Phoenix cathedral bans girl servers

… to promote vocations to the priesthood. Decision of rector, not bishop. Females can be sacristan and help set up before Mass, but not minister at the altar.

Rector claims that ministry at the altar is priestly, but I think he’s mistaken. Before Vatican II, ministry of servers (and choir, BTW, though it was largely ignored) was considered priestly and thus not open to females. Since Vatican II, such ministries are seen as lay, and in 1983 the Holy See decreed that females were permitted to be altar servers. It has since been clarified that no priest is required to allow female servers.

Story here.

Anthony Ruff, OSB

Fr. Anthony Ruff, OSB, is a monk of St. John's Abbey. He teaches liturgy, liturgical music, and Gregorian chant at St. John's University School of Theology-Seminary. He is widely published and frequently presents across the country on liturgy and music. He is the author of Sacred Music and Liturgical Reform: Treasures and Transformations, and of Responsorial Psalms for Weekday Mass: Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter. He does priestly ministry at the neighboring community of Benedictine sisters in St. Joseph.

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Comments

100 responses to “Phoenix cathedral bans girl servers”

  1. Bill deHaas

    Posted at NCR…..nothing like focusing on secondary and time limited historical circumstances rather than emphasizing the gospel call – all baptized; no differences between races, nations, genders; skipping over the call to ministry for all; cathedral as the seat and sign of the diocese, etc.

    Sorry, the weak denial that Olmsted was not involved – don’t buy it.

    And in this heightened sensitivity around marks of clericalism, etc. – if anything, a complete lack of common sense.

    Reply
    1. Dunstan Harding

      Right on Bill. Certainly not surprising coming from Phoenix, or any place in Arizona given the encouragement they and other ultra trads must feel they’re receiving from this pope and his CDW.

      Reply
  2. Carl R. Opat

    How very, very, sad. I would love to go to Phoenix and picket the Cathedral. Women are only good enough to clean up after priests. How Christian. What centuary are we in? If I recall at the last Papal Servers event in Rome, more than 60% of the servers present at the Vatican were girls and the Pope praised them and thanked them, and encouraged them for thier important ministry. But not good enough for Phoneix. Parents go out and protest with your feet, your mouths, and your money. Dont accept this. Peace, Carl

    Reply
    1. Samuel J. Howard

      If I recall at the last Papal Servers event in Rome, more than 60% of the servers present at the Vatican were girls and the Pope praised them and thanked them, and encouraged them for thier important ministry.

      And he’s also let stand legislation that leaves it up to local pastors to decide whether or not to have female altar servers.

      Reply
  3. Charles Culbreth

    +1, Bill.

    Reply
  4. Fr. Jim Blue

    (1) Cathedral rectors don’t make decisions like this without consulting with the bishop.
    (2) I thought the deck chairs looked lovely in their previous arrangement.

    Reply
  5. Mollie Wilson O'Reilly

    A nitpick: the 1983 revision of canon law permitted female altar servers, but the Vatican didn’t specifically clarify that that interpretation was correct until 1994.

    It’s always strange to see someone, especially someone considered “conservative,” assert that “serving at the altar is a specifically priestly act” when canon law specifically says otherwise. (I especially love the last line of the article. This guy says it was all a mistake, “based on his understanding of the rules”!) Is the argument for an all-male priesthood so weak that it can’t withstand more inclusive lay ministries? And what kind of men are we hoping to attract to the priesthood with arbitrary expansions of gender exclusivity in the liturgy?

    Reply
    1. Dunstan Harding

      And what kind of men are we hoping to attract to the priesthood with arbitrary expansions of gender exclusivity in the liturgy?
      ======================================
      Mollie, I think it goes to the very heart of the question: what is
      the caliber of the men being drawn to the priesthood today?

      Reply
  6. Karl Liam Saur

    Of course, what needs to be highlighted is the chimerical aspect of this: boys are fully admitted to this service already, so they are not gaining any opportunities by this, so it’s not really enhancing vocations prospects. Except perhaps if we are talking about boys who don’t want to do anything that girls do. And I am not sure I want such boys cultivated for ministerial service if that’s the switch from No to Yes for them. I don’t think I’d want to encourage boys into that calculus.

    Reply
    1. Samuel J. Howard

      Of course, what needs to be highlighted is the chimerical aspect of this: boys are fully admitted to this service already, so they are not gaining any opportunities by this,

      Depends on how many servers the parish has.

      Except perhaps if we are talking about boys who don’t want to do anything that girls do. And I am not sure I want such boys cultivated for ministerial service if that’s the switch from No to Yes for them.

      I think it’s fairly outrageous to condemn boys who likely aren’t even teenagers yet as not the sort you want cultivated for ministerial service.

      Reply
      1. Karl Liam Saur

        Note the important qualifier: if that’s the toggle switch for them. I don’t condemn them as persons. But I don’t approve of a system that relies on that being the toggle switch. Important difference.

      2. Mary Coogan

        I think it’s fairly outrageous to condemn boys who likely aren’t even teenagers yet as not the sort you want cultivated for ministerial service.– Samuel Howard. Isn’t it the Phoenix diocese’s “cultivation” of some hypothetical boys who might refuse to serve alongside girls that is in question? However inhibited a boy might be about doing the same work as girls, we ought not to indulge him but rather instruct him and perhaps wait until he has matured a little before encouraging him to serve. I do not hesitate to condemn catering to any male preference to have females removed from service at the altar. In this case, the outrage rightly belongs to the girls and women.

      3. Gerard Flynn

        The only outrage in this sorry saga is the action of the rector. Most interesting that it happens in a diocese with an arch-conservative bishop. I’d recommend that both clerics read the Gospel according to Luke for their summer holiday reading to see the role that women play there.

        Utterly disgusting and shocking what they are at.

  7. Henry Edwards

    In an “all boys” sacristy–from which three boys have gone to the seminary in the last couple of years and others have active plans–I’ve often heard “when we’re priests” chatter among the altar boys. I doubt that his particular kind of vocation-reinforcing camaraderie is typical of “integrated sacristies”.

    Reply
    1. Jeff Rice

      You would be incorrect. In our “integrated sacristy” we have “reinforcing camaraderie” between girls and boys. Many of our best servers are females, and I’ve noticed that they are more likely to take an interest and be mentors to the beginners. They have specifically encouraged some of our beginners who are boys to become much better, and realize more clearly what it means to serve at the altar. I could see some of the boys eventually becoming priests.

