Editorials
CORRESPONDENCE Nominal C h r i s t i a n s Bronx, N.Y. To the Editors: The trouble with Mr. Waagenaar [The Pope's Jews, book review, Aug. 23] is the same trouble that drove Hitler to seek...
...There is no such thing as a "pious but anti-Semitic Christian...
...1 November 1974:100...
...There's danger in bringing one's own agenda to someone else's convention and then making all judgments out of that narrowed focus...
...There is only one argument for the exclusively male priesthood, one not easily dismissed: tradition...
...there are Christians and nominal Christians...
...They should begin raising the issue publicly with more force...
...Now, this latest declaration sets the tone for the September 1976 Minneapolis General Convention of the Episcopal Church---a meeting of the House of Bishops and the House of Deputies of over 900 priests and laymen--when the policy against women's ordinations will very likely change...
...Why doesn't Mr...
...But it could also be argued that the male priest's popuar image, with his celibacy and liturgical garb, is not so much masculine as neutral, and that the transition from priest to priestess in the popular imagination might not be as difficult as male priests might like to believe...
...The 220-member House of Bishops is the same body that declared the July 1974 ordination of eleven women in Philadelphia invalid on the grounds that the four defiant ordaining bishops lacked jurisdiction, since the ordinations were authorized by neither the bishops nor the people of a diocesan community...
...At the same time, the Episcopal bishops may well have brought to a turning point an ecumenical cause whose time is long overdue and given the Catholic Church an example of a sister Church realistically facing an issue which in the Catholic community has been smothered by a conspiracy of silence...
...Copyright ~ 1974 Commonweal Publishing Co., Inc...
...It has deprived the Church's social and cultural life of the richness and variety that mark the human community at large...
...Parish councils, diocesan clergy and religious congregations should put the question on their agenda for their meetings and general chapters, and ask the National Conference of Catholic Bishops to take it up in the spring...
...Second class postage paid at New York, N.Y...
...We would particularly look forward to an end of the old seminary system and its replacement with a process that would allow men and women of any age to take their dogmatic, moral and pastoral theology at a Catholic university, even while continuing in their regular jobs, and then present themselves for ordination to a bishop and his council...
...Furthermore, male control of Roman congregations, ecumenical councils, synods, dogmatic and moral theology, public worship and most of religious education has put the government of the Church in the hands of a closed power group understandably interested in perpetuating its own control...
...23] is the same trouble that drove Hitler to seek out scapegoats for Germany's problems...
...The important point is that the values underlying the symbols of any culture can change: one of the profoundest changes in our society has been in its understanding of the woman's role...
...The Christian accepts Christ in his heart and then grapples with his human faults...
...In Pacem in Terris Pope John XXIII wrote: "Since women are becoming ever more conscious of their human dignity, they will not tolerate being treated as mere material instruments, but demand rights befitting a human person, both in domestic and in public life...
...Bishops' actions with regard to evangelization and communications...
...We're not superwomen or supernuns...
...Roman Catholics can start getting used to the fact that in its sister Church, whose doctrine and liturgy are barely distinguishable ,from their own and where some Catholics already feel free to worship and receive communion, women will soon utter the words of consecration and be accepted by the people...
...If one of these rights is access to the priesthood, there are a number of things concerned Catholics, together with their Protestant brothers and sisters, should do...
...It will not do to say, as apologists always have, that the Catholic teaching on marriage pays tribute to the woman's dignity, or that devotion to women saintsnmostly "virgins" and founders of religious orders--and the cult of the Blessed Virgin Mary are meant to give women a sense of fulfillment in the Church...
...But we've got our heads on straight...
...Some people tell us we'd be more effective if we paid attention to said image, so we set up a communications task force, in the light of the U.S...
...The writers will include David S. Toolan, Peter Hebblethwaite, Ri.chard P. McBrien, Joseph A. Fitzmyer, Daniel C. Maguire, Peter J. Henriot, Gregory Baum, Claire Hahn, Bernard Cooke...
...It has perpetuated a long-discredited anthropology that sees women as imperfect human beings and necessarily subservient to men...
...There seem to be no convincing theological or logical reasons for denying women ordination when they are called to and qualify for the priesthood...
...It inflicts injustice on at least half the Church's members and weakens the Church's credibility as a sign of God's loving presence on the world...
...Carlan--you really misread us ["The New Nuns," Sept...
...M. NACHAY The New Nuns Chicago, IlL To the Editors: Sorry, Ms...
...We concede that the introduction of women priests would radically realign the present social organization of the Church and disrupt the clerical class system, and that this issue is tied to a whole string of other economic and religious issues: married clergy, the diaconate, finances, parish organization, whether the priesthood should be a part-time occupation, seminary education, the role of the community in selecting candidates, and the future of the religious orders...
...If these issues are connected, they might as well be faced...
...Big deal...
...As for our being confused and pettily concerned about our image and identity --we're much too busy...
