Archdiocese says ordination of women brings automatic excommunication

Published: 2008-07-18

BOSTON (CNS) -- After an organization called Roman Catholic Womenpriests announced it would hold a Boston ordination ceremony for three women, the Boston Archdiocese said all those involved in the ceremony would "by their own actions" be "separating themselves from the church." The Boston Globe daily newspaper reported that the ceremony was to take place July 20 at a Protestant church and was to be performed by Dana Reynolds of Carmel, Calif., who the paper said became a bishop in Germany in April. "The organization calling itself 'Roman Catholic Womenpriests' is not recognized as an entity of the Catholic Church," the Boston Archdiocese said in a July 18 statement. "Catholics who attempt to confer a sacred order on a woman, and the women who attempt to receive a sacred order, are by their own actions separating themselves from the church." The Globe said the three women seeking ordination were Gabriella Velardi Ward of Staten Island, N.Y., Gloria Carpeneto of Baltimore and Mary Ann McCarthy Schoettly of Newton, N.J. The archdiocesan statement reiterated the church's teaching against the ordination of women, saying that "the ordination of men to the priesthood is not merely a matter of practice or discipline within the Catholic Church, but rather, it is part of the unalterable deposit of faith handed down by Christ through his apostles."

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