Tony Flannery

A few weeks ago I addressed a gathering of the CWO, the Catholic Womens Ordination movement in London.  I think it could accurately be said that, as far as the official Church is concerned, these people are the untouchables of today. We are not supposed to engage in conversation with them, since even talking about the topic that their movement promotes is forbidden.

The group I met with on that Saturday afternoon were about as far removed from being a dangerous body of people as you could imagine. 

This is such a wonderful letter, containing so much common sense, that I could not resist putting it up on my own site. If only the Church authorities could engage seriously with the questions John is raising we would all be in a more healthy place in our Church.

 

The Beginning of Lent, 2014

 

Dear Cardinal O’Malley,

 

I am writing to you and to all the ordinaries of the dioceses in the United States to ask you and your fellow bishops in your role as teachers to provide a clear and credible theological explanation of why women are not being ordained to the priesthood in the Catholic Church.

My evening in Enniskerry was very interesting.  It was part of a series of talks jointly sponsored by the Church of Ireland and Catholic parishes, and I was the second speaker.  The first one was a Jesuit, who spoke about Pope Francis, so, since I have tended to talk a good bit about Francis in my presentations on Church reform, I decided to take a very different line this time.  The overall theme they were working on was the faith journey.