Germany: More dissent from nuns

Today started with a post about that caput malorum omnium that is Germany.  Let’s continue.

The ultra-left La Croix stumps, not reports, on a German nun advocating women priests.

If one had the slightest… slightest… understanding of priesthood as flowing from the creation of Adam and Eve, the OT priestly office, and who Christ is, this would never come up, let alone be seriously proposed.   Let’s see what this German nun has offer.

Leading Benedictine nun in Germany calls for women priests ‘Why shouldn’t we pray for gender equality [First, mistake.  There is a difference between gender and sex.] in the Church? It is most important that all discussions on reform be offered up to God,’ says Sister Ruth Schönenberger

The leader of one of Germany’s most important female religious communities has called into question the Catholic Church’s exclusion of women from the ordained priesthood.”It is surely only natural for women to be priests and I cannot understand the reasons given as to why not,” [“only natural”?  It would be the most unnatural thing imaginable!] said Sister Ruth Schönenberger, head of the Benedictine Priory of Tutzing, the Bavarian motherhouse of a worldwide missionary order.”I am surprised that the presence of Christ has been reduced to the male sex,” [Confusing categories… the “presence of Christ”… ] she said in a recent interview with katholisch.de, the official website of the German Catholic Church.”Here in Tutzing, we, too, have excellently qualified women theologians. The only thing they lack is ordination – nothing else,” said 68-year-old Schönenberger, prioress of Tutzing since 2015.  [I know she’s a nun, but at 68 she should know that, yes, there is something else lacking.]

The priory is one of the most important in the Benedictine world. In 1885 it founded the Missionary Benedictine Sisters of Tutzing, a congregation that today numbers some 1,300 sisters in 19 countries around the world.

Priesthood should not be based on gender  [IT’S NOT!]

Schönenberger, who is responsible for the 70 members at the Tutzing priory and those at two other Benedictine convents, said the criteria for priesthood should not be based on one’s gender.  [again?] “Our present image/concept of the priesthood urgently needs to be fundamentally revised and I am genuinely surprised that priests themselves don’t protest more against present developments since they involve them,” [Perhaps because not all priests are as stupid as you take them for.  I mean… some are pretty dumb, but not that dumb.] said the prioress, noting that men and women should be treated as equals. [Her vision of priesthood must be based on power.]  “The extent to which this power imbalance [DING DING… say da magic woid, win a hunned dahlahs.] exists the world over is truly alarming and so is the fact that we have not learned to grapple with it more effectively. It is something we must rigorously tackle,” Schönenberger said.

She called for greater and open discussion on the issue to look for concrete steps that could be taken to remedy the imbalance “and not just comfort us women somehow – as, for example, by promising to look into the question of women deacons.”  [yawn] Schönenberger said she and her fellow sisters often discuss the subject.  [I’ll bet they do.]

New forms of Eucharist?

“After all, we experience concrete examples of subordination day after day. [Cf. Genesis… etc.  And, for everyone’s information, so do priests.] If we, as a group of women religious, want to celebrate the Eucharist together, we have to arrange for a man to come and celebrate it, every single day. He stands at the altar and leads the celebration. We are not allowed to,” the Tutzing prioress said. “We intend to look for forms (of celebrating the Eucharist) which suit us and develop new ones,” she added.  [The bare hubris is amazing.  The Golden Calf comes to mind.  The worship of Moloch in the time of Solomon comes to mind.]

Worldwide prayers for gender equality in the Church

She said she and her community fully supported the prayer initiative for gender [again] equality in the Church that was launched in February by Sister Irene Gassman, prioress of the Benedictine Monastery of Fahr (Switzerland).The Swiss religious has invited Benedictine communities around the globe — as well as parishes and other communities — to include the “Prayer on Thursday” during compline (or night prayer) each week.  Schönenberger said prayer alone was not enough, but added: “Why shouldn’t we pray for gender equality in the Church? It is most important that all discussions on reform be offered up to God.”

The sheer hubris of this is nearly palpable.  One almost needs to go and wash after reading this stuff.  There is a strong undercurrent of the Enemy of the soul all through that piece, hardly a surprise given its source.

The whole issue of equality, btw, is explained in two chapters of Genesis, recounting the creation of our first parents.  The creation account shows that there is equality between the sexes, but there is also hierarchy.  Paul was very sensible of this especially in his Pastoral Epistles, esp. 1 Timothy 2.

 

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21 Comments

  1. iamlucky13 says:

    This seems like one of those pieces that seeks to upend so many principles that it is not very practical to address them all. More relevant to this sort of writing tactic, it is deliberately impossible to address them all within the attention span of the readers the author intends to be swayed by such writing. Thank you for having the patience to even provide a cursory commentary on each of the myriad problems with this article.

