Review of Sara Butler's "The Catholic Priesthood and Women"

I have written positively of Sara Butler's "The Catholic Priesthood and Women" and cannot recommend it highly enough for all who truly want to undertand the Catholic Church's stance on this issue.

But there is a good review (with some criticism) by Monica Migliorino Miller on the First Things Blog.

The criticism is mainly over the distinction between "fundamental reasons" and "theological reasons". She does not deny the distinction (which I personally think is one of the strong points of Butler's analysis), but believes that "there is more of an overlap between these two approaches to the doctrine than Butler admits."

Butler brings the focus back to the “fundamental reasons,” which is necessary, considering how they are neglected in the debate. The fact remains, however, that the “fundamental reasons” alone have trouble convincing—and must be followed very quickly by the “theological reasons.”

One extremely good point that Miller makes is that emphasising the "fundamental reasons" without the "theological explanation" of these reasons may lead one to conclude that the will of Christ is "arbitrary".

The “fundamental reasons” in Inter Insigniores begin with a statement that the Church does not believe she has the authority to admit women to the ministerial priesthood. The Church is bound to follow an original gesture of Christ when he established the sacrament of Holy Orders. This is at once a christological and an ecclesiological issue.

When Christ called only men to the company of the Twelve, we are confronted by the will of Christ himself. The apostles themselves were faithful to the expression of Christ’s will. The all-male priesthood begins with Christ, is continued by the apostles and is part of the unbroken tradition of the Church. As the document explains, “The Church intends to remain faithful to the type of ordained ministry willed by the Lord Jesus Christ and carefully maintained by the apostles.”

Many who reject these reasons argue that Christ’s manner of acting, his will indeed, was subject to the historical conditions of the times. In other words, Christ was not free to act any differently than he did, as he was under cultural constraints to deny women liturgical leadership in the Church. But now that times have changed, the Church is free to abandon a practice that discriminates against women.

Butler points out that Inter Insigniores and Ordinatio Sacerdotalis both insist on Christ’s sovereign freedom in his choice of male apostles. And this is an enormously important point. Indeed, much of the legitimacy of the “fundamental reasons” is based on the fact that, not only did Christ act in a certain way, thus setting up a permanent norm, but that Christ acted in freedom. History does not constrain him, culture is not a barrier, history is not a force that may dictate to Christ his choices. Christ is the Lord of history, he is the Lord of his Church.

Behind the “fundamental reasons” is a christological one, and while the Church’s documents insist on Christ’s freedom, it is the theologian’s task to explain why this is important. Butler does not provide this much-needed explanation. What is at stake is the very person of Christ—the divine Logos—in a gesture by which the constitution of the entire new covenant depends. If we follow the arguments of the dissenters, we are forced to conclude that in the very founding of the Church Christ (perhaps innocently) was guilty of an act of injustice to half of the human race. This, of course, is untenable.

Point taken. However, one good thing about the distinction between fundamental reasons and theological explanations is that theological explanations (which have varied over the centuries) may be discussed, disputed, newly recognised and even finally rejected (eg. as was the theological arguement that women cannot be priests because they are of a lower order of human being). The fundamental reasons, however, do not change and cannot be disputed or rejected.

The Catholic Priesthood and Women: An end to confusion

I have just finished reading a brilliant book by Sister/Dr. Sara Butler called "The Catholic Priesthood and Women: A Guide to the Teaching of the Church". Sr Butler is professor of dogmatic theology at St Joseph's Seminary in New York, a member of the International Theological Commission (recently responsible for the document on Limbo), a member of the Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission, and (still) a member of the Catholic Theological Society fo America.

It may be of some interest to some of you that for one brief period in the past (around the early 90's) I was a supporter of the ordination of women. Of course, I was a Lutheran back then, but the questions were the same:

1) Can the church ordain women?
2) Why wouldn't Jesus/God want women to be pastors?

Interestingly, I had came to accept that the answer to the first question was "No" on the basis to the answers that I discovered to the second question.

However, that is not the direction that Sara Butler takes--and in taking the questions in proper order, she demonstrates a great clarity in theological method that Catholics (and Christians of other stripes and spots) would do well to imitate.

