Quotes and news
Sister answers back
Sister Pat Farrell, president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, the main organisation of Catholic nuns in the US, defended her organisation which is in conflict with the Vatican.
During a radio interview, Sr Farrell insisted that “there’s a need for genuine dialogue and there doesn’t seem to be a climate of that in the Church right now”.
“Imposing a silence doesn’t necessarily change people’s thinking but we continue to be very concerned that the position of women in the Church be recognised.”
Sr Farrell said the nuns represented by the organisation are very close to emarginated people who live in very painful and difficult situations. This is why they have a different perspective from that of the American bishops, she said.
World Day of Peace
‘Blessed are the peacemakers’ is the theme and title for the annual World Day of Peace message that Pope Benedict will give in January 2013.
The Pope’s message will take note of the 50th anniversary of Vatican Council II and also of the encyclical letter Pacem in Terris by Pope John XXIII, the Vatican said.
A Vatican statement said the Pope’s message will stress that “the primacy is always for human dignity and freedom, for the building of an earthly city to the service of every person, without any discrimination, and directed to the common good which is based on justice and true peace”.
The full text of the Pope’s message will be released nearer the date of the World Day of Peace.
Chinese bishop praised
Several news agencies have reported that Auxiliary Bishop Ma Daqin of Shanghai, China, is under investigation after his ordination during which he announced that he was resigning from China’s state-sanctioned Patriotic Catholic Association.
In an interview with the Asian Catholic news agency, UCA News, Cardinal John Tong Hon, Archbishop of Guangzhou in Hong Kong, expressed his support for Bishop Ma Daqin and criticised the Chinese authorities for their interference in the Church’s internal matters.
“Dialogue between China and the Vatican is a must. It is very urgent now to resolve the dramatic case of Bishop Ma Daqin,” Cardinal John Tong Hon said. “Only with dialogue will a ‘win-win’ result eventually be achieved.”
The Cardinal appealed to the government not to proceed with illicit ordinations, more so because Catholics are staying away from the bishops ordained without the approval of the Vatican.
Traditionalist leader sets parameters
Bishop Bernard Fellay, superior general of the traditionalist Society of St Pius X said the society would soon be answering the Vatican about the latter’s attempt to reconcile the society with the Church.
The society was set up in 1970 by the French archbishop Marcel Levebvre.
Fellay said they would insist on keeping their own identity. The bishop was commenting on a document called the ‘Doctrinal preamble’ which the Vatican came up with in its reconciliatory moves.
The document, which has not been made public, outlined what the Vatican said were “doctrinal principles and criteria for the interpretation of Catholic doctrine necessary to guarantee fidelity” to the formal teaching of the Church.
Mgr Lefebvre founded the society out of opposition to changes in the Catholic Church that followed Vatican Council II. He was excommunicated after ordaining bishops without the Vatican’s authorisation.
(Compiled by Fr Joe Borg)
Popular Stories
In Discussion
2 Comments
Post comment
Please sign in or create your Account to post comments.
Mr Emanuel Farrugia
Jul 22nd 2012, 20:09
The Role of Women in Church
The issue of women and the priesthood generated discussion and dissent within the Catholic Church and became a major ecumenical stumbling block when some churches in the Anglican Communion began ordaining women.
Pope John Paul II stated the following: "While defending women's rights and their "equal dignity" with men, the pope also highlighted the ways women are and should be different from men. Women and men have complementary natures, he taught, and their "diversity of roles" in the church and in the family are a reflection of that reality. The fact that God chose a woman, the Virgin Mary, to play such an important role in the world's salvation leaves little doubt about the God-given dignity of women, the pope wrote".
God created all of reality; thus all reality reveals something about Him. God did not make a mistake when He, through the very physical nature of female and male, created family and gave women the position of motherhood. Christ also had a specific intention when he chose 12 men to be his apostles and continue his priesthood. It wasn’t just a cultural consequence; practically all pagan religions of Christ’s time had priestesses.
Women’s purpose and vocation in the Church is further revealed in the structure of family, the Trinity and in the Blessed Mother. In the same way that a family functions in different roles, father and mother, man and wife, so the Church also functions. In Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, he compares the submission and absolute love between man and wife to the dying of Christ to achieve the holiness of the Church. Everyone in the Church then mirrors the image of woman. Yes, the Church possesses a hierarchical structure, but this structure is ordered entirely for the holiness of all its members. Similarly, the Trinity reveals to us how the different and distinct roles of Father, Son and Holy Spirit perpetuate selfless love. Finally, Mary, the mother of God and the first disciple, gives us a further understanding of what it is to be woman; through her submissive and humble “yes” came the incarnation of Christ, the Church and thus spiritual salvation.
“The presence and the role of women in the life and mission of the Church, although not linked to the ministerial priesthood, remain absolutely necessary and irreplaceable. As the Declaration Inter Insigniores points out, ‘The Church desires that Christian women should become fully aware of the greatness of their mission: today their role is of capital importance both for the renewal and humanization of society and for the rediscovery by believers of the true face of the Church’ ” ( No. 10).
Emanuel Farrugia [TARXIEN] former student Faculty of Theology UOM
Victor Rodenas
Jul 22nd 2012, 11:06
One day there will be women Priests,......those who now oppose it will have to swallow their tongue and will say, `now is the time,before it was not`.
Please choose the reason of your report below: