MEN AND WOMEN SHOULD KNOW THEIR PLACE

SIR,—It is very important that the subject . of the ordination of women should not be thought of as one of the issues between "progressives" and "conservatives". It is a much more fundamental matter than that, as any Catholic will know who has been able to absorb the depth of meaning which is in his religion.
There is no material thing on earth of the same nature as the Sacred Host. There is no human institution of the same nature as the Catholic Church. And there is no man of the same nature as the Catholic priest.
Admittedly it is in each case a dual nature. human (or material) and divine, but this does not prevent it from being unique.
So that the argument that women now do jobs which used to be done only by men is no argument. The priesthood is different from all other jobs.
Sir.—What on earth did Mr. St. John-Stevas mean when he wrote Sept.5) "If Christ had been born in our own times, ith the equality of men and women generally recognised. with women free to pursue their own careers and vocation in every sphere of secular life, would He not not have included some at least in the ordained leaders of His Church'?"
The only way this reads to me is that God did not. or could not. foresee the days in which we are living—and there can be little value in the argument of anybody who bases his contention on such an outrageous suggestion.
Ordinary layman
Sir.—Mr. St. John-Stevas is M.P. for Chelmsford, which includes the parish of which I am parish priest.
He is indeed a very good M.P. I feel, however, he is more at home in the House than in the columns of the CATHOLIC HERALD.
Mgr. Canon Michael J. Wilson, I.ondon Road, Chelmsford, Essex.
Sir.—Order is one of the three Sacraments which imprints a permanent "character" upon the soul. The other two are Baptism and Confirmation: and no one has ever doubted the ability of these to makc their mark on the souls alike of men and women.
There would seem. therefore, to no a priori or intrinsic reason why the Sacrament of Order should be incapable of doing the same; the more so as sex is a physical characteristic, residing in the body, and not directly in the spiritual soul at all.
Some say that Our Lord ordained only men in accordance with the social conditions of His time, race and country — per accidens, as it were, taking things as He found them. Others contend that by ordaining only men, He wished (though saying nothing) to demonstrate His deliberate exclusion of women and limitation of this power to men per sc.
To me, this seems to prove too much—and so nothing. For are vire, by the same token, to infer that because, as a fact, He ordained only Jews, He for all time excluded Gentiles, be they white, black or
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Cc it not be quite reasonably argued that because only Jews were present He ordained only Jews, and because only men were present Ile ordained only men—without prejudice to what His Church, guided by the Spirit of Truth, might do in the changed circumstances of the future?
Did He ever forbid the ordination of women (or Gentiles)?
Frank James Coldharbour, Dorking, Surrey.
We all need to know our place, men and women alike. There is enormous scope for women in the Church, not only in religious orders. The ministry of Christ is not debarred from women—only, very reasonably, the priesthood. So why fuss?
One of the greatest weaknesses of the Church, it seems to me (a six-year-old convert from Quakerism, in which men and women are equal in all matters—but there are no priests) is the failure of the laity, both men and women. to take fully the responsibilities which belong to their calling.
It would he better to concentrate on this now, whatever excuses we may have had in the past.
Agnes Yendell
High Glebe, Longdown, Exeter.