      Reply
      1. Henry Edwards

        Jeff, I said vocation-reinforcing camaraderie. In male-only sacristies one often hears comfortable low-key “guy talk” about priestly vocations, both among the boys and with priests (who in my observation tend to steer clear of such things when girls are present). So I really doubt that I’m “incorrect” in assuming that this particular type of camaraderie is not typical of mixed sacristies.

    2. Frank Agnoli

      So we cannot support one another in our respective vocations? So only boys can support boys considering the priesthood? What of the post below re: girls considering church ministry as future vocations? What of the fact that any future minister – lay or ordained, man or woman – better know how to interact appropraitely with members of the same as well as the other sex…? The last thing the church needs is a “good ‘ol boys club” … we have seen where that leads…. If one’s vocation to the priesthood is “threatened” by girl altar servers in the sacristy then allow me to opine that there does not seem to be much of a call there… at least not one that is based on real life in the church… where more than half of those active in ecclesial ministry are women….

      Reply
  8. Samuel J. Howard

    Before Vatican II, ministry of servers (and choir, BTW, though it was largely ignored) was considered priestly and thus not open to females.

    The situation is rather more complicated than that.

    De Musica Sacra
    100. Wherever such a choir [of men and boys] cannot be organized, a choir of the faithful, either mixed or consisting only of women or girls, can be permitted. But such a choir should take its place outside the sanctuary or Communion rail. The men should be separated from the women or girls so that anything unbecoming may be avoided. Local Ordinaries are to issue precise regulations about these matters, and pastors are to see to their enforcement (Decr. Auth. SCR 3964, 4210, 4231, and the encyclical Musicæ sacræ disciplina: AAS [1956] 23).

    This was, furthermore, not a new concession in 1958, it had been an open discussion for many many years.

    Sorry, the weak denial that Olmsted was not involved – don’t buy it.

    I completely buy it. I know several diocese where the rector of the cathedral operates with a great deal of independence.

    One thing that’s very odd, the article is credited to “Michael Clancy” and a “Michael Clancy” referenced at the end of it. Is one of these an error?

    Reply
    1. Dunstan Harding

      But such a choir should take its place outside the sanctuary or Communion rail. The men should be separated from the women or girls so that anything unbecoming may be avoided.
      ====================================
      “Outside the sanctuary”. Seems particularly absurd considering men and women have been admitted to our sanctuaries for the past 40 years. As for anything “unbecoming”, given recent events worldwise it’s hard to imagine just how “unbecoming” could anything be in a liturgical setting today?

      Reply
  9. Jan Larson

    I recently chatted with two teenage girls who are interested in working in parish ministry later on in their lives. They say their experience as servers is responsible for their knowledge about parish structure and their interest in ministry. How could this be??

    Reply
  10. Jeffrey Herbert

    Sorry, the weak denial that Olmsted was not involved – don’t buy it.

    The Cathedral Rector is responsible for such decisions and it wouldn’t be unusual at all for the Bishop to not be involved in the decision. Don’t construe from that statement that he didn’t know about the decision. From what I know of him, Bp. Olmsted would have no reason to oppose the Rector’s decision.

    I find it a bit humorous that the article points out that no hard evidence exists connecting service as an altar server with future vocations to the priesthood, and then in the next sentence points out that the Diocese of Lincoln Nebraska, the only example of an all-male server policy across the diocese, has one of the highest rates of vocations.

    Reply
    1. Frank Agnoli

      To my knowledge, that is also the only diocese that has refused to implement the Charter for the protection of children.

      Reply
    2. Stanislaus Kosala

      So before 1994 there was no shortage of priests in Europe and the U.S.?

      I think you’ll also find that vocations to the priesthood are most abundant in places where priests form a separate social class, and where boys come from backgrounds of limited means and limited opportunities.

      Reply
      1. Samuel J. Howard

        So before 1994 there was no shortage of priests in Europe and the U.S.?

        In a situation with more than one variable, showing that the result wasn’t different when one of the variables was different doesn’t prove that the variable doesn’t affect the outcome.

  11. John Drake

    I guess i never fully appreciated Lincoln when I lived there several years ago! Must make a return visit one of these days!

    Reply
  12. Cody Maynus

    Baptism is priestly. Last I checked, the RCC still baptized girls.

    Reply
  13. Jack Rakosky

    The practice of bishops and priests “grooming” young men for the priesthood (narcissists recruiting narcissists?) as well as that of encouraging people to discover if they have a secret message from God should be abandoned. There are better ways of being called.

    For example every parish, Catholic grade school, high school and college needs to have a Christian leadership development program that gives young people an opportunity to become familiar close up with a variety of Christian leadership roles not only in Catholic parishes and institutions but in business and the public sector.

    Sacramental graduation (preferably Confirmation /Eucharist) should allow entry into these voluntary and hopefully desirable “adult-like” experiences and programs.

    These experiences should be time limited, e.g. being a server for two years. The second year servers can teach the first year servers. Youth choirs should be recruited more to encourage people for a couple of years to sing at Mass than to be choir members. Those with an aptitude can then become adult choir members. The idea is to give young people a wide variety of experiences to help them discern their talents and interests, not just to be another form of free labor.

    The adult “mentors” of these programs should be mature, and free of narcissistic preoccupation with themselves and their roles in society, and interested and able to discern the talents present in others even when very different from their own.

    Most importantly the programs need to have a strong peer component that encourages peer to peer discussion of their “internship” like experiences, and their feelings about their own talents and interests.

    If this were done widely, even if no special emphasis was placed on priestly and religious vocations, young people would experience the attractiveness of the priesthood and religious life, and hear from their peers the most authentic message where God may calling them.

    Reply
    1. Frank Agnoli

      Yes… and the sooner we stop using “vocation” in a restrictive sense… and praying only for “vocations to the priesthood and religious life” the better…. Why not offer prayers for the diaconate, for married couples, for those discerning a call to the single state? Better… that we all respond to our baptismal call to holiness. Healthy vocations to church ministry are best fostered in an environement that treats vocations holistically… I am afraid that by continuing to emphasize a “special” call all you get is people that think they ought to be treated as “special” and above the law…. What is needed is a “culture of vocation” in the broad sense, as you describe, where discernment is taken seriously as a life-long endeavor for all the baptized, not a return to models that don’t seem to have been very healthy.

