Father Anne, was my latest guest on the “Your Radical Truth Podcast Show,” called, “Women Take their Rightful Place At The Table of God… As Priests.”

It is one thing for myself, as a Lay Catholic Woman, to express my views on the issue of Women Priests in the Catholic Church, but to actually have a Woman Priest tell her story, takes this specific topic to another level of needed discovery and understanding. 

When this other side of hidden Church history is seen, it more than substantiates Women’s past religious roles in the early history of the Catholic Church. In so many words Father Anne, mentioned about the ordination of Women in the Church, between the 12th and 13th century. Then in the time span of about one hundred years women were forced out of their Priestly roles. Father Anne, said, “So a new story was read into that history, that it never existed.”

Yet, thankfully Biblical Research is able to refute this wrong assumption.

I did ask Father Ann, “Becoming a priest, what has it meant for you?”

“It is the coolest work I could ever imagine. To be called by God, to help people encounter God, there is nothing more fulfilling.”

Yet, if a survey was taken of men becoming priests, and that same question of what that has meant for them was asked?  That question ends there with no further follow up comment about them getting into this position to attain power. On the other hand, that assumption of power is often ascribed to women as their main motivation to become priests, rather than them, simply trying to answer God’s call to them to serve as Women Priests.  

During the conversation, Father Anne mentioned, “As a priest I do it for every women,… every girl, around the world, right now who has been told, you are less that fully human. It is completely unacceptable for me, it means everything to stand up and say no to that lie, to unmask that lie for what it is”.

Pope Francis, has said, “We need a new theology of Women.” What about the past theology of women in Priestly positions. By allowing women to become Women Priests today isn’t starting something brand new. The hierarchy simply need to acknowledge their Church’s own past Church history which included Women Priests.

 On a positive note, Father Anne, mentioned that a document regarding Women’s Ordination to the Priesthood has made its way into the Synodal process. This 2024 Synod, is the Laity’s one shot, to hopefully have the Holy Spirit affect the out come of women around the world, to be able to finally answer their very call by God, to serve Him! 

Finally, Father Anne stated, “Women’s full participation is the gateway to any change that God is inviting the Church to do. Because, if you believe in the Holy Spirit is animating all of us, how can the Church discern what God is calling the Church to do, if a whole group of people is cut out of the discernment process?” 

That “whole group of people,” is speaking of any Catholic women here in the United States, or globally.

A survey of millennium women showed them leaving the Church, at a higher rate than millennium men. Their own inequality in our Church, was one of their major reasons for leaving. As either a mother, who wants to stand up for her daughter’s equality and or her own, or a grandmother for her granddaughter’s equality, let alone her own equality now is that time.

Let the Holy Spirit guide you into meaningful participation!

Learn more about Women in the Priesthood with my book, Scandal in the Shadows.