Sara Butler was also once a great proponent of the ordinaton of women. For a clear picture of where she once was, see "The Findings of the Research Team of the Catholic Theological Society of America" by Sara Butler, M.S.B.T. from "New Woman, New Church, New Priestly Ministry: Proceedings of the Second Conference on the Ordination of Roman Catholic Women" (November 1978, Baltimore, U.S.A.).

Where she is today is on the opposite end of the spectrum. What changed her mind? The clarity of Church teaching on the matter. But her experience in arguing the pro-women's-ordination case stands her in good stead to write this book, which is aimed above all at making clear exactly what the Church does and does not say regarding the ordination of women.

The beauty of Sr Butler's approach is that she distinguishes between the REASONS why the Church has judged that it does not have the authority to ordain women to the priesthood, and the EXPLANATIONS of why this may be so.

The "fundamental REASONS" are three fold:

1) The tradition of male only priesthood is rooted in Jesus' way of acting (in chosing only males to constitute The Twelve): it is the will of Christ
2) The Apostles' way of acting confirms the Tradition
3) The Tradition has normative value

These fundamental reasons are outlined in John Paul II's Ordinatio Sacerdotalis but have their root in Paul VI's 1975 Letter to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Declaration Inter Insigniores.

These are the REASONS why the Church cannot ordain women. Any argument with the Church's practice must address these reasons. BUT for those who wish to understand what God's purpose may be behind these REASONS, there are EXPLANATIONS. It is important to note that the "explanations" are not "reasons". They do not in themselves constitute the reasons for the Church's way of acting, but rather are to be regarded as "theological arguments" which give us a way of understanding God's purpose in directing the Church to act in such a way.

The EXPLANATIONS or "theological arguments" are based on the "Analogy of Faith" (ie. male only priesthood in relation to the doctrine of the Mystery of Christ and to the doctrine of the Mystery of the Church).

1) The Christological Argument: The priest acts in persona Christi capitis ecclesiae; the priest is a sacramental sign of Christ; the priest is a sign of Christ who is and remains a man.

2) The Ecclesial Argument: The analogy of the covenant and the Eucharist; the priest as the "living image" of Christ the Bridegroom; the ministerial priesthood and nuptial symbolism.

She also skillfully and faithfully outlines the "objections" to the Church's teachings, and (a la Aquinas) gives answers to the objections. She lists and answers 10 OBJECTIONS:

1) The exclusion of women is unjust
2) The Exclusion is based on faulty anthropology
3) If women can be baptised, they can be ordained
4) Jesus' choice of 12 men is irrelevant
5) Women were 'apostles' in the Early Church
6) All the baptised act in persona Christi
7) The priest acts in persona ecclesiae
8) Jesus' sex has no theological significance
9) The risen Christ transcends Maleness
10) Why not ordain only Jewish males?

You will recognise all these objections.

She highlights and interesting point--interesting at least for Protestants and Australian Lutherans in particular--namely that the Pauline "anti-women" passages do not fall into the "fundamental reasons" category, but rather into the "theological arguments" category. In other words, St Paul's prohibitions are not the REASONS why the Church cannot ordain women; rather they are themselves EXPLANATIONS or THEOLOGICAL ARGUMENTS for the practice that was already fully established in that first generation of restricting the pastoral ministry to men.

This excellent review and clarification of the Church's magisterial teaching on the subject of the ordination of women concludes with a short chapter on "The Development of Doctrine", investigating authentic development on the basis of Newman's famous essay. She concludes:

The discussion has been declared closed. The Pope clearly intended to prohibit Catholic theologians, pastors, and religious from publicaly espousing positions contrary to this teaching. This does not mean, however, that the teaching itself does not need to be expounded and discussed. Because the magisterum requires "the full and unconditional assent of the faithful" to this teaching, it devolves on Catholic theologians to explain this as fully and adequately as they can.

According to Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, the authentic development in Catholic doctrine with respect to the status of women in society and in the Church does not require their admission to the ministerial priesthood. Closing off this possibility has led the Church to search for new ways to identify the "genius" of woman and a new commitment to foster the collaboration of men and women in the Church and in society.

All in all, this is a strikingly sober and measured account of the matter, and a shining example of Catholic theological method at its best.

