Letter to Women

The final traditional argument we need to consider is the representation of Christ. In our own time, the Congregation for Doctrine has revived this argument. It concedes that it does not have conclusive force, but it feels that this argument shows the “profound fittingness that theological reflection discovers between the proper nature of the sacrament of Order, with its specific reference to the mystery of Christ, and the fact that only men have been called to receive priestly ordination.” In other words, once we understand this point we will sit up and exclaim: “Aha, that is why! Now it all makes sense!”

The Congregation develops this argument by stating that the priest does not act in his own name, but in the person of Christ. The supreme expression of this representation, it argues, is found in the altogether special form it assumes in the celebration of the Eucharist, which is the source and centre of the Church’s unity, the sacrificial meal in which the People of God are associated in the sacrifice of Christ. The priest, who alone has the power to perform it, then acts not only through the effective power conferred on him by Christ, but acts in persona Christi, taking the role of Christ, to the point of being his very image, when he pronounces the words of consecration. The question therefore arises: can a woman act in the person of Christ? The Congregation thinks not.

“The Christian priesthood is of a sacramental nature: the priest is a sign, the supernatural effectiveness of which comes from the ordination received, but a sign that must be perceptible and which the faithful must be able to recognize with ease. The whole sacramental economy is in fact based upon natural signs, on symbols imprinted upon the human psychology: ‘Sacramental signs,’ says Saint Thomas, ‘represent what they signify by natural resemblance’. The same natural resemblance is required for persons as for things: when Christ’s role in the Eucharist is to be expressed sacramentally, there would not be this ‘natural resemblance’ which must exist between Christ and his minister if the role of Christ were not taken by a man: in such a case it would be difficult to see in the minister the image of Christ. For Christ himself was and remains a man.”

“Christ is of course the firstborn of all humanity, of women as well as men: the unity which he re-established after sin is such that there are no more distinctions between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, but all are one in Christ Jesus (cf. Gal. 3:28). Nevertheless, the incarnation of the Word took place according to the male sex: this is indeed a question of fact, and this fact, while not implying an alleged natural superiority of man over woman, cannot be disassociated from the economy of salvation.”[220]

When I began to teach in India, in 1965, I was surprised to find that in seminary plays women’s roles were acted by men. The reason was simple: there were only men around. I found it quite unnatural for a man to present himself as a woman, in spite of the make up and the female saree. Later things changed, and it was agreed that men should act men’s roles and women play women’s roles. The Congregation takes up a parallel position with regard to the drama of the eucharist. Jesus Christ was a man, it states. Only a man can properly represent him to the community.

Since the Congregation quotes St. Thomas Aquinas in this context, let us first examine the origin of the argument.

Thomas Aquinas did, indeed, believe that a woman could not be a sacramental sign representing Christ. We should read his words carefully.

“Certain things are required in the recipient of a sacrament as being requisite for the validity of the sacrament, and if such things be lacking, one can receive neither the sacrament nor the reality of the sacrament. Other things, however, are required, not for the validity of the sacrament, but for its lawfulness, as being congruous to the sacrament; and without these one receives the sacrament, but not the reality of the sacrament. Accordingly we must say that the male sex is required for receiving Orders not only in the second, but also in the first way. Wherefore even though a woman were made the object of all that is done in conferring Orders, she would not receive Orders, for since a sacrament is a sign, not only the thing, but the signification of the thing, is required in all sacramental actions; thus it was stated above that in Extreme Unction it is necessary to have a sick man, in order to signify the need of healing. Accordingly, since it is not possible in the female sex to signify eminence of degree, for a woman is in the state of subjection, it follows that she cannot receive the sacrament of Order.”[221]

Aquinas states that a woman cannot receive ordination validly. The reason he gives, however, is significant. It is not, as the Congregation seems to say, that a woman does not look like a man, but that a woman “cannot signify eminence of degree”. It sounds ominous -- and it is!

Aquinas explains himself further in another text. Some people have wondered why God would make imperfect human beings such as women? Aquinas replies that women, though deficient as human beings, have a purpose in God’s overall scheme of things.

