All Topics  
Ordination of women

 

   Email Print
   Bookmark   Link






 

Ordination of women



 
 
In general religious use, ordination
Ordination

In general religious use, ordination is the process by which individuals are Consecration, that is, set apart as clergy to perform various religious rites and ceremonies....
 is the process by which a person is consecrated
Consecration

Consecration is the ritual dedication to a special purpose or service, usually religious. The word "consecration" literally means "to associate with the sacred"....
 (set apart for the administration of various religious rites). The ordination of women is a controversial issue in religions where either the rite of ordination, or the role that an ordained person fulfills, has traditionally been restricted to men because of cultural or theological prohibitions.

History
In historical Christianity, such as the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
, Eastern and Oriental Orthodoxy
Oriental Orthodoxy

Oriental Orthodoxy is the communion of Eastern Christianity Churches that recognize only three ecumenical councils ? the First Council of Nicaea, the First Council of Constantinople and the Council of Ephesus....
, Lutheranism
Lutheranism

Lutheranism is a major branch of Western Christianity that identifies with the teachings of the sixteenth-century Germans Reformer Martin Luther....
 and Anglicanism
Anglicanism

Anglicanism is a tradition of Christianity faith. Churches in this tradition either have historical connections to the Church of England or have similar beliefs, worship and church structures....
, ordination – distinguished from religious or consecrated life
Consecrated life (Catholic Church)

In the Roman Catholic Church the term Consecrated life, also referred to as the "Religious Life", denotes a stable form of Christian living by those faithful who Vocation to follow Jesus Christ in a more exacting way recognised by the Church....
 - is the means by which a person is included in one of the priestly orders: bishop
Bishop

A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
, priest
Priest

A priest or priestess is a person having the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particular, rites of sacrifice to, and propitiation of, a deity or deities....
, or deacon
Deacon

Deacon is a role in the Christianity that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions....
.

In many Protestant denomination
Denomination

Denomination may refer to:*Religious denomination, such as a:**Christian denomination**Jewish denomination**Islamic denomination**Hindu denominations...
s ordination is understood more generally as the acceptance of a person for pastoral work.






Discussion
Ask a question about 'Ordination of women'
Start a new discussion about 'Ordination of women'
Answer questions from other users
Full Discussion Forum



Encyclopedia


In general religious use, ordination
Ordination

In general religious use, ordination is the process by which individuals are Consecration, that is, set apart as clergy to perform various religious rites and ceremonies....
 is the process by which a person is consecrated
Consecration

Consecration is the ritual dedication to a special purpose or service, usually religious. The word "consecration" literally means "to associate with the sacred"....
 (set apart for the administration of various religious rites). The ordination of women is a controversial issue in religions where either the rite of ordination, or the role that an ordained person fulfills, has traditionally been restricted to men because of cultural or theological prohibitions.

History


In historical Christianity, such as the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
, Eastern and Oriental Orthodoxy
Oriental Orthodoxy

Oriental Orthodoxy is the communion of Eastern Christianity Churches that recognize only three ecumenical councils ? the First Council of Nicaea, the First Council of Constantinople and the Council of Ephesus....
, Lutheranism
Lutheranism

Lutheranism is a major branch of Western Christianity that identifies with the teachings of the sixteenth-century Germans Reformer Martin Luther....
 and Anglicanism
Anglicanism

Anglicanism is a tradition of Christianity faith. Churches in this tradition either have historical connections to the Church of England or have similar beliefs, worship and church structures....
, ordination – distinguished from religious or consecrated life
Consecrated life (Catholic Church)

In the Roman Catholic Church the term Consecrated life, also referred to as the "Religious Life", denotes a stable form of Christian living by those faithful who Vocation to follow Jesus Christ in a more exacting way recognised by the Church....
 - is the means by which a person is included in one of the priestly orders: bishop
Bishop

A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
, priest
Priest

A priest or priestess is a person having the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particular, rites of sacrifice to, and propitiation of, a deity or deities....
, or deacon
Deacon

Deacon is a role in the Christianity that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions....
.

In many Protestant denomination
Denomination

Denomination may refer to:*Religious denomination, such as a:**Christian denomination**Jewish denomination**Islamic denomination**Hindu denominations...
s ordination is understood more generally as the acceptance of a person for pastoral work. Since the mid-nineteenth century, these denominations have allowed for female office-bearers and preachers. Today, about half of all American Protestant denominations ordain women and about 30% of all seminary students (and in some seminaries over half) are female.

Orthodox Judaism
Judaism

Judaism is a set of beliefs and practices originating in the Hebrew Bible , as later further explored and explained in the Talmud and other texts....
 does not permit women to become rabbi
Rabbi

Rabbi , in Judaism, means a religious ?teacher?, or more literally, ?my great one?, when addressing any master. The word rabbi derives from the Hebrew root word , rav, which in biblical Hebrew means ?great?, used in many senses, including the sense of a ?master? and apprentice, whence someone who is a distinguished ?teacher?....
s (instead, the women in leadership positions are often rebbetzin
Rebbetzin

Rebbitzin or Rabbanit is the title used for the wife of a rabbi, typically from the Orthodox Judaism, or Haredi Judaism, and Hasidic Judaism movements....
, wives of a rabbi), but female rabbis have begun to appear in recent decades among more liberal Jewish movements, especially the Reconstructionist
Reconstructionist Judaism

Reconstructionist Judaism is a modern American-based Judaism Jewish denominations based on the ideas of the late Mordecai Kaplan . The movement views Judaism as a progressively evolving civilization....
, Renewal
Jewish Renewal

Jewish Renewal is a Jewish denominations in Judaism which endeavors to reinvigorate modern Judaism with Mysticism, Hasidic Judaism, musical and Meditation practices....
, Reform
Reform Judaism

Reform Judaism refers to the spectrum of beliefs, practices and organizational infrastructure associated with Reform Judaism in Reform Judaism and in Reform Judaism ....
, and Humanistic
Humanistic Judaism

Humanistic Judaism is a movement within Judaism that emphasizes Jewish culture and history?rather than belief in God?as the sources of Jewish identity....
 denominations (see Rabbi#Women as rabbis]]) .

Muslim
Muslim

:A Muslim , , is an adherent of the religion of Islam. The feminine form is Muslimah . Literally, the word means "one who submits "....
s do not formally ordain religious leaders. The imam
Imam

File:Medaillon chiite.jpgAn imam is an Islamic leadership position. Often the leader of a mosque and the community. Similar to spiritual leaders, the imam is the one who leads the prayer during Islamic gatherings....
 serves as a spiritual leader and religious authority. Most strands of Islam
Islam

Islam is a Monotheism, Abrahamic religion originating with the teachings of the Prophets of Islam Muhammad, a 7th century Arab religious and political figure....
 permit women to lead female-only congregations in prayer (one of the competences of an imam), but restrict their roles in mixed-sex congregations. There is a recent movement to extend women's roles in spiritual leadership.

Within Buddhism
Buddhism

Buddhism is a family of beliefs and practices considered by most to be a religionand is based on the teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as "The Buddha" , who was born in what is today Nepal....
, the legitimacy of ordaining women as bhikkhuni
Bhikkhuni

A Bhikkhuni is a fully ordained female Buddhism monastic. Male monastics are called Bhikkhus. Both Bhikkunis and Bhikkhus live by the vinaya. Bhikkhuni lineages enjoy a broad basis in Mahayana countries like Korea, Vietnam, China and Taiwan....
 (nuns) has become a significant topic of discussion in some areas in recent years. It is widely accepted that the Buddha
Gautama Buddha

Siddhartha Gautama was a Spirituality teacher in the northern region of the Indian subcontinent who founded Buddhism. He is generally seen by Buddhists as the Supreme Buddhahood of our age....
 created an order of bhikkhuni, but the tradition of ordaining women has died out in some Buddhist traditions, such as Theravada Buddhism, while remaining strong in others, such as Chinese Buddhism.

Buddhism


The ordination of women is currently and historically practiced in some Buddhist regions, such as East Asia and Taiwan, and not in others, such as India
India

India, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, the List of countries by population country, and the most populous liberal democracy in the world....
 and Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is an island country in South Asia, located about off the southern coast of India....
.

The tradition of the ordained monastic community (sangha
Sangha

Sangha is a word in Pali or Sanskrit that can be translated roughly as "association" or "assembly," "company" or "community" with common goal, vision or purpose....
) began with Buddha, who established an order of Bhikkhu
Bhikkhu

A Bhikkhu , Bhiksu is a fully ordained male Buddhism monastic. Female monastics are called Bhikkhunis . Bhikkhus and Bhikkhunis keep many precepts: they live by the vinaya's framework of monastic discipline, the basic rules of which are called the patimokkha....
s (monks). According to the scriptures, later, after an initial reluctance, he also established an order of Bhikkhunis (nuns). However, according to the scriptural account, not only did the Buddha lay down more rules of discipline for the bhikkhuni (311 compared to the bhikkhu's 227 in the Theravada version), he also made it more difficult for them to be ordained, and made them subordinate to monks. The historicity of this account has been questioned, sometimes to the extent of regarding nuns as a later invention. The stories, sayings and deeds of some of the distinguished Bhikkhunis of early Buddhism are recorded in many places in the Pali Canon
Pali Canon

The Pali Canon is the standard collection of scriptures in the Theravada Buddhism tradition, as preserved in the Pali. It is the only completely surviving Early Buddhist schools canon, and one of the first to be written down....
, most notably in the Therigatha
Therigatha

The Therigatha, often translated as Verses of the Elder Nuns , is a Buddhist scripture, a collection of short poems supposedly recited by early members of the Buddhist sangha....
.

The tradition flourished for centuries throughout South and East Asia, but appears to have died out in the Theravada
Theravada

Theravada...
 tradition of Sri Lanka in the 11th century C.E. It survived in Burma to about the 13th century, but died out there too. It was never introduced to Thailand, Laos, Cambodia or Tibet. However, the Mahayana
Mahayana

Mahayana is one of the two main existing schools of Buddhism and a term for classification of Buddhist philosophy and practice. It was History of Buddhism in India....
 tradition, in China, Korea, Vietnam, Taiwan
Taiwan

Taiwan is an island in East Asia. "Taiwan" is also commonly used to refer to the country governed by the Republic of China and to the ROC itself, which governs the island of Taiwan, Orchid Island and Green Island, Taiwan in the Pacific Ocean off the Taiwan coast, the Penghu islands in the Taiwan Strait, and Kinmen and the Matsu Islands...
 and Hong Kong
Hong Kong

Hong Kong , officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, is a territory located in Southern China in East Asia, bordering the province of Guangdong to the north and facing the South China Sea to the east, west and south....
, has retained the practice, where nuns are called 'Bhik?u?i' (the Sanskrit
Sanskrit

Sanskrit is a historical Indo-Aryan language, one of the liturgical languages of Hinduism and Buddhism, and one of the 22 official languages of India....
 equivalent of the Pali
Páli

P?li is a village in Gyor-Moson-Sopron county, Hungary.External links...
 'Bhikkhuni').

Recent developments


The International Congress on Buddhist Women's Role in the Sangha
International Congress on Buddhist Women's Role in the Sangha

The International Congress on Buddhist Women's Role in the Sangha: Bhikshuni Vinaya and Ordination Lineages, took place on July 18-20, 2007, was an historic event....
: Bhikshuni Vinaya and Ordination Lineages took place in Germany, on July 18–20, 2007.

Sri Lanka

There have been some attempts in recent years to revive the tradition of women in the sangha within Theravada Buddhism in Thailand
Thailand

The Kingdom of Thailand is an independent country that lies in the heart of Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Laos and Myanmar, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the west by the Andaman Sea and Myanmar....
, India
India

India, officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, the List of countries by population country, and the most populous liberal democracy in the world....
 and Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is an island country in South Asia, located about off the southern coast of India....
, with many women ordained in Sri Lanka since 1996. Some of these were carried out with the assistance of nuns from the East Asian tradition; others were carried out by Theravada monks alone.Since 2005, many have been ordained by the head of the Dambulla chapter of the Siyam nikaya in Sri Lanka.

Thailand

In 1928, the Supreme Patriarch of Thailand
Supreme Patriarch of Thailand

The Supreme Patriarch or Sangharaja is the head of the order of Buddhism monks in Thailand. The position is formally appointed by the King of Thailand, although the actual selection is made by senior clergymen....
, responding to the attempted ordination of two women, issued an edict that monks must not ordain women. The two women were reportedly arrested and jailed briefly. In a more recent challenge to the Thai sangha's ban on women, Dhammananda
Dhammananda

Dhammananda is a name that combines Dharma , the teachings of the Buddha, and Ananda, a disciple of the Buddha and "bliss" in Sanskrit. Ananda can be part of Hindu and Buddhist monastic names....
 Bhikkhuni
Bhikkhuni

A Bhikkhuni is a fully ordained female Buddhism monastic. Male monastics are called Bhikkhus. Both Bhikkunis and Bhikkhus live by the vinaya. Bhikkhuni lineages enjoy a broad basis in Mahayana countries like Korea, Vietnam, China and Taiwan....
, previously a professor of Buddhist philosophy known as Dr Chatsumarn Kabilsingh
Dhammananda Bhikkhuni

Chatsumarn Kabilsingh , ordained Bhikkhuni Dhammananda, is a Thai bhikkhuni. On February 28, 2003, Kabilsingh received full bhikkhuni ordination in Sri Lanka....
, was controversially ordained as a nun in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is an island country in South Asia, located about off the southern coast of India....
 in 2003. Despite some support inside the religious hierarchy, the sangha
Sangha

Sangha is a word in Pali or Sanskrit that can be translated roughly as "association" or "assembly," "company" or "community" with common goal, vision or purpose....
 remains fiercely opposed to the ordination of women.
Burma

The governing council of Burmese Buddhism has ruled that there can be no valid ordination of women in modern times, though some Burmese monks disagree.

Tibetan tradition

The Dalai Lama has authorized followers of the Tibetan tradition to be ordained as nuns in traditions that have such ordination.

Christianity


Roman Catholic Church


Doctrinal position and its supporters

The official position of the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
, as expressed in the current canon law
Canon law (Catholic Church)

Canon Law, the ecclesiastical law of the Catholic Church, is a fully developed legal system, with all the necessary elements: courts, lawyers, judges, a fully articulated legal code and principles of legal interpretation....
 and the Catechism of the Catholic Church
Catechism of the Catholic Church

The Catechism of the Catholic Church or CCC, is an official exposition of the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. It was first published in Latin and French in 1992 by the authority of Pope John Paul II....
, is that: "Only a baptized man (vir) validly receives sacred ordination." Insofar as priestly and episcopal ordination are concerned, the Church teaches that this requirement is a matter of divine law, and thus doctrinal. The requirement that only males can receive ordination to the permanent diaconate has not been promulgated as doctrinal by the Church's magisterium, though it is clearly at least a requirement according to canon law. In 1976, the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith discussed the issue of the ordination of women and issued a Declaration on the Question of the Admission of Women to the Ministerial Priesthood which concluded that for various reasons, the Church "... does not consider herself authorized to admit women to priestly ordination". The most important reasons stated were first, the Church's determination to remain faithful to its constant tradition, second, its fidelity to Christ's will, and third, the idea of male representation due to the "sacramental nature" of the priesthood. The Biblical Commission, an advisory commission that was to study the exclusion of women from the ministerial priesthood from a biblical perspective, had three opposing findings. They were, "that the New Testament does not settle in a clear way... whether women can be ordained as priests, [that] scriptural grounds alone are not enough to exclude the possibility of ordaining women, [and that] Christ's plan would not be transgressed by permitting the ordination of women." In recent years, responding to questions about the matter, the Church has issued a number of documents repeating the same position. In 1994, Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II John Paul II is widely acclaimed as one of the most influential leaders of the twentieth century. He has been Pope_John_Paul_II#Role_in_the_fall_of_Communism in bringing down communism in Eastern Europe, as well as significantly improving the Roman Catholic Church's relations with Judaism, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and A...
 declared the question closed in his letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis
Ordinatio Sacerdotalis

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis is a Roman Catholic Church document discussing the Roman Catholic Church's position requiring "the reservation of priestly ordination to men alone." This Apostolic Letter was issued from the Vatican City by Pope John Paul II on 22 May 1994....
,
stating: "Wherefore, in order that all doubt may be removed regarding a matter of great importance…I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful."

In 1995, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a clarification, explaining that Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, though "itself not infallible, witnesses to the infallibility of the teaching of a doctrine already possessed by the Church.... This doctrine belongs to the deposit of the faith of the Church. It should be emphasized that the definitive and infallible
Infallibility of the Church

The Infallibility of the Church is the belief that the Holy Spirit will not allow the Church to err in its belief or teaching under certain circumstances....
 nature of this teaching of the Church did not arise with the publication of the Letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis". Instead, it was "founded on the written Word of God, and from the beginning constantly preserved and applied in the tradition of the Church, it has been set forth infallibly by the ordinary and universal magisterium," and for these reasons it "requires definitive assent."

The Church teaching on the restriction of its ordination to men that masculinity
Gender

Gender comprises a range of differences between man and woman, extending from the biological to the social. Biologically, the male gender is defined by the presence of a Y-chromosome, and its absence in the female gender....
 was integral to the personhood of both Jesus
Jesus

Jesus of Nazareth , also known as Jesus Christ, is the central figure of Christianity and is revered by most Christian churches as the Son of God and the Incarnation ....
 and the men he called as apostles
Twelve Apostles

In Christianity, apostles were missionaries among the leaders in the Early Christianity and, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, Jesus Christ himself....
. The Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
 sees maleness and femaleness as two different ways of expressing common humanity. Contrary to the common phrase "gender role
Gender role

The set of perceived behavioral Norm associated particularly with males or females, in a given social group or system. It can be a form of division of labour by gender....
s," which implies that the phenomenon of the sexes is a mere surface phenomenon
Phenomenon

A phenomenon is any observation occurrence. In popular usage, a phenomenon often refers to an extraordinary event. In physics, a phenomenon may be a feature of matter, energy, or spacetime....
, an accident
Accident (philosophy)

Accident, sumbebekos as used in philosophy, is an attribute which may or may not belong to a subject, without affecting its essence. The use of accident has been employed throughout the history of philosophy with several distinct meanings....
, the Roman Catholic Church
Roman Catholic Church

The Roman Catholic Church, officially known as the Catholic Church is the world's largest Christianity Ecclesia , representing over half of all Christians and one-sixth of the world population....
 teaches that there is an ontological (essential
Essence

