Women’s Ordination Advocates Support Day of Action on September 26, 2010

US Contact: Erin Saiz Hanna, Women’s Ordination Conference, Executive Director/ WOW Leadership
 e: ehanna@womensordination.org, t: + (202) 675-1006

UK Contact: Therese Koturbash, WOW Leadership
 e: koturbash@btconnect.com, t: +44(-0)1923 779 446

 
Women’s Ordination Worldwide (WOW) stands in solidarity with Catholic women in Ireland who call for a widespread boycott of Mass on Sunday, September 26, 2010. 
 
"Women make up 60% of Mass-goers and 80% of lay ministers. If each one of us took action on one single day, there is no doubt that this would be a powerful and significant event," stated Erin Saiz Hanna, Executive Director of the Washington, D.C. based Women’s Ordination Conference (WOC), the oldest and largest advocacy group in support of women’s ordination. "The practical, financial, and political implications would be substantial to say the least," Hanna continued.
 
Jennifer Sleeman, an active Catholic from Cork, Ireland initiated this movement when she urged women of Ireland to send a message to the Vatican that "women are tired of being treated as second-class citizens in the Church." This call which began with one woman is now spreading beyond the shores of Ireland as women around the world link arms together for participation in the day of action.
 
In solidarity with Sleeman, WOW supports her call for justice for women in the Catholic Church. Recognizing the many different ways of bearing witness to the institutional sin of sexism that marginalizes women in the Church, on September 26th, 2010 WOW encourages people of Catholic faith to consider organizing one of the following options for their parish communities:
 

• Withhold Funds: Instead of making a donation at collection time, place a note in the collection basket that expresses your support for women’s ordination.
• Wear green armbands to Mass.
• Boycott Mass: Grieving the Church’s sin of sexism, participate in a prayerful fast from mass.  Gather together in one of the many other meaningful ways in which the Eucharist can be celebrated.

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Women’s Ordination Conference (WOC), founded in 1975 and based in Washington, D.C., is the oldest and largest national organization working for the ordination of women as priests, deacons, and bishops into an inclusive and accountable Roman Catholic Church. WOC also promotes new perspectives on ordination that call for less separation between the clergy and laity. 

Women’s Ordination Worldwide (WOW), was founded in 1996 at the First European Women’s Synod in Gmunden, Austria. It is an ecumenical network of national and international groups whose primary mission at this time is the admission of Roman Catholic women to all ordained ministries. WOW is founded on the principle of equality and therefore opposes any discrimination. ‘There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus’. (Galatians 3.28). WOW affirms the God-given diversity of humanity and is committed to providing a model of collaborative, non-hierarchical leadership.