While Peter and the male disciples left Jesus, the women remained faithful. Christian feminists today reflect on women's bodily experiences, theological and spiritual resources as integral to creating an inclusive Church for women and men. They are deconstructing a male-dominated patriarchal model and reconstructing a new egalitarian model, a discipleship of equals.
In her book, The Elephant in the Church, theologian Mary T. Malone makes the case that"the ordinary day-in-day out women of Catholicism should be respected , heard and treated as the significant theologians they are. They should also "be recognized and respected as the foundation stones of many a parish community, for without the presence and ministry of women, these communities would not exist. For women have always done theology in word and deed. Their theology has not necessarily been expressed in tomes or lecture halls, but it is the daily life-giving guide for more than half the Church." (p. 171)
The Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests recognizes the prior learning and life experiences of women as valid theology. Our preparation program offers an individualized program as well as a cohort experience on contemporary sacramental theology that fosters ministry in inclusive, empowered communities of faith. People's Catholic Seminary in partnership with Global Ministries University offers courses based on the ARCWP units of study that fufill the requirements for a Master of Pastoral Ministry degree. https://pcseminary.org/master-of-pastoral-ministry-degree
In these challenging times, I am filled with hope to see so many people in our country speaking out about racism and white supremacy. It seems that an increased awareness of the need for equality is taking hold where before we saw apathy and indifference.
Another form of supremacy — male supremacy — has run rampant in our world for far too long. Having served as a Catholic priest for 40 years, I am well acquainted with the injustices that result when institutional power rests solely in the hands of an elite group, in this case, the all-male priesthood. As the world around it struggles toward equality, the church hierarchy clings to its hold on power, trotting out the same tired justifications for women’s subordination, much of it rooted in pseudoscience and the ignorant musings of medieval philosophers.
Catholic male supremacists — and I do not think it is an exaggeration to describe them as such — believe that the church belongs to them. In recent years we have witnessed the Vatican engage in disingenuous attempts to find an acceptable "role" for women in the church, believing that a few cosmetic changes might convince women to stop agitating for equality. These men see women as lesser, suited only to do the work they view as beneath them.
Consequently, Catholic women are relegated to providing the ruling male elite with free or cheap labor, either as nuns, volunteers or church employees working for poverty wages. Women who aspire to ordination, the only route to a meaningful place in the hierarchy — even those who dare to speak openly about such a possibility — become the targets of a deeply misogynistic priesthood with the single aim of silencing the person who dared to question women’s subservience in the church.
In 2012, 40 years after I was ordained a Catholic priest in the Maryknoll Order, I was expelled for such an offense, the Vatican accusing me of creating "grave scandal" by publicly supporting women’s ordination to the Catholic priesthood.
A year before, I had sent a letter to each member of the Maryknoll community, believing that because they had experienced God's call to priesthood, they too would feel compelled to stand in solidarity with the women called to serve God’s people as a Catholic priest.
Many of my fellow priests responded with stony silence, others reacted with anger, behaving as if I had sided with the enemy. A small number admitted to supporting women's ordination but loathed to risk the loss of their status and power by taking a stand. Since that time, I have come to see that I had severely underestimated both the clergy's addiction to power and the depth of sexism and misogyny embedded in the all-male priesthood.
Today, as I watch people fill the streets to demand an end to racism and a dismantling of the institutional power that allows white supremacy to go unchallenged, I can only hope that one day Catholics will similarly rise up and demand an end to male supremacy in the church with the same courage and determination.
[Roy Bourgeois is a Vietnam veteran, a Purple Heart recipient, and the founder of the School of the Americas Watch movement. For more information about his struggle for women's equality in the Catholic Church, visit: www.roybourgeoisjourney.org.]
On July 22, the feast day of St. Mary Magdalene, apostle to the apostles, Christina Luz Galilea ARCWP wearing purple stole stands with women in Paris calling the hierarchy to open leadership roles in the Roman Catholic Church in France.
