Pope threatens women priests

2002-07-25 21:52

Vatican City - Seven women, under threat of excommunication by the Vatican if they don't repent for calling themselves priests, have asked for more time and say they want to have dialogue with a top cardinal.

Earlier this month, the Vatican's guardian of orthodoxy, Joseph Ratzinger, a German cardinal, set a July 22 deadline for women to acknowledge they erred in being "ordained" priests by a schismatic bishop.

The women, from Austria, Germany and the United States, were ordained on June 29 in a ceremony aboard a boat travelling on the Danube River. Performing the ceremony was Romulo Braschi, an Argentine who calls himself an archbishop but who is branded by the Vatican as the founder of a schismatic community.

Pope John Paul II, on several occasions, has made clear he sees no room in the church for debate about the possibility of opening up the priesthood to women.

Ratzinger's warning quoted from a past document of Pope John Paul II in which the pontiff wrote that the Church has no authority to "confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitely held by all the Church faithful".

On Thursday, three days after the deadline had passed, Vatican officials said that no excommunication has occurred and that excommunication, even with a warning and deadline attached, is not automatic.

'Tread with extreme caution'

Ratzinger's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is currently examining the case and "carrying out all the due checks," said a Vatican spokesperson, the Reverend Ciro Benedettini.

"Before carrying out an excommunication, even though it has been threatened, you must tread with extreme caution," Benedettini said.

In a document dated July 22 and provided on Thursday to The Associated Press in Vienna, the seven women insisted they "have not committed any act warranting" excommunication.

They said the document had been sent to Ratzinger, and, asserting that they don't want to be "at war" with the Church, expressed readiness for dialogue with him.

Asking about the pope's authority to ordain men

The women said they were seeking "instruction" from the Vatican on several points as well as three months of time to study the situation.

Among other questions, they were seeking clarification from the Vatican on just what constitutes schismatic conduct and on Biblical passages regarding "equality" of women. They also want "instruction" from the Vatican about the authority of the pope to ordain men.

The Church says that Jesus chose men to be his apostles and that the practice of ordaining only men must stand. Ratzinger's excommunication warning on July 10 called the "ordaining" of the women a "serious attack on the unity of the Church." - Sapa-AP

- SAPA