“Objection: It can be argued that woman should not have formed part of the world as it was initially created. For Aristotle says that a female is an misbegotten male. But it would be wrong for something misbegotten and [hence] deficient to be part of the initial creation. Therefore woman should not have been a part of that world.”

Reply: “Yes, with regard to its particular nature [i.e., the action of the male semen], a female is deficient and misbegotten. For the active power of the semen always seeks to produce a thing completely like itself, something male. So if a female is produced, this must be because the semen is weak or because the material [provided by the female parent] is unsuitable, or because of the action of some external factor such as the winds from the south which make the atmosphere humid. But with regard to universal nature the female is not misbegotten but is intended by Nature for the work of generation. Now the intentions of Nature come from God, who is its author. This is why, when he created Nature, he made not only the male but also the female.”[222]

What did he mean? Women do play a useful role in the overall scheme of things, but considered in themselves they are unfinished. Only men are complete human beings. Females become females because something has gone wrong in the process of their conception and birth.

Aquinas and his contemporaries still followed ancient Greek and Roman notions. They considered the semen to be the active principle in conception. Only men produced seed and therefore only men were responsible for procreation. They taught that semen was cast into the womb as seed into the soil. The process of embryonic development was activated by the semen and nourished by the blood of the mother.

“When thirsting for children a man falls into a kind of trance, softened and subdued by the pleasures of procreation as by sleep, so that again something is drawn from his flesh and from his bones and is ... fashioned into another man. For the harmony of bodies being disturbed in the embrace of love, as those tell us who have experienced the marriage state, all the marrow and generative part of the blood, like a kind of liquid bone, coming together from all the members worked into foam and curdled, is projected through the organs of generation into the living body of the female.”[223]

We see here how the heat of passion serves to create the semen, and so passion, and its concomitant pleasure for both men and women were considered essential to procreation. Foetuses developed their full potential, their maleness, if they amassed a decisive surplus of ‘heat’ and ‘vital spirit’ in the early stages in the womb. Females were the result of insufficient heat being absorbed by the foetus. This belief is the medical basis of Aristotle’s contention that women were ‘misbegotten males’. Women’s softer, moister and colder bodies meant they were less formed and ordered by nature than men. Proof of this is women’s inability to ‘concoct’ semen from blood, as it was thought that men did. Therefore, any excess nourishment over what was needed for sustenance had to be secreted from the body so that women would not be ‘water-logged’. This quotation from Aretaeus the physician demonstrates the interconnections between heat, semen, maleness and superior formation: “The semen, when possessed of vitality, makes us men hot, well braced in limbs, heavy, well-voiced, spirited, strong to think and act”.

But it is not semen per se that created new life. The semen was the vehicle for the spiritual principle, the ‘vital heat’ which was the first and efficient cause of life. Aristotle taught that the cause of life is not fire or any such force, but the spirit included in the semen and the accompanying foam. The proof of the spiritual nature of semen was that it is white, as opposed to menstrual blood which is red. Sexed bodies become symbolic of aspects of the cosmos: woman’s nature is analogous to earth, and man’s to the heavens. Hence male superiority was based on an understanding of men’s optimal formation in the womb, from which flowed superior personal characteristics, and their power to procreate.[224]

So now we understand what Aquinas means: a woman is misbegotten because “if a female is produced, this must be because the semen is weak or because the material [provided by the female parent] is unsuitable, or because of the action of some external factor such as the winds from the south which make the atmosphere humid”. Women are therefore not perfect human beings. For women are, after all, not fully created in God’s image. It can be seen in the fact that women have inferior intellects and are emotionally unstable. That is why they are subject to men. It also explains why Paul forbade them to teach. Women thus occupy an inferior status. And that is the reason why they cannot represent Christ, “since it is not possible in the female sex to signify eminence of degree”.

The Congregation for Doctrine quoted Thomas Aquinas in the matter of representing Christ, without telling us about the background of Aquinas’ opinions. Do they seriously want to claim validity for the traditional argument? But if they do not, then what remains of the argument in our better understanding of human biology and the equality between the sexes?

