women priests

Mitchell Atencio 8-30-2022

Catholic women with parasols expressing the call for women’s ordination in the church at the Vatican, Aug. 29, 2022. Courtesy Women’s Ordination Conference.

Kate McElwee, the executive director of the Women’s Ordination Conference and one of the women at the protest, spoke with Sojourners’ Mitchell Atencio about her hope for women’s ordination, Francis’ attitude toward reforms, and the symbolic nature of their activism.

Roman Catholic pilgrims travel as they accompany the statue of Our Lady of Conception during an annual pilgrimage along the Caraparu River in Santa Izabel do Para. REUTERS/Paulo Santos/File Photo

The document also issues a strong defense for the protection of the environment in the Amazon, deforestation, illegal mining, and development projects that threaten native cultures and the delicate ecosystem vital for the planet.

the Web Editors 11-01-2016

Image via Giulio Napolitano / Shutterstock.com

Pope Francis offered no new position on the issue of women’s ordination while on a flight returning from Sweden. When asked if the Catholic Church may one day allow women priests and bishops, he responded, as done previously, that the question was already settled in 1994 with St. John Paul II

Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley at Cathedral of the Holy Cross. Photo by George Martell - BCDS, courtesy of Roman Catholic Archdiocese

Following up on remarks to “60 Minutes” about the clergy sex abuse crisis and other controversial topics, Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley has stressed that the Catholic Church needs a system to hold bishops accountable and must “avoid crowd-based condemnations.”

“We are all aware that Catholics want their leaders to be held accountable for the safety of children, but the accountability has been sporadic,” O’Malley wrote in a column posted Nov. 19 at the website of the archdiocesan newspaper. “We need clear protocols that will replace the improvisation and inertia that has often been the response in these matters.”

“Bishops also deserve due process that allows them to have an opportunity for a fair hearing,” he added.

O’Malley’s column was responding to both praise and criticism of his CBS interview broadcast Nov. 16 in which he said the Vatican needs to respond “urgently” to cases like that of Missouri Bishop Robert Finn, who remains in office despite a conviction in 2012 for failure to report concerns about a priest, the Rev. Shawn Ratigan, who was later convicted of federal child pornography charges.

The cardinal said Francis, who recently sent a Canadian archbishop to Finn’s diocese to investigate, was personally aware of the situation.

In the “60 Minutes” interview, O’Malley also called the Vatican’s investigation of American nuns a “disaster” and said if he were starting a church “I’d love to have women priests,” but he added that’s not what Jesus did. Both comments sparked strong reactions.

Camelle Daley, a London-trained fashion designer, has designed new clerical wear for women. Photo courtesy Jonathan Self

A London-trained fashion designer has launched a new range of clerical wear for women in the Church of England.

Camelle Daley, who founded the label House of ilona, says it’s high time for a shake-up among Anglican clergy who, like Roman Catholic priests, still wear traditional black shirt and collar.

Daley said she got the idea when a recently ordained friend said she wanted a new look for a new age.

The result?

Daley’s collection, now selling briskly, includes peplum dresses and tops, classic black dresses, and a fitted green blouse with chiffon detail.

Jim Wallis 11-24-2011

I’ve learned that it’s especially important for those who are always trying to change the world, to remember what they are thankful for in their world as it is!

First I am thankful to God for his or her patience with us. Thankful that despite how much we human beings (perhaps especially we religious believers), so often disappoint, embarrass, and even hurt God with the things we say and do — even in God’s name; that God still continues to love us, forgive us, and call us to act more like God’s children, who should live together like brothers and sisters.

I am thankful to Jesus, who seems to have survived all of us Christians who name his name. Thankful that he is still so popular all over the world, even when Christians are, well, are not so much. But I’m also thankful for when Christians or others actually do the things that Jesus said, love their neighbors and even their enemies, just as he taught us to do, and when we do treat “the least of these” in the same way that we would treat him. I’m always most thankfully surprised by the unexpected and simple acts of love, grace, kindness, welcome, and justice that make people want to believe in and follow Jesus again....

Kaitlin Barker 11-18-2008

"I know you know what you're doing," Janice Sevre-Duszynska told Father Roy Bourgeois when he agreed to co-preside and give the homily at her ordination Mass, "but do you know what you're doing?" About a month ago I shared Janice's story of ordination, spotlighting her struggle for justice in the Catholic church and the long road she'd walked for years leading up to August 9, 2008, the day of her ordination Mass.

Kaitlin Barker 10-07-2008

Near the Vatican in October 2001, Janice Sevre-Duszynska and fellow advocates hung a banner calling in seven different languages for the ordination of women. Almost seven years later, the fruit of that action and many others like it was realized. Janice's long-awaited and hard-fought ordination Mass took place Aug. 9, 2008, in Lexington, Kentucky.