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Newest Vatican document is last straw for women

DANIEL O'CARROLL,

IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Thursday, July 29, 2010, 8:14 AM

Updated Thursday, July 29, 2010, 8:15 AM

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Vatican could be forced to take responsibility for all priest abuse cases if trial is successful

The latest document from the Vatican - Normae de Gravioribus Delictis - has caused worldwide outrage after it prescribed automatic excommunication for anyone found to be involved in the ordination of women.

The document provides for greater penalties to those who “attempted” women’s ordination than to clerics who abused children, and has come in for heavy criticism both from womens’ advocacy groups and from loyal Catholics.

The document’s title translates as ‘Norms of the Most Serious Crimes’, was allegedly intended to soften the Church’s growing negative PR image and implement some of the changes which victims’ and survivors’ groups.

Some of the less controversial amendments to Canon Law made by the document include allowing non-clergy to be involved in Canon Law trials and doubling of the statute of limitations period in respect of child sexual abuse allegations or those that will speed up the processing of child abuse investigations within the church.

The new document makes several overhauls to the Canon Law which is the governing law of the Roman Catholic Church.

Another important change affected by the document was that the highest ranking figures in the Church would now be subject to the authority of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

A child abusing priest can now be withdrawn without trial, and the sexual abuse of "developmentally disabled" adults by priests has been given the same legal status as child sexual abuse.

Despite all these positive developments, though, it seems certain that they will be overshadowed by the women ordination rules.

The offending provision reads:

". . . both the one who attempts to confer sacred ordination on a woman, and she who attempts to receive sacred ordination, incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See. If the one attempting to confer sacred ordination, or the woman who attempts to receive sacred ordination, is a member of the Christian faithful subject to the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches, with due regard for can. 1443 of that Code, he or she is to be punished by major excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See. If the guilty party is a cleric he may be punished by dismissal or deposition."

In a strongly worded article in today’s Irish Times, Dr Mary Condren of the Centre for Gender and Women’s Studies in Trinity College Dublin, the Republic of Ireland’s foremost university, said that such “misogynist” attitudes by the Church were legitimizing violence and discrimination worldwide and called for an end to the Church’s use of Gospel to justify discrimination, as she saw it.

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Carroll09 | Aug 10, 2010, 03:16 PM EDT

Barneyjo- it is not a question of God being a chauvinist. God is not simply a bigger version of us, as your rationale seems to suggest. No, He is God, and as the psalm says, "What He wills, He does". You can't reduce the question of women priests to simply a matter of equality. You know there are certain things that are required for a sacrament to be validly conferred: for baptism, one requirement is water; for the Eucharist, an essential element is bread and wine. If a priest were to use wine instead of water for baptism, or coffee & potato chips instead of bread & wine for the Eucharist, the sacrament would not be valid. That does not mean that wine is not a good drink in & of itself, or that coffee & potato chips are not good in & of themselves, but for the purpose of confecting the sacrament it is not appropriate to use them since Christ established the model for the confection of the sacraments which was carried on by the Apostles. He did likewise for Holy Orders in conferring the sacrament on men only: a woman, like using wine in baptism, is not valid matter for confection of the sacrament- it DOES NOT mean she isn't good enough.

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barneyjo | Aug 09, 2010, 06:37 AM EDT

So, according to the views of Carroll09 and others, it is necessary to consider whether or not God the Father was and is a Chauvinist; indeed the original Chauvinist?

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Carroll09 | Aug 01, 2010, 12:37 PM EDT

Good for you, P~Flynn: if only more people actually found out what the Church ACTUALLY teaches and WHY, rather than ranting about what they THINK the Church teaches. Bishop Fulton Sheen once remarked that there are not one hundred people in the United States who hate the Catholic Church, but there are millions who hate what they wrongly believe the Catholic Church to be. Mayosligo- if we Catholics seem backward to you it is merely because we have held fast to the teachings that Christ gave to the Apostles (which even they, the Apostles, did not presume to have the authority to alter). One can reduce this idea of women "priests" to an equality issue, but for those faithful to Christ it is much more than that. Interestingly, no one has argued that Christ was ignorant, out of touch or backward in not ordaining His own mother, Mary, a priest- imagine, the only woman in history who could actually have pronounced the words of the Consecration literally: "this is My Body; this is My Blood"...Perhaps it's because Christ has been forced to take a back-seat by those who have reduced the Church's teaching to solely an issue of equality.

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P~Flynn | Aug 01, 2010, 11:27 AM EDT

The last straw for women? Oh really? Maybe for some but definitely not for the majority of orthodox Catholic women like myself. The last straw for me would be if the Church exchanges its biblical, tradition-based teaching for modern feminist theory such as what the author has quoted above. God help us then.

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Mayosligo | Aug 01, 2010, 08:54 AM EDT

The Catholic Church continues to live in the past. It's ignorant, backward, out of touch veiw of the problems of it's people are why we and our children left the church thirty years ago. I can see no improvement at all since then.

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Carroll09 | Aug 01, 2010, 04:33 AM EDT

Knowthyself- St Pudentiana is certainly a saint of the Church but you are wrong to say that she was canonised in 820. There was no formal canonisation process in the Church until 993 when Pope John XV canonised St Ulrich. Before that saints were proclaimed by popular acclamation. Pudentiana died at age 16 and was certainly NOT a bishop. If the Church was suppressing records of such people then it was very generous to have her feastday observed on May 19. There were women in the early Church who claimed to have been ordained priests and bishops- no different to today - that doesn't mean their ordinations were valid. The earliest writings of the Apostolic Fathers, if you care to look, show that even the Apostles did not feel they had the authority to go against Christ's example and ordain women.