The Congregation for Doctrine maintains that a woman cannot preside over the eucharist because Christ was a man, and only a man can symbolise him properly. The eucharist is a sacrament which essentially depends on its sign value. The water poured in baptism signifies the cleansing action of God. We may not substitute petrol or milk, for these do not have the same symbolic meaning. The oil used at the anointing of the sick expresses healing. We could not legitimately apply water or vinegar in its stead. In the same way, it is argued, Christ’s maleness requires maleness in the priest who represents him at the eucharist. For the priest is Christ’s image.

But what makes the priest an image of Christ? If the natural resemblance between the minister of the eucharist and Christ formally concerned the maleness of Christ, then strictly speaking everything would have to be done to make the priest today resemble as closely as possible what we gather a Jew of the first century looked like. This is not being flippant; it is the logical corollary of the Congregation’s argument. If natural resemblance means physical likeness, then for the sake of making the image more perfect the priest ought to dress at Mass as a first century Jew dressed. As it is, the priest at Mass dons vestments which serve to hide his very maleness and to highlight his ministry as representative image, not as physical likeness of Christ the mediator.[225]

It is crucial to understand the difference between a ‘photocopy’ and an ‘image’. To be a symbol does not require that the symbolic person or function or object be a literal copy of the person, function or object symbolized. On the contrary, a symbolic manifestation or expression loses both vigor and viability, meaning and vitality if it becomes a stereotype. A bank note, for example, represents the State, which promises the owner to repay its nominal value in gold. The note will carry a symbolical image: a ruling monarch or a founding father. It does not need to carry a picture of the gold coins it takes the place of. Again, the queen of England need not be represented by a woman, and the president of the United States, if he is a man, by another man. Ambassadors represent the authority, the power, the function, not sex or gender. A woman may not be a photo likeness of Christ, but she can be, and is, Christ’s image. This is, after all, exactly what Paul is teaching:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female.

In other words: every baptised person, also every baptised woman, carries the image of Christ.

“Is Inter insigniores saying that having women at the altar would be the equivalent of using pizza instead of bread, or Coke instead of wine? Are we being told that the sign-value would be defective because women are of a fundamentally different nature than men, and therefore of Christ? Are we to understand that a woman cannot resemble Christ sufficiently for the faithful to see Christ in her, for her to become a sacrament of Christ? . . . What would be the reaction if one said that a particular race or nationality could not adequately image Christ? And yet in another age and among certain groups, this too would have been acceptable. The sacramentality of the priesthood cannot demand a male presence in the same way that the celebration of the Eucharist requires the elements of bread and wine. Christ is the destination and ultimate identity of each human being, and all are called to be remade in his image. Thus women are not called to be lesser images of Christ than are men.”[229]

The Congregation for Doctrine says that a woman cannot act in the person of Christ at the Eucharist. But women are already acting in the person of Christ. It is common sacramental doctrine that the minister of every sacrament acts as a vicar of Christ. With regard to baptism, it is the explicit teaching of the Church that anyone with the use of reason, having the right intention and employing due matter and form, may be the minister of this sacrament. The minister, male or female, acts in persona Christi. “By his power Christ is present in the sacraments, so that when a person baptizes it is really Christ himself who baptizes.”[230]

The ministers of the sacrament of matrimony are the partners themselves. As Pius XII succinctly expressed it in Mystici Corporis: ‘The spouses are ministers of grace to each other’.[231] The sacrament of matrimony is a permanent sacrament. Consequently, as long as the marriage lasts husband and wife remain ministers of Christ’s love and grace to each other. In the words of St. Augustine: “When a man marries, it is Christ who marries her; when a woman marries, it is Christ who marries him”.[232]

Women also act in the person of Christ as Christians in their daily lives, and they do so as women. The early Church honoured a rule of faith: “What is not assumed [into Christ's humanity] is not saved”. This defined the proper understanding of the human persona in the fourth-century controversy on the humanity of Christ. Any notion of the humanity of Christ that excluded anything essentially human from his existence was judged an inadequate notion according to this rule, since the excluded human dimension would not share in the hypostatic union and so not enjoy the union’s saving effects. But the Congregation for Doctrine comes very close to making Christ’s maleness an essential part of his incarnation.

