“A Sunday Without Women” in the Archdiocese of Portland, Oregon

Frates ^ | September 25, 2010

[NYer]

Mary Magdalene: Will be attending...

Despite their claims to the contrary, organizers behind Sunday’s scheduled world-wide protest ”A Sunday Without Women” are promoting women’s ordination and the boycotting of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass within the Archdiocese of Portland, Oregon. Promotional material for the event reads:

Catholic women of the world unite. September 26 is the day to boycott Mass and pray for greater inclusion of women in the Catholic church.

In her misguided call to empty pews in the hope of ”making the powers that be think again”, Irish convert and instigator of the protest, Jennifer Sleeman recently noted that she herself, “Had always had questions about the fact that women could not be ordained.”

And again, this statement of purpose:

“Stay at home and pray for change. We are the majority. We may have been protesting individually but unremarked on, but together we have strength and our absence, the empty pews, will be noticed.

Whatever change you long for, recognition, ordination, the end of celibacy, which is another means of keeping women out, join with your sisters and let the hierarchy know by your absence that the days of an exclusively male-dominated church are over.”

And so too, some believe here.

Jennifer Sleeman: Questions the fact that women can't be ordained as Roman Catholic priests

The pro-women’s ordination group sponsoring the protest, One Spirit ~ One Call, along with the local chapter members of the dissident church reform organization Call To Action are asking for help in “talking up” the event in every parish throughout the archdiocese. And as if this breach of fidelity and communion weren’t serious enough, they have/are now recruiting help in contacting and promoting “Sunday Without Women” at Catholic high schools and colleges, as their website memo clearly reveals:

Last week One Spirit ~ One Call was shared at the Call to Action meeting. Other organizations and groups we are working on getting in touch with are the Catholic high schools and colleges in the area and, of course, all the parishes. If you have contacts or would like to take the lead in contacting and “talking up” this event to any of these groups, please get in touch with Julie Granger: [E-mail omitted]

Archdiocese Response

Despite an Infallible declaration that ensures the subject of ordaining women to the Catholic priesthood is settled matter and will never change, some don’t accept this portion of church teaching as final, or fail in their duty to support and enforce it. And thus, the true reality that false ordination of women is grave sin punishable through excommunication becomes further obscured within the hearts of the faithful. Especially, when events such as this one are allowed to be promoted within the archdiocese beforehand, and at times with the carefully worded support of parish priest’s. For example:

Rev. J. Mosbrucker

In the Gospels, we hear Jesus treat women with respect and equality. Paul continues this attitude toward women, especially in the phrase “there is no longer male or female…”. It is time for the Church to reclaim this Gospel message. One Spirit-One Call is an opportunity to begin the dialogue to reclaim this status for women in the Church. I support this event as a beginning in this process.

Rev. Robert W. Krueger

Women have the human right, also a right recognized in Catholic Church law, to express the pain of the inequality they experience in the church and their opinions for change to their bishops and other Christian faithful. One Spirit~One Call will be an opportunity for women to make this expression clearly and strongly. I gladly endorse the event.

Msgr. Charles Lienert, Pastor, St. Andrew Catholic Church

I support the event on September 26 that calls for increasing the awareness of injustice to women in the Catholic Church. Women are equal to men in the eyes of God through creation and baptism.

Despite some of his own pastor’s backing the demonstration on Sunday, it appears that Archbishop Vlazny is opposed. Local’s here will remember that His Eminence was previously bush-whacked 3-plus-years ago by members of this same chapter of Call To Action with their secretly organizing the non-ordination (and subsequent self-excommunication) of Toni Tortorilla–and that, on the very same day His Imminence was personally ordaining authentic priests. Yet, nonetheless, all this will remain baffling for the faithful, and understandably so, if it’s true as has been reported that supporting pastors of the current protest will not face any disciplinary measures.

I for one would not recommend criticizing His Imminence… I do recommend contacting the Archdiocese with your concerns. And especially this one:

The nature of Catholic dissent and action has changed. And faithful Catholics would do well to make this fact known to their pastors and shepherd’s. In this case, Archbishop Vlazny.