...Printed In the USA and published weekly, except biweekly Christmas-New Year's and June to mid.September, by Commonweal Publishing Co,, 232 Madison Ave., New York, N.Y...
...Single copies S0c 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 WOMEN PRIESTS In last week's decision to endorse in principle, by an almost three to one majority, the ordination of women, the Episcopal House of Bishops has moved to resolve at least partially an important controversy within its own community...
...Then Catholics will look at their own congregations with embarrassment, all the more conscious of how their own tradition has deprived women of the dignity that is theirs by denying them full and equal participation in the sacramental life of the church...
...10016 MUrray Hill ;1.2042...
...And that vitiates four days of serious, tough-minded work...
...The Catholic Church could not prevent the systematic slaughter of Catholics in Eastern Europe, let alone the slaughter of other groups...
...Seen in perspective, all this looks like tokenism when, simply because of their sex, women have not been allowed to perform those sacred mysteries at the heart of the spiritual life...
...A unique world-wide subculture like the Church, that draws so much of its strength from shared values and historical continuity, should not toy lightly with its most powerful symbols...
...if not, the issue will die quietly--but at least it will have been faced...
...COMING 50th ANNIVERSARY ISSUE Combining the November 8 and 15 issues of the magazine and taking the form of Commonweal Paper 5, the next Commonweal will be an extrapage issue devoted entirely to the subject, ;~.*n'H: THE STRUGGLE TO BELIEVE...
...Waagenaar try to do likewise...
...Commonweal: 99 Let us say it bluntly: the overwhelming male domination of the Roman Catholic Church is a scandal...
...Foreign 117...
...To say, as one opponent has, that Jesus chose no women disciples makes as much sense as to say he chose no blacks or Irish...
...US and Canada...
...SIS a year...
...We've set our priorities...
...110 RELAXING WITH KARL RARNER: Peter Hebblethwaite 111 LABOR'S LOVE LOST: John C. Carl 113 BOOKS: Jordan Bishop, Robert Phillips, Mark Taylor 115 ILLUSTRATIONS: Front cover, Joel Andreas/LNS, with variation JAMBS O*GARA: Editor JOHN DBEDY: Managing Editor RAYMOND A. SCHROTH: Associate Editor ANNE ROBERTSON: Editorial Assistant COLIN L. WESTERBBCK, JR.: Movies JOHN FANDEL: Poetry BRIAN WICKER: Great Britain ALAIN WOODROW: Paris HENRY YEN KORTBNAAR: Rome JOHN COONEY: Dublin EDWARD S, SKILLIN: Publisher JOHN BRUBAKER: Advertising Manager COMMONWEAL A Weekly Review of Public Aflalrs, Literature and the Arts...
...If so, they will know that they have the support of their communities, and that they have done what had to be done to end this unjust discrimination in the community that claims to be the Church of Christ...
...At the highest level the bureaucracy is not only male but celibate and elderly and inevitably limited in its view of reality...
...today both men and women are expected to lead and serve...
...If within a very few years a consensus emerges, if it becomes clear that a good cross-section of the Catholic people believe women should be ordained, and Rome either says "never" or makes it clear that justice will be too long delayed, some Catholic bishops may well follow the example of their Episcopalian brothers in Philadelphia, raise the issue in the most decisive way possible, and validly ordain a group of women themselves...
...He is the "president of the assembly" who stands at the altar in the place of Jesus to re-enact for today the Passover and the Last Supper meal...
...One of these is the priest as "father," the male in the collar, turtle-neck or sport shirt, who, partly through his masculinity, brings comfort, reassurance, authority, or judgment...
...A good many Christians--both Episcopalian and Catholic--will be slow to accept a woman as an authority figure or in the cultic role...
...Thus, Humanae Vitae and an intellectually vulnerable sexual morality which, however rational and sublime in intent, in its implementation has often wedded sexuality to fear and guilt...
...Maybe you've expected too much of us...
...Finally, it may be that there is not yet a consensus in favor of women priests within the Church...
...We're moving into the year with well-thoughtout plans of action, appropriate to our regions and dioceses, in such areas as education, prison ministry, health care delivery, pastoral ministry, and religious (Continued on page 119) NEWS & VIEWS: 98 CORRESPONDENCE: 09 EDITORIALS: 99 BURYING THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF LAITY: Jim Castelli IO1 WASHINGTON REPORT: f f i ' [ a , Feila, [ o u r s e l f : Sisyphus 102 FOOTBALL FOR FEMINISTS: Michael Novak 104 CATHOLICS IN SOUTR VIETNAM: Jayne Werner 105 CASINOS AND DOMINOES: Warren Sloat 108 VERSE: Harold Wilt 112 THE SCREEN: Colin L. Westerbeck, Jr...
...It was obvious to most observers that NAWR members are much more committed to and serious about our broad Ministry for Justice than about an allout assault on the woman question...
Vol. 101 • November 1974 • No. 5
