Is the male-only priesthood a discipline or essential to the nature of being a priest? Sr. Vassa (again unflinchingly taking up a contentious topic by climbing up the ladder to the highest platform and then jumping into the deep end head first) dives right in and says there is no reason beyond personal preference to not have female clergy. You know, when people ask me about women in priesthood, they say, 'Sister, why can't women be priests?' And I say, 'Women CAN be priests. We don't WANT them to be priests.' Because you see, God can do anything, and the Church, by divine authority, uh, can do anything, but, the Church doesn't want to - and that's a legitimate reason. What I don't like is when we TRY to pretend that there are other reasons for this, because it's legitimate not to want something, and there are reasons not to want this - right? - but, we shouldn't pretent that there's some... reason, that, for example, the maleness...
The last post reminded me of the short but well done set of podcasts from Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church. Here is the podcasts page.
Sadly this custom has died out in the Western Church, with the notable exception of Hispanic Catholics.
ReplyDeleteVery true. There's a lot more kissing, touching, going down to the ground, etc. in the East in general. I wonder what it's a result of? Liturgical development? Arrangement of the church? No idea. It's worth researching.
ReplyDeleteNot sure. The Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite (a.k.a. the Traditional Latin Mass) prescribes ceremonial kisses (the 'solita oscula') anytime something is given to or taken from the Celebrant. This comes from the fact that his hands have been consecrated at his ordination and are worthy of reverence since through them the bread and wine become the Body & Blood of Christ.
ReplyDeleteI serve the Latin Mass once a month and am always surprised to see that the older servers (i.e. those in their 50s) never use the osculations and say they never learned them. I've had to teach them. LOL.