The ban on women’s ordination is not based on theological speculation, but on the Apostolic tradition of the Church, writes Fr Vincent Twomey SVD
On the Feast Day of our national Saint, the Irish Independent published a two-page article by management consultant Eddie Molloy: ‘Church must face appalling vista of its abominable treatment of women over years’, accompanied with a large image of a lonely nun strolling, head-down, through an almost empty St Peter’s Square. The article was written in support of the Ex-President, Mary McAleese’s controversial Roman address on women in the Church.
The main bone of contention, according to Mr Molloy, is the Church’s failure to ordain women to the priesthood. He strongly agrees with Mrs McAleese’s memorable description of the supposed reasons for not ordaining women as “misogynistic codology dressed up as theology”.
To prove his point, he has recourse to a book on the topic by Garry Wills, journalist and historian. According to Wills: “Over the centuries there were only two reasons given for excluding women from the priesthood – they were inferior beings (‘mis-shapen men’ according to Thomas Aquinas) unworthy to hold that dignity and that their ritual impurity (because of menstruation) kept them from the altar.”
Reason
If those were the ‘reasons’, they would amount to misogynistic codology dressed up as theology. But were they in fact?
With regard to the first ‘reason’, the late Fr Michael Nolan, in his article ‘What Aquinas never said about women’ (First Things, November 1998), pointed out the irony of attributing to Aquinas the view that women are defective males, since no fewer than five times does the great theologian explicitly reject this theory (which itself is that of Aristotle)!
And with regard to the second ‘reason’ – ritual impurity arising from menstruation – this topic is mentioned but once (in a footnote) in M. Hauke’s magisterial, 482-page theological study of the history of the question: Women in the Priesthood? In other words, it is not one of the reasons behind the Church’s teaching.
First of all: what precisely does the Church teach? Very simply, it teaches that the Church has no authority to ordain women, even if she wanted to. That doctrine is based on her understanding of Christ’s intention when he instituted the priesthood. Like all the received sacred doctrines that are part of the Deposit of Faith, this teaching too is derived ultimately from God’s self-revelation in Christ Jesus.
Over the centuries, including in the Middle Ages when theologians tried to relate various doctrines with each other into a coherent system (scholasticism), theologians speculated as why the Church only ordained men. And they sometimes produced opinions that Inter Insigniores (the 1976 document explaining the Church’s teaching) said were less than convincing, indeed must be rejected.
But the Church’s infallible teaching was not based on such theological speculation, but on the Apostolic tradition of the Church, which informs all theology.
The distinction between, on the one hand, what the Church teaches and, on the other, the theological speculation as to its deeper meaning is important. It also helps to address another serious allegation made by Molloy (who, incidentally, got almost all the details re papal utterances wrong, even their titles), namely that the solemn declaration made by Pope John Paul II in 1994 (Ordinatio Sacerdotalis) regarding the infallible nature of the Church’s teaching puts an end to all discussion.
And in one sense, that it true: infallibly defined doctrines cannot be questioned as to their truth content by treating them as though their teaching was as yet undecided. Church doctrines are the source and measure of all theological speculation. That was the point of the clarification issued by the Prefect of the Congregation of the Faith, Cardinal Ratzinger, in 1995. Infallible teaching cannot be treated as one theological opinion among others and so up for debate.
But in a more significant way, the contention that John Paul II’s solemn declaration of the Church’s teaching puts an end to discussion is simply false. Church teaching invites discussion. Defined doctrines are the starting point for real theological discussion. Theologians have, among other things, the task of exploring the meaning of doctrine within the context of theology as a whole, a task that involves intense academic debate with fellow-theologians.
Theologians also de-bate why this issue, dormant for some 14 centuries, has emerged once again in our own day. And that debate involves a radical critique of the contemporary cultural situation.
Our culture today has in many ways certain parallels with the culture of the heretical (Gnostic) sects of the early centuries, which did ordain women. Those sects were essentially dualistic: only what is spiritual is good, while the body (or matter in general) is either bad or of no real significance in matters spiritual. Like the Gnostics of old, today we seem to be incapable of grasping the profound, indeed sacral-symbolic, nature of the body – in particular its sexuality (maleness and femaleness, motherhood and fatherhood). Theologians have been writing on this topic for over a century, and that discussion will continue for quite some time in the foreseeable future, since the issues touch on the very meaning of what it is to be human.
The basically Gnostic mentality of today’s culture, which is exclusively rationalistic (or spiritualistic) only understands priesthood in functionalistic terms. Consequently, the sacramental/symbolic nature of ordination tends to be opaque to modern men and women.
The question of the ordination of women also touches on other theological subjects. Central to these is the question of the nature of the Church. Is the Church a purely human institution or a divine-human institution and so sacramental by nature (the Body of Christ., cf. I Cor. 12:27 etc.)? What do we mean by the term ‘sacrament’? What is the God-given purpose of the Church? Is her mission to heal humanity, to transform society from within, and lead us to union with God? And, if so, what is the role of the ordained priest in this mission? There is no shortage of topics for discussion.
One thing that the Church is not (or should not be), according to Pope Francis, is a self-referential institution, continually preoccupied with itself, its structures and administration, with the result that her ordained ministers are conceived only in terms of political power. That is clericalism at its worst – and Eddie Molloy seems to have fallen for it hook, line and sinker.
Fr D. Vincent Twomey SVD is a theologian and professor emetirue of moral thelogy at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth.
