ARTICLES

Who Knows How Things Will Change?

"Womanpriest" Saying "Mass" at San Jose State

BY CHRISTOPHER ZEHNDER

The diocese of San Jose was emphatic. That woman is no priest.

Said the April 21 San Jose "Diocese Daily Bulletin," "recent news reports of 'Roman Catholic Woman Priest' Victoria Rue leading celebrations of the Mass on the campus of San Jose State University require the Diocese of San Jose to issue the following statement: Victoria Rue is not a validly ordained priest of the Roman Catholic Church. Members of the Roman Catholic Church should not participate in celebrations of the sacraments that are conducted by Victoria Rue, as those celebrations are not in union with the local or universal Church."

One of these "recent news reports" was, perhaps, an April 4 San Jose State University Spartan Daily story, "Female priest conducts mass on campus." The report relates how Victoria Rue, a San Jose State University professor of comparative religious studies and women's studies, "presided over a Catholic mass in the Spartan Memorial Chapel" on Sunday, April 2. Concelebrating with Rue was Don Cordero, a former Jesuit priest who left the ministry to get married. The Daily called the service "the first official gathering" of a group that included about "30 participants." "The goals of our New Catholic Community," Rue told the paper, "are to reverence persons who seek authenticity and inclusion in the worship ceremony, who have experienced divorce and remarriage, who are diverse in sexual orientation, who seek progressive exploration of ideas, who want imagination and daring, who are concerned deeply about God's creation and how to preserve it and who seek personal and spiritual integrity."

That Rue told the Daily, "we are not trying to start a new church; we are Roman Catholics," was perhaps what induced the San Jose diocese to issue its statement; after all, it is the duty of the local ordinary to regulate the liturgy and to clarify which services are Catholic and which are not. However, the diocese's statement spurred the "Rev. Victoria Rue, M.Div., Ph.D, Roman Catholic womanpriest [sic]," to issue a press release, which she sent me on April 25. (In an April 26 e-mail message, I had asked Rue several questions to get her thoughts as to why she thought the Holy See's arguments opposing the ordination of women -- found in the 1976 document Inter Insigniores -- were incorrect. The same day Rue responded that she "appreciate[d]" my questions; but since she was "at the end of the semester at SJSU" and hadn't much time, she sent me the press release and directed me to a web address. Both her press release and the website give a defense of women's ordination. In the July-August issue of the Faith, we will consider these arguments and the reasons the Church says women may not be ordained to the priesthood.)

In her press release, Rue noted that the diocese published its statement "without prior dialog or conversation." The "Rev. Victoria Rue," said the release, "has stated in phone calls to the diocese that she is willing to engage in dialog with the bishop. To this date, there is no response."

Joining Rue in issuing the press release were Kathleen Strack, called a "woman deacon," and Juanita Cordero, a "candidate for the diaconate." The release quotes Rue: "we hope that instead of condemning the Roman Catholic Women Priest movement, church leaders will learn about the history of women' s ordination in our Roman Catholic Church and dialogue with us on shaping together a more inclusive, Christ centered church of equals. Women priests represent a new model of priesthood, not a schismatic church." The release notes that Rue "celebrates Mass" on Thursdays and Sundays "for student, faculty, staff and the greater San Jose community" at Spartan Memorial. On Sundays she is joined by Strack, Juanita Cordero, and Don Cordero.

Rue claims she was ordained a "womanpriest" and Stack a "woman deacon along with 7 other women last summer on the St. Lawrence Seaway." (According to the July 28, 2005 Monterey County Weekly, another California woman, Dana Reynolds of Carmel, was ordained a deacon at the same event, held July 25. According to the Weekly, Reynolds, then 58, is a wife and mother, "a volunteer chaplain for Hospice of the Central Coast, a self-proclaimed 'spiritual mentor' who works with mostly women and performs weddings, and perhaps most importantly, is a member of the Roman Catholic Church.") Those performing the "ordinations," according to Rue, were three "womenbishops," who "were ordained in Europe in 2003 by male bishops who are in good standing with Rome. The ordination of the womenbishops was done in secret because the male bishops ["manbishops"?] feared reprisal from the Vatican."

According to Rue, because she and the others were ordained by women bishops who were ordained by male bishops, they are "validly" though "illicitly" ordained, "because the ordinations break Canon Law 1024 which states 'only baptized males may receive the sacrament of ordination.'" Thus, she claims, she and the other womenpriests/deacons really possess holy orders, only they are canonically illegal.

