A global movement of women becoming priests shows no signs of stopping, despite the steep consequences.
Every Sunday, Christina Moreira and her husband Vittorino prepare for Catholic mass. Tucked away on the fourth floor of a downtown building, the couple leads Comunidade Cristiá do Home Novo, a small congregation based in Galicia, Spain. “We have a way of celebrating [mass] that is perhaps closer to how the early Christians did, where everyone has a voice,” Moreira tells The Progressive. A priest since 2015, she was recognized for her leadership and authority by the Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests, and was ordainedas a bishop on June 24 in Santiago de Compostela.
While the ceremony affirmed her commitment and leadership within her community, the Vatican sees her ordination as distinctly wrong. Moreira has been excommunicated from the Catholic Church since she was first ordained as a priest ten years ago, and her ordination as bishop only serves as yet another defiance of official doctrine.
As it stands, women are not permitted to be ordained under Roman Catholic law, and those who do are automatically excommunicated. In the hierarchical structure of the Catholic Church, the pope is the highest authority and has supreme legislative power over Church doctrine. Priests are responsible for individual parishes, while bishops are more senior figures who oversee a group of parishes within a larger area.
Excommunication was the punishment cast upon the Danube Seven, a group of women from Germany, Austria, and the United States who were ordained aboard a boat on the Danube River in 2002. The Vatican quickly tried to crush the movement, giving the women three weeks to retract their vows. Upon refusal, they were formally excommunicated by Pope John Paul II in a decree issued by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the office responsible for promoting and safeguarding Catholic doctrine. The decree argued that Jesus only had male apostles and the sacrament of Holy Orders is reserved for baptized men.
When asked why she went ahead with her ordination, despite the consequence, Moreira stated that in the twenty-first century, excommunication means nothing. “It’s ridiculous because this has absolutely no power,” she says. “We are no longer in the middle ages.”
Indeed, her church in Galicia has welcomed her as a leader with open arms, in total defiance of official doctrine. Moreira is one of hundreds of women around the world who have been recognized as priests within their own communities. Accompanied by a group of committed activists, they continue to preach a message of inclusion that is only growing louder.
While small grassroots movements pushed for women’s ordination in both England and the United States in the early 1900s, the fight began in earnest in the latter half of the twentieth century. Paralleling the rise of global feminist movements, such as the legalization of abortion in the United States, and Protestant denominations beginning to ordain women, Catholic activists began organizing more forcefully. In 1975, the first major gathering, known as the Women’s Ordination Conference, took place in Detroit, Michigan, which led to the formation of an organization of the same name that has since hosted numerous similar conferences in the coming years.
Miriam Duignan, executive director of the Wijngaards Institute for Catholic Research, knows this fight well. Twice arrested by the Italian police for her activism, she most recently protested in Rome in support of women’s ordination, moments before the beginning of the papal conclave that would select Pope Leo XIV. She argues that the current structure of the Catholic Church is not only symbolically misogynistic, but also deprives women of a voice in an institution that has global influence.
“It is way deeper than who gets to say mass and who gets to run parishes,” she tells The Progressive. “The Church administers and runs one quarter of the world's schools and one quarter of the world's healthcare facilities . . . and not one woman is allowed to speak about one single policy.” Duignan adds that the Vatican has permanent observer status at the United Nations, and also shapes curricula that teach children about contraception, abortion, consent, and same-sex relationships.
Advocates also point to historical precedent to support women’s ordination. Gary Macy, professor emeritus of theology at Santa Clara University, explains that until the thirteenth century, ordination referred broadly to being appointed to a church office. “Ordination originally meant the selection of a member into any new posts at all.” This means abbesses, along with deacons—a role historical evidence proves was once filled by women as well—were all ordained, Macy says.
Duignan and Macy point to archaeological findings and historical references that suggest women served as both deacons and priests. While scant, the evidence includes paintings of women alone at the altar, tombstones which refer to women as presbytera (the feminine form of the Greek word for “priest”), and writings from Pope Gelasius in 494 A.D. that condemn the practice of women serving at the altar in Italy, suggesting that women were acting in priestly roles.
“The reason for ordaining women as priests is because they should always have been priests,” Duignan says. “If we had an uninterrupted history and an uninterrupted tradition, women would be priests. There is no reason to exclude them other than ancient prejudice.”
That prejudice, both say, became codified as the Church began to align with the prevalent view in secular society which saw women as subordinate to men. “It changed because of the way people thought back then,” Macy says.
The Vatican rebuffs this historical perspective, maintaining that women have never been ordained as priests, and notes that the question of women deacons remains contested. In modern times, as calls for reform intensified, Pope John Paul II declared in 1994 that the Church has “no authority whatsoever” to ordain women. Benedict XVI went further, declaring such ordinations a “grave delict.” Pope Francis adopted a more conciliatory tone, opening commissions to study the role of women deacons and appointed women to senior Vatican positions. Still, he has made clear that ordination remains off-limits.
While the Church calls on both historical precedence and theological documents to justify their position, advocates note that change is possible, pointing to past examples of Church reform. Notable examples include reversing their position on slavery, accepting evolution, and convening the Second Vatican Councilwhich concluded in 1965 and led to major changes such as the modernization of mass and the promotion of interfaith dialogue.
“When people say the Church can’t change, . . . I say baloney,” Macy says. It’s changed 180 degrees before. It can do it again.”
Despite both setbacks and victories for the movement, Christina Moreira has pushed forward on her own personal journey. She first felt called to the priesthood at fifteen, and assumed the feelings would fade. “I told myself that all these teenage foolish thoughts would pass,” she says. “But this calling has never left me.”
In 2001, she took part in a conference on women’s ordination in Dublin, where she realized she was far from alone. This experience marked a turning point in her journey.
Nearly a decade later, Benedict XVI drew immense criticism from activists when he classified the ordination of a woman in the same category as clerical sexual abuse. Moreira was appalled. “I snapped. I had an immediate reaction. I grabbed the phone and called a friend who had contacts with the Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests and said, ‘Put me on the list. I want to be ordained.’ ”
From there, she began to study theology, and was ordained as a deacon in 2013. Two years later, she says, she became the first woman in Spain to be made a priest. While the Vatican has pushed her away, she notes her community in Galicia has been nothing but loving. One of the pillars of her practice is inclusivity; her congregation welcomes people as they are, including those who have been historically marginalized by the Church, such as divorcees and members of the LGBTQ+ community.
Now a bishop, Moreira herself can ordain other women, and further expand the movement she cares deeply about.
Though the newly elected Pope Leo XIV has so far remained noncommittal on whether women could ever serve in any ministerial capacity, his first curial appointment was to name Sister Tiziana Merletti as Secretary of the Dicastery for Consecrated Life (the office responsible for overseeing monks, nuns, and others who have taken religious vows), continuing the precedent set by Francis to elevate women in church leadership.
While Moreira hopes the new pope will listen and help bring this long-fought change to the Vatican, she knows the movement will continue onward. “Regardless of what the pope says or does,” she says, “we will continue to persevere.”
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