Fr. Z's Blog

I have a wonderful bottle of cava in the fridge.   Today, being a Vigil, is not usually a celebratory day for me, but I can’t help but let out a little whoop of joy.

The lesbian writer, who was so very mentored by heretic Margaret Farley at Yale, the Fishwrap’s own Jamie Mason, reminds us today – she wasn’t celebrating, I fear – that today is the …

…26th Anniversary of Ordinatio sacerdotalis, in which Pope St. John Paul II definitively and indeed infallibly put the question of the ordination of women to the priesthood six feet under.

Today is the 26th anniversary of Pope John Paul II’s ban on the ordination of women, and #MrsAmerica is here for it.

?@MsSarahPaulson, brilliant work.
Lesbian feminist Catholics thank you. ??

? #OrdainWomen #ERANow pic.twitter.com/Vc4reIaKhN

— Jamie L. Manson (@jamielmanson) May 20, 2020

ERA, too?  Another thing that is not going to happen.

So, the question in certain circles keeps coming back, like a coronavirus.

Can women be ordained to the priesthood?

The short answer is, “No.”

When asked again, and again, and again, and again, as libs are wont to do, we can give them the longer answer.

“Nooooooooooooooo.”

It helps to shake the head slowly while extending the vowel.

That goes now for women and the diaconate, by the way.  By the very fact that Holy Orders is in three grades, diaconate with the two grades of priest, priesthood and, that deepening of authority, episcopate, and since those second two are infallibly reserved to men only, therefore women cannot be ordained to the other order, diaconate.

Women cannot receive the Sacrament of Holy Orders.

So, when they ask or insist, again, and again, and again.

The short answer is “No.”

Here’s a link to Ordinatio sacerdotalis.  HERE

Here’s a link to Card. Ratzinger’s explanation that the teaching John Paul clearly defined is also infallible.  HERE

It’s belongs to “the deposit of the faith”.

And this HERE

“In this case, an act of the ordinary Papal Magisterium, in itself not infallible, witnesses to the infallibility of the teaching of a doctrine already possessed by the Church.”

Here is Card. Ladaria’s Response to dubia.  HERE

“John Paul II referred to this infallibility in Ordinatio sacerdotalis. In this manner he did not declare a new dogma, but, with the authority conferred upon him as the Successor of Peter, he formally confirmed and made explicit, so as to remove all doubt, that which the Ordinary and Universal Magisterium has long considered throughout history as belonging to the deposit of faith.”

Francis in 2016: HERE

“On the ordination of women in the Catholic Church, the last word was clearly given by Saint John Paul II, and this remains.”

Can women be ordained?