God/ess: Sounding the Note of True Revolution

We must get rid of the parent image of God and become autonomous. Reuther sounds the true note of revolution: "Patriarchal theology uses the parent image for God to prolong spiritual infantilism and to make autonomy and assertion of free will a sin." Even the attractive human person of Christ will no longer serve as a model of "redemptive personhood" for women because "the Christological symbols have been used to enforce male dominance." "Must we not say that the ver limitations of Chris as a male person must lead to the conclusion that he cannot represent redemptive personhood for them? That they must emancipate themselves from Jesus and seek a new redemptive disclosure of god and of human possibility in female form?" Ruether proposes that we call the divine principle "God/ess." Feminists insist that, as a means of liberation, the people must reclaim the sacraments into their own administration. "Eucharist is not an objective piece of bread or a cup of wine that is magically transformed into the body and blood of Christ. Rather, it is the people, the ecclesia who are being transformed into the body of the new humanity." At the 1983 WomanChurch conference, Reuther, to ecstatic applause, described the historic church as an "idol of masculinity" and expounded the feminist revolutionary vision of liberation in messianic language: We are WomanChurch, not in exile, but in exodus. We flee the thundering armies of Pharaoh. We are not waiting for a call to return to the land of slavery and to serve as altar girls in the temples of patriarchy. Our brother Jesus did not come to this earth to manufacture this idol and he is not represented by this idol. We cry out -- horror, blasphemy, deceit, foul deed. We call our brothers [here she named several liberal Bishops who were in her audience] to flee with us from this idol with flashing eyes and smoking nostrils who is about to consume the earth … Together let us break up this great idol and grind it into powder, dismantle the great leviathan of violence and misery …. and transform it back into the means of peace and plenty, so that all the children of the earth can sit together at the banquet of life. Golly. And these are the women whom the bishops expect to placate by the changing of a few pronouns.

See also,

• Pursuit of Liberty: A Feminist Declaration of Sentiments Then (1848) and Now (1998)

• The Scholars & the Goddess

• Glenn Close Weighs in on Wicked Women

• Deconstructing the Western Mind: Gramscian Subversion of Faith & Education

• A Call to Vigilance ... Pastoral Instruction on "New Age"

• A Thought That Haunts Me Constantly

She's "ordained" only in her own brain.

False prophets.

Yet another Protestant group.

Well. She can start her own "church" alongside the other 22,000. No skin off my nose.

One thing's for sure: she ain't no "Catholic."

Seems like an awful lot of coverage for a woman Protestant minister. Last I checked, they were pretty common. Wonder why this is so significant?

The Catholic Church has been around for 2,000 years preaching the Word of God, teaching the Faithful and converting non-believers.

Sometimes, on rare and very thoughtful, inspired occasions, the Church has modified some of its practices -- but not our Faith and not our foundation.

Just because you might not like everything about the Catholic Church doesn't mean that the Church should throw it out. If the majority of Catholics decided that abortion was fine and dandy, does that mean they should break off of the Church because of the Church's firm support for the rights and Life of the Unborn? No, of course not!

The Church has taught that Priests must be male and celibate. Just because some people don't agree doesn't mean that Church should throw out 2,000 years of tradition to appease them.

God bless you, and God bless the Holy See.

Very interesting, but what does it have to do with Catholicism? The Old Catholics split off from the Catholic Church in the late 19th century, because they were angry about the Vatican I council's declaration of papal infallibility. They can call themselves "Catholic" till they're blue in the face, but they're not - they LEFT the Catholic Church over 100 years ago.

The point of my comments is not to criticize or put down Protestants. I firmly reject the medieval position that those who disagree with Catholicism should be forced to remain within it.

Today we have the completely opposite situation, where those who disagree with fundamental Catholic teachings still want to remain within Catholicism. However, it's deceptive when those who still remain within the Catholic Church, and yet disagree with its stand against ordaining women, insist that this woman is an "ordained Catholic priest." She simply isn't.

