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The Church of England voted on Saturday to ordain women as bishops, a major liberalising step in a faith that has also faced schism over homosexuality, although it could be years before the first woman bishop is named. The church has ordained women as priests for a decade and one in six parish priests is now a woman. But the church maintained what critics called a "stained-glass ceiling" that prevented women from rising to the rank of bishop. At their synod in York, the three "houses" of laity, priests and bishops each voted overwhelmingly in favour of a motion that...

By coincidence, a potentially historic speech about women that received little media fanfare was made two weeks before America's Episcopal Church elected Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori as its leader, the first female to head a branch of the international Anglican Communion. The speaker was Cardinal Walter Kasper, the Vatican's top official on relations with non-Catholic Christians, addressing a private session with the Church of England's bishops and certain women priests. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, spiritual leader of the 77 million Anglicans, invited Kasper to discuss the English church's projected move to allow women bishops. To date, only the United...

I propose that three innovations made by the mainline Churches, especially the Episcopal Church, of the USA are like three triplets – that is they not only belong together but they are intimately related and have proceeded from the same womb and parents. All belong in origin to the radical period that began in the late 1960s and continued into the 1970s. They are: the new doctrine of matrimony that was adopted by the ECUSA in its 1973 Marriage Canon and its Marriage Service in the Prayer Book approved by the 1976 & 1979 General Conventions; the new doctrine of...

The Church “cannot remain as it always has been,” Archbishop Ellison Pogo told over 100 delegates to the 11th General Synod of the Church of Melanesia, and called for the Anglican Church in the Central Pacific to permit the ordination of women to the priesthood. The Anglican Churches of the Global South are as divided over the issue of women’s orders as is the Church of England. Evangelical provinces such as Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda ordain women -- while Nigeria and Southeast Asia do not. Anglo-Catholic Provinces are equally divided with Central Africa opposed and the West Indies in favour...

One Ontario Roman Catholic priest has been suspended for publicly supporting the ordination of women clergy and a second is under close scrutiny from his superiors after his declaration on national television that he is homosexual. Rev. Ed Cachia was fired as pastor of St. Michael's Parish in Cobourg, east of Toronto, after he wrote an article in the Cobourg Daily Star urging his church to admit women to the priesthood and reportedly told his bishop he had celebrated mass with women priests in the United States. Rev. Tom Lynch, a spokesman for the Catholic diocese of Peterborough, which includes...

An Eastern Ontario Catholic priest has been stripped of his duties for suggesting women could someday become priests. Rev. Edward Cachia "can no longer be relied upon to celebrate the Eucharist within the Church as Christ intended," states a letter from Peterborough Diocese Bishop Nicola De Angelis. Cachia served at St. Michael's parish in Cobourg. Following an unofficial ordination of nine women on a tour boat on the St. Lawrence River near Kingston in July, Cachia told the Cobourg Daily Star that he hoped the ceremony was "the beginning of a new and awesome change in the life of the...

p>OTTAWA, October 7, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The October 2005 issue of Toronto based Catholic Insight magazine contains a detailed report on two recent Catholic women’s ordination conferences. The insider account reveals that the internationally publicized ‘ordination’ events were more a front for a wider agenda to grab power and insert acceptance of homosexuality, abortion and a New Age type of anti-Christian religion into Catholic institutions. The Catholic Insight article, The ‘ordination’ of ‘womenpriests’ by Donna O'Conner-Hunnisett, especially relates the content of various talks given by speakers at the second Women’s Ordination Conference which took place at Ottawa’s Carleton University. The...

Bonavoglia Takes On the Men in Skirts If those who fight for justice are truly blessed, then Angela Bonavoglia must be nearing sainthood. In "Good Catholic Girls," she tells her own charged story and that of other faithful women who seek equality and reform from within the Catholic Church. (WOMENSENEWS)--One Easter Sunday in the late 1980s, Angela Bonavoglia, headed for Mass at St. Peter's Cathedral in Scranton, Pa.Years earlier, she'd written an article for New Directions for Women, a feminist newspaper, criticizing the Vatican's directive against ordaining women. Since then her frustration had been growing."I know I'm going to...

For 2,000 years, the Catholic Church has ordained only men to the ministerial priesthood, and many have accused this teaching of being an archaic, anti-feminine remnant of a patriarchal society. But are these claims true? Should women be allowed to be priests? In this essay we will look at the theological reasons why the Church not only does not but also cannot validly ordain women. There are several reasons why the Church doesn’t allow women to be priests, but I think they can be summed up in four main points: Jesus didn’t choose female Apostles, the Apostles followed in Jesus’...

When Priests Don't Run the ParishIn this diocese, lay people, deacons and nuns have new roles. By Larry B. Stammer Times Staff Writer May 18, 2003 Faced with a shortage of priests in one of the fastest-growing regions in the nation, the Roman Catholic diocese of San Bernardino is becoming a national leader in using lay Catholics, nuns and permanent deacons to run parishes and meet the spiritual needs of its flock. Though virtually every diocese in the country faces a serious shortage of priests that threatens to leave parishes without full-time clergy, the San Bernardino diocese, which covers San...

VATICAN CITY, JULY 23, 2002 (Zenit.org).- Seven women who took part June 29 in Austria in a simulated priestly ordination were officially excommunicated at midnight Monday. That is when a deadline set by the Vatican expired. The deadline came in a "monitum," or canonical warning, issued by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, on July 10. He called on the seven women to acknowledge that the "ordination" was invalid and repent publicly. The simulated priestly ordination was carried out by an Argentine, Romulo Antonio Braschi, founder of a schismatic community. In a letter...

On January 15 the U.S. Bishops conference passed a regulation prohibiting preaching by lay ministers "at the moment reserved for the homily." Since over 82% of all paid lay ministers are women, the new regulation effectively silences women's voices in Sunday worship. In June, 600 Catholics in the Indianapolis diocese sent a petition to the U.S. Bishops meeting in Dallas asking them to rescind the regulation. They organized after Indianapolis Bishop Daniel Buechlein' sought to reverse a long standing practice permitting lay ministers to preach after the proclamation of the Gospel. On July 22, nearly 200 groups in the U.S....

Why Women Can Never Be Priests I begin with the assumption that doctrinally the issue of women's ordination is settled. The papal statement and its subsequent clarification were clear, perhaps painfully so. I know that not everyone in the Catholic Church agrees. Some feel since the declaration may not be infallible, it could be reversed in the future. Others consider that the doctrine must be "received," that is everyone or almost everyone has to agree before it becomes binding. And a few will point to the Galileo affair or slavery to argue that all teachings of the magisterium are...

DECLARATION ON PRIESTLY ORDINATION OF CATHOLIC WOMENVATICAN CITY, JUL 10, 2002 (VIS) - Following is a declaration by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith which warns seven Catholic women who have received priestly ordination from the hands of the founder of a schismatic community. They are required to comply with certain conditions before July 22 if they do not wish to incur excommunication. The declaration (monitum) is dated today and is signed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and Archbishop Tarcisio Bertone, S.D.B., prefect and secretary of the dicastery. "On June 29, 2002, Romulo Antonio Braschi, the founder of a...

An international movement seeking to ordain women as Catholic priests considers Denver a top contender for its first seminary. "Without any problem we could have 20 women ready" in Colorado to be ordained soon, Roberta Meehan said Monday. The Greeley college instructor was among a dozen Americans who witnessed the ordination two weeks ago of seven European women in Germany. The ritual was conducted by two excommunicated Catholic bishops on a boat cruising down the Danube. Meehan said she will be provost of the new seminary and that coordinators hope to launch it by this fall. Arizona sites are also...