EQUALITY AT THE ALTAR

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32561, 22 March 1971, Page 7

EQUALITY AT THE ALTAR

(Newsweek feature service) In most of the world’s churches, women have traditionally occupied a position in the hierarchy at about the same level as children and servants: objects to be seen but never heard, deemed capable of performing only the most menial tasks. “It’s all right if women come to church with a cake in their hands,” remarks one female theologian wryly, “but if they come with an idea in their heads, they’re not welcome.”

But this is the age of confrontation and women in the church, as in so many other areas, are no longer willing to accept subservient, secondary roles. Like Martin Luther hammering his 95 theses on the church door, women’s liberation is assaulting the theological establishment with increasingly militant demands for equality. And in more and more cases, they are succeeding. The Episcopal Diocese of New York, for example, has endorsed a change in canon law that would permit women to become priests. In Cincinnati, moreover, a 24-year-old Jewish girl named ■ Sally Priesand is studying at Hebrew Union College to become a rabbi. If she succeeds, she will be the first female rabbi in the history of Judaism, even though seven distaff prophets appeared in the hierarchy of ancient Israel.

This autumn, too, a pretty 30-year-old named Elizabeth Platz was ordained as the first Lutheran pastor in the United States. During her ordination at the University of Maryland chapel, the celebrant, the Rev. Gilbert E. Dean Jun., wore a splashy vestment made by Miss Platz. It was decorated with large letters spelling out, “It is good,” and with a button stating, “Right On.”

DOCTORS OF CHURCH A few weeks earlier, Pope Paul VI had established a dramatic precedent by naming two female saints doctors of the church. The distance feminists have to travel before they achieve anything like parity with men in the Roman Catholic Church, however, (was pointed up by the pontiff. who was careful to reassert his commitment to male dominance.

“Even today,” he said, a woman is not destined to have ministerial and magisterial frictions in the hierarchy.” Many liberal Roman Catholics admit that there is no truly valid reason for excluding women from the priesthood, but they are openly

loath to break with tradition. “I can’t see any theological reason against women in the priesthood,” says one bishop, “but-1 hope I’m not around when it happens.”" Opponents of the feminists have plenty of Biblical ammunition on their side. The Vatican newspaper, “I’Osservatore Romano,” has stated flatly: “Christ did not call on women to serve. He did not let women share the message He had received from His Father.” And St Paul, one of the earliest and most outspoken male chauvinists, often railed against pushy females. “As in all congregations of God’s people, women should not address the meeting,” reads Paul’s “First Letter to the Corinthians.” “They have no licence to speak, but should keep their place as the Law directs. If there is something they want to know, they can ask their husbands at home. It is a shocking thing that women should address the congregation.” FASHION OF TIME Feminists scoff at the admonition, insisting that Paul was simply echoing the fashion of his time, and claim that men who cite the letter are afraid of competition from women.

“The real opponents of a female clergy are male ministers who feel threatened if they have to treat women as colleagues,” says the Rev. Tilda Norberg who, with her husband, has a Protestant congregation in Staten Island, New York. "They can only relate to us if we do secretarial chores, pour coffee and, above all, work largely with the children.” Though women comprise the majority of the membership of most churches, there are only about 7000 female ministers in the United States, and most of them are in the less formalised, more fundamentalist religions which do not elevate their clergy to special status. And even when a woman reaches ministerial rank, she is likely to encounter continuing discrimination because of her sex. Promotions to large, wealthy parishes are usually reserved by national church councils for males, and salaries for distaff preachers are well below those for men. “Poor congregations recognise this,” says one woman minister. “They know they can get a good woman to work for a salary that even mediocre male ministers might not accept.”

FEW STRINGS Since United States courts have no jurisdiction over what on in church i organisations, feminists are . fighting discrimination the ■ only way they know how—by ’ banding together. In 1969,

Methodist women raised $lO million for their church, but this year, they promise, they are going to attach a few strings to their purse. “What male organisation would allocate $lO million annually and ask for nothing in return, not even a fair shake?” asks a Methodist woman. Bands of Roman Catholic women plan to present a meeting of United States Roman Catholic officials this winter with a list of tough demands, including the opening up of all liturgical functions to women. (Within the church itself, however, the

militant fervor seems to glow less fiercely. Asked if radical nuns planned to engage in tactics like braburning, one sister told a reporter she did not think so since “it’s only very recently that we’ve been permitted to wear them.”) So, in spite of the Pope’s intransigent opposition to female priests, it may not be too long before a favourite joke among liberal Roman Catholics becomes reality. At the next Vatican Council, it goes, bishops will be attended by their wives. And at the following Council, some may even bring their husbands.