Category: Women’s Ordination

I belong to a small faith group (small in numbers, hopefully not in faith!) whose recent discussion topic was: How do we live with uncertainty. Easily, I ventured, especially compared to living with its opposite which I have always found infinitely more difficult. Really, I wondered, how do we possibly manage to live with the…
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Congress can’t seem to pass a stimulus package or keep the president from hosting COVID parties. But here’s what I wish they would do: Ban the use of the phrase “In these difficult times.” You want to know difficult times? About five hundred years ago, a microscopic bacteria called y. pestis hitched a ride on…
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Of course, the central conceit of Pope Francis’s latest encyclical, Fratelli Tutti, is a problem. The deep meaning he attaches to “fraternity” is meant to extend the warm feeling of male bonding to all of humanity. But male bonding leaves me out and leaves me cold. What does not leave me cold is separating out…
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What possibilities arise when we take on rearranging world-wearied words, exhausted expressions, tiresome traditions, tedious tenets, parched principles, prosaic practices to discover, or even create, something utterly fresh, invigorating, maybe even electrifying! In fact, perhaps the one good thing that comes out of the Catholic Church’s centuries old ban on any other than male words,…
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I have no business addressing this topic. I can’t even communicate with Jamie Manson to congratulate her on her new job because I’m not on the social media she suggests. That she’s so modern does make me feel that she’ll continue doing a great job speaking to and for Catholic women everywhere. Articles in print…
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Having met Tony Flannery, the Irish Redemptorist priest, in 2014 when he toured the United States, I mourn for his current situation. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) has asked him to assent to four statements, and he has declined. NCR and other outlets broke the news on September 15, and later…
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In an unexpected turn of events, I find myself living in my childhood home. Before the pandemic hit, I hoped to find a job that would allow me to stay in New York City among a community of seminarians, activists, and artists. Instead, I’m working remotely from my lilac-painted bedroom, searching for other part-time work…
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Half empty or half full, as the old cliché goes. Is it possible for you to keep up your enthusiasm, or do you despair that women will be ordained in the Roman Catholic Church in your lifetime? Several long articles examining this very question have appeared in the last couple of weeks. FutureChurch’s Deborah Rose-Milavec…
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[Editors’ note: Molly Minnerath is a 2019 awardee of the Lucile Murray Durkin Scholarship for women and non-binary persons discerning priestly ordination. This is the first in a series of reflections from our 2019 awardees on how the scholarship impacted their journey over the academic year.] This year my spiritual director introduced me to the…
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I could be facetious and call this event “Biking for God” but that would be an all-encompassing, community building, good thing. Instead, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia called it “Biking for Vocations” and, needless to say, they were not biking for you, ladies – or any gender other than male. From August 5 through August 9,…
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