      Reply
      1. Jack Rakosky

        Frank,

        Edward Hahnenberg has a fine book Awakening Vocation: A Theology of Christian Call (2010) .

        Since Vatican II, Catholics have settled into a kind of sleepy consensus on vocation. Papal statements and the bishops continue repeating the Vatican II distinction between the universal call to holiness and the various vocations. Most Catholics still associate the word “vocation” primarily with priesthood or religious life.. although most would agree that marriage, for example, is a vocation. The result appears to be a kind of vague appreciation for a concept that offers little help in living out the faith (p.43-44)

        Hahnenberg takes a tour of Luther, Ignatius, Barth, Rahner and Ellacuria to come up with his theology of the Christian call. A little heavy on the theoretical and not enough of the practical. Does give some historical perspective on how we got where we are, at least beginning with Luther. However, he did manage to get me to read the book even though I am resistant to works of systematic theology (as contrasted with the study of spirituality, liturgy, and scripture). Sugar coating the theology with sufficient social science awareness helped.

        He is joining John Carroll’s faculty this Fall, so it will be interesting to meet him.

  14. Margaret O'Connor

    I despair of the Catholic Church sometimes. This story makes me feel sad, and concerned for its future direction.

    Reply
  15. Todd Flowerday

    “So only boys can support boys considering the priesthood?”

    An interesting comment, Frank, that reminds me of when my last parish got a grant for new server garb. It was the girls on the captain team who suggested they should continue to wear albs. They thought the pseudo-cassocks looked good on the boys, plus it might encourage vocations.

    The rector has every right to make this call. Alas, he also has the right to make stupid decisions.

    Reply
    1. Frank Agnoli

      Interesting… though it should be noted that the USCCB norms for servers makes it clear that boys and girls should not be distinguished by either vestment or duties or title….

      http://www.usccb.org/prayer-and-worship/resources-for-the-eucharist/guidelines-for-ministers/guidelines-for-altar-servers.cfm

      Reply
  16. Stanislaus Kosala

    Does anyone else think it’s inconsistent that they would forbid females to serve at the altar but still allow females to read at Mass, to sing in the choir, to distribute holy communion and to touch the host with their bare hands? All of these have been traditionally forbidden to women. As late as 1907 Pope St. Pius X forbade women to sing in the choir even if there were no men present.

    Reply
    1. Samuel J. Howard

      As late as 1903 Pope St. Pius X forbade women to sing in the choir even if there were no men present.

      This is not true. The legal situation is not fully understood by reading Tra le Sollecitudini in isolation.

      Reply
      1. Stanislaus Kosala

        So enlighten us. Are you saying that when Pius X writes:

        “singers in church have a real liturgical office, and that therefore women, being incapable of exercising such office, cannot be admitted to form part of the choir. Whenever, then, it is desired to employ the acute voices of sopranos and contraltos, these parts must be taken by boys, according to the most ancient usage of the Church.”

        He’s not forbidding women to sing in choir without indults?
        Why does Pius XII’s De Musica Sacra give permission for women to substitute men in choirs?
        It’s a shame this wasn’t made known then, many young boys would have saved their testicles.

    2. Siobhan Maguire

      Siobhan Maguire

      Re #32 Pius X forbade women to sing in the choir and also exchewed flutes and violins because they might remind one of a woman’s singing voice and thus be similarly distracting. We looked at this document in my (secular) music history course on early 20th Century music. The professor’s theory was that it may have influenced Stravinsky, inter alia, in his compositional choices as he was writing his Mass (lots of low strings, brass, voices, etc.).

      Reply
      1. Samuel J. Howard

        This doesn’t really match the facts.

        If you look at the document now, you’ll find that in discussing wind instruments it doesn’t distinguish between flutes and brass, nor between violins and cellos.

        It allows the organ at all pitches… including on those not so coincidentally named “flute stops”.

        Stravinsky’s Mass has no strings, it’s scored for mixed choir (specifying childrens’ voices) and two oboes, cor anglais, two bassoons, two trumpets and three trombones.

  17. Matthew Ferguson

    Frank Agnoli :

    Why not offer prayers for the diaconate, for married couples, for those discerning a call to the single state?

    Perhaps because we aren’t lacking deacons, married couples, and single persons.

    Reply
    1. Jeff Rice

      First of all, according to data, the Church is decreasing in numbers of folks in all vocations. Second, does this mean that deacons, married couples, or singles don’t deserve our prayers. Shouldn’t our ultimate prayer be that each individual discerns and follows God’s call, no matter their vocation?

      Reply
      1. Matthew Ferguson

        I am intrigued by your first point. Could you point me to some studies that support your claim?

        As to your second point, in reading Frank’s comment, I assumed that “praying for” vocations meant asking God to send more, i.e. asking the Lord of the harvest to send laborers for the harvest. Upon re-reading the post, I see how one could interpret him as praying for people to live their vocations better, in which case I would certainly agree with your second point.

    2. Jack Feehily

      We are certainly lacking in couples who have a sense of living out a sacramental vocation. We also are lacking in parents who give children strong spiritual leadership. In my parish we also pray for those vocations everyday. Many of the folks in the pews know that we wouldn’t have a priestly vocation shortage if those other than celibates were allowed to serve. Some wonder if the leaders of the church are willing to go out of business rather than consider a change in discipline.

      Reply
      1. Dunstan Harding

        Jack, In some respects they are going out of business.

  18. Charles Day

    Here’s all I have:
    “The scribes and the Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses.
    Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do not follow their example. For they preach but they do not practice.
    They tie up heavy burdens* [hard to carry] and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them.
    All their works are performed to be seen. They widen their phylacteries and lengthen their tassels.
    They love places of honor at banquets, seats of honor in synagogues,
    greetings in marketplaces, and the salutation ‘Rabbi.’

    Reply
  19. Fr. Ron Krisman

    Read John 11:35

    Reply
  20. Stanislaus Kosala

    Only comments with a full name will be approved.

    Samuel J. Howard :

    So before 1994 there was no shortage of priests in Europe and the U.S.?
    In a situation with more than one variable, showing that the result wasn’t different when one of the variables was different doesn’t prove that the variable doesn’t affect the outcome.

