Catholic Women Announce Global Strike from Church Participation

In celebration of International Women’s Day, Catholic women are initiating a global strike from Church participation, attendance, and financial contributions throughout the month of May.  Organized by a network of 12 progressive Catholic organizations, the Catholic Women Strike campaign will begin on May 3rd, the “World Day of Prayer for Vocations,” and will nonviolently disrupt “business as usual” to demand women’s equal place at the altar and in Church governance. 

“Women are the lifeblood of the Church. They lead and coordinate the vast majority of parish ministries around the world. Without their presence and labor, vital work would be left undone, and pews would be empty,” said Kate McElwee, executive director of the Women’s Ordination Conference. “Despite women’s essential role, we are left out of decision-making structures and sacramental leadership through ordained ministry. This injustice cannot continue.” 

Inspired by the German “Maria 2.0” movement, Catholic Women Strike will commemorate the one-year anniversary of the on-going movement in Germany, and encourage those participating in the strikes to wear white as a unifying color of women’s suffrage. 

The month-long demonstrations calls upon the institutional Church to: 

• To remove all barriers to ministry and governance for women;
• To reform church teaching on sexuality to reflect the complex reality of lived experience, primacy of conscience, and pastoral needs of the people of God;
• To transform church teaching and practice to end all oppression of LGBTI+ people,  persons of color, impoverished people , and all currently on the margins in the wholeness of their personhood.
• To create structures and processes that bring the expertise of all Catholics — especially women — to call our entire church to a just reckoning of clerical sex abuse and cover up.

“The Church cannot afford to stall on equality any longer,” said Linda Pinto of CORPUS. “The all-male, celibate hierarchy has failed to live the Gospel by upholding prejudice and is simply no longer trusted as a moral voice in the world.” 

“Catholic Women Strike will stand shoulder to shoulder with Catholic women everywhere until the Good News of women’s full equality in ministry and governance in the Church is realized,” concluded Deb Rose-Milavec, co-director of FutureChurch.

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For more information and details on local actions, please visit cwstrike.org

Contact: Kate McElwee, Executive Director, Women’s Ordination Conference kmcelwee@womensordination.org

Deb Rose-Milavec, Co-Director, FutureChurch
debrose@futurechurch.org

Linda Pinto, CORPUS
corpususa@gmail.com