Läste just en intressant artikel - nedan några utdrag.
Senare i artikeln tas frågan om enbart män som representanter för Kristus upp - ur ett för mig nytt perspektiv. Även Gudsbildens manliga och kvinnliga sidor - och deras betydelse för Kyrkan tas upp - dessutom jämförs protestantiska och katolska kyrkan i detta hänseende.
***
""Bishops enjoy the fullness of the sacrament of orders and both priests and deacons are dependent upon them in the exercise of their authority. For the priests are the prudent fellow workers of the episcopal order and are themselves consecrated as true priests of the New Testament, just as deacons are ordained for the ministry and serve the people of God in communion with the bishop and his presbytery."
According to the most authoritative Catholic sources, therefore, priesthood and episcopacy are so closely united in the unity of holy orders and the unity of the local church round their bishop, that the question of women bishops and women priests are one and the same question.
/.../
For the community of Roman Catholic theologians the simple issue is: are the arguments for excluding women from ordination given by the Vatican valid or not? Did Jesus Christ establish a norm when only choosing men under the initial twelve? Did the subsequent reluctance to ordain women in the Church derive from cultural prejudices, or from an awareness of a presumed divine and revealed injunction originating in Jesus himself? The answer determines the fate of women deacons, priests and bishops - all in one stroke.
And what is their verdict?
By all evidence available to me, I estimate that three-quarters of Catholic theologians disagree with the official position held out by the Vatican. They do not accept as proven that Jesus Christ himself excluded women from future ministries. They point at cultural bias against women as the culprit of anti-women decisions in tradition."
Vatikanen må sörja - men jag jublar - svårt att hålla tillbaka glädjetårarna....
"Members of its General Synod threw out compromise proposals on females in senior ranks.
All safeguards demanded by traditionalists were rejected.
But the Vatican warned the ruling would present a new obstacle to reconciliation between the Catholic Church and the Church of England.
In a statement it said: "We learned with regret the news of the vote of the Church of England that opens the way to the introduction of legislation that would lead to the ordination of women bishops.""
***
Uppdatering: Vatikanen har uttalat sig om detta idag. Mest intressant i artikeln jag läste om det är följande citat från annat håll:
"The traditionalists argued that bishops must be men, as were Jesus and his apostles.
Retired Canon Alan Duke, a longtime supporter of women in church leadership posts, said those arguments "simply do not stack up."
Duke said that while Jesus named no female disciples, he used and valued woman in radical and different ways for his time.
"He was hardly going to choose women and send them into a situation where they might have been in grave risk," Duke said.
Så har ett gäng anglikanska biskopar inlett hemliga nödsamtal med Vatikanen.
Vad det gäller? Vart de ska ta vägen om kvinnor snart får biskopsvigas och homosexuella får del av fler mänskliga rättigheter. Typ.
I en skräckvision ser jag dem masskonvertera och bidra till att långsamt förstena katolska kyrkan.
En vän som läst artikeln skrev i ett mail:
"A thought related to all of this (from one of my professors):
"If you can't see your way to ordaining women, PLEASE do not baptize them. ALL Christians are given the right/duty to answer God's vocational call."
Rev. Leonel Mitchell Credited with the current 1979 liturgy of baptism, one which changed the theology of the Episcopal Church."
Bra sagt.
***
"Senior Church of England bishops have held secret talks with Vatican officials to discuss the crisis in the Anglican communion over gays and women bishops.
/.../
Dr Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, was not told of the talks and the disclosure will be a fresh blow to his efforts to prevent a major split in the Church of England.
In highly confidential discussions, a group of conservative bishops expressed their dismay at the liberal direction of the Church of England and their fear for its future.
They met members of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the most powerful of the Vatican's departments, the successor to the medieval Inquisition, which enforces doctrine and was headed by Pope Benedict XVI before his election."
Beslut om kvinnliga biskopar kan leda till massflykt
Ja, så kan det tyvärr bli....
Kan dock tycka att de präster och lekmän som i så fall lämnar Anglikanska kyrkan i protest kunde bilda en egen liten sekt istället för att bli katoliker....
Det är inte rätt att skyffla över alla problem till oss. Bara för att vi råkar vara sist ut med att återinföra vigning av kvinnor så är det ju dumt att fördröja det ytterligare genom att acceptera en tillströmning av extremtraditionalister som bygger sin kyrkotillhörighet på en enda fråga - som inte ens grundar sig i tron...
Borde katolska kyrkan alls släppa in dem på så felaktiga grunder?
***
"The church of England faces a mass exodus of priests and worshippers after plans were approved to allow women to become bishops without protection for traditionalists.
At a confidential meeting, bishops narrowly voted to proceed with the historic reforms and to resist pressure to create separate dioceses free of women clergy.
The decision will dismay hundreds of priests who could defect to the Roman Catholic Church, which refuses to ordain women. It was taken at a meeting of about 50 members of the House of Bishops, at a hotel in Market Bosworth, Leicestershire, last week, and has set the stage for a showdown with traditionalists when the General Synod, the Church's parliament, is next convened, in July."
