history is the
Blessed Virgin. In St. Gabriel’s address, “Hail full of grace,” we see that God
has elevated her above the angels. My single greatest assurance that God does
not intend for women to be priests is the fact that He did not make Mary a
priest. If the priesthood signifies “eminence of degree” as St. Thomas Aquinas
writes, and if it were at all possible for a woman to be a priest, would not
Jesus Christ have ordained His Mother? Would not she who is honored by angels merit
the priesthood if it were open to her sex?
Proponents of the ordination of women pretend that women feel
alienated from the Church because they are excluded from the priesthood. This
is demeaning to centuries of women who have courageously, humbly, piously, and
selflessly served the Church. Women do not require admission to the priesthood
to contribute to the life of the Church.
Deus Vult!
