‘Obstacle’ over ordination

Press, 15 July 1986, Page 16

‘Obstacle’ over ordination

NZPA-Reuter Vatican City Pope John Paul has told the Archbishop of Canterbury that the ordination of women priests in some Anglican Churches poses an “increasingly serious obstacle” to progress towards eventual reunion with Rome. The Vatican released an exchange of letters between the Pope and the Archbishop, the Most Rev. Robert Runcie, and between Dr Runcie and Cardinal Johannes Willebrands, head of the Vatican’s Secretariat for Christian Unity.

In a letter to Dr Runcie in December. 1984. the Pope said the Catholic Church would continue to adhere to a ban on women priests and that the ordination of Anglican women was a threat to

reconciliation between the Churches, which split in 1536. Joint Roman CatholicAnglican commissions have been discussing the possibility of unity since 1970.

“The increase in the number of Anglican Churches which admit, or are preparing to admit, women to priestly ordination constitutes, in the eyes of the Catholic Church, an increasingly serious obstacle to that progress,” the Pope wrote to Dr Runcie.

Anglican Churches in Canada, New Zealand, Uganda and Hong Kong have ordained women. The Church of England, which is divided over women priests, will discuss the issue at a General Synodin York.

In his reply nearly a year later, after conferring with Anglican leaders around the world, Dr Runcie acknowledged that the question had divided Anglicans. Those Anglican communities that had admitted women to the priesthood “have done so for serious doctrinal reasons,” he said. A joint study of the question was needed urgently, he said, especially concerning consequences on efforts towards eventual Anglican-Roman Catholic unity.

In his letter to Cardinal Willebrands, Dr Runcie said Anglican communities that had ordained women had done so with the sincere conviction that the exclusion of women from the priestly ministry "cannot be proved to be

of divine law.” In his reply Cardinal Willebrands told Dr Runcie those explanations were unsatisfactory and that the Catholic Church’s practice of ordaining only men was part of its fidelity to Christ.

“The arguments you relay cannot count as reasons for the radical innovation of ordaining women to the priesthood

.. .” Cardinal Willebrands said. “Such a departure from tradition could not be taken independently of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches.”

The Pope and Dr Runcie have met three times, including an historic encounter at Canterbury in 1982 while the Pope was visiting Britain.