In philosophy, essence is the attribute or set of attributes that make an object or substance theory what it fundamentally is, and which it has by metaphysical necessity, and without which it loses its identity....
) difference between humanity expressed as male humanity and humanity expressed as female humanity. While many functions are interchangeable between men and women, some are not, because maleness and femaleness are not interchangeable. Just as water
Water

Water is a common chemical substance that is essential for the survival of all known forms of life. In typical usage, water refers only to its liquid form or States of matter, but the substance also has a solid state, ice, and a gaseous state, water vapor or steam....
 is necessary for a valid baptism
Baptism

In Christianity, baptism is the ritual act, with the use of water, by which one is admitted as a full member of the Christian Church and, in the view of some, as a member of the particular Church in which the baptism is administered....
, and wheat
Wheat

Wheat , is a worldwide cultivated Poaceae from the Levant region of the Middle East. Globally, after maize, wheat is the second most-produced food among the cereal just above rice....
en bread
Bread

Bread is a staple food prepared by baking a dough of flour and water. It may be leavened or unleavened. Edible salt, fat and a leavening agent such as yeast are common ingredients, though bread may contain a range of other ingredients: milk, Egg , sugar, spice, fruit , vegetables , Nut or seeds ....
 and grape
Grape

File:Table grapes on white.jpgA grape is the non-Climacteric #In_botany fruit that grows on the Perennial plant and deciduous woody vines of the genus Vitis....
 wine
Wine

Wine is an alcoholic beverage often made of fermentation grape juice. The natural chemical balance of grapes is such that they can ferment without the addition of sugars, acids, enzymes or other nutrients....
 are necessary for a valid Eucharist
Eucharist

The Eucharist, also called Holy Communion or Lord's Supper and other names, is a Christianity sacrament commemorating, by consecrating bread and wine, the Last Supper, the final meal that Jesus Christ shared with his disciples before his arrest, and eventual crucifixion, when he gave them bread saying, "This is my body", and wine...
 (not because of their superiority over other materials, but because they are what Jesus used or authorized), only men can be validly ordained, regardless of any issues of equality.

Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II John Paul II is widely acclaimed as one of the most influential leaders of the twentieth century. He has been Pope_John_Paul_II#Role_in_the_fall_of_Communism in bringing down communism in Eastern Europe, as well as significantly improving the Roman Catholic Church's relations with Judaism, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and A...
, in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis
Ordinatio Sacerdotalis

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis is a Roman Catholic Church document discussing the Roman Catholic Church's position requiring "the reservation of priestly ordination to men alone." This Apostolic Letter was issued from the Vatican City by Pope John Paul II on 22 May 1994....
,
explained the Roman Catholic understanding that the priesthood is a special role specially set out by Jesus
Jesus

Jesus of Nazareth , also known as Jesus Christ, is the central figure of Christianity and is revered by most Christian churches as the Son of God and the Incarnation ....
 when he chose twelve men out of his group of male and female followers. John Paul notes that Jesus chose the Twelve (cf. Mk 3:13–14; Jn 6:70) after a night in prayer (cf. Lk 6:12) and that the Apostles
Twelve Apostles

In Christianity, apostles were missionaries among the leaders in the Early Christianity and, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, Jesus Christ himself....
 themselves were careful in the choice of their successors. The priesthood is "specifically and intimately associated in the mission of the Incarnate Word himself (cf. Mt 10:1, 7–8; 28:16–20; Mk 3:13–16; 16:14–15)."

Pope Paul VI
Pope Paul VI

Pope Paul VI , born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini , reigned as Pope of the Roman Catholic Church and monarch of Vatican City from 1963 to 1978....
, quoted by Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II John Paul II is widely acclaimed as one of the most influential leaders of the twentieth century. He has been Pope_John_Paul_II#Role_in_the_fall_of_Communism in bringing down communism in Eastern Europe, as well as significantly improving the Roman Catholic Church's relations with Judaism, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and A...
 in Ordinatio Sacerdotalis
Ordinatio Sacerdotalis

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis is a Roman Catholic Church document discussing the Roman Catholic Church's position requiring "the reservation of priestly ordination to men alone." This Apostolic Letter was issued from the Vatican City by Pope John Paul II on 22 May 1994....
,
wrote, "[The Church] holds that it is not admissible to ordain women to the priesthood, for very fundamental reasons. These reasons include: the example recorded in the Sacred Scriptures of Christ
Christ

Christ is the English language term for the Greek meaning "the anointing", which is a title given to the Reigning Messiah in the given age of the Zodiac....
 choosing his Apostles only from among men; the constant practice of the Church, which has imitated Christ in choosing only men; and her living teaching authority which has consistently held that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is in accordance with God's plan for his Church."

Concerning the "constant practice of the Church," in antiquity the Church Fathers Irenaeus, Tertullian, Hippolytus, Epiphanius, John Chrysostom, and Augustine all wrote that the ordination of women was impossible. The Synod of Laodicea prohibited ordaining women to the Presbyterate, although the meaning of Canon 11 has long been disputed.

The Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued and published on May 29, 2008, in the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, a decree signed by Cardinal William Levada
William Levada

William Joseph Cardinal Levada is an United States Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. He currently serves as Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in the Roman Curia, previously serving as Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland from 1986 to 1995 and Roman Catholic Archbishop of San Francisco from 1995 to 2005....
, on the existing ban on women priests by asserting that women 'priests' and the bishops who ordain them would be excommunicated "latae sententiae
Latae sententiae

Latae sententiae is a Latin term used in the Canon law of the Catholic Church meaning literally "given sentence".Officially, a latae sententiae penalty follows automatically, by force of the law itself, when the law is contravened....
".

Deaconesses and female deacons

The ordination of females to the diaconate is a matter of some controversy among Roman Catholic historians and theologians. At issue are two distinct but interrelated questions: whether some women in the early Church received true sacramental ordination, or whether all were merely so called for functional or honorific purposes; and, whether the prohibition against ordaining women to the diaconate is also a matter of unchangeable divine law, or potentially changeable ecclesiastical law. If some women did receive true sacramental ordination, then the current prohibition would be ecclesiastical rather than divine law.

It can be verified that the term deaconess
Deaconess

Deaconess comes from a Greek word diakonos . This Greek word means a servant or helper and occurs frequently in the Christian New Testament of the Bible and is sometimes applied to Christ himself....
es was employed in late antiquity; the word, like "deacon", comes from the Greek word diakonos , meaning "one who serves". Deaconesses still existed at least as late as the seventeenth century. Deaconesses mainly assisted the priest in receiving women into the Church for baptism by full immersion (which is still practiced by the Eastern Catholic Churches and by some parishes in the Western or Latin rite
Latin Rite

The Latin Rite is one of the 23 sui iuris particular Churches within the Catholic Church. This particular Church developed in western Europe and north Africa, where, from classical antiquity to the Renaissance, Latin was the principal language of education and culture, and so also of the liturgy....
 as well), and did not perform any of the duties associated with male deacons. In this sense "deaconess" implied a title of honour and respect.

Other, later discovered historical evidence points to women serving as deacons in many areas of the church in the West as well as in the East. Monastic women deacons in the East received th stole as a symbol of their office at ordination, which took place inside the sanctuary. Work by K. K. Fitzgerald, Phyllis Zagano, and Gary Macy argue for the sacramental ordination of women as deacons.

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith wrote in 1977 that the historical nature of deaconesses was "a question that must be taken up fully by direct study of the texts, without preconceived ideas." The position that deaconesses received true sacramental ordination (in certain times and places) is given by Roger Gryson, and the position that deaconesses never received true sacramental ordination is given by Aimé Georges Martimort. Both Gryson and Martimort argued from the same historical evidence, which is mixed. For example, the ecumenical First Council of Nicaea (A.D. 325) stated that deaconesses: "do not receive any imposition of hands, so that they are in all respects to be numbered among the laity." However, 126 years later, the ecumenical Council of Chalcedon (A.D. 451) decreed: "A woman shall not receive the laying on of hands as a deaconess under forty years of age, and then only after searching examination." Martimort argues that the "laying on of hands" in the latter case referred only to a special blessing. Against this, "Gryson argues that the use of the verb cheirotonein and of the substantive cheirothesia clearly indicate that deaconesses were ordained by the laying on of hands."

Until rather recently, the theologians and canonists who addressed the question almost unanimously considered the exclusion of women from ordination, including to the diaconate, as having a divine origin and therefore remaining absolute. Only in recent decades have any theologians or canonists entertained the theory that the prohibition of women from the ordained diaconate was a matter of merely ecclesiastical, rather than divine law. This renewed theological assessment was spurred on by the Second Vatican Council
Second Vatican Council

The Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, or Vatican II, was the twenty-first Ecumenical Council of the Roman Catholic Church. It opened under Pope John XXIII in 1962 and closed under Pope Paul VI in 1965....
's revival of the permanent diaconate, which lifted the question from a purely theoretical matter to one with immensely practical consequences. Based on the theory that some deaconesses received the sacrament of Holy Orders, and based on the fact that some writers in the Middle Ages exhibited a certain hesitancy concerning the ordination of women stemming from knowledge that there had been deaconesses in antiquity, there have been modern-day proposals to ordain female permanent deacons, who would perform the same functions as male deacons.

