INTRODUCTION to “The Question of Women and the Priesthood”

from The Question of Women and the Priesthood, Sr Vincent Emmanuel Hannon, Geoffrey Chapman 1967, pp.13-20. Republished on our website with the necessary permissions.

The twentieth century is a questioning age; the passive acceptance of tradition, conventions or theories without demur may have been a mark of previous times, but it is no longer so today. Rationalism on the one hand and existentialism on the other are in part responsible for this mentality. It may be that Marxism too, with its notion of the part conflict plays in the process of development and maturity, has influenced this century to ask daring questions. No longer however is questioning taken for revolt. Indeed in these present times we are encouraged to ask and probe. If this is true in secular sciences it is no less true in theology. In fact the Church her self, reflecting on her two thousand years' life and activity, is today courageously rethinking her own position. Not to ask a question is often nothing but mental laziness, which is no less often taken for submission and loyalty. But we of the household of the faith, while enjoying ‘the liberty of the sons of God’, are safeguarded in our very probings from the evil of error by submitting our queries to her, who is the ‘pillar and the ground of truth’.

Every age has its quota of problems to solve, but very often they are posed prematurely or arise from caprice and party interests and hence are shelved for the attention of subsequent generations. It is a phenomenon of history that this very shelving or dodging of issues makes them more critical and urgent. Today the question ‘Can women be priests?’ is asked with such confidence that it hardly evokes the open ridicule and the patronizing attitude which were the customary reactions to this question in the past. The confidence of the modern woman in making this query is based on her newly-acquired and hard-won status, which Pope John XXIII so generously acknowledged in his encyclical Pacem in Terris:

It is obvious to everyone that women are now taking a part in public life. This is happening more rapidly perhaps in nations of Christian civilization, and, more slowly but broadly, among peoples who have inherited other traditions or cultures. Since women are becoming ever more conscious of their human dignity, they will not tolerate being treated as mere material instruments, but demand rights befitting a human person both in domestic and in public life.(1)

The twentieth century therefore provides a new and, one hopes, a more mature climate in which the question of women and holy orders can be discussed with sufficient seriousness. We know that the Councils of Florence(2) and Trent(3), which dealt with the sacraments, say nothing explicitly of the exclusion of women from the priesthood. In general it is true to say that the Catholic approach to the subject is negative: St Paul has said the last word! Representative of Catholic opinion on the matter is Dom Cabrol's statement made in The Tablet of 16 March, 1918: ‘For the Catholic Church the question can have no existence . . .’. For other Christian Churches the possibility of women being priests is a burning question which no Church can go on refusing to discuss now that it has been asked’.(4) Indeed one modern author has claimed that ‘if there had been no Reformation, and there were no Protestants, this problem would not now plague the Church’.(5)

One asks if women can be priests not in a spirit of a once popular song :

"Anything you can do
I can do better . . ."

but as an obvious question, and this for many reasons: the new status of women in the twentieth century as contrasted with that in which St Paul wrote; the vital need today of more priests; the new light shed through biblical and patristic studies, as well as the admission of women to the ministry by many non-Catholic Churches - all combine to make one take the question of women and orders seriously and rethink the possibility of their ordination without giving a hasty solution, however tentative. What is there in Christian revelation that deprives woman from participating in the sacrament of Order? How much of what is found in sacred scripture and tradition comes from cultural environment and how much is the will of God? Courage to think slowly and without prejudice is a necessary requisite at the human level. The final answer rests with the infallible magisterium of the Church of Christ. The Spirit of God works in and through this organ, but he sometimes works from below, as history has evidenced, choosing the ignorant and poor to provoke sane and authentic questions, however uncomfortable.