Some more good stuff - on turning around Religious life

Early this year the general congregation of the Society of Jesus took place in Rome. We all hoped that it might mark a turn around for this once great order and a recommittment to the intention of their founder that they "think with the Church". Alas, despite pleading from Cardinal Rode (prefect of the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life) and from the Holy Father himself, they remained determined to continue to head down a path the path of discontinuity and rupture.

Well, there has been a big meeting in the States on "Apostolic Religious Life since Vatican II ... Reclaiming the Treasure: Bishops, Theologians, and Religious in Conversation", and two papers from this meeting are of especial interest.

One is from Sister Sara Butler, she of "The Catholic Priesthood and Women" fame, and also current observer at the Synod of Bishops in the Vatican. Her address was entitled "Apostolic Religious Life: A public, ecclesia vocation". While she is addressing the situation in the Religious Orders since Vatican Two, her paper is in fact applicable to all Catholics. In this sense, the religious communities are akin to the "canary in the coal mine" - but I think we are far beyond the canary stage by now - we can all smell the gas...

Sister Butler gets into the swing about half way through her talk when she discusses the "opposition" that has grown up between "Commitment to Social Justice and the Direct Proclamation of the Gospel". She goes on to address "Competing Ecclesiologies" and "Polarization: Hierarchically-Structured Church vs. Discipleship of Equals". Check this out:

We have no reason to promise obedience to God unless we believe that the person who exercises authority does so in his name. If we accept the authority of the hierarchy we do have reason to do this because we understand that the authority the religious superior exercises "proceeds from the Spirit of the Lord" through the hierarchy, that is, because the Bishop or the Holy See "has granted canonical erection to the institute and authentically approved its specific mission." We accept the authority of the hierarchy -- its teaching authority and jurisdiction -- because we believe that Jesus Christ entrusted his ministry to them. This is part of our faith in the Church as the unique mediator of salvation. This is what justifies our decision to imitate the saving obedience of Jesus by surrendering our wills to another whom we confidently believe mediates God's will to us.

Her best line, one worth remembering, in the whole address is her suggestion that "the crisis of "followership" is just as problematic as the crisis of leadership". As Brian Coyne never tires of pointing out, "Sentire Cum Ecclesia" is precisely about addressing the crisis of "followership".

Once you have finished with Sister Butler's paper, you can go on to read Cardinal Rode's own address "Reforming Religious Life with the Right Hermeneutic" - it is no less to the point than his call to the Jesuits back in January.

And yet another moaner and groaner about the CDF Clarifications on the Doctrine on the Church

In the same edition of The Tablet (subscription only) to which I refer in the blog below, there is an article by Nicholas Lash (Norris-Hulse Professor Emeritus of Divinity, University of Cambridge) entitled "Churches, proper and otherwise". Again, I reproduce part of here, with my comments in [bold].

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has issued a document aimed at clarifying the distinction between the concepts of ‘Church’ and ‘ecclesial community’. But it is difficult to see how this latest document harmonizes with the key texts of the Second Vatican Council. [Only if the Council is read with an "hermeneutic of rupture".]

On 10 July, L'Osservatore Romano published a statement from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) entitled “Responses to some questions regarding certain aspects of the doctrine on the Church". I have no idea why the document has been produced, nor where these “questions” come from. [In fact, no-one does to this day, although Sandro Magister offers a clue.] It is, in fact, dated 29 June. Perhaps publication was delayed so that it could come out under ‘the smokescreen created by the long-awaited appearance of the motu proprio by which the Pope, overriding the authority of the episcopate (although he denies that he is doing this) [Ah... This tells you where he is coming from. You know what to expect now. "Hermeneutic of rupture" meets "hermeneutic of suspicion"] has given widespread permission for the use of the unreformed Missal of 1962.

The fifth and last of the questions addressed in the document runs as follows: “Why do the texts of the Council and those of the Magisterium since the Council not use the title of ‘Church’ with regard to those Christian communities born out of the Reformation of the sixteenth century?”