Ordination and equality

The Roman Catholic Church states that the hierarchical
Hierarchy

A 'hierarchy' is an arrangement of items The word derives from the Greek language , from ?e?????? , "president of sacred rites, high-priest" and that from , "sacred" + , "to lead, to rule"....
 structure that includes the ordained ministerial priesthood is ordered to benefit the holiness of the entire body of the faithful, and not to ensure the salvation of the ordained minister. There is no additional benefit in terms of automatic holiness that comes about through ordination. Ordination is not required for salvation
Salvation

In religion, salvation is the concept that God saves humanity from death. As commonly conceived, He has both Will of God and omnipotence to realize human salvation....
, nor does it effect salvation in the one ordained. In other words, a priest can go to Hell
Hell

In many religious traditions, Hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife, often in the underworld. Religions with a linear Divinity history often depict Hell as endless ....
 just as easily as a layperson. Likewise, saint
Saint

A saint in Christianity is a human being who has been called to holiness. The term is used differently by various denominations, with some, such as the Anglicans, Methodists, and Lutherans distinguishing between Saints and saints....
hood is equally open to men and women, lay or ordained. For example, the Blessed Virgin Mary
Blessed Virgin Mary

The Blessed Virgin Mary, sometimes shortened to The Blessed Virgin or The Virgin Mary, is a traditional title used by most Christians and most specifically used by liturgical Christians such as Roman Catholics, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholics, and some others to describe Mary, mother of Jesus, the mother of...
 is venerated as the Queen of all Saints. Furthermore, there are female Doctors of the Church
Doctor of the Church

Doctor of the Church is a title given by a variety of Christian churches to individuals whom they recognize as having been of particular importance, particularly regarding their additions to theological or doctrinal matters....
.

Pope John Paul II wrote, in Mulieris Dignitatem: "In calling only men as his Apostles, Christ acted in a completely free and sovereign manner. In doing so, he exercised the same freedom with which, in all his behaviour, he emphasized the dignity and the vocation of women, without conforming to the prevailing customs and to the traditions sanctioned by the legislation of the time."

In Ordinatio Sacerdotalis
Ordinatio Sacerdotalis

Ordinatio Sacerdotalis is a Roman Catholic Church document discussing the Roman Catholic Church's position requiring "the reservation of priestly ordination to men alone." This Apostolic Letter was issued from the Vatican City by Pope John Paul II on 22 May 1994....
,
John Paul wrote: "the fact that the Blessed Virgin Mary
Blessed Virgin Mary

The Blessed Virgin Mary, sometimes shortened to The Blessed Virgin or The Virgin Mary, is a traditional title used by most Christians and most specifically used by liturgical Christians such as Roman Catholics, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholics, and some others to describe Mary, mother of Jesus, the mother of...
, Mother of God and Mother of the Church, received neither the mission proper to the Apostles nor the ministerial priesthood clearly shows that the non-admission of women to priestly ordination cannot mean that women are of lesser dignity, nor can it be construed as discrimination against them. Rather, it is to be seen as the faithful observance of a plan to be ascribed to the wisdom of the Lord of the universe."

The Roman Catholic Church does not regard the priest as the only possible prayer
Prayer

Prayer is the act of communicating with a deity or spirit in worship. Specific forms of this may include praise, requesting divine providence, confessing sins, as an act of reparation or an expression of one's emotional expression....
 leader, and prayer may be led by a woman. For example, outside the context of a Mass and in the absence of a priest or deacon, laypersons (both men and women) "are to be entrusted with the care of these [Sunday] celebrations." This includes leading the prayers, ministry of the word, and the giving of holy communion
Eucharist

The Eucharist, also called Holy Communion or Lord's Supper and other names, is a Christianity sacrament commemorating, by consecrating bread and wine, the Last Supper, the final meal that Jesus Christ shared with his disciples before his arrest, and eventual crucifixion, when he gave them bread saying, "This is my body", and wine...
 (previously consecrated by a priest). Also during these assemblies, in the absence of an ordained minister, a layperson may request God's blessing on the congregation, provided that the layperson does not use words proper to a priest or deacon, and omits rites that are too readily associated with the Mass.

Women are also able to live the Consecrated Life
Monasticism

Monasticism is the religion practice in which one renounces world pursuits in order to fully devote one's life to spiritual work. The origin of the word is from Ancient Greek, and the idea was originally related to Christian monks....
 as a nun
Nun

A Nun is a woman who has taken special vows committing her to a religious life. She may be an monasticism who voluntarily chooses to leave mainstream society and live her life in prayer and contemplation in a monastery or convent....
 or abbess
Abbess

An abbess is the female religious superior, or Mother Superior, of an abbey of nuns.In Roman Catholic and Anglican abbeys, the mode of election, position, rights, and authority of an abbess correspond generally with those of an abbot....
, and throughout the history of the Church it has not been uncommon for an abbess to head a dual monastery, i.e., a community of men and women. Women today exercise many roles in the church that they were previously not able to participate in. They can run catechetical programs in parishes, do spiritual direction, serve as readers and Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion, and teach theology. Also, in 1994, the Vatican Congregation for Divine Worship decided that women could assist at Mass as altar servers. Still many people see the Church's position on the ordination of women as a sign that women are not equal to men in the Catholic church.

Dissenting views

The arguments for the Catholic ordination of women, include the one based on equality. Some sacramental theologians have argued that ordaining men but not women creates two classes of baptism
Baptism

In Christianity, baptism is the ritual act, with the use of water, by which one is admitted as a full member of the Christian Church and, in the view of some, as a member of the particular Church in which the baptism is administered....
, contradicting Saint Paul
Paul of Tarsus

Saint Paul, also called Paul the Apostle, the Apostle Paul or Paul of Tarsus , was a Hellenistic Judaism, who called himself the "Apostle to the Gentiles", and was, together with Saint Peter and James the Just, the most notable of early Christian missionaries....
's statement that all are equal in Christ
Christ

Christ is the English language term for the Greek meaning "the anointing", which is a title given to the Reigning Messiah in the given age of the Zodiac....
.

Another argument is based on the theological position that there is a fundamental unity between the different levels (deacon, priest, and bishop) of the sacrament of Holy Orders, as taught by the Second Vatican Council. So, if history shows that the deaconesses known to have existed in the Early Church had actually received the sacrament of ordination, then because of the fundamental unity of Holy Orders, women can also be ordained as priests and bishops. (This same argument is sometimes used in reverse, against the historical possibility that deaconesses received sacramental ordination.)

Whatever argument is used in favor of the priestly ordination of women, there is the problem of reconciling this position with Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (or ignoring it, if the arguer so wishes). Based on the statements from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the official point of view is that Ordinatio Sacerdotalis, without itself being ex cathedra, authoritatively and bindingly teaches that: (1) the Church cannot ordain women as priests due to divine law; and that (2) this doctrine has been set forth infallibly by the ordinary and universal magisterium. A dissenting view is that, according to section 25 of the Second Council's Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium
Lumen Gentium

Lumen Gentium, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, is one of the principal documents of the Second Vatican Council. The Constitution was promulgated by Pope Paul VI on November 21, 1964, following approval by the assembled bishops by a vote of 2,151 to 5....
, the "ordinary and universal magisterium" is exercised by "the Pope in union with the bishops". In other words, according to the Congregation, it is an instance of the Pope 'publicising' what he and the other bishops, as the ordinary and universal magisterium' have already consistently taught through the ages.

Since the encyclical Humani Generis, it is well known that the Roman Pontiff can, by his own authority, settle a theological question via a fallible papal teaching that is nonetheless sufficiently authoritative to end all debate on the matter, at least under Church law. This is clearly what has occurred with Ordinatio Sacerdotalis in regard to point (1). (Although, in fact, the position taken by Pius XII in Humani Generis was overturned by Vatican II.) Thus, theological debate on whether women can be ordained as priests is no longer seen by the Church as permitted for Catholics, and the arguments in favor of ordaining women to the priesthood in this section are termed a "dissenting position". However, several noted dogmatic theologians have questioned how this same alleged debate-ending authority can apply to point (2), which is a matter not of faith or morals, but a factual matter relative to teachings promulgated by all the bishops of the Catholic Church over her two thousand year history. These dogmatic theologians find it especially problematic that, concerning this point, Ordinatio Sacerdotalis gives no indication of what historical facts are sufficient to ensure infallibility by the ordinary and universal Magisterium, nor any indication of how those historical facts were verified. Because of these issues it is argued that, if it is indeed possible for the Church to ordain women to the priesthood, this would not contradict the Church's dogma regarding infallible teachings.

Some supporters of women's ordination have asserted that there have been ordained female priest
Priest

A priest or priestess is a person having the authority or power to administer religious rites; in particular, rites of sacrifice to, and propitiation of, a deity or deities....
s and bishop
Bishop

A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
s in antiquity. The official Church position on this is that, although "a few heretical sects in the first centuries, especially Gnostic ones, entrusted the exercise of the priestly ministry to women: this innovation was immediately noted and condemned by the Fathers who considered it as unacceptable in the Church." In response to that position, some supporters of women's ordination take the position that those sects weren't heretical, but, rather, orthodox.