    True and since there are many variables, then you can’t draw an inverse correlation between a high priest to layperson ratio and lack of girl servers.
    If seeing women handle the blessed sacrament doesn’t drive guys away from the priesthood then neither should girl servers.
    Either ban women from the sanctuary completely or open up all of the roles to them. Anything else is just silly.

    Reply
  21. Fr. Brent Maher

    I am happy to see the cathedral rector taking positive steps to promote vocations in this manner. Automatically assuming that this move is an intentional slight again women in the Church is forcing one’s own agenda onto the rector’s decision. That said, I find the 1994 document to be rather enlightening. While affirming women’s ability to serve at the altar and in the other ministries, it also says this:

    “The Holy See respects the decision adopted by certain Bishops for specific local reasons on the basis of the provisions of Canon 230 2. At the same time, however, the Holy See wishes to recall that it will always be very appropriate to follow the noble tradition of having boys serve at the altar. As is well known, this has led to a reassuring development of priestly vocations. Thus the obligation to support such groups of altar boys will always continue.”

    If the Holy See notes that it will always be appropriate to support the ‘noble tradition’ of boy servers only and that we have an obligation to support such groups for the encouragement of vocations, why not simply support them (as we’re obligated to do) and pray that they are fruitful in fostering vocations?

    Reply
    1. Dunstan Harding

      Why must we assume having altar boys only must lead to a
      priestly vocation, and that only boys should be able to serve as acolytes because only boys have any chance of ever being admitted to the priesthood? Maybe, a young girl may find serving at mass will lead to a vocation as a religious. Religious orders do have a tradition of having women serve, at least in a limited way, as acolytes. Catholic women have every right to be
      insulted. Their husbands or boyfriends/lovers should be too.
      Just withdraw your child from the parochial school while you’re at it.

      Maybe it’s time for them to go on a general strike too. Just start sending their Sunday offerings to Protestant charities.

      Reply
    2. Gerard Flynn

      “At the same time, however, the Holy See wishes to recall that it will always be very appropriate to follow the noble tradition of having boys serve at the altar.” 1994

      “If the Holy See notes that it will always be appropriate to support the ‘noble tradition’ of boy servers ONLY” B.M.

      You have inserted the word ‘only’ into the document, thus attempting to justify this unjust practice. We are most certainly not obligated to support such an interpretation.

      “Automatically assuming that this move is an intentional slight against women in the Church is forcing one’s own agenda onto the rector’s decision.”

      It is nothing of the sort. It is a slight against women. The rector’s action is deliberate. He could not possibly fail to be aware of the immorality of such an act. Therefore, by proceeding with it, he was acting intentionally.

      You’re trying to defend the indefensible, and in the process attempting to justify injustice.

      Reply
  22. M. Jackson Osborn

    Jack Rakosky on the ‘narcissistic’ practice of priests grooming boys for the priesthood –

    What makes this inherently narcissistic? There must be some prejudice or bias, some contempt, underlying such a gratuitous and ignoble denigration? When one becomes aware that those in their youth show an inclination and promise in any given field, be it medicine, music, architecture, or whatever, he or she encourages these youthful charges to follow their vocation – if, indeed, their vocations are genuine. Further, every profession and calling has, to some degree, its cultural identity. This is all for the good – for it and society as a whole. The palpable dislike of the priestly calling (and perhaps some gender bias) is, I suggest, not worthy of the writer.

    Reply
    1. Jack Rakosky

      “Grooming” occurs when person A gives a lesser status person B extraordinary attention beyond what they deserve in order to recruit that person to do what person A wants, e.g. the president of a family business or dictatorship who “grooms” his son to take his position. As is particularly evident in the family situation, this tends to be “narcissistic” self replication.

      In the fifties in grade school as an altar boy, I was “groomed” for the priesthood by a pastor who gave me a beautiful wall crucifix, made me sacristan able to handle the sacred vessels, and put me on a religious order priest friend’s mailing list. I was deluged with literature for about a year or more. Later I learned my mother had put a stop to this. Although she was happy when I went off to Jesuit Novitiate after high school, she correctly discerned that all this attention to get me into a high school seminary was just too much, way over where I was in my development. It was grooming.

      I also experienced grooming when I entered graduate school as a person interested in teaching college students; faculty members did a good job of turning me into a researcher. They were far more interested in making me to their image and likeness as a researcher than in developing my broader scholarly and teaching interests.

      Narcissistic preoccupation with self replication is very common in academia, professional, and business worlds as well as the church. As I said in my original comment, good “mentors” need to get beyond this whether in the church, academia, professional or business world.

      IF you read my many comments you will find a consistent even handled criticism across church, academia, professional and business life, a posture which I share with Robert Greenleaf, the author of Servant Leadership and for many of the same reasons.

      Reply
    2. Gerard Flynn

      Another fine parody, Ms/Mr M.J.O.

      Reply
  23. Paul Martinez

    Carl Opat,

    [Women are only good enough to clean up after priests.]

    WHO said this? How does this even begin to make sense?

    Tradition shows us that females did not alter serve. Tradition should have prized place of consideration. So this is more than enough reason to think that it’s a good idea to continue the practice.

    Saying that women can’t alter serve doesn’t say anything bad about women, just as women’s inability to become priests doesn’t reflect anything badly on the women.

    Reply
    1. Gerard Flynn

      Tradition without reason is but ancient error. Declaring that women have an ability to become priests doesn’t say anything derogatory about women, only about the men who reach that conclusion.

      Power tends to corrupt.

      Reply
  24. Pietro Albano

    At a time when the Church should be seen more as a community of ALL baptized (regardless of gender, culture, vocation) than a hierarchy, this move is really appalling.

    Reply
  25. John Quinn

    Does this fly in the face of Galations 3:28?

    ‘ … there is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus’

    Reply
  26. Nicholas Mitchell

    Good for the Cathedral rector! Would that many more pastors had his courage.

    And for the record, I don’t think women ought to be Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion either – but then these ministers ought to be truly extraordinary, male or female, in my opinion, and not used just to make Mass faster or to facilitate communion under two kinds. Incidentally, my wife’s views on the matter are much more strict than mine!