“What is not assumed [into Christ's humanity] is not saved. If maleness is constitutive for the incarnation and redemption, female humanity is not assumed and therefore not saved.”[234] Giving Jesus’ maleness a privileged status as the Congregation for Doctrine does, particularizes the human notion of persona in a way that puts it at odds with the ancient rule of faith, thus destroying the Christian notion of human person implicit in our Christian awareness. Christ’s being a male cannot exclude women from any part of the salvation he brought, sacraments and all. Since woman too is a person in Christ, she can act in his persona.

A man is, first and foremost, a male person and a woman is a female person. This means that both men and women have always in common that capacity for full humanness and for the full range of symbolic action and function that the primacy of personhood involves. There are differences between male and female, but they both are totally subservient to being a person. Any added symbolical meaning in gender may never lose sight of the primacy and meaning of personhood in both men and women. To cherish that value and to respect that validity require, therefore, that the symbolism of sexuality be applied to ministerial status. It functions within the larger and more adequate context of the personal, and not within a limited sexual-anatomical perspective.[235]

It is interesting to reflect on discussions among moralists as to what kind of water is required for the symbolism of baptism. Would dirty water, for instance, not invalidate the baptism -- since the sacrament signifies cleansing? The Church has rejected such subtle distinctions. Any water is valid for baptism: ditch water as much as rain water, salt water as much as spring water, chlorinated water and carbonated water as much as filtered water, in short anything that is water. The analogy to holy orders is clear. Any person who is in Christ can represent him at the Eucharist.

The Congregation for Doctrine puts the main emphasis on the priest’s task at the moment of consecration. In its view the priest is then fully identified with Christ.

“The supreme expression of this representation is found in the altogether special form it assumes in the celebration of the Eucharist, which is the source and centre of the Church’s unity, the sacrificial meal in which the People of God are associated in the sacrifice of Christ. The priest, who alone has the power to perform it, then acts not only through the effective power conferred on him by Christ, but in persona Christi, taking the role of Christ, to the point of being his very image, when he pronounces the words of consecration.”[236]

“Saying ‘in the name and place of Christ’ is not however enough to express completely the nature of the bond between the minister and Christ as understood by tradition. The formula in persona Christi in fact suggests a meaning that brings it close to the Greek expression mimema Christou [= doing an impression of Christ]. The word persona means a part played in the ancient theatre, a part identified by a particular mask. The priest takes the part of Christ, lending him his voice and gestures.”[237]

But is this really true? We obtain a different picture from studying the liturgy itself. Throughout the eucharistic prayer the priest speaks in name of the community. It is enough to read the words themselves, as we find them, for instance, in the traditional ‘Roman’ eucharistic prayer. The priest always speaks of ‘we’, ‘us’, ‘all of us’, etc. I will just indicate the beginnings.

¨ “We come to you, Father, with praise and thanksgiving through Jesus Christ your Son. Through him we ask you to accept and blesss these gifts we offer you in sacrifice . . . ”

¨ “Remember all of us gathered here before you. You know how firmly we believe in you and dedicate ourselves to you . . . . ”

¨ “Father accept this offering from your whole family. Grant us your peace in this life and save us from final damnation . . . ”

The priests says ‘we’, ‘us’. He speaks as representative of the community. And the words of consecration fit into the same pattern.

Following Thomas Aquinas and other medieval theologians, Rome gives the impression that the words of consecration stand apart, that - while the priest speaks these words - he steps outside his role as leader of the community and suddenly speaks only in the name of Christ. “The priest, who alone has the power to perform it, then acts not only through the effective power conferred on him by Christ, but in persona Christi, taking the role of Christ, to the point of being his very image, when he pronounces the words of consecration.” This is not the case. Let us look at the text itself, as we find it in the first eucharistic prayer (the socalled Roman Canon). I will give a literal translation from the latin text which is at least ten centuries old.

