As ordained women who see the official church rejecting their calls and claims to priesthood, womenpriests carry in their bodies, their histories, their educations, their ministries, and their sacramental actions a multitude of tensions confronting the contemporary Roman church. Whereas tens of thousands of American Catholics who want gender reform have left the Roman Catholic Church altogether, RCWP's women have stayed. Whereas tens of thousands of Roman Catholics horrified by the sex-abuse crisis and frustrated by Rome's slow pace of change have turned to Protestant Christianity, womenpriests have doubled down on the value of Roman Catholicism. Whereas older generations of Catholics are some of the most conservative in the US church, these female (mostly) baby boomers are outspoken agitators working to change their church. Whereas other Catholic feminists have used academic and theological arguments to challenge Roman authority, RCWP's women have put protest action front and center. In short, womenpriests are distinctive, and they offer a window onto the most fraught discussions within Western Roman Catholicism today.” Jill Peterfeso
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