    But then this is only my opinion – church law on the matter must be obeyed. That, however, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t pray and work for change in our proper spheres and in the proper, lawful manner. I would be delighted were my parish were to rescind altar girls; my wife may even be prepared to set foot in the Ordinary Form Mass there (she only attends the EF, and not just because of the girls on the altar). But I don’t see that happening.

    Reply
    1. Fr. Jim Blue

      How much courage does it take to play toady to a powerful arch-conservative bishop? I suspect it would have taken much more courage to stand up to him on this issue.

      Reading your message I get the idea that if you had your way you would have only men giving birth as well.

      Reply
    2. Gerard Flynn

      Thank you for sharing!

      Helps us all to gauge the level of bigotry out there.

      Reply
  27. Tom Valerius

    I knew it! Mary should not have been at the foot of the cross. Martha and Mary’s debate was phony! Who let those women run to the open grave? Thank to the powers that “think they are always correct”, with their help we can all stop this “creeping christian love” stuff. God please help us with those who confuse reasonable their brand of narrow sanity as sanctifying grace. And from those who are confused in their narrow naiveté with an attitude of spiritual superiority!

    Reply
  28. M. Jackson Osborn

    John Quinn – Does this fly in the face of Galatians…

    The same Lord who said ‘there is neither male nor female…’ chose to ordain in the upper room only his male disciples, the apostles. It was them whom he ‘groomed’ to continue his work. He, of course, could have ‘breathed on’ some of the women who were important in his life as well, but did not. This action is a statement of no less significance than the verbal one of Galatians. He was ‘offered up’ for doing things that were not done in his day, such as forgiving sins on his own authority and saying such blasphemous things as ‘before Abraham was I AM’. Further, we are told in the scriptures that Jesus left out nothing of what had been the Father’s will for him to do, some of which he was crucified for.

    Those who favour ordaining women are trying to impose their desires onto a paradigm of Jesus’ intentions that does not exist. Women have their own distinct, unique, and wondrous gifts. Jesus’ love of women is glowingly, touchingly, evident in the record of his life. Still, though he could have, he did not ordain them.

    It is puzzling to me that while there are some things which are for women only and men generally respect them and have no desire to impose themselves into them, there are some things that are male specific, and many women cannot seem to resist imposing themselve into them. There is, indeed, a curious sort bias at work here

    Reply
    1. Jay Taylor

      While it is a true statement regarding women that “he did not ordain them”, I don’t see evidence that he “ordained” men either, in the way we understand ordination today.

      Reply
    2. Bridget O'Brien

      If you consult Acts again, you’ll note that there were women present in the upper room prior to Pentecost:

      “When they entered the city they went to the upper room where they were staying, Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James son of Alphaeus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. All these devoted themselves with one accord to prayer, together with some women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.”

      Moreover, when Peter interprets the events of Pentecost, he does so through an explicitly gender-inclusive Scriptural citation:

      ” ‘It will come to pass in the last days,’ God says,
      ‘that I will pour out a portion of my spirit upon all flesh.
      Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
      your young men shall see visions,
      your old men shall dream dreams.

      Indeed, upon my servants and my handmaids
      I will pour out a portion of my spirit in those days,
      and they shall prophesy.’ ”

      Things are not so cut-and-dry as you would like to imagine; there are many missioning events in the life of the Church, and not all of them were limited to men.

      Reply
    3. Jim McKay

      Jesus gave a loud cry and breathed his last.
      The veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom.
      When the centurion who stood facing him saw how he breathed his last he said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!”
      There were also women looking on from a distance. Among them were Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of the younger James and of Joses, and Salome.

      Hmmm. Jesus DID breathe on the women…

      Maybe those who favour ordaining only men are trying to impose their desires onto a paradigm of Jesus’ intentions that does not exist. Women have their own distinct, unique, and wondrous gifts which might enrich the priesthood.

      Reply
    4. Gerard Flynn

      “The same Lord who said ‘there is neither male nor female…’”

      I thought it was Saint Paul who wrote that.

      Try to have your conclusions fit your evidence, not vice versa!

      Reply
  29. Stephen Manning

    As in politics, I suspect that behind all these religious differences on individual issues lies a more fundamental difference, a fundamental conflict of visions and narratives. Those (including feminists) who are uncomfortable with hierarchy and tradition vs those for whom hierarchy and tradition –including real male and female difference– are naturally at the heart of things. Those for whom the vision of the future drives them vs those for whom the realities of the past hold most weight. Simply put, egalitarians vs patriarchs. IMHO, regardless of your degrees or reading or ordination status, mostly everything else flows from that.

    Reply
    1. Jim McKay

      What about those who accept hierarchy and tradition, but understand them differently? Those who accept the tradition of Galatians, for instance, and believe it is more central to Christianity than the exclusion of women from ordination? That is an opposition of one tradition to another, rather than an opposition to tradition itself.

      There are those who think that hierarchy, and tradition, exist for the purpose of adaptation to circumstances, believing that we are being led into all truth. Conversion and transformation are ongoing, essential to our call to Christ, and we should constantly be scrutinizing our lives for our failures to life up to the life Christ left us.

      So some of the tension is between visions of hierarchy and tradition, rather than between those who support them and those who do not. At least three sides, not two.

      Reply
      1. Stephen Manning

        Well, I have to say that you’d fit in the egalitarian visionary camp because “transformation” is the primary value, that is, progress and adaptation to circumstances. Tradition and hierarchy serve that. There may be a spectrum, but not three sides.

      2. Jim McKay

        There are people for whom hierarchy and tradition –including real male and female difference– are naturally at the heart of things and who are driven by a vision of the future. These are not opposite poles on a continuum

        The question is whether hierarchy and tradition are focussed on the past, or on the future. Bl John XXIII’s opening address to the Council is a vision of hierarchy and tradition at the service of the future. He repudiates a vision of h&t as conservators of a museum. I can’t think of any examples of the latter, though it seems to be the essence of one of your narratives.

        There are those who do not like h&t, and support ordaining women etc. But there also those who live by h&t who support it; they just have a different idea of the content of tradition. They believe in one baptism more than they believe in sex segregated ordination, to take an example from earlier in the thread.