Discussion on the possibility of the ordination of women is in fact not a new issue at all. The early Church, perhaps because of the excesses of the Marcionites, Montanists and Collyridians, had occasion to prohibit the ordination of deaconesses(6). Tertullian(7) and Epiphanius(8) too in their mockery of `female heretics' initiated the long patristic tradition of prohibitions, restrictions and, one must admit, prejudices as far as the ministry of women is concerned. There are, however, reasons for believing that at the beginning, in some Churches at least, the idea of the sacramental character of deaconesses was accepted, but nowhere is there any hint that women were ordained to the priesthood proper. The contention of this study is that there was indeed an order of ordained deaconesses in the early Church and that the position of women in Christianity, especially in regard to the ministry,(9) has been greatly conditioned by historical factors. From admitting the existence of a female diaconate to accepting the possibility of sharing in the sacerdotal powers is not such a large step. There are many theologians, including St Thomas, who have held that even the minor orders are a part of holy order, and this opinion is still tenable today. It is unquestionable that women never received the power of the priesthood proper. But is it far-fetched to suggest that the low status of women, which persisted in the Christian era, forced the Church at that time to take the stand it did? Women's lack of learning, their legal disabilities, together with the fanatical excesses of heretics in the early Christian community - all contributed towards confirming women in their inferior position.

In the secular world of today woman has acquired a totally new status, though certainly not without tremendous effort, against odds which often seemed insurmountable. This ‘coming into her own’ has been a painful and slow development. So much ignorance, prejudice and hatred had first to be conquered. The entrance of women into any of the professions is typical of their admittance to all. The universities of the United States began in the late nineteenth century to admit women to the study of law. But then all was not clear. In England, fear that they would swamp the legal profession caused the Inns of Court to refuse at least three women, and for the same reason the Law Society obtained a Queen's Bench judgment protecting the solicitor's profession from their entry. In fact it was not until 1919 that an Act of Parliament opened all professions to women in England.(10) The first profession to admit women was teaching. Previously they had been considered too weak to enforce discipline, but the great need for teachers compelled the profession to open its doors to women, who were then the readiest source of personnel. What happens in secular affairs, however, can never be a precedent for thinking that one day the last stronghold, the altar, will also yield to either force of circumstances or feminine importunity. No, the reluctance to admit women into the secular fields is cited to show the amount of prejudice that has existed wherever there was question of women.

One can quote the vilifications that have been uttered against women from pagan times right down through the Christian era. For Virgil she was ‘varium et mutabile semper’;(11) Aristotle designates her as an incomplete or mutilated male; (12) the Chinese thought that a woman without ability was normal(13) amongst the Hindus ‘infidelity, violence deceit, envy, extreme avarice, a total want of good qualities with impurity were thought to be her natural faults’.(14) In Hebrew society by and large she was held in higher esteem, but the Jew began his morning thanking Yahweh ‘who hast not made me a heathen, a slave or a woman’. One rabbi is quoted as saying ‘Let the words of Torah rather be destroyed than imparted to a woman’.(15) Christian writings can be quoted to the same effect: the medieval abbot who thought it unsafe for a woman to know Latin is well known. There was ready sympathy for Napoleon's dictum that he wanted women who believed but did not reason. On reading some of the patristic and scholastic writings one realizes that the full benefit of the moral status which Christianity brought to woman was long-deferred. In view of the better conditions which the twentieth century has given her, one cannot help wondering whether St Paul would still lay down the restrictions he set upon the women of the Churches of Corinth and Ephesus, if he appeared again in our midst. Or is it to be held as dogma that historical and cultural circumstances do not, in some indefinable way, condition the insertion of divine revelation into the concrete situation? One might just as well declare that the incarnation had no relation whatever to the sin of mankind.

