Reverend Shannon Sterringer, was my guest on the, ”Your Radical Truth Podcast” called, “The Truth Of Excommunication of Women Priest from the Catholic Church.”
Most Catholics have heard this term but do we really know all that it entails, for any woman in our Church, aspiring to become a Woman Catholic Priest? In reality, until we would actually receive such a letter, we never will ever know for ourselves, what that really would mean.
Reverend Shannon states,” What does it mean for someone to be excommunicated? “It is a public shunning. Excommunication is a scarlet letter alerting others that a person has committed a serious crime and is forbidden to participate in the sacraments or enjoy any ecclesial benefits, including employment. It is emotionally and spiritually painful.”
The hierarchy of our Church will immediately contend, that it is the Woman’s fault, she caused this, she chose this. Well not exactly, what she chose was to follow her spiritual call from God, to become a Woman Priest in our Church. One’s own spiritual call turns into their own character being maligned, along with mention that they have brought scandal to their Church as well! The Scandal brought to our Church, comes directly from our Church’s hierarchy. For centuries now they refuse to recognize the period in their own Church’s history, when women were ordained as Priests in our Catholic Church.
Reverend Shannon had spoken to the idea of why would any woman go through such an ordeal if they basically didn’t have a real call, to begin with. Reverend Shannon’s genuine words present the real sacrifice any woman makes when choosing to follow God’s call to them:
”Women priests are accused of many things, being ambitious and power hungry and all of that. And unless anyone, especially those using those kinds of labels walks in our footsteps, they don’t realize, for most of us, our call came through our committed ministry in the Church we so deeply love. And then we went through the grieving process of being cut out and removed from that through the Excommunication process.” …” figure out how do we make a living from our ministry? How do we claim health benefits, our salary most lost when we leave our Diocesan spaces? We have critics saying, they are not real priests. The amount of humility and the thickness of skin it takes to walk this journey is tremendous. This is another piece of this process that is overlooked. We aren’t praised for our call as Seminarians are. It is a very rough road out there.”
The most important presence I find missing in this whole Excommunication process is the very Ministry of Jesus Christ. Where is there any iota of Jesus’ love, care, or inclusion present? Instead, we find hurt, abandonment, and Scandal from the Church’s own doing ever-present.