  30. Mike Burns

    Maybe the rector is preparing to install the EF, after all there can be no females serving at the altar. Or maybe we did have a liturgical reform called Vatican II to encourage full, conscious, and active participation in the Liturgy. Did that only mean praying now in English, or did it mean FCAP in liturgical ministries?

    Reply
  31. M. Jackson Osborn

    Jay Taylor – evidence of ‘ordination’.

    I believe that Jesus’ ‘breathing upon’ his disciples in the upper room and comissioning them to cary out his teachings throughout the world is regarded as his having ordained them, that this was the first ‘ordination’; and that Jesus did what he consciously intended to do in complete fulfillment of the Father’s will.

    Stephen Manning – as in politics, I suspect…

    This is perhaps a reasonable and fairly accurate assessment of the realities underlying all our positions. I would only stress that ‘patriarchal’ is not a wholly pejorative label, i.e., it is not synonymous with male tyrrany, though many use it in that manner. (It is a fact of history that we have patriarchs… and matriarchs – and only against the former does there seem to be socially acceptable contempt.) Nor do the ‘progressives’ among us have a monopoly on the egalitarian concept, i.e.,’ equal’ does does not mean ‘the same’, though many seem to think that it does. And even those who banter it about generally tilt in this way or that in favour of those desiring ‘equality’.

    Reply
    1. Stanislaus Kosala

      Such a shame that Jesus didn’t say why He chose only male apostles and we have to keep guessing. We only know that he chose only men, but not why He did so. I wonder if the fact that women had very few rights.

      It’s funny that when apologists point to an unbroken tradition of an exclusively male priesthood, they usually neglect to mention that in many parts of the church women were forbidden from receiving holy communion and even to enter the church while menstruating. Natural law was used to justify the beliefs that women not being allowed to have authority over men, and that women were less rational than men, etc. All of these things the church would never accept today. It seems like you a case of wanting to have your cake and eat it too, though. They want to point to this ‘unbroken tradition’ without making use of any of the reasons that were historically used for it.

      Even if you’re about the priesthood though, that still doesn’t account for excluding women from the diaconate, and from serving in place of acolytes and lectors.

      Reply
      1. Gerard Flynn

        Have a look at Luke’s Gospel where Jesus sent out 72 others. By definition, all were apostles.

    2. Stephen Manning

      I did not use any of the adjectives in a necessarily pejorative way but rather as descriptors. But from the point of view of either side, most of these words are highly value-laden indeed.

      Part of my point is that someone will argue what Jesus did or did not do or intend, etc. from a prior assumption about what constitutes the narrative of the good in history. And oddly enough, Jesus always seems to be on their side!

      And by saying this, I am not promoting relativism or a tu quoque argument. One side, I believe, is mistaken. But it’s the fundamental and default vision which gets worked out in all the various battles.

      Reply
    3. Richard Verver

      Even if one were to accept that Jesus ordained only men that, by itself, doesn’t justify the perennial exclusion of women from orders. There must be another reason, a more deeply essential or theological reason than that.

      The Twelve were all male, yes. The Twelve were also all Jews, and all free (non-slaves). Yet, the early church did not restrict orders to Jews and non-slaves. And this wasn’t an easy issue for the church to deal with (see Acts and the Pauline epistles). Indeed, there are more statements of Christ in the Gospels that express the distinct and special status of the Jews than that of male human beings. In our own day, if we think that Jewishness and freedom are accidental categories it is because the leaven of the Gospel has been at work for two millennia.

      Is sex differerent? Maybe it is, but if so it would have to be different for a reason. I don’t know what the reason is, or whether there even is one, but it can’t be “because Jesus picked twelve men”. It would also have to be deeply consonant with the mysterious purposes of God and not be an expression, however carefuly shrowded, of sinful manifestations of dominance, etc.

      I’m not saying such a reason doesn’t exist, but I think it’s important to find it if it does. And if it doesn’t, we need to be able to admit that too and not engage in a quixotic quest to find it.

      Reply
  32. Mary Wood

    Not a new thought, but who formed and enfleshed the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ? A woman.

    Reply
  33. M. Jackson Osborn

    We have established that Jesus breathed on the twelve and commissioned them to carry on his work, and that this was the first ordination. And, that being a man not in the habit of not doing his Father’s will, even if it was contrary to social norms of the time and would bring trouble upon him, he would, then have chosen to ordain women if that had been a part fulfillment of the Father;s wish. He did this with conscious intention. This speaks as loud as, if not louder, than ‘…neither male nor female…’ ,I.e., actions speak louder than words. It was on the basis of this reasoning that Holy Father Benedict, and Holy Father John Paul before him, said the Church does not have the authority to ordain women.

    But, Richard Verver (no doubt with a host of supporters) says that that is not enough, that there must be another reason, a more deeply essential or theological reason. There no doubt is such reasoning: a theologian, the holy father, could no doubt put these data into theological form.

    But, would it satisfy the naysayers? Probably not. I have observed that their stock answer, no matter what reasons from scripture, tradition, theology, respectul erudition or pope, is the never changing ‘but there are no theological reasons not to ordain women’. This is something the partisans of which desire very badly, and no scripture, reason, papal teaching, example of our Lord, is going to sway them from it. They feel entitled to it and that is that. It doesn’t help that we seem to be living in a time in which men, on the other hand, are undergoing subtle and not so subtle changes of character by which they are retreating somewhat from, even outright shirking, the roles and responsibilities which are there noble inheritance.

    Reply
  34. M. Jackson Osborn

    Mary Wood – you are right: ‘a woman’, sinless by the operation of a special gift of grace by God, ‘formed and enfleshed the body and blood of Jesus Christ… after it had been put there by God the Holy Ghost… in accordance with her obedience and consent.

    Reply
    1. Gerard Flynn

      Most mainstream biblical scholars regard the infancy narratives of both Matthew and Luke as unhistorical. Great theology, yes. History, no.

      Reply
  35. Jordan Zarembo

    What did girls’ schools do before the wider acceptance of female altar servers? 1994 is not a good demarcation point, as some dioceses were permitting girls or women to serve at the altar even in the late 60’s or early 70’s.

    I went to boys’ Catholic high school, so the question of serving never applied to us. We were not invited to the Masses at the “sister school”.

    In the late 1980s, the order that ran my school also started a co-ed school in the same county. I attended the lower school for two years. Students of either sex were permitted to serve, if my memory serves me right. I do remember that young women in their senior year of high school were permitted to be EMHC’s.

