According to Giertych, theologians cannot say why Jesus chose only men as his Apostles any more than they can explain the purposes of the incarnation or the Eucharist. Nevertheless, he said, theology can help illuminate the "internal coherence and beauty of the mystery which has been offered to us by God. Reflecting on differences between the sexes, Giertych suggested other reasons men are especially suited to the priesthood.
Men are more likely to think of God in terms of philosophical definitions and logical syllogisms, he said, a quality valuable for fulfilling a priest's duty to transmit church teaching. Although the social and administrative aspects of church life are hardly off-limits to women, Giertych said priests love the church in a characteristically "male way" when they show concern "about structures, about the buildings of the church, about the roof of the church which is leaking, about the bishops' conference, about the concordat between the church and the state.
Giertych acknowledged that a Catholic woman might sincerely believe she is called to the priesthood, but said such a "subjective" belief does not indicate the objective existence of a vocation. Women are better able than men to perceive the "proximity of God" and enter into a relationship with him, Giertych said, pointing to the privileged role played by women in the New Testament.
Send your thoughts and reactions to Letters to the Editor. Learn more here. Join now. Why not women priests? The papal theologian explains Feb 5, Rocca , Catholic News Service.
Father Giertych said though women cannot be ordained priests, they do not play a secondary role in the church. Join the Conversation Send your thoughts and reactions to Letters to the Editor.
Theology Why not women priests? Her writings manifest the prayerful way she processed her desire. I have no doubt that it was challenging for her, nor that it continues to be challenging for other women. Perhaps when we ask if women can be ordained, we are asking the wrong question.
But the experiences of many may be more connected to a desire to improve upon flawed understandings or experiences of the priesthood. When we see our ordained leaders fail us, sincere Catholics start to look for solutions.
The problem with this is that we are responding to a failure, an abuse of power, which is more of a management crisis. And we think that in order to remedy the situation, power must be redistributed. That might be part of the solution, as I will discuss below. And yes, unfortunately, that reality has not been lived out by some of the ordained, even if we can all point to good examples of men who are ordained ministers.
When we experience more than a few tragic examples like the sex abuse scandals , faithful Catholics cannot but look for solutions to the problem. In terms of decision making, there is no reason why clerics cannot better incorporate the laity.
Yes, canon law does have a top-down model. At the same time, it does not limit a bishop or priest from delegating decision-making power. When speaking on the topic of transparency and the Catholic Church, each of them said that because they picked competent people—people who were skilled and willing to ask the tough questions—they never had to contradict the decisions of their diocesan finance councils. The same should be true of other advisory boards, such as those that review cases of sex abuse.
Relying on expert and strong-minded lay women and men is a way for a bishop to utilize professional expertise outside the realm of his own skillset and to be more certain in his decisions. While the bishop is ultimately responsible for the final decision, canon law does not prohibit him from diffusing the power of his office through collegiality. I would also add that often we think that priests are someone who they are not; in these cases, the laity performs a reverse clericalism.
We expect them to make significant decisions on important matters as if the only people who should weigh in are those in clerical collars. In some places, this is already happening. When Cardinal Pell was Prefect of the Secretariat of the Economy at the Vatican, he was known for designating a lay woman on his staff who was eminently qualified in economics to attend meetings that were traditionally reserved for ranking clerics.
Ordination, he understood, does not confer an M. In our Program of Church Management in Rome , we have been fortunate to construct a faculty that is representative of all vocations, in which practitioners share their expertise with current and future church leaders so that they may better steward the assets of the church. Of course, in order for this to work, the church has to be willing to pay competitive salaries for competent expertise. My proposal is more structural than the superficial attempts of those who want to keep dysfunctional clerical structures in place and simply add women.
Most of these roles in the church do not require priestly ordination. The church teaches consistently that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven are not the ordained, but the saints.
I would like to think that we are beyond the s, when many women in the workplace felt that to be accepted they had to act and dress like men. Women should not have to change who they are in order to have their significance in the church recognized. Also, it is important to recognize that the vast majority of men are not called to the priesthood; it makes little sense to limit or shape conversations about the vocation of women in the church around the subject of ordination.
Jesus said that the harvest is great. Perhaps the laborers are so few simply because we have not yet appreciated the depth and breadth of his witness. Similarly, at least in developed countries, we have seen a shift in the meaning of diversity. Now, when practiced integrally, diversity means that we value the perspectives of people of different backgrounds rather than expecting them to conform to the pre-existing ideals and characteristics of a larger group of people.
Science Technology Business U. Peter's Basilica. Pope Francis has changed church law to explicitly allow women to do more things during Mass, Monday Jan. Full Coverage: Religion. Connect with the definitive source for global and local news. The Associated Press.
0コメント