"Why Not?" Scripture, History and Women's Ordination by Robert J. Egan S.J/ Response to Sara Butler's Book- The Catholic Priesthood and Women.

http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/why-not-0


April 11, 2008
Article
"Why Not?"
Scripture, History & Women's Ordination
Robert J. Egan
(Robert J. Egan, SJ, a frequent contributor to Commonweal, teaches theology and spirituality at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington. )

In response to Sara Butler's arguments for excluding women from the priesthood, Robert Egan, SJ made the following case in Commonweal Magazine:
Sara Butler's book titled The Catholic Priesthood and Women: A Guide to the Teaching of the Church (Hillenbrand Books, $23, 132 pp.). Butler is a professor of dogmatic theology at St. Joseph’s Seminary in New York.

..."The fourth problem is that to frame this discussion in terms of excluding women from “the priesthood” confuses the matter considerably. There is no talk about a Christian “priesthood” in the New Testament. ..Early Christianity had no priests. It can even be said, on the basis of these New Testament texts, that early Christianity did not understand itself to be the kind of religion that has or needs a priesthood. It was only in the second century that bishops, in reference to their role (by then) as chief presiders at the communities’ Eucharistic liturgies, began to be likened to priests. Later, during the third century, presbyters too, as delegates of a bishop for presiding at liturgies, also began to be likened to priests.
Building a theology of the presbyterate and episcopate on the basis of “priesthood” tempts us to read back into New Testament times attitudes and ideas that developed only centuries later. ..
There is no evidence in the New Testament that Jesus made any connection between the Twelve and any established offices or continuing roles of leadership in the local communities like elders or overseers. There is, for that matter, no evidence that Jesus himself explicitly intended or foresaw elders or overseers in the new communities. And there is certainly nothing in Jesus’ way of acting or his teaching that suggests that he intended any of his followers to become priests... None of these words or roles has any particular connection with cult or sacrifice, but in the second century, as the episcopus became the ordinary presider at the community’s Eucharistic liturgy, he began to be likened to a sacerdos. Later, in the third century, as the presbyter became the delegate of the episcopus to preside at some Eucharistic liturgies, he too began to be likened to a sacerdos. Eventually the terms presbyter and sacerdos came to be used interchangeably to refer to an ordained Christian minister of a rank above deacon but below bishop. Ironically, the word “priest,” which is the only word we have to translate sacerdos or hiereus, is derived historically from presbyter. " —R.J.E.