Some arguable evidence that not all ordinations in the Catholic tradition have been those of males exists. For example, the Pope Gelasius I apparently condemned the practice of women officiating at altars; inscriptions near Tropea in Calabria refer to "presbytera," which could be interpreted as a woman priest or as a wife of a male priest. Furthermore, a sarcophagus from Dalmatia is inscribed with the date 425 and records that a grave in the Salona burial-ground was bought from presbytera Flavia Vitalia: selling burial plots was at one time a duty of presbyters. There have been some 15 records so far found of women being ordained in antiquity by Christians; while the Vatican insists those are ordinations by heretical groups, the Women's Ordination Conference contends that those were orthodox Christian groups.

There is also the church of Santa Praxedis, where Theodora Episcopa—Bishop Theodora, with the word for "bishop" in feminine form—appears in an image with two female saints and Mary. That church's pastor alleges that the church was built in honor of Pope Pascal I's mother by her son, who graced her with the title "Episcopa" due to her being the mother of a Pope. However, Theodora wears a coif in the image, suggesting that she is an unmarried woman.

Setting aside these theological considerations, advocates for the ordination of women have pointed to vocation
Vocation

A vocation as defined in a religious environment is an occupation for which a person is suited, trained or qualified. Often those who follow a religious vocation have a inclination to undertake the work, often called a calling....
s declining in Europe and North America and have made the utilitarian argument that women must be ordained in order to have enough priests to administer the Sacrament
Sacrament

A sacrament, as defined in Hexam's Concise Dictionary of Religion is "a rite in which God is uniquely active." Augustine of Hippo defined a Christian sacrament as "a visible sign of an invisible reality." The Anglican Book of Common Prayer speaks of them as "an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible Grace." Examples of sacram...
s in those areas. Supporting this argument, they made public the story of a Czech woman Ludmila Javorová
Ludmila Javorová

Ludmila Javorov? is a Czech Republic Roman Catholic woman who worked in the underground church during the time of communism rule in Czechoslovakia and served as a vicar general of a clandestine bishop....
, who, in the 1990s, said that she and four or five other women had been ordained by the late Bishop Felix Maria Davídek
Felix Maria Davídek

Felix Maria Dav?dek was a bishop of the Roman Catholic Church. He was born in Chrlice in what today is the Czech Republic. He was ordained a priest on June 29, 1945 in the diocese of Brno....
 in the 1970s, as priests in the underground Catholic Church in Czechoslovakia. Javorová ceased to practice as a priest at some point.

There is at least one organization that calls itself "Roman Catholic" that ordains women at the present time, Roman Catholic Womenpriests
Roman Catholic Womenpriests

Roman Catholic Womenpriests is an international group that claims connection to the Roman Catholic Church. They are descended from the Danube Seven, a group of women who claim to have been validly ordained as priests in 2002 by R?mulo Antonio Braschi, an independent bishop whose orders could possibly be recognized as 'valid but illicit' by...
; and, several independent Catholic
Independent Catholic Churches

Independent Catholic churches are Christian denominations which claim Apostolic Succession for their bishops but are not a part of the Roman Catholic Church, Oriental Orthodoxy, the Eastern Orthodox Churches, the Old Catholic Churches under the Archbishop of Utrecht or the Anglican Communion....
 jurisidictions have been ordaining women in the United States since approximately the late 1990s. These organizations are independent of and unrecognised by the Roman Catholic Church. There are several others calling for the Roman Catholic Church itself to ordain women, such as Circles http://womenpriests.org/circles/, Brothers and Sisters in Christ, Catholic Women's Ordination, and Corpus, along with others.

Eastern Orthodoxy


The Eastern Orthodox churches follows a similar line of reasoning as the Roman Catholic Church with respect to ordination of priests.

Regarding deaconesses, Professor Evangelos Theodorou argued that female deacons were actually ordained in antiquity. K. K. Fitzgerald has followed and amplified Professor Theodorou's research. Kalistos Ware wrote:

The order of deaconesses seems definitely to have been considered an "ordained" ministry during early centuries in at any rate the Christian East. ... Some Orthodox writers regard deaconesses as having been a "lay" ministry. There are strong reasons for rejecting this view. In the Byzantine rite the liturgical office for the laying-on of hands for the deaconess is exactly parallel to that for the deacon; and so on the principle lex orandi, lex credendi
Lex orandi, lex credendi

Lex orandi, lex credendi refers to the relationship between worship and belief, and is an ancient Christian principle which provided a measure for developing the ancient Christian creeds, the canon of scripture and other doctrinal matters based on the prayer texts of the Church, that is, the Church's liturgy....
—the Church's worshipping practice is a sure indication of its faith—it follows that the deaconesses receives, as does the deacon, a genuine sacramental ordination: not just a but a .


On October 8, 2004, the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church of Greece voted to permit the ordination of monastic women deacons, that is, women deacons to minister and assist at the liturgy within their own monasteries.

There is a strong monastic tradition, pursued by both men and women in the Orthodox churches, where monks and nuns lead identical spiritual lives. Unlike Roman Catholic religious life, which has myriad traditions, both contemplative and active (see Benedictine monks, Franciscan friars
Franciscan

The term Franciscan is commonly used to refer to members of Catholic religious orders that follow a body of regulations known as "The rule of St....
, Jesuits), that of Eastern Orthodoxy has remained exclusively ascetic and monastic
Monasticism

Monasticism is the religion practice in which one renounces world pursuits in order to fully devote one's life to spiritual work. The origin of the word is from Ancient Greek, and the idea was originally related to Christian monks....
.

Anglicanism


The majority of Anglican provinces ordain women as both deacons and priests. Only a few provinces, however, have consecrated women as bishops (although the number of provinces where women bishops are canonically possible is much greater). The Episcopal Church in the United States ordains women as both priests and bishops. The situation regarding women's ordination in the Anglican Communion (and churches in full communion) as of April 2008 can be seen in the following table:

Bishops (consecrated) Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia
Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia

The Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia is a church of the Anglican Communion serving New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, and the Cook Islands....
; Australia
Anglican Church of Australia

The Anglican Church of Australia, a member church of the Anglican Communion, was previously officially known as the Church of England in Australia and Tasmania ....
; Canada
Anglican Church of Canada

The Anglican Church of Canada is the sole Canada representative of the Anglican Communion. The official French name is l'?glise Anglicane du Canada....
; United States, Cuba
Iglesia Episcopal de Cuba

The Episcopal Church of Cuba consists of forty-six parishes, and about ten thousand members. It is a part of the Anglican Communion, though part of no ecclesiastical province....
Bishops (none yet consecrated) Bangladesh
Church of Bangladesh

The Church of Bangladesh is a church of the Anglican Communion in Bangladesh. It is in fact a United and uniting churches, having been formed by the union of various Christian churches in the region....
, Brazil
Igreja Episcopal Anglicana do Brasil

The Anglican Episcopal Church of Brazil is an ecclesiastical province of the Anglican Communion that covers Brazil....
, Central America
Central America

Central America is a central geography region of the Americas. It is the southernmost, isthmus portion of the North American continent, which connects with South America on the southeast....
, Ireland
Church of Ireland

The Church of Ireland is an autonomous province of the Anglican Communion, operating across the island of Ireland. Like other Anglican churches, it considers itself to be both Catholicism and Protestant Reformation....
, Japan
Nippon Sei Ko Kai

The Nippon Sei Ko Kai , abbreviated as NSKK, or the Anglican Church in Japan, is the religious body in the Province of Japan of the Anglican Communion....
, Mexico
Anglican Church of Mexico

The Anglican Church of Mexico is the Anglicanism province in Mexico, and includes 5 dioceses. The primate is the Presiding Bishop and Bishop of Mexico, The Most Revd....
, North India
Church of North India

The Church of North India , the dominant Protestant denomination in northern India, is a united church established on 29 November 1970 by bringing together the main Protestant churches working in northern India....
, Philippines, Scotland
Scottish Episcopal Church

The Scottish Episcopal Church is a Christian denomination in Scotland and a member of the Anglican Communion, although it itself has pre-Anglican origins....
, Southern Africa, Sudan
Episcopal Church of the Sudan

The Episcopal Church of the Sudan is an autonomous ecclesiastical province of the Anglican Communion in Sudan. The province consists of twenty-four dioceses, each headed by a bishop....
Priests England
Church of England

The Church of England is the State religion Christianity Ecclesia in England, the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the oldest among the communion's thirty-eight independent national and regional churches....
, Burundi
Anglican Church of Burundi

The Anglican Church of Burundi is a member Church in the Anglican Communion, located in East Africa between Tanzania, Rwanda, Kenya, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo....
, Hong Kong, Indian Ocean
Church of the Province of the Indian Ocean

The Church of the Province of the Indian Ocean is a province of the Anglican Communion. It covers the islands of Madagascar, Mauritius and the Seychelles....
, Kenya
Anglican Church of Kenya

The Anglican Church of Kenya is part of the Anglican Communion, and includes 29 dioceses. The Primate of the Church is the Archbishop of Kenya. The Most Rev....
, Korea
Anglican Church of Korea

The Anglican Church of Korea is the province of the Anglican Communion in North Korea and South Korea Korea. Founded in 1889, it has over 100 parish and mission churches with a total of roughly 50,000 members....
, Rwanda
Church of the Province of Rwanda

The Church of the Province of Rwanda is a province of the Anglican Communion, covering 9 Episcopal see in East Africa. The current primate of the province is Archbishop Emmanuel Musaba Kolini....
, South India
Church of South India

The Church of South India is a union of many Protestant denominations spread throughout South India. It is the largest Protestant Church in India and second largest Christian church after the Catholic Church in India ....
, Uganda
Church of Uganda