The answer given is that, “according to Catholic doctrine, these communities do not enjoy apostolic succession in the sacrament of orders, and are, therefore, deprived of a constitutive element of the Church”, Accordingly, these ecclesial communities “cannot, according to Catholic doctrine, be called ‘Churches’ in the proper sense”. The authority for that final clause is given, correctly, as the highly contentious [or, more accurately, highly contended, especially by the "Loyal Opposition", aka the Dissenters] declaration Dominus Iesus which the CDF issued, over the signature of Cardinal Ratzinger, in June 2000.

The expression does not, however, occur in the documents of the Second Vatican Council. It should make any theologically trained nose twitch suspiciously, because if a community is "properly" called "ecclesial" churchly, then that community must surely be in some sense properly called “church” [this argument should make any grammatically trained nose twitch suspiciously: "churchly" is an adjective; it differs from "church" which is a noun. In addition to this, there is a distinction to be made between saying whether a given Christian community is "Church", "a Church", or "The Church"]. As I shall indicate in more detail later on, it is at the very heart of traditional Catholic doctrine, as expressed in the documents of Vatican II, that concepts central to our attempts to give expression to the mystery of God, and of God’s relationships with humankind, are not reducible to the kind of tight and tidy definition with which the officials of the CDF seem most at ease.

The distinction between "Churches" and "ecclesial communities” occurs in the title of the third chapter of the Council’s Decree on Ecumenism, Unitatis Redintegratio “Churches and Ecclesial Communities Separated from the Roman Apostolic See’ The distinction is intended, as a note in Abbott’s edition of the conciliar documents puts it, to convey “the idea that the more a Church has of the essential structures of the Catholic Church, the more it approaches the ideal of the Church". [Lash is very mistaken to think that Abbott's footnotes have any magisterial or hermeneutical authority whatsoever. In particular, Abbott errs in this case by thinking that the essence of the matter is "structures" rather than "communion". This sends Lash off up the wrong garden path in what follows.]

The key conciliar text on Catholic doctrine on Church structures is, of course the third chapter of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church "Lumen Gentium". I have long insisted that the central doctrinal achievements of Vatican II are to be found in the sequence of chapters of its two Dogmatic Constitutions, on Revelation and on the Church.

Where the latter is concerned, the subject of the first chapter is “The Mystery of the Church". It is a marvellously biblical and patristically rich meditation on the irreducibility of the mystery of the Church, the mystery of God's gathering of sinful scattered humankind into communion with him, to any single model, image or description. [Ecclesiology is not about making up "models" of the Church, any more than theology is about making up "image" for God. It is about recognising the revealed reality.] The second chapter does, nevertheless, relatively privilege one such image or description in treating of "the People of God".

The selection of this theme ensures that the Council’s teaching on the Church is both historical and eschatological. We are a people on the way, a people whose finishing began at Calvary and at the empty tomb, but which still lies ahead of us in the consummation of the kingdom. Of central importance is the Council's treatment, in articles 13 to 16, of the theme that all of humankind is called by God to be this people, to be this gathering, ecclesia, of which that which we usually call the Church is the already symbolically realised expression or (as Chapter One had put it, "sacrament"). [And the sacramental analogy is behind the meaning of the term "subsistit in" too.]

The account of the ways in which different kinds and conditions or people already live within this “People’s” scope runs all the way from those, "fully incorporated into the society of the Church who, possessing the Spirit of Christ, accept her entire system and all the in means of salvation given to her, and through union with her visible structure are joined to Christ", through other Christians, “consecrated by baptism, through which they are united with Christ”, and who “recognise and receive other sacraments within their own Churches or ecclesial communities" and so on to the Jews, the Muslims [here Lash is importing ideas from Nostra Aetate into Lumen Gentium--LG does not actually mention Jews or Muslims, and certainly does not suggest that the Church exists beyond the communities of the baptised], and those, who “have not yet arrived at an explicit knowledge of God, bit who strive to live a good life thanks to His grace."

Notice especially the expression, “possessing the Spirit of Christ” and “thanks to his grace". This is a description of humankind’s relationship with God’s gathering according to which the holy atheist is closer to being part of God’s People than a wicked pope [this really is stating far more than the Council ever said--the wicked pope may not be a true Christian, but what exactly is a "holy atheist"?]. This point should be obvious, but may still be worth making.