With the creation of the American Catholic Council (ACC) set for Detroit, Michigan in 2011, all the former “old-Guard” individual reform groups such as Call To Action have now organized under this one banner of the ACC, and are currently in the process of creating and promoting so-called listening dialogue sessions in our communities. All with the intention of eventually addressing the hierarchy with their dialogue (demands) for change; a moral as well as structural push for change of the Catholic Church in America. And this current protest blip in the process appears to be directed toward this same goal, by the same folks, within the Archdiocese of Portland, Oregon.

From the One Spirit – One Call website:

What’s next?
The Spirit is guiding us as we plan and organize. We believe that One Spirit ~ One Call has the potential to become more than an event; it could the beginning of a new movement among God’s people and within the Church. We will contribute positively to reform and renewal in our Church. One Spirit ~ One Call will continue to use women’s wisdom and processes, inviting women to begin holding small gatherings to share their stories and name their hopes and dreams for the church. These small gatherings will begin in October and November; what comes out of the One Spirit ~ One Call Circles will guide us. When the time is right, we imagine we will enter into dialogue with the hierarchy. This all needs to be discerned and we will engage in a discernment gathering on the Feast of Christ the King, Nov. 21, at St. Charles Parish.

This all sounds too familiar to the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis with this Saturday’s past convening of the Catholic Coalition for Church Reform (CCCR). A new organization that the Archdiocese find necessary to warn the faithful about:

It has come to the attention of the Archdiocese that a group calling itself the Catholic Coalition for Church Reform (CCCR) is planning a 2010 ‘synod’ in the Archdiocese entitled, ‘Claiming Our Place at the Table’.

While the agenda for the proposed synod purports to be an exploration of the role of baptized Catholics within the institutional Church of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis, it is not being conducted under the auspices of the Archdiocese, the universal Roman Catholic Church, or any entity or organization affiliated with the Archdiocese or the universal Roman Catholic Church.

The Archdiocese wishes it to be known that the Catholic Coalition for Church Reform, the 2010 synod, and individuals endorsing the same, are not agents or entities of the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis or the Roman Catholic Church. Moreover, the Archdiocese wishes to lovingly caution those members of the faithful participating in the ‘work/study groups’ and intending to attend the synod of the potential that the issues on which CCCR will seek reform are magisterial teachings of the Church, and are therefore to be believed by divine and catholic faith. The Archdiocese also wishes to remind the faithful of its need to shun any contrary doctrines, and instead to embrace and retain, to safeguard reverently and expound faithfully, the doctrine of faith and morals proposed definitively by the magisterium of the Church.

Let us hope for the same warning.

[Northern Yankee]

Nope... didn't need the sarcasm tag. I was with you at the outset.

Love the rant Mrs. A. Right on the money.

[Tax-chick]

LOL! I was mopping the kitchen in my nightgown when the choir began arriving ...

[SumProVita]

Don’t you DARE be sorry for passionately defending the TRUTH! As a woman who temporarily fell into a bit of the radical feminist thinking myself, I quickly learned that the philosophical and spiritual underpinnings of radical feminism come straight from “below.” At best, they are self-serving; at their worst, purely evil and destructive.

We would not all be called to actually BE SAINTS if it was not possible. Grace from God....

;-)

[Coleus]

one apostle for each tribe in Israel.

[savagesusie]

The example of these radical feminists is one of lust for POWER. Period.

Not only that, it is an example of Marxist philosophy that has been taught in the US. This cultural Marxism says there is no difference between a man and a woman, which is like saying there is no difference between a rooster and hen. They ignore Natural Law Theory which is founded in logic and reason and science.

They have to be called for the Marxists that they are. They are trying to destroy the natural family and push "homosexuality" as normal and equal....all to promote this absurd "utopia" since they are really godless and do not believe in heaven. They understand, for Marxist ideology to prevail, they have to destroy Christianity in its orthodox form and they are trying to destroy the Catholic Church. These are very ugly, selfish women, who really have no souls and no belief in God at all.