Helene Pichon, Christina Moreira, Loan Rocher, Marie-Automne Thepot, Sylvaine Landriv on, Anne Soupa et Laurence de Bourbon Parme, ce mercredi devant la Madeleine, à Paris.Photo François Guillot. AFP
My Response: Christina Moreira (Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests, ARCWP) in purple stole prayed in the Church of St. Mary Magdalene in Paris and recited Eucharistic Prayers in the pew with the people as the priests prayed at the altar. She received Eucharist, and after the Liturgy, some people approached her to express gratitude for her presence. They asked her to celebrate Mass with them and pray for their needs. I am grateful to these seven courageous sisters who are spreading the liberating message of women's call to follow Jesus as apostles living the liberating good news of the gospel in our world today. Bridget Mary Meehan ARCWP, https://arcwp.org The people are ready, it is time for Pope Francis and the hierarchy to follow Jesus example of Gospel equality today!
Le collectif « Toutes Apôtres ! » est composé de femmes engagées dans l’Église et soutenu par un ensemble de baptisé‧e‧s mû par le désir de servir leur Église dans différents ministères (diacre, curé, nonce, évêque) mais aussi des fonctions décisionnelles qui leur sont interdits aujourd’hui. Ce collectif a pour ambition de mettre en lien des personnes et des mouvements de laïc‧que‧s engagé‧e‧s pour l’égalité des baptisé‧e‧s dans l’Église.
Nous, chrétiennes, avons co-créé le collectif « Toutes Apôtres ! » composé de femmes engagées dans l’Église et soutenu par un une diversité de baptisé‧e‧s. Ce collectif a pour ambition de mettre en lien des personnes et des mouvements de laïc‧que‧s engagé‧e‧s pour l’égalité des baptisé‧e‧s dans l’Église, car l’absence des femmes en situation de responsabilité – que ce soit à la gouvernance de nos paroisses, de nos diocèses, au Vatican ou comme ministres ordonnées – constitue un scandale autant qu’un contre-témoignage de l’Église. Cette immense injustice n’est pas un problème mineur mais blesse l’ensemble du corps ecclésial.
Notre geste n’est ni une revendication syndicale ni une déclaration de grands principes, mais un acte salutaire de désobéissance à la doxa ecclésiale.… Lire la suite
À la suite de la candidature d’Anne Soupa à l’archevêché de Lyon le 25 mai 2020, 7 femmes ont décidé de candidater publiquement auprès de la nonciature à Paris à divers ministères qui leur sont interdits au sein de l’Église catholique : ministères de diaconesse, de curée, de nonce, d’évêque ou de prédicatrice laïque. Elles ont chacune remis à la nonciature apostolique en France un dossier personnel où elles exposent leur profession de foi, la fonction à laquelle elles candidatent et le type de service qu’elles sont capables d’assumer. Elles demandent par ailleurs à être entendues par Celestino Migliore, nonce apostolique en France, seul habilité à transmettre au pape ces candidatures. Chacune de ces 7 candidatures est le fruit d’un appel et d’un discernement propres, jusque-là étouffé par la discrimination dont sont l’objet les femmes dans l’Église catholique.
En portant cette action un 22 juillet, jour de la fête de sainte Marie de Magdala, ces femmes se mettent directement sous le patronage de cette femme que la tradition a consacrée comme « l’apôtre des apôtres ». Personnalité exceptionnelle rapportée par les quatre évangiles, Marie de Magdala est celle qui a reconnu la première le Ressuscité et annonce l’accomplissement de la promesse du Christ aux apôtres figés dans la crainte. Tandis qu’ils vivaient terrifiés et cloîtrés à l’étage de leur maison, c’est Marie de Magdala qui – dans une inversion des rôles traditionnels qui ne doit pas nous échapper – a couru avec folle audace et espérance au-devant de la promesse de vie.