    Usually lay-brothers were priority EMHC’s at my high school, with schoolteachers of either sex occasionally helping. Then again, we had many more priests and lay-brothers than the newer school.

    Reply
  36. Fr. Allan J. McDonald

    I have no problem with altar servers being of either sex and have promoted it since the 1970’s. What I think is a bit off base is promoting any ministry in the Church as though it is a God-given right for the individual to determine independent of ecclesiastical authority. No one has a “right” to any of the sacraments or other ministries of the Church if there is an impediment of any kind whether in natural law or canon law or a combination of both. I do think that to remove a permission that has been established with decades of tradition is politically incorrect and distasteful to many people and hurtful to those girls who have served in an exemplary way.

    Reply
    1. Jack Rakosky

      Canon 213. Christ’s faithful have the right to be assisted by their Pastors from the spiritual riches of the Church..

      Canon 214 Christ’s faithful …also have the right to follow their own form of spiritual life, provided it is in accord with Church teaching

      “ a parish…cannot be forced to accept a particular spirituality.. simply because the parish priest considers it to be the most appropriate spirituality.” p.123 The Code of Canon Law: Letter and the Spirit.

      Many of our current difficulties, such as this one, stem from some people (usually pastors but sometimes laity) attempting to impose their spirituality (both Pre and Post V2) on others.

      The pre-Vatican II spirituality of promoting vocations to the priesthood through altar serving can be done at the same time lay ministry is promoted through altar serving.

      We got so many priests (and religious) in the pre-Vatican II church because the priesthood (and religious life) were very visible and attractive opportunities. That meant that most young men of some talent or aspirations gave at least some thought to the priesthood.

      Today we have a vibrant and visible church ministry that includes deacons, music ministers, religious educators, and many volunteers. We should involve many young people in a wide variety of parish ministries in the hope they will consider careers and voluntarism in the Church. Out of this broad ministry recruitment effort, many young people will likely give at least some thought to the priesthood and religious life.

      The young men who (along with young women) serve at the altar in grade school, become cantors in the choir and bring communion to the home bound in high school are going to have an exposure to ministerial life far superior to the pre-Vatican II altar boy. Such broad and deep exposures are sure to bring many young people to consider the priesthood and religious life along with the deaconate, music ministry, etc.

      Reply
  37. Trish Vanni

    Oh, let’s just consider it practically and pastorally: My son can serve, but my daughter can set. Maybe she could iron the altar cloth as well. That would certainly resonate with her contemporary experience of gender subservience in other areas of her life. Not.

    Reply
  38. Stephen Manning

    What a lot of people forget is that the role of women in the West has gone through a revolutionary change in the space of one lifetime. What the outcomes of that will be remain to be seen; I for one can see some definite negative ones. How this will play out in a hundred years? Just on grounds of prudence alone, regardless of “theological reasons”, it would seem wildly irresponsible to introduce an equally revolutionary change into what is, like it or not, the heart of Roman Catholicism, the priesthood. To say nothing of the fact that it would completely sabotage relations with the other ancient Catholic (as opposed to Protestant) churches of the East. Sometimes the Church follows the culture, sometimes it opposes it. Your daughter’s experience of “gender subservience” is not a revelation from God, just a contemporary social behavior. Not enough, in my book, to destabilize 2000 years.

    Reply
    1. Stanislaus Kosala

      Many of the ancient Catholic Churches of the East maintain the practice of forbidding holy communion to menstruating women. In the Russian Orthodox Church women are not even permitted to venerate icons and enter churches while menstruating. There already is a wide divergence between the Roman Catholic Church and many ancient eastern churches.

      It’s also important to note that the church has accepted many of the radical changes in the roles of women in western culture, and has characterized many of previous common ways of discriminating women as being unjust. Look at John Paul II’s letter to women. This is much more than just a prudential attitude toward modern developments in women’s rights.

      Reply
  39. Stephen Manning

    This is hardly a wide divergence, merely a local variance in lay communion practice (strange to us thought it be). And constitutes no barrier to Roman/Eastern relations. Ordaining women as priests and bishops would be a matter of an altogether different kind, obviously.

    And the same John Paul II made the doctrinal definition excluding women from the priesthood, as you know.

    Reply
    1. Stanislaus Kosala

      The same John Paul II permitted girl servers as you know. He didn’t not make any official doctrinal definition concerning the matter of women’s ordination. The fact that he didn’t make Ordinatio Sacerdotalis an ex cathedra definition is very suspicious, especially given the amount of doctrinal developing that has occurred in the last 100 years or so.

      As to the Orthodox churches, I don’t know. Given the big deal that Rome places on the nature of relations between men and women, the fact that there is strong disagreement over the purity of women, and over contraception with those churches does not bode well for reunion. I can’t imagine Rome ever approving of denying holy communion to menstruating women as a legitimate option, or local custom. At the very least it shows a very different understanding of the differences between men and women.

      Reply
      1. Karl Liam Saur

        And the rationales offered in support of the Eastern practices are not univocal. Some focus on purity, others on the marks of the fallen state, others still on the issue of open wounds that could, notionally at least, leak the Precious Blood (there being an understanding of communion that has a more physical dimension in that regard than is common in the Western tradition). So which is the “tradition”? The practice, not the rationale(s). And there’s no pope to “develop” it further….

      2. Stephen Manning

        “He didn’t not make any official doctrinal definition concerning the matter of women’s ordination” .

        Proponents of women’s ordination seem unable to hear a doctrinal definition when it does not say what they want to her. If the Pope had written the same words but in favor of the practices, do you think anyone could doubt that it was definitive and infallible? Example:

        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 Our ministry of confirming the brethren, we declare that the Church does have the authority to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful.

        Any conservative who protested would be told that it was a closed issue.

      3. Jordan Zarembo

        Re: #82 by Stanislaus Kosala on August 24, 2011 – 3:54 pm

        Stanislaus, I think you’re trying to get entirely too much mileage out of the issue of menstruation and women’s participation in the sacramental life of Orthodox churches. It’s important to remember that these prohibitions are not practiced by all synods. Ancedotally, prohibitions that concern menses are generally not observed in many North American Orthodox churches, for example.