The great shortage of clergy even in Catholic nations and the continued increase of pagan populations in our times make the question of a female priesthood a matter of expediency. The situation in countries like South America, however, does not mean that the answer can be found in present circumstances or in expediency or in any sphere other than the theological, no matter how urgent the need for more priests. For the problem is basically a theological one. Nevertheless this very need for priests should hasten discussion of the subject and it is the opinion of the present writer that although the problem is theological it is conditioned by many contingent factors, especially those of a sociological and historical nature. This accounts for the amount of space I have given to the position of woman in those cultures which influenced the writing of the scriptures and subsequent Christian thinking. Frank and positive study of the possibility of the ordination of women to the priesthood can at least do no harm, and in any case a clear declaration of the Church's teaching on this seems a necessity. The Catholic position is frequently branded as obscurantist, or ridiculed for dismissing the question in syllogistic form. Typical of this criticism is Prohl's parody of the Thomistic view:

Woman must be in subjection. A woman must wear her hair long to indicate this subjection. A monk or priest must have a tonsure. Since it is impossible to have hair short and long at the same time, a woman cannot be a monk or a priest! (16)

Another author declares that the Catholic Church settles this issue without even discussing it.(17)

The traditional arguments against the ordination of women are felt to be most unsatisfactory and unconvincing by those who in recent years have studied the question. This indicates the urgency of a Catholic re-appraisal. Honest, unprejudiced and frank discussion of this subject, not an investigation to give assurances that a feminine priesthood is in no way contemplated, is imperative precisely because so many non-Catholic bodies have found their own answers. The fact that their conception of the priesthood and ours are totally different makes a Catholic inquiry all the more urgent. For the greater part these denominations have admitted women to various grades of the ministry because of a lack of male personnel. All however have attempted to justify their decision by appealing to scripture and theological arguments. Once again it is important to insist that expediency can never solve this, which is at root a theological problem. The opinion expressed in recent years by members of several denominations that the raising of this question adds further confusion to the whole ecumenical situation is not fully intelligible. It is true that bitter division has arisen in the Church of Sweden over this issue, and in other denominations indecision and divided opinion also prevail. Of the members of the World Council of Churches ninety do not admit women to the ministry at all, while twentyone did not answer the inquiry sent out by this body. On the other hand, forty-eight Churches admitted women to the full ministry and nine allowed them to the partial or occasional ministry.(18) It is consequently difficult to see how raising this question could be a serious obstacle to Christian unity. Ecumenism is concerned with truth, and the hushing up of any, especially modern, theological problems cannot but hurt the cause of this movement. It does not mean that prudence is not called for but this, no matter how essential, can never be a substitute for truth. In the light of the total present situation it would seem a greater imprudence, indeed a disservice to truth and an undesirable risk, not to face the issue. For Catholics, the answer to the question ‘Can women be priests?’ must be found in scripture and tradition. It is only the magisterium of the Church guided from above that can give the final word; but the raising or pursuing of the question might well be prompted from below by the Holy Spirit of God.

Notes

1. Trans. Vatican Polyglot Press, 1963, Part, p.13.

2. Denziger 1310f.

3. Denziger 1764f.

4. Madeleine Barot, ‘Women and the Ministry’, Laity Bulletin, IX (July, 1960).

5. Russell C. Prohl, Woman in the Church, Michigan, 1957, p.15.

6. E.g. the Council of Orange in 441, can. 26: ‘Diaconae omnimodis non ordinandae: si quae iam sunt benedictioni quae populo impenditur capita submittat.’

7. PL 2:56: ‘Ipsae mulieres haereticae quam procaces quae audeant docere...’

8. PG 42:739.

9. The use of this word throughout, except where it is qualified, refers to its meaning in the strict sense of participation in the priestly officee of Christ through ordination to the major or minor orders.

10. Sex Disqualification Act. There was one reservation: diplomatic, consular and certain higher civil service appointments were open to men only. This disability was removed in 1946.

11. Aeneid, IV, 569.

12. De Generatione Animalium ii, 3.

13. 'Women' in Encyclopaedia Britannica, 24 vols., London, 1954.

14. Ibid.

15. A.Cohen, Everyman's Talmud, London, 1932, p.189.

16. Prohl, ‘Women and the Ministry, op.cit., p.15.

17. C.E.Raven, Women and Holy Orders, London, 1828, p.99.

18. This is the statistical position as known to the World Council of Churches in 1958. For further information on ecumenical considerations see the Church of England Report, Women and Holy Orders, London, 1966.

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