C’est dans cette même geste que, nous, femmes baptisées de l’Église catholique, allons au-devant des interdits posés par l’Église des hommes, pour affirmer notre attachement à l’Église du Christ et annoncer les vœux que nous formons pour elle.
Plus largement, nous souhaitons mener des actions qui permettent de rendre justice à toutes les sœurs en Christ, quelles que soient leur origine, leur état civil, leur orientation de genre et leur orientation sexuelle ou leur profession.
Paris, Wednesday July 21. Seven of them sent in their candidacy (from top to bottom and from left to right): Laurence de Bourbon-Parme, Marie-Automne Thépot, Christina Moreira, Claire Conan-Vrinat, Hélène Pichon and Sylvaine Landrivon (absent: Loan Rocher). Photo: Yong Chim
RELIGION - This Wednesday, July 22 celebrates Saint Mary of Magdala, better known under the name of Mary Magdalene. Famous for having been the first to see the Risen Christ, she also bears the title of “apostle of the apostles”. It is therefore on this symbolic day that seven women have chosen to run for positions which are prohibited to them within the Catholic Church , because they are reserved for men.
Among them, Claire Conan-Vrinat, Loan Rocher and Marie-Automne Thépot wish to become deacons, that is to say, among other things, to assist priests in the sacraments and to make the link between the parish and the outside world. Christina Moreira, for her part, aspires to be a pastor, and therefore responsible for a parish and other priests. Sylvaine Landrivon, would like to be ordained bishop, to lead a diocese, the equivalent of a department in the Church. Hélène Pichon is applying to become a nuncio, that is to say ambassador of the Vatican. Finally, Laurence de Bourbon-Parme is aiming for the title of lay preacher, a position which until now exists only in the Protestant Church, and which consists in participating in sermons without being ordered by the Pope.
Unanswered claims
These candidatures were collected by the recent group d'All Apôtres !. Co-founded by five women “committed to the Church and supported by a diversity of baptized”, it is part of the launch of Anne Soupa's candidacy for the Archbishopric of Lyon on May 25th.
“I joined Anne Guillard and Valentine Rinner, who had already set up feminist collectives,” says Alix Bayle, one of the co-founders of the collective , to HuffPost . We were very excited about this initiative, and we launched a petition on its behalf, which received over 150 signatures. ” It is then transmitted to the nuncio of Paris, accompanied by a letter recommending to Pope Anne Soupa as archbishop. They have received no response to date.
So the four women, with Hélène Pichon, form All Apostles! . “We thought about what we could do to prevent his gesture from remaining a unique moment. We wanted to transform it into a movement, to give it visibility: it is not the only one to want equality between men and women in the Church ”, continues Alix Bayle. The objective: to perpetuate this movement with initiatives every year, on July 22, until the Catholic Church is reformed .
“Challenging male ordination”
Because women are today largely excluded from most positions of responsibility within the Church. They usually act upstream of the rituals. Women are often relegated to positions of volunteer service, or teaching catechism. And for good reason, the responsibilities fall to ordered people, who can only be single men. “We must therefore question male ordination.”
This is already what some of the candidates are doing. Christina Moreira, for example, is already a priest . “She's part of a network of women priests, who sort of ordain themselves,” Alix Bayle told HuffPost . But they are excommunicated by the Catholic Church, and therefore are not recognized. ”
Making things change is the collective's objective. But it must be done gradually according to them. “This is why we did not run the initiative on social networks, but rather sent emails asking the women around us to whom our initiative spoke to come back to us.”
Once the dialogue was established, it was not easy to find all the candidates. “The Church is in crisis and is not very attractive today. And above all, some women in a position of responsibility in Catholic universities or in parishes were aware that standing as a candidate could have led to their exclusion ”.
But the initiative attracted seven women, who wanted to run for positions for which “they were called”. They submit their file this Wednesday, July 22 at 10 a.m. to the apostolic nunciature of Paris. And Alix Bayle is convinced, “this initiative intends to show that only the union of women will be their strength.”