“Bless and approve our offering, make it acceptable to you, an offering in spirit and in truth. Let it become for us the body and blood of Jesus Christ, your only Son, our Lord

who on the day before he suffered took bread in his sacred hands and looking up to heaven, to you, his almighty Father, gave you thanks and praise. He broke the bread, gave it to his disciples, and said: ‘Take this, all of you, and eat it: this is my body which will be given up for you’. When supper was ended, he took the cup. Again he gave you thanks and praise, gave the cup to his disciples, and said: ‘Take this, all of you, and drink from it: this is the cup of my blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. It will be shed for you and for all so that sins may be forgiven. Do this in memory of me’. ”

It is clear that the words of consecration are part of the whole eucharistic prayer. Textually the institution narrative depends upon the invocation which precedes it, and the narrative is unintelligible except as a continuation of the invocation. The narrative does not stand alone or in disjuncture from the rest of the eucharistic prayer. Moreover, the institution narrative, which quotes the verba Christi, is spoken in the third person: it is a quotation within a narrative recital addressed as part of a prayer to God the Father, and it is encompassed within a prayer spoken in the name of the whole church.

An examination of all eucharistic prayers shows that even at the moment of consecration the priest does not really step into the character of Christ or play his part, even though he uses certain words and gestures of Christ. The form of this part of the mass is not drama; it is narrative, in which the priest speaks throughout of Christ in the third person, clearly as someone other than himself, even in the pronunciation of the words of consecration. He unmistakably maintains his direct representation of the church and his identity as its minister right through the sacred action.

Christian antiquity, at least until the fourth century, universally viewed the entire prayer as consecratory. Western theological reflection, for a variety of reasons had by the high Middle Ages singled out the institution narrative as ‘words of consecration’. More recent theological reflection, attentive to the nature and structure of the eucharistic prayer, has returned to the older view. Isolating the ‘words of consecration’ ignores the structure of the eucharistic prayers, which are composed of a number of elements, of which the institution narrative is certainly one, but, very importantly, the epiclesis [=calling down of the Spirit] is another. It is the epiclesis that is considered consecratory in the Byzantine tradition.

The well known liturgist, Ralph A. Keifer, who was general editor for the international committee for English in the liturgy, comes to this conclusion:

“At no point in the eucharistic prayer does the priest speak directly in the name of Christ. He continually speaks in the name of the church. Even the institution narrative, which quotes the verba Christi, is spoken in the third person: it is a quotation within a narrative recital addressed as part of a prayer to God the Father, and it is encompassed within a prayer spoken in the name of the whole church. The Congregation contends that the priest represents the church because he first represents Christ himself as head and shepherd of the church . . . On the level of sign, in what is said and done at the act of eucharist, the exact opposite is the case. It is only by praying in the name of the church that the priest enacts his role as consecratory representative of Christ.”

“Thus in the articulation of the eucharistic prayer in the Roman rite no clearcut distinction is made between the priest’s representing the praying church and his representing Christ the head and shepherd of the church. The two roles are enacted simultaneously. Even on a view which insists on pinpointing a temporal moment of consecration with the recitation of the verba Christi, there is still no disjunctive representation of Christ as the head and shepherd of the church apart from the priest’s representation of the church as the body and bride of Christ. In reciting the institution narrative, the priest continues to speak on behalf of the praying church. And since, on the level of sign, the representation of Christ is grounded in representation of the Church, it would seem that a woman could perform the priestly role of representing Christ as well as a man.”[238]

One problem with the Congregation for Doctrine’s approach is that it is excessively cultic. But Christ’s priesthood is about much more than presiding at the eucharist. It implies a service of the Christian community in many pastoral fields: instructing and affirming people in faith; absolving and healing; encouraging and empowering; guiding people to God in prayer and leading them in action.[239]

What does it mean to be such a spiritual leader representing Christ? Listening to Christ himself we hear him stress love as the sign he requires.

¨ Christ proved his love by laying down his life for his friends. That is the leadership he expects.

¨ It is by such love that the true shepherd is distinguished from the hireling.