The Church of the Province of Uganda is a member church of the Anglican Communion. Currently there are thirty-one dioceses that make up the Church of Uganda, each one headed by a Bishop....
, Wales
Church in Wales

The Church in Wales is a member Church of the Anglican Communion, consisting of six dioceses in Wales. Like many Anglican churches, it recognizes the primacy of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who does not however have any formal authority in Wales ....
, West Indies
Church in the Province of the West Indies

The Church in the Province of the West Indies is a member Ecclesiastical province in the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church comprises eight dioceses spread out over much of the West Indies area....
, West Africa
Church of the Province of West Africa

The Church of the Province of West Africa is a province of the Anglican Communion, covering 15 Episcopal see in West Africa, specifically in Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone....
Deacons Southern Cone
Iglesia Anglicana del Cono Sur de las Americas

The Anglican Church of the Southern Cone of America is the ecclesiastical province of the Anglican Communion that covers the countries of Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay....
, Congo
Province de L'Eglise Anglicane Du Congo

The Province de L'Eglise Anglicane Du Congo is a province of the Anglican Communion. The Most Revd Dr Dirokpa Balufuga Fidele is the current primate and archbishop of the Anglican Province of Congo....
, Pakistan
Church of Pakistan

The Church of Pakistan is a United and uniting churches in Pakistan, which is part of the Anglican Communion and a member church of the World Methodist Council....
No ordination of women Central Africa
Church of the Province of Central Africa

The Church of the Province of Central Africa is part of the Anglican Communion, and includes 15 dioceses in Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe....
, Jerusalem and the Middle East
Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East

The Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East is a ecclesiastical province#Anglican Communion of the Anglican Communion stretching from Iran in the east to Algeria in the west, and Cyprus in the north to Somalia in the south....
, Melanesia
Church of the Province of Melanesia

The Church of the Province of Melanesia is part of the Anglican Communion, and includes 8 dioceses. The Primate of the Church is the Archbishop of Melanesia....
, Nigeria
Church of Nigeria

The Church of Nigeria is the Anglican Church body in Nigeria. It is the second-largest Province in the Anglican Communion, as measured by baptized membership, after the Church of England....
, Papua New Guinea
Anglican Church of Papua New Guinea

The Anglican Church of Papua New Guinea came into existence as a discrete province of the Anglican Communion when the Anglican Province of Papua New Guinea was separated from the Anglican ecclesiastical Anglican Church of Australia#Provinces, Australia, in 1976 following Papua New Guinea's independence....
, South East Asia
Church of the Province of South East Asia

File:Anglican Province Of The Church Of South East Asia.pngThe Church of the Province of South East Asia, a member church of the Anglican Communion, was created in 1996, comprising the four dioceses of Kuching, Sabah, Anglican Diocese of Singapore and West Malaysia....
, Tanzania
Anglican Church of Tanzania

The Anglican Church of Tanzania is a member of the Anglican Communion based in Dodoma. It consists of 21 dioceses headed by their respective bishops....


Some provinces
Ecclesiastical Province

An ecclesiastical province is a large jurisdiction of religious government, so named by analogy with a secular province, existing in certain hierarchical Christian Christian Church, especially in the Catholic Church and Orthodox Church Churches and in the Anglican Communion....
 within the Anglican Communion
Anglican Communion

The Anglican Communion is an international association of national Anglican churches. There is no single "Anglican Church" with universal juridical authority as each national or regional church has full autonomy....
, such as the Episcopal Church in the United States of America (TEC), the Anglican Church of New Zealand
Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia

The Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia is a church of the Anglican Communion serving New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, and the Cook Islands....
, the Anglican Church of Canada
Anglican Church of Canada

The Anglican Church of Canada is the sole Canada representative of the Anglican Communion. The official French name is l'?glise Anglicane du Canada....
, the Episcopal Church of Cuba, and, from May 2008, the Anglican Church of Australia
Anglican Church of Australia

The Anglican Church of Australia, a member church of the Anglican Communion, was previously officially known as the Church of England in Australia and Tasmania ....
, ordain women as deacons, priests and bishop
Bishop

A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
s.

Some Anglican provinces ordain women as deacons and priests but not as bishops. A number of other Anglican provinces, as noted in the table above, have removed canonical bars to women bishops but have not yet consecrated any.

The ordination of women has been a controversial issue throughout the Anglican Communion. However, by 2008, twenty-eight of the thirty eight provinces of the Anglican Communion ordain women as priests and seventeen have removed all bars to women serving as bishops.

Within provinces which permit the ordination of women, there are some individual dioceses which do not, or which ordain women only to the diaconate (such as the Diocese of Sydney
Anglican Diocese of Sydney

The Diocese of Sydney, in the Anglican Church of Australia, is unusual in that the majority of the diocese is Evangelicalism and low church in tradition and committed to Reformed and Calvinist theology....
 in the Anglican Church of Australia
Anglican Church of Australia

The Anglican Church of Australia, a member church of the Anglican Communion, was previously officially known as the Church of England in Australia and Tasmania ....
).

The first woman ordained to the priesthood in the Anglican Communion was Florence Li Tim-Oi
Li Tim-Oi

Florence Li Tim-Oi was the first woman to be ordained to the priesthood in the Anglican Communion. Already appointed as a deacon to serve in the colony of Macau at the Macau Protestant Chapel, she was ordained priest on 25 January 1944, by the Bishop of Hong Kong, in response to the crisis among Anglican Christians in China caused by the Jap...
, who was ordained on 25 January 1944 by the Bishop of Hong Kong
Hong Kong

Hong Kong , officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, is a territory located in Southern China in East Asia, bordering the province of Guangdong to the north and facing the South China Sea to the east, west and south....
. It was thirty years before the practice became more widespread, beginning controversially in 1974, when eleven women were ordained to the priesthood in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia is the largest city in Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population city in the United States. It is the fifth-largest metropolitan area and fourth-largest urban area by population in the United States, the nation's fourth-largest consumer media market as ranked by the Nielsen Media Research, and the 49th-most...
, by three retired Episcopal Church bishops. Four more women were ordained in 1975 in Washington D.C. These ordinations were ruled "irregular" because they had been done without the authorization of ECUSA's General Convention
General Convention of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America

The General Convention of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America is its primary governing and legislative body.The convention is held every three years....
. Two years later, General Convention authorized the ordination of women to the priesthood and the episcopate. The Church of England
Church of England

The Church of England is the State religion Christianity Ecclesia in England, the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the oldest among the communion's thirty-eight independent national and regional churches....
 authorized the ordination of woman priests in 1992 and began ordaining them in 1994. This was the premise of the television program
Television program

A television program , television programme , or television show is something that people watch on television. It may be a one-off broadcast or, more usually, part of a periodically recurring television series....
me The Vicar of Dibley
The Vicar of Dibley

The Vicar of Dibley is a British sitcom created by Richard Curtis and written for its lead actress, Dawn French, by Curtis and Paul Mayhew-Archer, with contributions from Kit Hesketh-Harvey....
.
The nearly simultaneous publication by the Vatican of the encyclical Veritatis Splendor
Veritatis Splendor

Veritatis Splendor is an encyclical by Pope John Paul II. It expresses the position of the Catholicism regarding fundamentals of the Church's role in moral teaching....
,
which argued that truth was immutable, however unpalatable, was a coincidence which was not lost on many traditionalist Anglicans who became Roman Catholics. These included women, such as Ann Widdecombe
Ann Widdecombe

Ann Noreen Widdecombe is a United Kingdom Conservative Party politician and, more recently, television presenter and novelist. She is the Member of Parliament for Maidstone and The Weald and a Privy Council of the United Kingdom....
 MP
Parliament of the United Kingdom

The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislature in the United Kingdom and British overseas territories....
.

The first woman bishop in the Anglican Communion was Barbara Clementine Harris
Barbara Clementine Harris

The Rt. Rev. Barbara Clementine Harris was the first woman ordained a bishop in the Anglican Communion....
, who was ordained bishop suffragan of Massachusetts
Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts

The Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts is one of the List of Original Dioceses of ECUSA Dioceses of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America....
 in February 1989. Later in the same year, Penelope Jamieson of the Anglican Church in New Zealand became the first female diocesan bishop when she was elected Bishop of Dunedin. The first female primate
Primate (religion)

Primate is a title or rank bestowed on some bishops in certain Christianity churches. Depending on the particular tradition, it can denote either jurisdictional authority or ceremonial precedence ....
 (or senior bishop of a national church) is Katharine Jefferts Schori
Katharine Jefferts Schori

Katharine Jefferts Schori is the Presiding Bishop#Episcopal Church in the United States of America of Episcopal Church in the United States of America....
, who was elected presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church (USA) at its 2006 General Convention, and began her nine year term as presiding bishop and primate on 3 November 2006. By April 2008 the Episcopal Church had elected 15 women as bishops.

Most Anglican provinces have taken steps to provide pastoral care and support for those who cannot in conscience accept the ministry of women as bishops. The Church of England, for example, has instituted "flying bishops" to cater for parishes who do not wish to be under the supervision of bishops who have participated in the ordination of women.