Actu : Ces femmes qui veulent bousculer l’Église À la suite d’Anne Soupa, théologienne et candidate à l’archevêché de Lyon, le collectif « Toutes Apôtres ! » compte bousculer les codes de l’Église et donner enfin aux femmes la place qu’elles méritent dans cette institution.
Isère : Sylvaine Landrivon postule pour devenir évêque
Sylvaine Landrivon est universitaire, mariée, a des enfants et des petits-enfants. Aujourd’hui, elle veut devenir évêque, elle a d’ailleurs postulé en ce sens ce mercredi. Face aux interdits dans l’Église catholique, l’Iséroise sait pourtant que sa demande n’aboutira pas…
Par Marine LANGEVIN - Hier à 08:00 | mis à jour à 19:41
The following reflection “Mary to Mary” is from Deven Horne, a member of the Upper Room Inclusive Catholic Community in Albany, NY and the PCS Mary of Magdala book club. She submitted the following reflection on Meggan Watterson’s book, Mary Magdalene Revealed. Deven was hesitant to share such a story but went with Watterson’s open-hearted sharing.
Thank you, Deven
Mary to Mary
By Deven Horne
I have always prayed to Mother Mary, mother of Jesus. I am not sure why except that my mother prayed the rosary all her life. I always felt I could talk to Mary, woman to woman, mother to mother. I identified with her more than I have with her son. I have talked to Jesus sometimes especially about my own sons and asking him to help them. Since I began reading Meg Waterson's book on Mary Magdalene, I have found myself talking to Mother Mary about Mary Magdalene. The other day I was kneeling in front of my statue in my yard to Mother Mary, clearing weeds and planting flowers in front of her and I found myself talking to Mary about her son's love of Mary. I wanted to know how did she feel about her? Was she cautious with her at the beginning being around her son? Having two sons who now have serious girlfriends, probably future wives, I wanted to know how Mother Mary felt about Mary Magdalene. For myself I have prayed every day that my sons would love and be loved. As I age and my sons age, I desire nothing more than for them to love someone and that someone loves them back as much as I have loved them. As mothers I think we are never convinced that another person could love our child as much as we do. We want it and watch and wait. I felt Mary Mother doing the same with Mary Magdalene. Walking with her son throughout the journey even to the end and being comforted as she came to love Mary Magdalene for loving her son. I think it takes two women to love a man into manhood and not just any manhood but one which is endowed with the feminine power as well as the masculine power. I hear Mary, mother of Jesus, telling Mary Magdalene thank you for loving my son, and Mary Magdalene telling Mother Mary thank you for raising such a sensitive, and compassionate man. I have said and heard these very words and know it comes from my own dying to the physical body as I birthed this child and raised him lovingly through life struggles which often physically did a number on my body. Mother Mary came to say yes to Mary Magdalene and Mary Magdalene said yes to Mother Mary. Through these "yeses" to love, the world is coming to say yes to Jesus and his teaching of Divine Love.
In this painting we see Mary Magdalene carrying out her mission, preaching with the authority conferred on her by the risen Christ, preparing the disciples, both female and male, for the work of the future.
Opening Prayer:
God of visions and dreams, join our hearts today as we celebrate the Feast of St. Mary of Magdalene and to proclaim again the story of Jesus’ resurrection, first proclaimed by St. Mary of Magdala. We thank you for the healing gift of Jesus’ resurrecting love proclaimed by women and men to this present day. We thank you for Mary Magdalene’s gift to Jesus of accompaniment in joy filled times, in suffering, death and resurrection. Open our hearts wider today because our country and world needs our prophetic witness to transform unjust social structures. Open our minds and hearts to see how deeply interrelated we all are.
ALL: Breath of the One Life, source of all wisdom and compassion, just as you called Mary Magdalene, you have also called each of us through our baptism to be disciples in your kindom.* Gift us with the courage to hear your call and the strength to follow your way. Teach us, each in our own way, to be disciples of the Gospels so that all who encounter us will know your warming, nurturing, and embracing love. In the name of Jesus, our brother, we pray. Amen.