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knowthyself | Aug 01, 2010, 02:27 AM EDT

The Vatican is in Denial of Female Priests , Decons and Bishops and they have Lyed about it. Its Church History , Two Females were Ordained as Priests in the Early Catholic Church. and in the year Both were Made Bishops, Bishop Ttheodora Bishop Pudentiana . Both Have their Names and Picture inscribed Tiles over the Altar of Saint Praxedis Church.Bishop Pudentiana was cannonised a Saint in 820 AD.The Church has suppressed most of the Records of the early church , But Many have survived in private hands . and in The Vatican and has leaked out. The Church is known for its Denial of Female Priests , Bishops and yes its Pedophile Priests. nothing new Here same o same o. its the Old Boys Politicial Club,--- Duck Cover Hide and lie lie lie. Men of Satan not of God !!

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Carroll09 | Jul 31, 2010, 04:33 AM EDT

Jamthecat- you asked me why priests who rape children aren't excommunicated. Excommunication is not - or rather it is very rarely - a formal process where the Church says "you are excommunicated". There are many grave acts which cut one off from unity with the Church or which show that a person doesn't desire to foster this unity - such acts can incur automatic (or "latae sententiae") excommunication. That said, the Church (the Catechism is very clear on this) will never refuse to receive back a repentant sinner. But the bottom line is that the Church has not cut the sinner/criminal off from the Church - the person involved has done it through their own actions.

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Michele123 | Jul 31, 2010, 02:23 AM EDT

I am saddened by these changes. Once again, the Pope and his Papal Palace residents are involved with the discrimination of women. It disgusts me to compare the penalties for priests who abuse not only children, but also women. They get away with it, but the women suffer excommunication, without abuse to anyone, man, woman or child. No wonder we are losing people. especially families in the Catholic Church, it's very sad.

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CitizenWhy | Jul 31, 2010, 12:00 AM EDT

What's so bad about ex-communication? The church is wrong. People should do the right thing. Equality for women is the best hope of a civilized world. And the only way the church will reflect God's charity and justice. Please put to rest the silly argument that the priesthood was instituted at the Last Supper and no women were present so no women should be priests. The Last Supper was only completed with the Resurrection, and a woman was the first that the Risen Christ appeared to. And women were present at Pentecost.

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pubhopper | Jul 30, 2010, 09:28 PM EDT

This is typial and is why I am a recovering catholic. Even with 8 years of nun, 4 of Franciscans and 4 of Jesuits, I have lost complete faith in those in charge of the churcy. They make some of the current crop of politicians look honest.

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jamthecat | Jul 30, 2010, 07:28 PM EDT

Not to nitpick, Carroll09, but if people "excommunicate themselves," then why aren't the priests who rape children excommunicated? It goes completely against the teachings of Christ. Why were they helped to evade the law and those who aided and abetted their evil acts promoted within the ranks of this church instead of being excommunicated? Do you think like the pope and his minions do -- that it's all right for an adult man to have sexual relations with a pre-adolescent boy or girl, in direct violation of public law?

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Carroll09 | Jul 30, 2010, 05:04 PM EDT

Mcdolan - firstly,on what basis do you place more credence on an author of fiction than on the teaching of Apostles which were hand-picked by Christ & who were charged not only with teaching the truth, they were also promised the guidance of the Holy Spirit forever to teach this truth. Secondly, if Church, as you say, "trashed" certain gospels as heresy, then why were they not reinstated by the sixteenth-century Protestant "reformers"? Luther, for example, was perfectly happy to reject books which did not suit his new doctrines, so why did he never attempt to add books which never even belonged to the Christian canon of Scripture? I would suggest that even these "reformers" were aware of their dubious authorship and did not dispute the Church's decision that they are not inspired texts. Also, you claim that Canon Law is manmade, and certainly some things are subject to change and development, but teachings of the Church which belong to the "deposit of faith" (Apostolic teaching) cannot change - developed, yes; but not disregarded.

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mcdolan | Jul 30, 2010, 03:18 PM EDT

If Dan Browne's and others' research is to be believed (and I do believe it),in the earliest gospels woman figured prominently in preaching the Word of God, and it is claimed that Mary Magdalene had a gospel attributed to her. Of course, this along with many others were trashed by the Church as heresy and only Matthew, Mark, Luke and John gospels became acceptable. Canon Law is manmade, and most unfortunately the discrimination continues after all these centuries.

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Carroll09 | Jul 30, 2010, 02:41 PM EDT

"Despite all these positive developments, though, it seems certain that they will be overshadowed by the women ordination rules" - the positive developments are only being overshadowed by "the women ordination rules" because the media keep mis-representing the facts. Firsly,there is nothing new in the Church's teaching on women's ordination: the Church's current position doesn't differ at all from Apostolic teaching on the matter.Secondly, this idea that the Church excommunicates people is a fallacy: PEOPLE EXCOMMUNICATE THEMSELVES. Those who do not desire unity with the Roman Catholic Church or who knowingly and deliberately disobey or disregard its teaching on faith and morals are automatically excommunicated "latae sententiae". So what's the big deal? If people want to be part of the Church, then they should foster unity in it - those who disregard its teachings, such as those who ordain female "priests", those who are "ordained" as female "priests", or indeed, those who commit horrific abuse, do not desire unity with the Church, so they shouldn't be so shocked to be told outright that they are in no way in union with Rome, no matter how they try to convince the outside world that they are.

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