There have been a number of breakaway groups established by conservative Anglicans who see the ordination of women as representative of a trend away from traditional or orthodox doctrine. The Continuing Anglican Movement
Continuing Anglican Movement

The term Continuing Anglican refers to Anglicanism or former Episcopal Church churches that either separated from the Anglican Communion or formed outside the Anglican Communion in order to continue the faith and practices they believe were altered, revised or abandoned during the modernization of the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Churc...
 was started in 1977 after women began to be ordained in the USA.

Church of England

On 11 July 2005 the General Synod
General Synod

The General Synod is the title of the governing body of some church organizations....
 of the Church of England, in York
York

York is a walled city, sited at the confluence of the rivers River Ouse, Yorkshire and River Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city status in the United Kingdom is noted for its rich heritage and it has played an important role throughout much of its almost 2,000 year existence....
, voted to "set in train" the process of removing the legal obstacles preventing women from becoming bishops. Debate on the legislation was scheduled for February 2006. The process is currently underway but is not progressing quickly due to problems in providing appropriate mechanisms for the protection of those who cannot accept this development. On 7 July 2008 the General Synod held a more than seven hour debate on the subject, and narrowly voted for a national statutory code of practice to make provision for opponents, to be considered by the Synod in February 2009 - other provisions for opponents (such as separate structures or overseeing bishops) were backed by more than opposed them but failed to win the majority required across each of the three houses (bishops, clergy and laity).

Church in Wales

On 2 April 2008, the Governing Body of the Church in Wales
Church in Wales

The Church in Wales is a member Church of the Anglican Communion, consisting of six dioceses in Wales. Like many Anglican churches, it recognizes the primacy of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who does not however have any formal authority in Wales ....
 considered, but did not pass, a bill to enable women to be ordained as bishops. Though the bill was passed by the House of Laity (52 to 19) and the House of Bishops (unanimously), it failed by three votes (27 to 18) to secure the required minimum two-thirds majority in the House of Clerics. The Archbishop of Wales, the Most Revd Barry Morgan, expects the issue to be debated again in 2011. However the Church in Wales decisively ended the role of provincial bishop whose responsibility was to minister to opponents. In February 2009 the Church in Wales appointed the first woman Archdeacon.

Anglican Church of Australia

The Anglican Church of Australia
Anglican Church of Australia

The Anglican Church of Australia, a member church of the Anglican Communion, was previously officially known as the Church of England in Australia and Tasmania ....
, though its appellate tribunal, ruled on 28 September 2007 that there is nothing in the church’s constitution that would prevent the consecration of a woman priest as a diocesan bishop in a diocese which by ordinance has adopted the law of the Church of England Clarification Canon 1992, which paved the way for the ordination of women as priests. Following the agreement at the April 2008 Bishops' Conference of the "Women in the Episcopate" protocol for the provision of pastoral care to those who cannot in conscience accept the ministry of a woman bishop, the first nominations of women as bishops was widely anticipated, and on 11 April 2008 the Archbishop of Perth, the Most Revd Roger Herft
Roger Herft

Roger Adrian Herft is the present Anglican Archbishop of Perth, Australia. He was inaugurated in 2005.Born in Wattegama, Sri Lanka, he studied at the Royal College, Colombo in Columbo, later training for the ministry at United Theological College of Lanka in Pilimatalawe, gaining a Bachelor of Theology and Bachelor of Divinity degree from...
, announced the nomination of the Venerable Kay Goldsworthy
Kay Goldsworthy

Kay Goldsworthy is a bishop within the Anglican Diocese of Perth, Western Australia. In April 2008 she was chosen to become an assistant bishop in the diocese by the Archbishop of Perth, Roger Herft....
, Archdeacon of Perth and Registrar, as a bishop in the Diocese of Perth. She was the first woman ordained as an Anglican bishop in Australia: her episcopal ordination was held on 22 May, the Feast of Corpus Christi
Corpus Christi

Corpus Christi may refer to:Religious:* Corpus Christi , a Christian feast day, or solemnity, commemorating the supreme gift of the institution by Jesus Christ of the Holy Eucharist on the Thursday following Trinity Sunday, or on the Sunday following that Thursday....
 (Thanksgiving for the Holy Communion) in St George's Cathedral, Perth
St George's Cathedral, Perth

St George's Cathedral is the principal Anglican church in the city of Perth, Western Australia and the mother-church of the Anglican Diocese of Perth....
. Then, on 24 April 2008, the Archbishop of Melbourne, the Most Revd Philip Frier, announced the nomination of the Revd Canon Barbara Darling, Vicar of St James' Dandenong, as an assistant bishop. Her episcopal ordination was held on 31 May 2008, the Feast of the Visitation
Visitation

Visitation may refer to:In law:* In United States Law, the term for the right of a non-custodial parent to visit with their children, elsewhere known as Contact ...
 of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Elizabeth, in St Paul’s Cathedral, Melbourne.

Protestantism


A key theological
Theology

Theology is the study of the existence or attributes of a deity or gods, or more generally the study of religion or spirituality. It is sometimes contrasted with religious studies: theology is understood as the study of religion from an internal perspective , and religious studies as the study of religion from an external perspective....
 doctrine for most Protestants is the priesthood of all believers
Priesthood of all believers

The universal priesthood or the priesthood of all believers, as it would come to be known in the present day, is a Christian doctrine believed to be derived from several passages of the New Testament....
. The notion of a priesthood reserved to a select few is seen as an Old Testament
Old Testament

In Western Christianity, the Old Testament refers to the books that form the first of the two-part Christianity Bible Biblical canon. These works correspond to the Hebrew Bible , with some variations and additions....
 concept, inappropriate for Christians. Prayer belongs equally to all believing women and men.

However, most (although not all) Protestant denominations still ordain church leaders who have the task of equipping all believers in their Christian service . These leaders (variously styled elders, pastors or ministers) are seen to have a distinct role in teaching, pastoral leadership and the administration of sacrament
Sacrament

A sacrament, as defined in Hexam's Concise Dictionary of Religion is "a rite in which God is uniquely active." Augustine of Hippo defined a Christian sacrament as "a visible sign of an invisible reality." The Anglican Book of Common Prayer speaks of them as "an outward and visible sign of an inward and invisible Grace." Examples of sacram...
s. Traditionally these roles were male preserves, but over the last century, an increasing number of denominations have begun ordaining women.

The debate over women's eligibility for such offices normally centers around interpretation of certain Biblical passages relating to teaching and leadership roles. This is because Protestant churches usually view the Bible as the primary authority in church debates, even over established traditions (the doctrine of sola scriptura
Sola scriptura

Sola scriptura is the doctrine that the Bible is the only Biblical inerrancy authority for Christian faith, and that it contains all knowledge necessary for salvation and holiness....
). Thus the Church is free to change her stance, if the change is deemed in accordance with the Bible. The main passages in this debate include Galatians
Epistle to the Galatians

The Epistle to the Galatians is a book of the New Testament. It is a letter from Paul of Tarsus to a number of early Christian communities in the Roman province of Galatia in central Anatolia....
 3.28, 1st Corinthians
First Epistle to the Corinthians

The First Epistle to the Corinthians is a book of the Bible in the New Testament, often referred to simply as 1 Corinthians. The book is a letter from Paul of Tarsus and Sosthenes to the Christians of Corinth, Greece....
 11.2–16, 14.34–35 and 1st Timothy 2.11–14. Increasingly, supporters of women in ministry also make appeals to evidence from the New Testament that is taken to suggest that women did exercise ministries in the apostolic Church (e.g., Acts
Acts of the Apostles

The Acts of the Apostles is a book of the Bible, which now stands fifth in the New Testament. It is commonly referred to as simply Acts. The title "Acts of the Apostles" was first used by Irenaeus in the late second century, but some have suggested that the title "Acts" be interpreted as "the Acts of the Holy Spirit" or even "the Acts...
 21:9,18:18; Romans
Epistle to the Romans

The Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Romans is one of the letters of the New Testament canon of Scripture of the Christianity Bible. Often referred to simply as Romans, it is one of the seven currently undisputed letters of Paul the Apostle....
 16:3–4,16:1–2, Romans 16:7; 1st Corinthians 16:19, and Philippians 4:2–3) and that the Biblical passages used to argue against women's ordination might be read differently when a clear understanding of the unique historical context of each passage is available.

