Photo Source: Flickr Creative Commons by Quinn Dombrowski https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/quinnanya\/<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nHe was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place because our current system cannot provide priests to the people who live in the vast area of the Amazon. This leaves these people without access to the sacraments.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThe people who want to bring Pope Francis down were foaming at the mouth over the possibility of him allowing married priests and women deacons. According to them, such a change would cause St Peters itself to fall into rubble and dust. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nNow that the pope has given them exactly what they demanded, they are, of course, not satisfied. They still hate him. They still want to destroy him. They are still willing to split the Church from top to bottom to get at him.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nOn the other side, there are lot of outraged and sad people who are wondering if the Church even has a place for them at all.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThe women who thought that perhaps the female half of the human race would have a place in the Church that wasn\u2019t at the back of the bus are bitter and disappointed. I think some of them will end up leaving the Church and ultimately abandoning Christ and their own salvation because of it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nMeanwhile, anyone who has been keeping up with the news these last 20 years realizes that the \u201ccelibate\u201d priesthood is more pretend than real. All the stories about how the celibate priesthood is a beacon to animist peoples, something that draws them to Christ, are belied by the testimony of raped nuns, raped little boys and women with babies born to priests. Not only that, but Protestants have managed to convert a lot of people, even though they come to the mission fields as married couples.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nI am not questioning the pope\u2019s decision. It was his decision to make, and he made it. I accept his judgement on this. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nI also never expected anything else.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nHaving said all that, the people of the Amazon, while they have been spared the horror of married priests and women deacons, still do not have access to the sacraments. I don\u2019t expect that any of the people who have been battering the pope over this issue will go to the Amazon to minister to them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nWhat I think will happen is that the pope-attacking red and pointy hat wearers will condemn the women who wanted women deacons. They will tell these women that they are \u201cunnatural\u201d and in need of schooling in \u201ctrue femininity.\u201d When some of these women leave the Church, the red and pointy hat wearers will shrug; good riddance to an annoyance.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nAs for the people of the Amazon, they won\u2019t even be told good riddance. That\u2019s because they don\u2019t have a megaphone loud enough to be an annoyance. Out of sight, out of mind, and nobody cares.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThe people of the Amazon can sin without hope of confession, endure the vicissitudes of life without the healing strength of the Eucharist, die without rites, marry by whatever means they have, and progress through their Christian walk without confirmation.\u00a0 <\/span>They\u2019re nothing. They don\u2019t matter. Nobody cares.<\/p>\nIf large numbers of them drift back into animism, then that\u2019s their sin. They\u2019ll go to hell. But it\u2019s their choice to go to hell.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nIf Protestants, who are much more open to married and women clergy, send missionaries to convert these people, that would be a huge blessing. At least somebody would care enough about them to bring them Christ. If the Church doesn\u2019t want them, I hope and pray that somebody else does. I do not want these souls to be lost to Christ because of the particularities of a pretend celibacy and the desire to keep things as they are, no matter who we desert or abandon.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nAs for me, I don\u2019t care all that much in a personal way about whether or not we have married priests. I have been Protestant and I am now Catholic. I know that it can work, either way. On the other hand, I also know that married clergy are no more immune to sexual predation and adultery than their unmarried brothers. Priests aren\u2019t always celibate, and married clergy aren\u2019t always faithful to their wedding vows. Sexuality is the biological manifestation of the life force. It won\u2019t be mastered.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nWhile I would dearly love to see women deacons, I\u2019m not going to leave the Church over it. I\u2019m still trying to work out how I can square the circle of the fact that the Church I love has no place for women except the back of the bus. I will write later and with as much honesty as I can about the Church\u2019s abject failure to stand with rape victims and victims of sexual assault. But for now, I\u2019ll just say that I\u2019m disappointed that there won\u2019t be women deacons, but not at all surprised. Nobody wants to share power.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nThe sticking point in all this is that the Holy Father\u2019s decision leaves large numbers of people abandoned and adrift in an absolute and final way.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nAs I read the rancorous discussions about this issue which preceded the publication of the pope\u2019s decision, I was struck by the total lack of concern or even interest in the plight of the people of the Amazon. The arguments I read verged on the fantastical. They were nasty nonsense. None of them addressed or even acknowledged the needs of people who are starved for the sacraments.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/span>The people of the Amazon don\u2019t have choices. They can\u2019t leave the Church because the Church has already left them. Their task is how to stay Christian when other Christians don\u2019t want them, when the only One Who wants them is Jesus, Himself.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nI think we need to address this situation with prayer.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nFor everyone, including our own poor selves.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nI have just described so many lost souls. We treat one another so very badly. What we need is the Holy Spirit to heal us. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0 He was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place because our current system cannot provide priests to the people who live in the vast area of the Amazon. This leaves these people without access to the sacraments.\u00a0 The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1155,"featured_media":30621,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,5392,1631,7593,7906],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-catholic","category-christian-leadership","category-holy-father-2","category-holy-father-3","category-pope-francis"],"yoast_head":"\n
Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons.<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0 He was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0 He was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Public Catholic\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-02-13T16:20:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2024-11-14T02:29:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/254\/2015\/10\/priest.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"640\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"427\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Rebecca Hamilton\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Rebecca Hamilton\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/\",\"name\":\"Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons.\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2020-02-13T16:20:55+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2024-11-14T02:29:16+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#\/schema\/person\/e8d2778109308e0e776e5c16eae7b67d\"},\"description\":\"Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0 He was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons.\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/\",\"name\":\"Public Catholic\",\"description\":\"Catholic in the Public Square\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#\/schema\/person\/e8d2778109308e0e776e5c16eae7b67d\",\"name\":\"Rebecca Hamilton\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f6253ced313d53e0b7bfa51e5c9eb56d?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f6253ced313d53e0b7bfa51e5c9eb56d?s=96&d=identicon&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Rebecca Hamilton\"},\"description\":\"During her tenure in the Oklahoma Legislature, Rep. Hamilton has been an advocate for human rights, believing that government must support and defend the sanctity of all human lives, from conception to natural death. Representative Hamilton: Authored the original Victim\u2019s Protective Order to protect battered women, Obtained funding for the first statewide program for adult day care and the first statewide program of domestic violence shelters, and she She has also passed legislation to prevent law enforcement officials from publicly posting the private information of rape victims, Rep. Hamilton authored a 2005 law hailed as the most significant piece of pro-life legislation in Oklahoma in 30 years. She also passed the bill outlawing elective abortions in state-funded hospitals She has passed pro life bills requiring informed consent, parental notification, and limiting forced abortions. She also passed a law allowing prosecutors to file criminal charges against anyone who intentionally causes the death of an unborn child by harming the mother. Rep. Hamilton has also authored legislation ensuring taxpayers are not forced to subsidize elective abortions Rep. Hamilton was one of six original co-founders of first rape crisis center in Oklahoma. The Oklahoma City Democrat has worked to bring a wide range of groups together to fight on the behalf of abused women, including the creation of the Annual Day of Prayer for an End to Violence Against Women at the Oklahoma Capitol. Rep. Hamilton has been married for 30 years to her husband, Rodney, and the couple has two grown sons. She attends St. James Catholic Church, and is a long-time volunteer at Birth Choice of Oklahoma.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/author\/rhamilton\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons.","description":"Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0 He was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons.","og_description":"Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0 He was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/","og_site_name":"Public Catholic","article_published_time":"2020-02-13T16:20:55+00:00","article_modified_time":"2024-11-14T02:29:16+00:00","og_image":[{"width":640,"height":427,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/254\/2015\/10\/priest.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Rebecca Hamilton","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Rebecca Hamilton","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/","name":"Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons.","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#website"},"datePublished":"2020-02-13T16:20:55+00:00","dateModified":"2024-11-14T02:29:16+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#\/schema\/person\/e8d2778109308e0e776e5c16eae7b67d"},"description":"Pope Francis has decided to say no to allowing married priests and women deacons.\u00a0 He was considering married priests and women deacons in the first place","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/2020\/02\/pope-says-no-to-married-priests-women-deacons\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Pope Says No to Married Priests, Women Deacons."}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/","name":"Public Catholic","description":"Catholic in the Public Square","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#\/schema\/person\/e8d2778109308e0e776e5c16eae7b67d","name":"Rebecca Hamilton","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f6253ced313d53e0b7bfa51e5c9eb56d?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f6253ced313d53e0b7bfa51e5c9eb56d?s=96&d=identicon&r=g","caption":"Rebecca Hamilton"},"description":"During her tenure in the Oklahoma Legislature, Rep. Hamilton has been an advocate for human rights, believing that government must support and defend the sanctity of all human lives, from conception to natural death. Representative Hamilton: Authored the original Victim\u2019s Protective Order to protect battered women, Obtained funding for the first statewide program for adult day care and the first statewide program of domestic violence shelters, and she She has also passed legislation to prevent law enforcement officials from publicly posting the private information of rape victims, Rep. Hamilton authored a 2005 law hailed as the most significant piece of pro-life legislation in Oklahoma in 30 years. She also passed the bill outlawing elective abortions in state-funded hospitals She has passed pro life bills requiring informed consent, parental notification, and limiting forced abortions. She also passed a law allowing prosecutors to file criminal charges against anyone who intentionally causes the death of an unborn child by harming the mother. Rep. Hamilton has also authored legislation ensuring taxpayers are not forced to subsidize elective abortions Rep. Hamilton was one of six original co-founders of first rape crisis center in Oklahoma. The Oklahoma City Democrat has worked to bring a wide range of groups together to fight on the behalf of abused women, including the creation of the Annual Day of Prayer for an End to Violence Against Women at the Oklahoma Capitol. Rep. Hamilton has been married for 30 years to her husband, Rodney, and the couple has two grown sons. She attends St. James Catholic Church, and is a long-time volunteer at Birth Choice of Oklahoma.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/author\/rhamilton\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1155"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34944"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34944\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44134,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34944\/revisions\/44134"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/publiccatholic\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/254\/2015\/10\/priest.jpg\")
<\/a>