"Women's Ordination is about much more than women priests" by Jamie L. Manson/NCR

http://ncronline.org/blogs/grace-margins/womens-ordination-movement-about-much-more-women-priests
..."In his new book, A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence, and Power, former President Jimmy Carter explores the religious and cultural structures that have led discrimination, war, poverty and disease to fall disproportionately on women. He writes: "The most serious and unaddressed worldwide challenge is the deprivation and abuse of women and girls, largely caused by a false interpretation of carefully selected religious texts and a growing tolerance of violence and warfare."The statistics about the disproportionate suffering endured by women globally are grim."

 In a recent essay in NCR's Global Sisters Report, St. Joseph Sr. Elizabeth Johnson explained:

"Women, who form half of the world's population, work three-fourths of the world's working hours; receive one-tenth of the world's salary; own one percent of the world's land; form two-thirds of illiterate adults; and together with their dependent children form three-fourths of the world's starving people.
To make a bleak picture worse, women are subject to domestic violence at home and are raped, prostituted, trafficked into sexual slavery and murdered by men to a degree that is not reciprocal. Regarding education, employment and other social goods, men have advantages simply by being born male. ...
To point this out is not to make women into a class of victims but to underscore statistics that make clear the struggles women face in society because of their gender. In no country on earth are women and men yet treated in an equal manner befitting their human dignity."

..."The struggle over women's ordination isn't a culture war issue. It is a movement that shines light on the truth that the Roman Catholic church's denial of the full equality of women has global consequences. It seeks to dismantle the poverty, abuse and violence that are intricately tied to the systematic belief that women and men are not equal.
Women's ordination isn't simply about making women priests. It's about helping church leaders recognize that if they were to include women in their leadership as their equals, they could truly be a powerful force for economic and social justice for women and children throughout our world.'"