First Reading: Wisdom of Solomon 7:22-23
What is Wisdom?
She is intelligent, holy unique, subtle, flowing, transparent, and pure;
She is distinct, invulnerable, good, keen, irresistible, and gracious;
She is humane, faithful, sure, calm,
all-powerful, all seeing, and
available to all who are intelligent, pure, and altogether simple.
Responsorial Psalm - Psalm 147 By: Nan Merrill
Praise the Beloved, Life of all life! Invite Love into your heart!
For Divine Love gives strength to the weak, with courage to face their fears.
Response: Holy Wisdom, Wisdom Bearer, expand our minds and hearts.
Divine Love brings peace to the heart, peace that is beyond our knowledge.
Divine Love serves the veil that separates realms of the profane and sacred;
Holiness radiates through all touched by Divine Love, a refining Fire!
Response: Holy Wisdom, Wisdom Bearer, expand our minds and hearts.
Second Reading: The Risen One By: Rainer Maria Rilke
Until his final hour he had never refused her anything or turned away, lest she should turn their love to public praise. Now she sank down beside the cross, disguised, heavy with the largest stones of love like jewels in the cover of her pain.
But later, when she came back to his grave with tearful face, intending to anoint, she found him resurrected for her sake, saying with greater blessedness, “Do not –”
She understood it in her hollow first:
how with finality he now forbade her, strengthened by his death, the oils’ relief or any intimation of a touch: because he wished to make of her the lover who needs no more to lean on her beloved, as, swept away by joy in such enormous storms, she mounts even beyond his voice.
(Rainer Maria Rilke, New Poems, Second Part, 1908; Translation, Ann Conrad Lammers, 1998, 12/10/98)
Gospel Reading: John 20:1-2, 11-18 http://usccb.org/bible/john/20:1
For Your Reflection: By: Ann M. McGovern, RSM
Will the real Mary of Magdalene please stand up? Mary of Magdala was given the title “Apostle to the Apostles” by St. Thomas Aquinas. Her name comes from her hometown of Magdala, a fishing village on the western shore of Lake Tiberias. But mention her name to some people and invariably someone will identify her as “prostitute,” “repentant sinner,” and the like. How did it happen that she became known as aprostitute, or the woman caught in adultery, rather than Apostle to the Apostles, or the woman at the heart of Christianity?
Mary of Magdala or St. Mary Magdalene appears in all four canonical gospels which is indicative of her importance in early Christianity. In Luke’s Gospel, she is the first person mentioned in the listing of women who supported Jesus’ ministry out of their own financial resources. In the Gospel as remembered by Matthew and Mark, she is specifically named as one of the witnesses to Jesus’ crucifixion. And in the Gospel, you just prayed/proclaimed from the evangelist John, Mary of Magdala is the first person to have seen Jesus after he was raised from the dead. Jesus commissioned her to, “go to my brothers (and today let us add sisters) and tell them I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.”
Yet down through the years, labels have been wrongly attached to Mary of Magdala – scarring her reputation and distracting us from the significance of her relationship with Jesus and her leadership role in early Christianity. The conflated portrayal of Mary Magdalene is largely due to Pope Gregory the Great who served the Church from 540 to the year 604.
Contemporary scholarship has rightfully restored our understanding of Mary Magdalene as an important early-Christian leader, enabling her to become an inspiring role model for Twenty-first century disciples. “Her friendship with Jesus helped to heal her painful memories. Her encounter with His risen presence contained a commission to gather all the broken-hearted of history and to proclaim to them her story of unbelievable good news.” (Patricia Clemens Repikoff).
In 2016 Pope Francis recognized St. Mary Magdalene’s role as the first to witness Christ’s resurrection and as a “true and authentic evangelizer,” by raising July 22 to a feast on the church’s liturgical calendar. Mary is the first woman other than Our Blessed Mother to have her liturgical celebration raised to the rank of a feast.