Against the sweep of these articles, it is easy to see why the late Bishop Christopher Butler was never tired of insisting that the heart of the Council's teaching on the Church was well captured in an expression of the Russian theologian Paul Evdokimov: “We can say where the Church is, but not where she is not." [And in fact the CDF clarification doesn't attempt to say "where the Church is not", but rather to clarify what is meant when we say that the Catholic Church is "THE Church" and when we call a particular Christian community "A Church"] (Incidentally, in his contribution in a learned collection of essays on “Lumen Gentium”,·L'Eglise & Vatican II. Etudes autour de la Constitution conciliaire sur l'Eglise, edited by Y.M.J. Congar and published in 1966, Bishop Butler suggested that "ecclesial communities" should be thought of as not merely “Churches by desire”, but true extensions of the Church, although seriously defective.) [There is no indication at all that the CDF Clarifications consider the "ecclesial communities" as "Churches by desire"--whatever that might mean.]

Only in the third place, after these two doctrinally rich chapters, did the Council treat, in Chapter Three, of "The hierarchical structure of the Church, with special reference to the episcopate."

Structures matter. Structures, in an incarnational and sacramental dispensation, are indispensable. From the standpoint of Catholic doctrine, other Christians traditions are, in widely varying degrees, structurally defective. [Here Lash makes a big mistake. Just as Fr Lawrence mistakenly thought the CDF Clarifications considered the Eastern Churches to be wounded because they failed to recognise the primacy of the bishop of Rome, so here Lash mistakenly thinks that the CDF Clarifications deny the ecclesial communities the status of "true, particular or local Churches" because they have the wrong "structure". As I said before, I will say again: what is wanting is neither structure nor recognition of primacy (although both are involved) but COMMUNION.] But, according to Catholic doctrine, as represented by the Dogmatic Constitution “Lumen Gentium' structures do not come first, or even second, but third. The CDF claims that it is "clarifying the authentic meaning of some ecclesiological expressions" such as what it is to be, or not be, "Church". [Neither the Clarifications nor the Commentary ever talk about what it "means to be Church". They are concerned solely with what it means to speak of "THE Church" and "A Church".] But to treat, for example, the distinction between “Churches” and “ecclesial communities” in complete abstraction from the context in which that distinction is shaped and figured by the rich teaching of the first two chapters of the Constitution is not to "clarify" Catholic doctrine but grossly to distort and misrepresent it. [is the CDF guilty of this?]

By way of conclusion, a word on Anglican orders. What is the Catholic Church’s view of their status? [A good question] Here we confront a paradox. On the one hand, Leo XIII's encyclical Apostolicae Curae, of 1896, which denounced Anglican orders as “absolutely null and utterly void", has never been repealed. [More to the point, it remains the judgement of the Church--even more so now that the Anglicans have proceeded to ordain women as bishops.] It would seem to follow that there must be some sense — for all I know a “proper” sense - in which the Archbishop of Canterbury is, as one Roman Catholic bishop put it in a letter to The Times, I think, 1951, a letter exhibiting a tact and generosity worthy of the CDF, a ‘doubtfully baptised layman”. [Oh very nice, very nice touch. But this is dishonest. Lash knows that we recognise the validity of Rowan Williams' baptism, even if we do not recognise the validity of his Ordination.]

On the other hand, it is also the case that for over 40 years, successive popes have received bishops and other dignitaries of the Church of England with richly symbolic gestures (and facts have their own logic) such as Paul VI's exchange of episcopal rings with Archbishop Michael Ramsey John Paul II's gift of a priest’s stole to Professor Henry Chadwick and, last November, the invitation to Archbishop Rowan Williams to celebrate the Eucharist at the high altar of the ancient basilica of Santa Satins, a celebration at which the Gospel was read by a senior official of the Roman Curia. [All this is quite true. It means that the bishops of the Anglican Church--and the sacraments they celebrate--are "not nothing". But the Pope also regularly receives women pastors and bishops of the German and Scandanavian Churches with all civility--and that doesn't mean that the Catholic Church recognises them as valid priests. My take on the matter is that the Archbishop of Canterbury and every other protestant minister is to be honoured because (by human arrangement rather than divine ordination) they have been entrusted with the pastoral care of communities of validly baptised Christians, and they exercise effective ministries of the Word of God.]

