Today I saw one of the weirdest things I’ve seen in a long while.
Get this. It is not intended to be satire. From CNA about “Walking Together about Walking Togetherity” (aka “W-T-F” – explained HERE)
Synod on Synodality: Italian nun claims St. Paul attended ‘non-ritual female liturgy’ [?!?]
An Italian religious sister told the Synod on Synodality assembly Friday that St. Paul attended “a non-ritual female liturgy” ahead of synod discussions of women’s inclusion in the Church. [This is word salad. What, pray tell, is liturgy that is non-ritual? If is liturgy, it is ritual. And what sort of strange things were women off on their own doing in that time frame in a pagan, Gentile city?]
Mother Maria Grazia Angelini gave an exegesis [eisegesis, rather] of the New Testament for synod delegates during the general congregation on Oct. 13 in which she claimed that St. Paul “inserted himself into a ‘non-ritual’ female liturgy” when he arrived in the city of Philippi in Macedonia.
Speaking to hundreds of synod participants in Paul VI Hall, Angelini described how “Paul was welcomed by a liturgy outside the ritual, among women, in the open air.”
She said: “The apostle did not start, as was his custom, in the synagogue … He inserted himself into a ‘non-ritual’ female liturgy, breaking into it with the word of the Gospel.” [“Breaking into it”. I’m picturing Paul doing this: “I was just writing to my friend Timothy over in Ephesus about the question of whether women should be speak or be silent.”]
Angelini’s speech referred to a historical event recorded in chapter 16 of the Acts of the Apostles, which states: “On the sabbath, we went outside the city gate along the river where we thought there would be a place of prayer. We sat and spoke with the women who had gathered there” (Acts 16:13). [Women gathered at the river… talking. Women talking. REALLY cutting edge stuff here. In the ancient world… women talking at a river… perhaps doing laundry? I guess that’s a kind of non-liturgical ritual.]
The Scripture goes on to describe how one of the women named Lydia listened “and the Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what Paul was saying” and she was baptized along with her household (Acts 16:14-15). The Biblical text does not make mention of any sort of a liturgy. [Nor does it mention laundry.]
The sister’s exegesis of the Acts of the Apostles was part of a larger speech on “the cry of women” throughout the New Testament. She argued that the contribution of women “unceasingly fuels the spiritual dynamism of reform.”
Angelini is one of two “spiritual assistants” who helped to lead the meditations for the retreat and the prayers throughout the Synod assembly this month, along with Father Timothy Radcliffe. [Good grief.]
[…]
That’s pretty strange.
This is also pretty strange, but it comes from the Fishwrap (aka National Sodomitic Reporter) where everything is strange.
$1.25M Lilly grant funds new program in women’s preaching
A new program to prepare women to preach in the Catholic Church has received a $1.25 million grant from Lilly Endowment Inc., even as current church practice does not allow women to give the homily at Mass. [Current and future Church practice, founded on divine revelation.]
But the possibility of women’s greater participation in the church is currently being discussed at the Synod of Bishops at the Vatican. A working document for the Oct 4-23 synod explicitly mentions “the possibility for women with adequate training to preach in parish settings.” [Note the premise underlying this: women don’t have great participation in the church. It’s small c with them always. But is this premise correct? Do woman not have great participation in the Church? Just because by divine will some roles are not available to women, does that mean that they don’t participate? They have a distorted understanding either of a) participation or b) women. I’m not excluding that both of those could be operative.]
“This is a massive investment by the Lilly Foundation in Catholic women’s vocations and the possibility of them growing as ministers of the Word,” Casey Stanton, co-director of Discerning Deacons, told NCR. [Guess what that group promotes.]
Discerning Deacons will share the grant with its fiscal sponsor, St. Thomas More Catholic [Jesuit] Community in St. Paul, Minnesota, and the Center for the Study of Spirituality at St. Mary’s College in Notre Dame, Indiana.