Today Mary Magdalene, invites women and men to continuously enlarge our hearts and minds; to evolve into living spirits capable of sharing and being Jesus’ embodied spirit and to engage in dialogue in an effort to heal and overcome the on-going struggle women face for equality in Church and society.
(Gathered from resources provided by Future Church, www.futurechurch.org)
Questions for Your Pondering:
• What sensations or feelings arise in your heart today as you reflect on Mary Magdalene?
• Imagine yourself sitting with Mary Magdalene. What questions would you ask her?
• What do you hope Mary Magdalene brings to birth in us today?
For Your Further Reflection: Here is a link to Richard Rohr’s reflection on Mary Magdalene, Knowing and Becoming One. https://cac.org/love-and-knowing-become-one-2020-07-19/
Prayers of the Faithful
Mary Magdalene remained at Jesus’ side through his suffering, a brutal death and his burial. O God, who accompanies us when we suffer, give us strength to accompany our loved ones who are sick and dying especially during these days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Enable us to know that love is stronger than death.
Response: O Sophia, present amongst us, hear our prayer.
When Jesus called Mary by name, she recognized him. Jesus give us ears to hear, hearts to feel, and eyes to see our discipleship being called forth from our deepest being. Strengthen our inner knowing.
Response: Holy Wisdom, enable us to trust and believe in our inner voice and give us the strength to realize our calling to incarnate Love for individuals marginalized due to unjust systems.
Because of her witness and fidelity, Mary of Magdala is known as Apostle to the Apostles. Help us, O God of Righteousness, to accept your apostolic call “to go and tell our brothers and sisters” of Jesus’ power to heal and love the broken hearted. Enable us to be advocates for racial justice and equality in our country.
Response: Beloved of our Hearts, embolden us to recognize justice as a sacred endeavor and to join efforts to change and heal systems of dominance and oppression. Women were faithful disciples of Jesus and significant leaders in the early Christian communities. Cleanse the Church of its sin of repressing the Divine Feminine enabling all persons to breath and be free from this societal oppression.
Response: Help us, Most Inclusive One, to discern our baptismal call to leadership and to pray daily for the recognition of women’s gifts and equality in Church and society.
God of love and compassion, just as you called Mary Magdalene, you also call us. Strengthen us in our baptismal vocations. Build us into the kindom* of God and seal us with the Spirit of your love for all people. Give us the strength to persevere, the courage to speak out, the faith to believe that “The Risen Lord is indeed risen. Present, intimate, creative, closer that our own heartbeat, accessed through our vulnerability, our capacity for intimacy….for love is the ground in which you live and move and have your being. This is the message that Mary Magdalene has perennially to bring. This is the message we most need to hear.”
(The Meaning of Mary Magdalene by: Cynthia Bourgeault)
Ritual of Anointing:
Let us honor Mary Magdalene who, most scholars believe, anointed Jesus in preparation for his burial. His response, “Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached in all the world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.”
Bless your head, heart and hands with this blessing from the Song of Songs
May we be renewed with God’s inclusive spirit and light that shines forth through us. May Christ continue to be our Way, our Truth, and our Life. May the Spirit will be our guide and inspiration. May Saint Mary Magdalene be our model of courage and faithful service in the Church and in the world.
Closing Song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiLy9kQnPzs “The New Consciousness”
By: Jan Novotka
https://youtu.be/QiLy9kQnPzs
* “kindom” denotes a world in which we recognize that we are related, that we are “kin” in God, and work to build relationships of love, peace and justice with all creation.
Recommended resources for your further pondering on Mary Magdalene:
The Meaning of Mary Magdalene, Discovering The Woman At The Heart of Christianity by Cynthia Bourgeault
Future Church www.futurechurch.org
“The Mary Paintings: Expressions of the Divine Feminine” by Catherine Steinberg on loan to Mercy by the
