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...
I'll bet the Great Entrance was quite the workout!
ReplyDeleteHaha! They look like something Gulliver might have left behind in Lilliput.
ReplyDeleteThey used that chalice for the reunion of the Russian church in 2007 but I hadn't seen the diskos and star before. They're splendid. I can't see a deacon carrying that on his own.
I don't know - that deacon in the photos looks like a man who can handle such a task.
ReplyDeleteI suspect the line to get to that chalice was rather long.
In a pinch, that chalice could double as a baptismal font!
ReplyDeleteNo effete priests serving there, eh? :)
ReplyDeleteBigger, in Eastern Orthodoxy, is obviously better!
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