The diocese of San Jose, however, has denied this claim, since in its statement it says Rue "is not a validly ordained priest of the Roman Catholic Church." [Emphasis added.] Thus, she does not possess holy orders, cannot confect the Eucharist, nor give absolution. She is merely a laywoman playing priest. In saying this, the diocese merely reiterates what Pope John Paul II declared in his 1994 Apostolic Letter, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis: "In order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance, a matter which pertains to the Church's divine constitution itself, in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren (cf. Lk 22:32) I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful."

But while the San Jose diocese was decisive in its response to Rue's alleged ordination, a September 19, 2005 Spartan Daily story ("SJSU professor challenges traditional Catholicism") made it appear that the San Jose State University's Catholic ministry was less so. The story quoted Dominican sister Marcia Krause, director of the campus ministry, saying she "emphasized on the Catholic tradition, saying, 'We have not been able to break that down right now. The Catholic tradition has only had women deacons in its history,' she said adding that womenpriests are illegally [not invalidly?] ordained and they have excluded themselves from and are not part of brother Roman Catholic [sic]. 'You just need to work with your own conscience and be very considerate of the bigger picture but you need to move,' Krause said. 'I respect their need to respond to their call to priesthood; however, they have to bear the consequences of separating themselves from the bigger Catholic picture.'"

Father Jose Rubio, the campus ministry's chaplain, according to the Daily, "believes that the Catholic people are not ready yet for this change ... most of the people are not even ready to accept women's leadership in general in the society. 'It's not a decision that has come from the top, it is a growing consciousness that has to come from people of the bottom,' Rubio said, adding that it will happen whenever everybody is ready to accept it.'"

Further on, the story says, "Rubio referred to other religions, saying that there is no female leadership role in such major religions as Islam, Orthodox [sic], Judaism and Hinduism. He said, 'it is a starting movement, and I think it is something whose time is not there yet. It is something that will happen in the future.' Rubio said the R.C. Womanpriests Movement will change people's attitude but it is a slow process. 'Attitudes have to change and it is attitudes of everyday people,' Rubio said. Unlike Rue, who believes that it is not something new and womanpriesthood has been explicitly mentioned in the Bible, Rubio said it is something new, which has been forbidden in the Bible. 'But sometimes the spirit calls people to do new things in new ways,' he said. He said he validates the movement if it aims to raise people's consciousness about the importance of women's leadership in the church. 'I think things have to happen because people want it,' he said."

I contacted Sister Marcia and Father Rubio in late April to see whether the Daily accurately represented their responses. On April 26, Sister Marcia e-mailed me the following response: "current Church teaching holds that women may not be ordained nor may we entertain public conversation regarding that matter. I abide by this and thus am not in a position to say any more. Victoria Rue is not a validly ordained priest of the Roman Catholic Church nor is conducting licit celebrations of the Eucharist as those celebrations are not in union with the local or universal Church." I found Sister's response somewhat puzzling. For, while she says that Rue is not only illicitly but invalidly ordained, Sister Marcia's use of the phrase "current Church teaching" suggests a time-bound value to Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. Did Sister Marcia mean to suggest that the Church might one day change her teaching on women's ordination? I sent Sister Marcia a follow-up question asking this but received no response.

Father Rubio, with whom I spoke by telephone, was less suggestive. "I don't believe I'll ever see it [women's ordination]," he said. "But I believe that maybe 1,000 or 2,000 years from now, who knows how things will evolve? It will be possible. But I don't believe any of us or any of our children or grandchildren will see even married clergy. But I think, perhaps, 1,000 years from now things will be different."

But what of Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, where Pope John Paul II, invoking his apostolic authority ("in virtue of my ministry of confirming the brethren..."), declared "that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful"? "Definitively" basically means, "absolutely and for all time." Is this not an unchangeable teaching of the Church? To which Rubio responded, "what 150 popes from now might do? Who knows? I certainly don't believe [women's ordination is] a possibility now, and I certainly believe that it is contrary to what current Church documents say, and I wouldn't advocate for changing them."

Rubio explained "the whole context" of what he said to the Daily's reporter. "I was using the example of slavery, and I said the Bible condones slavery," Rubio said. "But certainly no one today would say that slavery is an acceptable thing, even though Paul counsels slaves to be obedient to their masters as to the Lord as does Peter himself. Today we would never say that slavery is the will of God. And, who knows, centuries hence, how things would develop on this issue?"

But, Rubio said, "obviously" Rue's "ordination is null and void because all those ordinations were declared null and void prior to their happening."

Anyhow, according to Rubio, Rue's services are not affecting students at the university very much. "I could tell you a few things," he said. "I haven't gone, but -- how do I say this? I sent spies? They said that most of the people there were not students but were adult people who looked like they knew her and she knew them and looked like they were already part of the community, because they all seemed to know each other by name."

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