[…]
The Center for the Study of Spirituality at St. Mary’s College, under the leadership of Franciscan Fr. Daniel P. Horan, [That guy?!? I don’t think we have a lot to worry about.] will be the primary institutional partner in the venture.
[…]
Stanton of Discerning Deacons pointed out that, despite church prohibitions, [“in defiance of”] women currently break open the Word at funeral homes, Communion services and in other venues. “So even if nothing changes in the synod, women are already doing this,” she said. “We hope they can do it with the church’s blessing.” [The readership knows about Communion in the hand, girl altar boys, etc. This is how they do things: simply violate the law until in something like exasperation (0r collusion) the powers that be cave in. It’s not going to happen with ordination to the diaconate.]
By the way, there is a difference between “breaking open the word” and “preaching”.
NO preaching.
Discerning Deacons… the site has a note about celebrating St. Phoebe Day. Feminists claim, without any compelling evidence, that Phoebe was a deaconess. Whenever I see that, I have to chuckle. One of my old profs at the Augustinianum was Prosper Grech, who was eventually made a Cardinal (over 80). I believe he gave the speech to the Cardinals in the Sistine Chapel as that sad Conclave got underway in 2013. Grech was a bit of a wag with a very sharp tongue. Anyway, he once quipped that Phoebe was probably a man, which still makes me smile. Let’s just say that Grech wasn’t impressed with feminist claims.
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All very weird, Father. And that may be part of the plan. If everything is weird, then nothing is.
Incidentally, I fear the Italian sister and you both are incorrect. Reading between the lines and knowing a lot about the critical history method, I am able to conclude that it must have been a women’s competitive catfish noodling meet down at the riverbank that day.
Mother Maria Grazia is a nut.
Sorry but I have to.
St. Paul said women in church should keep their heads covered and mouths shut.
As with most things people don’t look at the why he said it. These were radical women of his day. Now we have seen it come to fruition.
May the spirit of St. Paul come over WT.
” “On the sabbath, we went outside the city gate along the river where we thought there would be a place of prayer. We sat and spoke with the women who had gathered there” (Acts 16:13).”
There is a small brook/creek behind my house. If my wife, mother and stepdaughter walk over their tomorrow and perform the liturgical action of washing their underwear, does that fulfill their Mass obligation?
Also, if they talk while performing this sacred task, does it have to be in Latin or is it okay to use the vernacular?
A text without a context is a pretext.
Much of St. Paul’s letters are W-T-F type letters. Rarely is he writing to a community that is doing a good job of living The Way. St. Paul is the original “mansplainer” — even the example that is given from Acts is such a thing. He is there to convert those women singing psalms while they wash their clothes to Christ. Feminists don’t know what they are talking about.
—>The Biblical text does not make mention of any sort of a liturgy.
Yes it does, and you just mentioned it: The Baptismal Liturgy. Further, it must be noted that Lydia et. al. when they show up elsewhere are ensconced as full participants in the liturgical life of the Church in SUBORDIANANT roles (just like everyone else who is not ordained). They are not doing their own female thing that is independent, parallel, shadow, or whatnot to a “male hierarchy”. (As a side note here, again showing that this nun doesn’t know what she is talking about: The early Church liturgy, following the temple and synagogue pattern, separated males and females from each other in the congregation during the liturgy. Separate but fully integrated as part of the whole. You are really interested in “restoring” how women functioned in the early Church???).
–>“the possibility for women with adequate training to preach in parish settings.”
Any woman with adequate training would not seek to preach in a parish setting. It is definitional so that if one does not know or accept that only the ordained ministers preach, one is not properly trained/formed.
I’d be tempted to say that these women should become Protestant as they would be much happier there, but as a convert, I know that they won’t and should just go all the way and become wiccan or whatever that is the desired goal of their narcissism and broken female urge to control/manipulate. (Men have their own issues too, especially with the impulse to tinker with/modify God’s commands that is very much on display as the contemporary W-T-F is reflexive of situations that warranted the writing of St. Paul’s W-T-F Epistles.).
