Posted on 07/18/2010 6:50:22 AM PDT by Publius804
In an interview published July 15, Bishop Brian Farrell, secretary of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, called the prospect of the appointment of women bishops in the Church of England an “enormous obstacle” to Christian unity.
“All the Churches of the first millennium, Catholic, Eastern and Orthodox, state that only men can be ordained,” he said. “These Churches see the ordination of women as an illegitimate abandonment of authentic Tradition.”
“It saddens us that on this point the Anglican Communion has left what we consider the essential Tradition of the Church since its beginning,” he continued. “But the process began a long time ago.”
“We will continue the ecumenical dialogue with a realism that accepts things as they are and is aware that the road ahead is long and arduous. Knowing, however, that dialogue is a task imposed by Christ himself and sustained by the grace of the Holy Spirit, soul of the Church of Christ.”
Bishop Farrell emphasized even apart from the provisions of Anglicanorum Coetibus-- the 2009 document that paved the way for Anglican communities to be received into the Catholic Church-- individual Anglicans may be received into the Church in local parishes at any time they wish.
Considering the darkness creeping into the various churches, woman clergy is the LEAST of our troubles.
Bull. Our Lord never instructed us to 'dialogue' with anyone. Talk for the sake of talk is ridiculous. The Anglican Church has become a farce and it would be better to walk away and shake the dust from your sandals. A female clergy and episcopacy is NOT an obstacle. It's a deal killer and it's just plain stupid to continue any 'dialogue'.
Unfortunately most of the women clergy are not Joyce Meier types but often liberals in sheeples clothing.
Mother Theresa would have told you that she couldn’t be a priest. Maybe you should just go with that.
Joyce Meier strikes me as a liberal - just less liberal than some others.
Maybe I’m not the sort of person who accepts an irrational answer, sorry to hear you are.
You wrote:
“Maybe I’m not the sort of person who accepts an irrational answer, sorry to hear you are.”
The teaching is not irrational - it’s from Christ’s own example. The Church has no authority or ability to ordain women. That isn’t irrational either. The Church has never done it, can’t do it and doesn’t want to try it. None of that is irrational either.
You suggest Mother Theresa - because of her sanctity I assume - was ready for the priesthood, but she herself would have denied that her sanctity changed the reality of the Church’s inability to ordain her as a priest. And that you call irrational? So, you bring her up as an example but don’t accept the views of that actual person? I’m not the one being irrational and neither was Mother Theresa. That leaves you (and Charles Manson). How fitting.
I disagree. Every denomination that has allowed women clergy has sank into the "creeping darkness" of apostasy. It is one of the first steps to total disintegration of the church.
That is why I’m not in favor of wholesale ‘appointment’ of women as bishops or any other position of authority in the church. I believe that God Himself will put women who are true to Him and His purpose where He wants them. He did in the Bible, at times when women were the lowest class. Women like Esther, Deborah, the prophetess, Abigail, Mary, were women seeking God.
Women of today seeking to be acknowledge or raised to positions of authority by earthly means are not necessarily seeking God. I don’t need a title to be of service to Him. And a woman serving Him has that relationship as her satisfaction so she has no need to seek earthly recognition.
I’ve always wondered why Charlie Manson would be a fundamentally more qualified candidate for the clergy than Mother Theresa would have been.
It’s the penis.
My own personal observation is that feminized men are doing most of the really destructive things in churches. Is the presence of women in authoritative position leading to the feminization of men? Not alone. I think the whole culture is driving this and female clergy is just a symptom.
Not culture but Satan. And female clergy are clearly on of his devices.
Considering the darkness creeping into the various churches, woman clergy is the LEAST of our troubles.*ALL* that is "creeping" is dangerous ...
Have you read the reason why woman can not be ordained? I bet you haven’t so why do you assume it is irrational? And you must understand that the ordained priesthood in the Orthodox and Catholic churches is way different from the ordained ministry of Protestant churches. The Protestant churches do not claim or hold to the teaching of an ordained priesthood with the priest being alter Christi. They do not have a sacramental theology.
The Catholic and Orthodox do. So don’t try to see Catholic/Orthodox teaching and beliefs through Protestant glasses. It does not work.
I wish I had a link to an Eastern Orthodox defense of the all male priesthood. Since I bet any Catholic source would earn your automatic contempt. Perhaps an EO freeper would be so kind as to provide one.
The prohibition is more likely to be based on a priesthood made up largely of men who don't enjoy the company of women.
well, The Church basically follows Christ’s precedence. Christ did not have female apostles, even though the most religious and the most faithful followers of His were women. It’s strange for some that HE had no apostles, yet the first to see the empty tomb and the ones at the foot of the Cross were women. I see that as saying that women are holier than men in general and yet their role is different — equal but different from the men in the clergy.
Joyce Meyer belongs to the Word-of-faith group that believes in such strange things as multiple-gods, that we are god-lings, etc.
Manson would be a fundamentally more acceptable candidate for the priesthood under the accepted rules of the Catholic church. Mother Theresa's opinion of the matter does not affect the irony of the issue. How is a dispassionate review of the matter without the irrelevant red-herring of an opinion that does not address the question irrational?
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