WomenPriests to ‘ordain’ 4 to priesthood, diaconate

October 31, 2008

One woman say that they will be ‘ordained’ to the priesthood and three to the diaconate during a WomanPriests ceremony at a Chicago-area United Church of Christ-- despite the clear teaching of the Church that these 'ordinations' are null and void, and the participants in the ceremony are guilty of sacrilege. ‘Cardinal [Francis] George could declare that those persons have been excommunicated by the law itself, but they are excommunicated whether the cardinal declares them so or not,’ said an archdiocesan spokeswoman.

Barbara Zeman, who will receive priestly ‘ordination,’ earned her master’s degree in theology from Loyola University in Chicago and has served as lector and extraordinary minister. Chicago Tribune reporter Margaret Ramirez begins her highly sympathetic coverage with an appeal to the emotions: ‘On the window ledge of her Edgewater apartment, where she prays, Barbara Zeman keeps a cross, a pile of sacred books and a small, plush black sheep. Zeman said the sheep is a symbol of women's exclusion from priesthood in the Roman Catholic Church. But Zeman and others are fighting to change their black-sheep status by taking the bold step of ordaining themselves.’

 

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Further information:

• Woman hears call to priesthood: but in Catholic Church, price is excommunication (Chicago Tribune)