“The sister’s exegesis of the Acts of the Apostles . . . . ”
No. Sister did not express exegesis but eisegesis of the scripture.
“da qualche fessura sia entrato il fumo di Satana nel tempio di Dio” ~ Pope Paul VI
So the smoke of Satan entered long ago. What about Satan himself?
Perhaps Bishop McButterpants can get involved in something like this, to try to get some of that money. I hope someone smuggles out some more of his diary soon.
Wow. As a son of a Mother who has schizophrenia, this is all too eerie. It’s sounds as if Mother Angelini is sick and I mean that sincerely. Shame on the synod. Mental illnesses should be treated and not promoted. We know as Catholics what Angelini has said is a Lie and a delusion. Shame on anyone for going along with it. She is unwell and deserves prayer.
My mother yelled at me in the back of a Church today for not remembering for her that my daughter plays violin! Angelini is much like my Mom, unwell.
I was given a prayer
I find it baffling that there is not seemingly any intellectual curiosity in the hierarchy to seriously question what is going on. Considering that Bergoglio and his supporters, seemingly hate the Church, her teachings, and therefore her Bridegroom, it would seem that one would inquire as to whether something that was amiss at the beginning of the pontificate. At least ask the question. I mean at the very least, the pontificate of B16 ended in a way that was historic and the next one is doing something that many have believed could never occur within ANY pontificate, at least ask the question. My entire faith is being challenged. And I am not alone.
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I often think our describing our need for all male priesthood as backwards. The real point is that we have a mystically all female Church. We are all the Bride of Christ, waiting for his love to complete and fructify us. This obtains to the priest in the pew with the rest of us just as it does the nun in her choir and the parents and children in the pews. We don’t need a “Female Liturgy.” All of our Liturgy is Female. We do need to thank our priests for taking on the extra burden of representing our Lord in the Divine Liturgy, and to remember that through their work for us the bridal people is our Nuptial Banquet completed.
Also, when religious women say the Divine Office, is that not a more literal all female liturgy?
I agree with Not:
“St. Paul said women in church should keep their heads covered and mouths shut.”
The places I see silent women with veiled heads are the TLM Masses I attend. It’s such a relief.
In replying to Not and Mater:
I do weekly TLM and us men also keep our mouths shut except with uncovered heads…except for the priest and altar servers who happen to be male. The men and women in the choir occasionally vocalize too.
I think the WTF is not only implying the want female priests, but also that they want Masses to sound akin to a Southern Baptist service. I suppose that counts as a non-ritual liturgy by their apparent definition.
How is it that Bishop McButterpants is not a member of the Synod? Should be right in his wheelhouse, good Italian food and wine, and theological nonsense.
At another Catholic website I attributed Mother Maria Grazia Angelini shallow “exegesis” to depth fantasy — yet another exhibition that the feminist “theological” enterprise refuses to rise above itself. It does not even rise to the level of eisegesis [a new one by me and much appreciated]. How utterly discouraging is it to observe religious and clerics who should be characterized as having devoted lives to contemplation, study and service reduce their own selves to twisting Catholic faith into a pretzel to serve their own agenda.
Eoin OBolguidhir’s comment above provoked some thought, though I admit to not having a perfect response…the Divine Office or the Liturgy of the Hours are required of individual priests, male and female religious depending on the congregation, and encouraged for the faithful. While the Office/the Hours are a critical facet of the liturgical practice of the Church they can be sung in community choir or recited individually with equally validity . Given that reality, I don’t believe you can stretch their communal recitation in a community of sisters/nuns to be a “female liturgy,” not could you characterize a community solely constituted of brothers with no priests to be some sort of lay presided liturgy.
The Office/the Hours is the prayer of the Church all together, priests, religious and laity.
A very old and departed Priest that I knew for many years always told us that in Seminary when ever a question arose, the Teacher would say…Let’s see what St. Paul has to say about it.
He used that through out his ministry.
It is surreal being lectured to about women’s roles by people who profess not to know (or prefer not to state, or fear to state) the essential natural difference between men and women.
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