Boston Archdiocese Says Trio Will Be Excommunicating Themselves
TheBostonChannel
July 18, 2008
http://www.thebostonchannel.com/news/16920636/detail.html
[with links to a statesment from the Boston archdiocese and the Roman Catholic Womenpriests Web site]
BOSTON — Three Catholic women will be ordained as priests in a Back Bay neighborhood church this weekend, despite the Vatican's admonition that the trio will be excommunicated if they do so.
 |
"Excommunication or not, I will still be a validly ordained priest and still will be able to serve the people of God," said Gabriella Velardi Ward, 61, a Staten Island architect and mother of two.
VIDEO: 3 Catholic Women To Be Ordained Priests
Also a grandmother of three, Ward said she has wanted to be a priest ever since she was five years old and once considered becoming a nun, but felt the priesthood was her true calling because she wants to be able to celebrate the sacraments.
She will be joined by Gloria Carpeneto, of Baltimore, and Judy Lee, of Florida. Mary Ann McCarthy Schoettly, of Newton, N.J., will be ordained as a deacon.
The Vatican, however, said the ordinations would be illegal and the Boston Archdiocese sent out an e-mail to all priests saying that women who try to receive sacred orders and priests who try to confer them are automatically separating themselves from the church.
The Catholic Church has always said women cannot be priests because Jesus did not have female Apostles.
The ordination ceremony will take place Sunday at the Church of the Covenant on Newbury Street, which is affiliated with two Protestant denominations, the Presbyterian Church (USA) and the United Church of Christ, the Boston Globe reported.
Link: Boston Archdiocese Statement
Link: Roman Catholic Womenpriests
The church, which has a female pastor, offered to let the ordination take place there as a way of supporting and encouraging the women's group.
The trio will be ordained by Dana Reynolds, of California, a woman who was consecrated as a bishop in Germany in April.
They are all part of an organization called Roman Catholic Womenpriests, which has been holding ordination ceremonies for women since 2002; the organization says there are now 28 women Catholic priests in the United States, according to the Globe.
The group says its ordinations are valid because its first female priests were ordained by bishops who were in good standing with the Vatican. They won't reveal the names so those bishops can avoid sanctions.
The Boston ordinations will coincide with the first Boston conference of four organizations that are pushing for the admission of married men, as well as of women, to the priesthood.
Jean Marchant, who once worked for the Boston Archdiocese's healthcare ministry, has already been ordained and, together with her husband, serves a small Catholic congregation in Weston, Mass.
Any original material on these pages is copyright © BishopAccountability.org 2004. Reproduce freely with attribution.