Bump!

Those who are separated from the Catholic Church remain part of it in a mysterious way, as they say, but maybe this applies to individuals, not to people who start their own separate sect.

The feminists are having a party day over this, it seems. And is it just me, or could these people have been smoking a few while this thing was going on?

more disobedience. How sad.
As a faithful Catholic that happens to be female, there are many places besides the altar for me to serve...and I do so joyfully, continuously striving for humility and obedience to the Lord..

"[T]he man is the head of the woman [1 Cor. 11:3], and he is originally ordained for the priesthood; it is not just to abrogate the order of the creation and leave the first to come to the last part of the body. For the woman is the body of the man, taken from his side and subject to him, from whom she was separated for the procreation of children. For he says, He shall rule over you [Gen. 3:16]. For the first part of the woman is the man, as being her head. But if in the foregoing constitutions we have not permitted them [women] to teach, how will any one allow them, contrary to nature, to perform the office of the priest? For this is one of the ignorant practices of Gentile atheism, to ordain women priests to the female deities, not one of the constitutions of Christ" (ibid., 3:9).

Yet another Protestant group. ... One thing's for sure: she ain't no "Catholic."

Well, it is the 'catholic' mistake to cut their church loose from the Scripture (in order to try to secure a 'market' for the profitable dispensation of grace) which allows weirdos like this a chance to make her own rules.

After all, if the RCC can ignore the Bible and claim validity for their man-made religon, why can't she?

No, I think she's just being 'a good catholic.' Obviously, she would be a lot better off trying to deterimine what the Word of God says about the role of women in authority in the church rather than trying to invent yet another 'infallible tradition'.

There is no Biblical justification for the ordination of women.

FReegards,

Oh give me a break...God created men and women EQUAL, but not the SAME. There's a difference. Why can't these people get that? We each have a role. That's a beautiful thing, in my opinion.

At least they have the decency to admit that they have nothing to do with the REAL Church.

Seems like an awful lot of coverage for a woman Protestant minister. Last I checked, they were pretty common. Wonder why this is so significant?

Because bashing Catholics, Jews, etc. is the standard here at FR. It wouldn't be a normal day here without it.[/sarcasm]

The occasion was the ordination of Mary Ramerman to the Catholic priesthood (not the Roman Catholic priesthood, but priesthood in the Old Catholic Church, which broke with Rome over papal infallibility but practices faith in the Catholic tradition).

It don't mean a thing if she ain't got that swing ...

I like your reply. There is a great amount of truth in your few words. Well stated. ;>)
Regards, lurkysis

"With all due respect," he said, "the church has to evolve faster or it will wither and die."

In contradistinction to the witness of the martyrs, who thought it was better to die than to apostatize. Non serviam summarizes the whole affair quite succinctly.

more disobedience. How sad.

You're right. It is sad.

These people are so utterly confused and lost. They associate the priesthood with earthly power and authority. There are certainly priests who do that, but they are bad priests.

Good priests remember that their office is to be an image of Christ, "who came not to be served but to serve". Like all Christians, but to a greater degree, the essence of their vocation is to crucify their fleshly selves.

All I hear from these feminist types is "me me me power power power me me me now now now". I don't hear much about being nailed to the Cross.

That's not the only point they miss. Here's a test for Catholics. Name five Catholic women who are more powerful than Pope John Paul II.

Ready? If you said, "There aren't any" ... you flunk.

The correct answer is, "Any five female saints in heaven." (There may, in fact, be five female saints on earth who qualify, but only God knows that for sure.)

The fact that women like Mary Ramerman think that the only way they can be "powerful" in the Church is to play at being ordained is a symptom of much deeper problem. At their core, these people have lost their faith. (I'm being generous and assuming that they originally had some to lose). They see earth as home and power as earthly power. Christians see earth as a way-station, and power as grace and salvation.