Some day a pope, assisted by the other bishops of the Catholic Church, will have to sort things out, bang heads together. It seems unlikely, however, that this will happen during the present pontificate. [Again, I beg to differ. The very document that Lash is criticising is part of the "head-banging" he longs for. Unfortunately for him, his head is one of those requiring to be banged.]

All in all, not a helpful article in any sense. "Being Church" (to take Lash's phrase) isn't about recognising primacy or structures. Say it after me, boys and girls, it is all about COMMUNION.

_____________________

PS. Is it worth observing that there are also groupings of Catholics which are not "Churches in the true and proper sense"? I am thinking for instance of the way we sometimes use the word "Church" to refer to our local parish. This is not "a Church" in the true sense, because a local particular Church in the true sense is the Diocese, not the parish. Neither can we say that the "Australian Catholic Church" is "a Church" in the true sense, because there is really no such animal. There are Catholics in Australia, and you could call them the Catholic Church in Australia, but the Catholic Churches in Australia are the individual Dioceses and Eparchies in communion with the Successor of Peter, not the national conglomerate of all these individual Churches. So you see, we are not being pejorative toward protestants when we say that the various "denominations" are not "Churches in the proper sense". We certainly aren't suggesting that they are not Christian or that their members do not, by virtue of the baptism and faith in Christ, belong to the one true Church of Christ.

Who's going to the Synod on the Word of God?

That's a question I put to our local ordinary just before he left for the English Language Liturgical meeting in Vancouver last week. But the full list of delegates to the Synod of Bishops on the Word of God was released only the next day, and here it is for those who are interested.

Three Australian bishops will be attending, Cardinal Pell, Bishop Peter Ingham (as President of the Federation of Catholic Bishops' Conferences of Oceania), and Bishop Michael Putney (who was our guest speaker at a Catholic/Muslim Iftar dinner here on Tuesday night).

But a surprise announcement from the Holy See came just a day or two ago::

VATICAN CITY, 9 SEP 2008 (VIS) - The Holy Father appointed Cardinal George Pell, archbishop of Sydney, Australia, as president delegate of the Twelfth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops. He substitutes Cardinal Oswald Gracias, archbishop of Bombay, India, who is unable to attend the gathering.

How about that?

And another thing to note is that among the six women who will be participating in the Synod is Sr Sara Butler, previously mentioned on this blog for her superaltive work "The Catholic Priesthood and Women".

And in the light of this story, a Synod on the Word could not come at a better time!

On another tangent is this column in the Sydney Morning Herald about the importance of the bible in a balanced education within the Australian cultural context. At least here in Victoria the Yr 12 "Texts and Traditions" curriculum provides the opportunity for study of the Sacred Scriptures in our schools. My friend, Pastor David Spike, was telling me recently of his experience in teaching the Gospel of John as a part of this curriculum to his students at Luther College. He remarked on the very positive value it had for the students in helping them to see that there is very serious scholarship behind this Christianity thing.

Ebenezer Lutheran Church: "Her Church"

Interesting to compare the Holy Father's comments about the invalidity of calling God "Mother" with this promotional video for Ebenezer Lutheran Church ("Her Church") in San Francisco.

Also it is interesting that the Holy Father expressly said that "we can only tentatively seek to understand" why the Scriptures avoid using feminine pronouns, titles and forms of address for God, even while employing feminine imagery; nevertheless "even if we cannot provide any absolutely compelling arguments, the prayer language of the bible remains normative for us".

Here again we find the distinction that Sara Butler makes (in her book about why the Church only ordains men) between "explanations" and "fundamental reasons".

Of course, how we address God has consequences for our whole liturgical and spiritual life. One of the consequences of going wobbly or flakey on this point is that you end up with women priests. Ebenezer Lutheran Church has gone so wobbly that it is a wonder it is still standing...