    To me, one of the central issues is this one:
    “It is surely only natural for women to be priests and I cannot understand the reasons given as to why not

    Can she honestly describe how much effort she has made, and what resources from the Church’s history and teaching she relied upon in her efforts to understand the male priesthood?

  2. veritas vincit says:

    “Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church’s divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32) I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful.” — St John Paul II, Ordinatio Sacredotalis

    What part of this declaration, arguably an infallible pronouncement, do the “excellently qualified women theologians” fail to grasp?

  3. Benedict Joseph says:

    The German Benedictines are at the core of the rot we endure today. In the US, look no further than “Collegevile.”

  4. Ryan M says:

    Every time I hear this sort of demand, I want to ask people if they’ve read the 16th chapter of the book of Numbers (and why they think they are any different in demanding they be priests).

  5. JustaSinner says:

    She’s in charge of 70 members? They’re probably average age, what, 64-66? Time solves THAT problem quickly…

  6. Pius Admirabilis says:

    I am from Germany, and have never heard of her. She is not that important. Sure, it’s disgusting behavior, but we should keep everything in ratio, and not make a fuss about a minor note.

  7. Julia_Augusta says:

    Sister Ruth should join the Church of England. They have women bishops now. This is the perfect moment for the Church of England to increase its membership: go to the Benedictine nuns in Germany and invite them in.

  8. Spinmamma says:

    @Gab There is not enough time to do sufficient penance for that sacrilege. It is shocking beyond words.

  9. Hidden One says:

    Isn’t seeking the priesthood in order to acquire power one of the very worst forms of clericalism?

  10. iPadre says:

    I con only conclude that people saying these preposterous things, whatever state of life – laity, Religious, priest, bishop, and even Cardinal, have no supernatural faith. They don’t seem to hold to the same religion that was willed by our Heavenly Father and founded by our Lord Jesus Christ.

  11. Chaswjd says:

    If they are “looking for new forms” of celebrating the Eucharist, why bother staying Catholic? Go and invent whatever form of Eucharist you want. But for me and mine, we will dwell in the house of the Lord using those forms which have fed us for millennia.

  12. GregB says:

    In the modern Church the people who are the most obsessed with power are usually the ones who are the least fit to wield it.

  13. grateful says:

    There but for the grace of God, go I.

  14. Ms. M-S says:

    Sister Ruth says, “I cannot understand the reasons given as to why not” and that alone is enough justification for overturning the whole applecart. I imagine Eve said something of the same thing to Adam about biting into the apple. And there are people who don’t believe in the aftereffects of Original Sin!

  15. Gab says:

    If Our Lord wanted female priests, I suspect our Holy Mother would have been first in line.
    @grateful, yes, a good reminder. Thank you.

  16. If it’s any mitigation, it appears that the Sister’s interview in German didn’t refer to “gender” but to the traditional word “Geschlecht” (sex). Perhaps La Croix chose to translate it as “gender”.

    Alas, the other errors in her comments are probably really hers.

  17. THREEHEARTS says:

    I have seen Bl Mary waiting at the altar rails outside the sanctuary with her baby, I have seen at the back looking out the door where the priest enters. The only time I saw a woman was as a little girl in a communion dress at a funeral where Jesus took her by the hand walked off the altar. A priest, 6 priests were present for this woman’s send off, one corrected me. and said it was a wedding dress. The woman had died from cancer discovered when she was pregnant and would not have the operation that would have caused the child to be killed.

  18. jjbulano says:

    If God had intended humans to be equal in “all ways” — He would have created only one sex.

  19. tho says:

    Equality is such an ambiguous word, to take it literally, we would not have to take tests to determine our fitness for various occupations. Men and women are distinctly different, not only biologically, but in temperament, and many other ways. Our Bishops are successors of the Apostles, and of course the Apostles were all male. Men are servants of the Lord and women are hand maidens of the Lord, there is a difference.
    Sister verbalizes what is wrong with society today, where a man can say he is a woman, and ipso facto, he is. Everything is so artificial that it will eventually fall of it’s own weight, but not before causing great and unnecessary damage.

  20. Tony McGough says:

    Tony’s wife here: The point about Our Blessed Lady is very well made. She is the greatest of all creatures, and she is NOT a priest. She provides women with a model of contemplative prayer bearing fruit in total obedience to God and self-effacing self giving that leads to true happiness. Part of this happiness is seeing men flourish in the way God intended. Beats power any day.

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