Category: Women’s Ordination

Can you imagine a murder mystery in which the Women’s Ordination Conference has a major role in the plot? Marjorie Jones did! In the Convent: A Frances Yeats Mystery is set in Mexico City, in and around the very convent where Sor Juana de la Cruz lived in the 17th century. These nuns are definitely…
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This June, only five us stood outside our city’s cathedral to hold up our “Ordain Women” signs as men only were being ordained inside. So few were able to attend the witness this year, we almost did not come at all fearing we would look weak or pathetic with such low numbers. But it was…
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“We are compelled to be transgressive.” Seven more women in France have come forward to join Anne Soupa and apply for positions denied to them. However, La Croix International devotes more space to arguments for not challenging ordination to priesthood or diaconate, but working within the church. What is transgressive? It’s a narrative that begins with…
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These words in Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s dissent on Wednesday to the Supreme Court’s decision regarding birth control should be engraved on all our hearts. When debating deep moral and religious issues, we must understand ambiguity, which the majority decision does not do. The rights of these employers have suddenly become paramount; the rights of…
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When I opened Facebook one day in June and saw the headline, “Men Think God is a Man,” I thought, well doesn’t that say it all…  In 2020, quite a few men still believe that God is a man. While I don’t particularly care to paint all of man-kind with one broad brush, there is…
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The Supreme Court decision affirming that sex discrimination includes discrimination based on gender identity and sexual orientation isn’t getting the notice it deserves. Think of this like the Brown vs. Board of Education decision in that it defines another fundamental right, one that many LGBTQ persons have been denied, often in Catholic institutions. However, the…
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Step by step the longest march can be won, can be won Many stones can form an arch, singly none, singly none And by union what we will can be accomplished still Drops of water turn a mill, singly none singly none https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnRlNfpCt8o This labor song by Waldemar Hille and Pete Seeger uses lyrics from…
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Having just called my 95 year-old cousin with COVID-19 in a rehab facility in New Jersey, I am especially appalled by this comment from Cardinal Timothy Dolan to President Donald Trump, described in Crux: The New York cardinal said he was “honored to be the lead-off batter, and the feelings are mutual sir,” noting that…
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In the women’s supplement to the May issue of L’Osservatore Romano, Canadian Cardinal Marc Ouellet calls for more women in seminaries! But it’s not for the good of the women, though I would be happy if more academic jobs were made available to women theologians. No, this is for the good of the seminarians. I’m…
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I took this picture from inside the ruins of a dwelling in Qumran where they discovered the Dead Sea Scrolls. It haunts me because it is like the caves we are in today, staying in but staring out.  It also haunts me because the outer world in the picture looks the same as the inner:…
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