New Lutheran title on the Ordination of Women (agin it) includes Australian Authors

Dr William Tighe has alerted me to the following title that has just been released:

New Book on Women’s Ordination Includes Essays by Several CTS Faculty

A collection of essays on the ordination of women, Women Pastors? The Ordination of Women in Biblical Lutheran Perspective, edited by Concordia Theological Seminary professor John T. Pless and Matthew Harrison has been published by Concordia Publishing House and is available for $26.99. This anthology of essays includes chapters by CTS professors Charles Gieschen (“Ordained Proclaimers or Quiet Learners?”), Roland Ziegler (“Liberation Theology in the Leading Ladies of Feminist Theology”), William Weinrich (“Women in the History of the Church” and “It Is Not Given a Woman to Teach: A Lex in Search of a Ratio”), and David Scaer (“May Women Be Ordained as Pastors?” and “The Office of Pastor and the Problem of Women’s Ordination”). Other essays are included by North American, European, and Australian theologians Henry Hamann, Bertil Gaertner, Bo Giertz, Reinhard Slenczka, Peter Kriewaldt, David Bryce, Fredrik Sidenvall, Peter Brunner, John Kleinig, Hermann Sasse, Gregory Lockwood, Louis Smith, Louis Brighton, and Robert Schaibley.

CTS President Dean O. Wenthe commented on the significance of the anthology: “It is striking that in the ancient Near East where female deities and priestesses were abundant, Israel was told to have only male priests. Similarly, in the Greco-Roman world, where female gods and priestesses flourished, the church restricted the apostolic office to men. This volume is to be commended for similarly resisting prevailing cultural novelties by supporting in a scholarly and churchly manner the God-given order for the church’s ministry. Women as well as men are blessed when they hear and follow the living, healing voice of Jesus in the prophetic and apostolic Scriptures.”

Marco Vervoorst and I were reflecting today on how one could possibly make a case for not ordaining women from a Lutheran perspective. The Catholic argument assumes that the one who is ordained IS a PRIEST, and not just a "minister". From the blurb about by Wenthe (about the priesthood of ancient Israel) it would seem that he assumes the equation pastor=priest. But is this true of Lutheran theology in general and of these essays in particular?

Incidentally, several of the Australian authors are, were or have been my close associates or teachers: Henry Hamann, Peter Kriewaldt, David Bryce, John Kleinig, Gregory Lockwood, and (in spirit but never in person) the great Hermann Sasse. Also one of the editors, Pastor Matt Harrison, and his wife were my neighbours at Luther Sem for a year when he was studying here in Australia. A good man and mean banjo player (and yes, I say that even though I was living right next door to him in the same building!).

It would be an interesting endeavour to compare the arguments in this book to Sara Butler's "The Catholic Priesthood and Women", which I regard as the best on offer from a Catholic perspective on this question.

The tomb of St John the Apostle

Those of you who followed my travel blogs will have read about my "discovery" of the Tomb of St John in the ruins of the 6th Century Basilica of St John in Selcuk near ancient Ephesus in Turkey. You can read more about this basilica here and below is a picture I snapped of the tomb itself.
I was surprised that my journey led me to this spot, as I have never before asked myself where St John was buried. All the checking I have done since indicates that this is the only place indicated by tradition for the burial of this important apostle. There is nothing to indicate that at any stage his remains have been removed from this spot. To my knowledge, there is no other place associated with the veneration of St John's final resting place.

Butler's Lives of the Saints has this reference:

St John was buried on a mountain without the town. The dust of his tomb was carried away out of devotion, and was famous for miracles, as St Austin, St Ephrem, and St Gregory of Tours mention. A stately church stood formerly over this tomb, which is at present a Turkish Mosque.

That isn't quite accurate. The church is in ruins, and the mosque referred to is the Isa Bey Mosque (Lord Jesus Mosque!) just down the hill (although in the last years before it was completely demolished by earthquake in the 14th Century, the church itself was used as both a mosque and a church). The Mosque has its own peculiarity in that it doesn't face Mecca, but more on that in a separate blog.

So--considering what a great to do there is about the resting place of other great apostles such as St Peter (St Peter's Basilica, the Vatican) and St Paul (St Paul's Outside the Walls, Rome)--why is this holy place allowed to go unrecognised, unadorned, unkept, unvisited by pilgrims, uncelebrated by the liturgy, and just about un-everything else? Is this a happy situation? I don't think so.

I'm not calling for another crusade or anything, but I ask you: should the final resting place of the beloved disciple, the guardian of the Blessed Virgin in her old age, the Divine Theologian of the most sublime Gospel and the resplendant Apocalypse, be forgotten? What can we do about this?