        Karl’s specific observations on bodily emission in West and East point towards a vastly different understanding of prelapsarian condition between the two theologies. Don’t let a superficial Eastern understanding of emission and menstruation in particular devolve into a soft misogyny of sorts. The issue is bodily emission in general, and not the natural physiology of women.

        Re: #80 by Stanislaus Kosala on August 24, 2011 – 2:36 pm

        Mulieris Dignitatem, regardless of opinion on the freedoms of women in secular society, is still quite bound to JP II’s conception of Being for men and women. His praise for a nuptial vision of the body of Christ in both the marital, clerical, and consecrated states is much more of a stumbling-block to women’s ordination than women’s physiology.

  40. Brigid Rauch

    The argument is often made that by permitting only boys to be altar servers, we encourage priestly vocations.

    Number 1 – Don’t vocations come from God?

    Number 2 – Are we to assume that a young man will choose the priesthood over marriage and family life solely because he could serve at Mass and his sister couldn’t?

    Number 3 – Assuming that the argument is correct, that by allowing only boys to serve we encourage more men to choose the priesthood, what are we actually doing? We are according boys special privileges denied to their sisters. Some will see this as a taste of special privileges they will have as priests not accorded to laymen and certainly not to the laywomen. My point is that the kind of person attracted to the priesthood this way may not grow into the best kind of priest!

    Reply
    1. Jack Feehily

      You are right on track. I never served mass in my life. I celebrated my 38th anniversary as a priest yesterday. Even the appearance of a bias against the service of girls and women should be avoided at all costs. The canons ought to be changed that impede women from positions of leadership that don’t require priestly orders. I would go so far as to admit women to the diaconate and to the college of cardinals.

      Reply
  41. M. Jackson Osborn

    Brigid Rauch – makes some quite valid and cogent points concerning motivation and true calling (to whatever path of life). They do not, however, trump scriptural authority and our Lord’s example cited above; nor the all but defining words of John Paul II and Benedict XVI; nor 2000 years of tradition. And, not wanting to tell one’s daughter or sister that she can’t be a priest is hardly a reason, theological or otherwise, why she should be. All paths are not open to all people, their equality notwithstanding. One might also note that the extent to which our secular culture does not mirror the healthy spiritual life of the Christian faith is the extent to which it is in serious trouble. The Church has never mirrored secular culture but for deeply considered and non-compromising reasons.

    Reply
    1. Gerard Flynn

      You’re a great (wo)man to be able to come up with such amusing parodies. Keep them coming!

      Reply
      1. Karl Liam Saur

        This line in particular is pure gold of parody: “The Church has never mirrored secular culture but for deeply considered and non-compromising reasons.”

  42. Stanislaus Kosala

    Stephen Manning,

    “…regarding the doctrine that priestly ordination is reserved only to men. The Supreme Pontiff, while not wishing to proceed to a dogmatic definition, intended to reaffirm that this doctrine is to be held definitively,32 since, founded on the written Word of God, constantly preserved and applied in the Tradition of the Church, it has been set forth infallibly by the ordinary and universal Magisterium… this does not foreclose the possibility that, in the future, the consciousness of the Church might progress to the point where this teaching could be defined as a doctrine to be believed as divinely revealed.” – Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Commentary to Ad Tuendem Fidem

    There, JPII didn’t make a doctrinal definition, though he could have. That doesn’t inspire much confidence in me. If they could find a way to circumvent, err develop Bl. Pius IX’s teaching on religious freedom, they could find a way to do the same here, especially since it wasn’t solemnly defined.

    Reply
    1. Jim McKay

      Stephen M wrote:
      Proponents of women’s ordination seem unable to hear a doctrinal definition when it does not say what they want to hear.

      You are not suggesting Cardinal Ratzinger was a proponent of ordaining women, are you?

      Reply
    2. Stephen Manning

      It is a doctrinal definition but not a DOGMATIC one, as the text carefully says. And he goes on to say that it is “set forth infallibly”. Not everything that is doctrinally definitive is dogmatic.

      Reply
  43. M. Jackson Osborn

    Jack Feehily – ‘…canons ought to be changed that impede women…’

    This is not a loaded question… not being a scholar of the canons, I ask for my own edification: what positions of leadership that do not require holy orders are closed to women? It seems to me that there are as many women as men in the leadership of parish and diocesan life.
    As for including the collge of cardinals in your aspirations for women: if it were again, after a lapse of some centuries (I think), open to lay appointments, why would this not include women?
    This is an area in which I am (obviously) not well informed.

    Reply
    1. Jim McKay

      Cardinals could be laymen until the 1917 Code of Canon Law. John XXIII further limited it to bishops, which means anyone chosen must be made a bishop. (Unless they decline the ordination, generally only done by aged theologians who are appointed as an honor rather than as an administrative aide to the Pope.)

      But in practice the job went only to clerics. The last lay man appointed was by Pius IX in 1858, but he was ordained as a deacon a month or two later. Another of Pius IX’s cardinals also remained a deacon.

      Apparently Paul VI considered making Jacques Maritain a cardinal, but decided against it.

      Reply
  44. Stanislaus Kosala

    Jordan Zarembo,

    I think that I’m getting the exact right amount of mileage from the issues of the purity of women in the Orthodox Churches. My points are the following:

    1. The fact that this is an ancient practice, one that was widely accepted and still is to this day in some parts of the eastern churches, shows that there was an understanding of women operating in those times and places that is very much alien and unacceptable to us today. It is inconceivable that the church would tolerate such a practice today. Hence it puts into question appeals to the ‘long and unbroken’ tradition of excluding women from ordination.

    2. Whatever the reasons were for forbidding menstruating women from receiving holy communion, this prohibition has historically been used to justify excluding women from liturgical service.

    3. I’m not referring to Mulieris Dignitatem but rather to John Paul II’s letter to women. He praises the movement for equal rights towards women, and condemns those who had called it ‘unfeminine’ and ‘sinful’. This is a development on the part of the church. At the very least this does show that the church has the ability to reject large swaths of attitudes towards women that were thought to have metaphysical and theological justifications. What’s important here is that traditionally, even the church used reasons that JPII would condemn to exclude women from ordination. There has not been a convincing case made that it wasn’t these reasons that were responsible for such exclusion but some mystical, allegorical meaning of human sexuality and nuptial union.

    Reply

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