Eight US women ordained to the 'priesthood'

FROM AGOSTINO BONO
IN WASHINGTON DC RISKING excommunication from the Catholic Church, eight American women have participated Mg riverboat ceremony near Pittsburgh that they said constituted ordination to the priesthood.
At the ceremony last week, another four women said that they were ordained to the diaconate.
"They have excommunicated themselves by walking away from the Church and by not following Church teaching on this matter," said Fr Ronald Lengwin, Pittsburgh diocesan spokesman.
A statement by the Pittsburgh diocese called the ceremony "an invalid ritual" because of Church teaching that only men can be ordained to the priesthood and diaconate. It also said those "attempting to confer holy orders" were removing themselves from the Church.
Fr Lengwin said that Catholics in his diocese have been asked to pray for the reconciliation of the women with the Church and that the Church was ready to welcome them back.
One of the women who said she was ordained to the priesthood said that the ceremony strengthened her ties to the Church.
"I never felt more Roman Catholic or more devoted to the Church than during the ceremony," Bridget Mary Meehan said.
"I think in the future the Church will accept women priests," said Sister Meehan, who is a member of the Sisters for Community Service. She said it is an independent community of consecrated women founded in 1970.1t has about 500 members.
"Christ had women and men as disciples. He did not distinguish," said Meehan, producer of GoaalkTV, which provides cable-channel programming on women and religion.
The Pittsburgh diocesan statement said: "Those attempting to confer holy orders have. by their own actions, removed themselves from the Church, as have those who present themselves for such an invalid ritual. Additionally, those who by their presence give witness and encouragement to this fundamental break with the unity of the people of God place them
selves outside the Church."
The statement quoted Popes Paul VI and John Paul II as saying that the Church has no power to ordain women because Christ instituted an allmale priesthood.
A press release by Roman Catholic Womenpriests, the organisation sponsoring the ceremony, said the event was presided over by three women "bishops" from Germany. Two of the women "were ordained secretly by Roman Catholic male bishops in order to avoid Vatican reprisal", said the release.
Sister Meehan said that these male bishops are in union with the Pope and the women promised to keep their names secret.
The ceremony took place on a riverboat at the confluence of the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio rivers. A similar boat ceremony took place last year on the St Lawrence Seaway separating Canada and the United States. Other boat ceremonies have taken place in Europe with the first occurring in 2004 on the Danube River. The Vatican has said that such ceremonies are invalid ordinations.
Four of the women who said they were ordained deacons during the St Lawrence Seaway ceremony were listed as ordained to the priesthood during the ceremony.
One of the women who participated in last year's St Lawrence ceremony is Jean Merchant, former director of the Boston archdiocese's office of health care ministry. She resigned on July 17 after revealing that she was "ordained" a priest in the 2005 ceremony.
For the ceremony Marchant adopted her great-grandmother's family name, St Onge, because at that time she was not ready to leave her ministry in the archdiocese, she said. She said she decided to leave her post now because she wanted to live her "priesthood more openly" and to participate in the Pittsburgh ceremony.
She previously worked for five years as director of mission and spiritual care at Caritas Carney Hospital in Dorchester, Massachusetts, and also spent 16 years in hospice ministry. She holds a master's degree in divinity from the Weston Jesuit School of Theology in Cambridge, Massachusetts.