¨ Not in presiding at table alone but in washing people's feet is the Master recognised.[240]

One should note that we are not dealing here with love as a mere moral requirement but with an element that has sign value. “By this love you have for one another, everyone will know that you are my disciples”. Although elsewhere Christ spoke of love as a commandment, he is here addressing the apostles on the very occasion he is ordaining them as his priests. His “Do this in memory of Me” presupposes pastoral love as the special sign by which his disciples should be recognised. It is such love he demands from Peter before entrusting him with the apostolic commission.[241]

Such considerations do not directly prove that women could be ordained priests. They demonstrate, however, that Scripture itself lays stress on values such as sympathy, service and love on the level of the sacramental sign, rather than on accidentals like being a man. Are we not nearer to Christ’s mind when we stipulate that a woman filled with the spirit of Christ’s pastoral love is a more ‘fitting’ image of his presence than a man who were to lack such love? And will women, with their special charisms of healing and insight, of sensitivity and care, of attention and self-effacing generosity, not represent Christ’s priestly love in ways that men cannot? Does the Catholic Church at present not lack the priestly service that women could give “in the person of Christ”?

It is clear from the above considerations that women can represent Christ, also in the administration of the sacraments and in the Eucharist.

[220] Inter Insigniores, § 26-28.

[221] Summa Theologica Suppl. qu. 39 art. 1.

[222] Summa Theologica, 1, qu. 92, art 1, ad 1.

[223] Methodius, The banquet of the ten virgins, 2. 2, trans. William R. Clark, The writings of Methodius, ANCL, 14, Edinburgh 1969 p. 13; cf. Lucretius, On the nature of things, 4. 1037, GB 12, p. 57.

[224] Kim E. Power , ‘Of godly men and medicine: ancient biology and the Christian Fathers on the nature of woman’, Woman-Church 15 (Spring 1994) pp. 26-33.

[225] Eric Doyle, ‘The Question of Women Priests and the Argument In Persona Christi’, Irish Theological Quarterly 37 (1984) 212 - 221, here pp. 217 - 218.

[229] Rose Hoover, ‘Consider tradition. The case for women’s ordination’, Commonweal 126 no 2 (Jan. 29, 1999), p. 17-20.

[230] Vatican II, Sacrosanctum Concilium, § 7.

[231] Acta Apostolicae Sedis 35 (1943) p. 202.

[232] In Iohannis Evangelium VI; PL 35, 1428.

[233] Inter Insigniores, § 28.

[234] Elizabeth A. Johnson, She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse, New York 1992, p. 153.

[235] Thomas Newbold, ‘Symbolism of Sexuality: Person, Ministry and Women Priests’, in Women and Priesthood. Future Directions, Collegeville 1978, pp. 133-141; here pp. 138-139.

[236] Inter Insigniores, § 25.

[237] Commentary on Inter Insigniores, § 88.

[238] Ralph A. Keifer, ‘The Priest as "Another Christ" in Liturgical Prayer’, in Women and Priesthood. Future Directions, Collegeville 1978, pp. 103-110; here pp. 109-110.

[239] Marie Augusta Neal, ‘Models for Future Priesthood’; Dorothy Donnelly, ‘Diversity of Gifts in Future Priesthood’; Arlene Anderson Swidler, ‘Partnership Marriage: Model of Future Priesthood’; Leonard Swidler, ‘Sisterhood: Model of Future Priesthood’, all in Women and Catholic Priesthood, Anne Marie Gardiner (ed.), New York 1976, pp. 103-134.

[240] John 15, 12-13; 10, 11-15; Matthew 20, 24-28; John 13, 12-16.

The Ordination of Women in the Catholic Church,

Unmasking a Cuckoo's Egg Tradition.

By John Wijngaards

Published by Darton Longman and Todd, London 2001.

© John Wijngaards. Republished on our website with the necessary permissions

Not human enough to represent Christ?

Readings from Women Priests web site
Thomas Aquinas: * on women’s lower status * on how women are born * on women’s ordination Kim Powers, ‘Of godly men and medicine: ancient biology and the Christian Fathers on the nature of woman’ Anne Jensen, ‘The Representation of Christ, Ecclesiastical Office, and Presiding at the Eucharist’ John Wijngaards Women can represent Jesus Christ at the Eucharist: * because women are equal in Christ * women too bear Christ’s image * women already act as other Christs * women reflect better Christ’s feminine traits * women too can represent Christ’s love which is the essence of his priesthood.	http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/aqui_inf.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/aqui_wom.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/aqui_ord.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/power1.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/related/jensen1.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/pers_equ.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/pers_ima.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/pers_chr.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/pers_fem.asp http://www.womenpriests.org/theology/pers_lov.asp