Examples within specific churches


  • The Apostolic Johannite Church
    Apostolic Johannite Church

    The Apostolic Johannite Church is a Gnostic Christian Church which claims valid Apostolic Succession from various lineages including Catholic, Old Catholic and Orthodox Christianity bishops....
     has offered ordination to women as deacons, priests and bishops since its foundation.
  • Baptist
    Baptist

    A Baptist is a member of a Christian denomination characterized by the rejection of infant baptism in favor of believer's baptism by Baptism#Immersion....
     Churches
  • The Baptist Churches in Germany
    Germany

    Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
     and Switzerland
    Switzerland

    Switzerland is a landlocked Swiss Alps country of roughly 7.7 million people in Western Europe with an area of 41,285 km?. Switzerland is a federal republic consisting of 26 states called Cantons of Switzerland....
     (Bund Evangelisch-Freikirchlicher Gemeinden, Bund Schweizer Baptistengemeinden) ordain women.
  • The Southern Baptist Convention
    Southern Baptist Convention

    The Southern Baptist Convention is a United States-based, mostly conservative Christian denomination. The name "Southern" stems from its having been founded and rooted in the Southern United States....
     does not support the ordination of women; however, some churches that are members of the SBC have ordained women.
  • Baptist groups in the United States that do ordain women include American Baptist Churches USA
    American Baptist Churches USA

    The American Baptist Churches USA is a group of Baptist churches within the United States; the denomination maintains headquarters in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania....
    , North American Baptist Conference
    North American Baptist Conference

    North American Baptist Conference - initially an association of Baptists in the United States and Canada of German ethnic heritage.The roots of the NABC go back to 1839, when Konrad Anton Fleischmann began work in New Jersey and Pennsylvania with German immigrants....
    , Alliance of Baptists
    Alliance of Baptists

    The Alliance of Baptists is a fellowship of Baptist churches and individuals espousing moderate-to-liberal theological and social stances. The Alliance was formed in 1987 by congregations some of which separated from the Southern Baptist Convention as a result of the 1980s Fundamentalist Christianity/moderate controversy....
    , Cooperative Baptist Fellowship
    Cooperative Baptist Fellowship

    Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, Inc. ? "a fellowship of Baptist Christians and churches who share a passion for the Great Commission of Jesus Christ and a commitment to Baptist principles of faith and practice." CBF does not consider itself a denomination, but rather a fellowship of churches and Christians....
     (CBF) and Progressive National Baptist Convention
    Progressive National Baptist Convention

    The Progressive National Baptist Convention is a convention of African-American Baptists emphasizing civil rights and social justice.The convention was formed at Cincinnati, Ohio in 1961, in a separation from the older National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc....
    .
  • The Charismatic Church of God ordains women as Missionaries, Evangelists, and Pastors.
  • Christian Connection Church. An early relative of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
    Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)

    The Christian Church is a Mainline Protestant denomination in North America. It is often referred to as The Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, or more simply as The Disciples....
     and the United Church of Christ
    United Church of Christ

    The United Church of Christ is a mainline Protestant Protestantism Christian denomination principally in the United States, generally considered within the Reformed churches tradition....
    , this body ordained women as early as 1810. Among them were Nancy Gove Cram, who worked as a missionary with the Oneida Indians by 1812, and Abigail Roberts (a lay preacher and missionary), who helped establish many churches in New Jersey. Others included Ann Rexford, Sarah Hedges and Sally Thompson.
  • The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does not ordain women
    Women and Mormonism

    The status of women in Mormonism has been a source of public debate since before the death of Joseph Smith, Jr. in 1844. Various denominations within the Latter Day Saint movement have taken different paths on the subject of women and their role in the church and in society—views range from the full equal status and ordination of...
    .
  • The Church of Scotland
    Church of Scotland

    The Church of Scotland , known informally by its Scots language name, The Kirk, is the national church of Scotland. It is a Presbyterianism church , decisively shaped by the Scottish Reformation....
  • Women were commissioned as deacons from 1935, and allowed to preach from 1949.
  • In 1963 Mary Levison petitioned the General Assembly for ordination.
  • Woman elders were introduced in 1966 and women ministers in 1968.
  • The first female Moderator of the General Assembly was Dr Alison Elliot in 2004.


  • The Cumberland Presbyterian Church
    Cumberland Presbyterian Church

    The Cumberland Presbyterian Church is a small Presbyterianism body spawned by the Great Revival of 1800 . As with any church holding to a presbyterian polity, individual congregations are represented by elders at presbyteries....
    .
    In 1888 Louisa Woosley was licensed to preach. She was ordained in 1889. She wrote Shall Woman Preach
    Shall Woman Preach

    Shall Woman Preach may refer to:* Shall Woman Preach, a 1891 book by Louisa Mariah Layman Woosley, the first ordained US Presbyterian woman . The book is about the question of ordination of women...
    .
  • Community of Christ
    Community of Christ

    Community of Christ, known from 1872 to 2001 as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints , is an American-based, international Christian church established in April 1830 that claims as its mission "to proclaim Jesus Christ and promote communities of joy, hope, love, and peace." The church reports approximately Commun...
    .
    A revelation was approved at the church's 1984 World Conference which called for the ordination of women, and granted women access to all the offices of the priesthood. Although this caused many congregations to break off from the main body of the church, forming dissident congregations and in some cases new denominations, women have been ordained in many nations since then. Currently the Council of Twelve Apostles has four female members. In addition, in 2007, Becky L. Savage became the first female member of the church's First Presidency
    First Presidency

    In the Latter Day Saint movement, the First Presidency was the highest governing body in the Latter Day Saint church established by Joseph Smith, Jr....
    . Following the legislative action of the 1984 World Conference, the church changed the name of one of it's priesthood offices from evangelist-patriarch to evangelist, and it's associated sacrament, the patriarchal blessing, to the evangelist's blessing.
  • The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
    Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

    The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is a mainline Protestantism List of Christian denominations headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Formed in 1988 by the merging of three churches and currently having about 4.70 million baptized members, it is the largest of all the Lutheranism denominations in the Religion in the United States and t...
     ELCA is the largest Lutheran body in the USA. The church bodies that formed the ELCA in 1988 began ordaining women in 1970 when the Lutheran Church in America
    Lutheran Church in America

    The Lutheran Church in America was a U.S. Lutheran church body that existed from 1962 to 1987. It was headquartered in New York City and its publishing house was Fortress Press....
     ordained the Rev Elizabeth Platz
    Elizabeth Platz

    The Rev Elizabeth Alvina Platz is an American Lutheran pastor and was the first woman in North America ordination by a Lutheranism church body. She was ordained in November 1970 into the Lutheran Church in America ....
    . The ordination of women is now non-controversial within the ELCA.
  • The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Latvia
    Evangelical Lutheran Church of Latvia

    The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Latvia is a Lutheranism Protestant church in Latvia. Latvia?s Lutheran heritage dates back to the Protestant Reformation....
     reversed its earlier (1975) decision to ordain women as pastors. Since 1993, under the leadership of Archbishop Janis Vanags, it no longer does so.
  • The Independent Evangelical-Lutheran Church
    Independent Evangelical-Lutheran Church

    The Independent Evangelical-Lutheran Church is a confessional Lutheran Lutheran church body of Germany. It is a member of the :de:Europ?ische Lutherische Konferenz and a member of the International Lutheran Council ....
     in Germany does not ordain women.
  • The Independent Old Catholic Church of America (IOCCA), ordains women.
  • The Lutheran, United
    United

    United can refer to:...
     and Reformed Churches
    in Germany
    Germany

    Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
     (EKD) ordain women and have women as bishops.
  • The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS), which is the second largest Lutheran
    Lutheranism

    Lutheranism is a major branch of Western Christianity that identifies with the teachings of the sixteenth-century Germans Reformer Martin Luther....
     body in the United States
    United States

    The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
    , does not ordain women.
  • The Lutheran state churches in Denmark
    Church of Denmark

    The Danish National Church, Church of Denmark or Evangelical Lutheran Church of Denmark is a state church and is the largest Christian church in Denmark, including Greenland....
    , Sweden
    Church of Sweden

    The Church of Sweden is the largest Ecclesia in Sweden. The Church of Sweden professes the Lutheran branch of Christianity, and is a member of the Porvoo Communion....
    , Finland
    Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland

    The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland is the Lutheranism national church and the largest church of Finland. The church professes the Lutheran branch of Christianity, and is a member of the Porvoo Communion....
    , Norway
    Church of Norway

    The Church of Norway is the state church of Norway. The church confesses the Lutheranism Christianity faith. It has as its foundation the Christian Bible, the Apostles' Creed, Nicene Creed, Athanasian Creed, Luther's Small Catechism and the Augsburg Confession....
     and Iceland
    Church of Iceland

    The National Church of Iceland, or ?j??kirkjan, formally called the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Iceland, is the state church in Iceland....
     ordain women and these Lutheran churches in Europe have women as bishops already. However, while the Church of Sweden was the first Lutheran church to ordain female pastors in 1958, there is still considerable debate in this church as to the legitimacy of the ordination of women into the pastoral office. In fact, in 2003 the Missionsprovinsen
    Missionsprovinsen

    Missionsprovinsen is a second, independent ecclesiastical province within the Church of Sweden and somewhat also inside the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, founded by members of the "orthodox opposition" to the ordination of women to the priesthood and episcopate....
     (Mission Province) was formed within the Church of Sweden to support those who oppose the ordination of women and other developments seen as theologically problematic.
  • The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church
    The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church

    The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church is a mainline Protestantism denomination under the General Conference of Evangelical Protestant Churches ....
     (GCEPC) has ordained women since its inception in the year 2000. Ordination of women is not a controversial issue in the LEPC/GCEPC. Women are ordained/consecrated at all levels including deacon,priest, and bishop in the LEPC/GCEPC.
  • The Moravian Church
  • Many Old Catholic Church
    Old Catholic Church

    The Old Catholic Church is a Christianity denomination originating with mainly German language-speaking groups that split from the Holy See in the 1870s because they disagreed with the solemn declaration of the doctrine of papal infallibility promulgated by the First Vatican Council ....
    es
    within the Utrecht Union
    Utrecht Union

    The Union of Utrecht is a federation of Old Catholic Churches, not in communion with Holy See, that seceded from the Roman Catholic Church over the issue of Papal infallibility....
     in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Netherlands ordain women, but two churches have left the union because they do not do so. Other Old Catholic Churches do not ordain women, but accept this in other Old Catholic Churches of the Union. These are not to be confused with the Roman Catholic Church which does not ordain women (see above).
  • The Pentecostal
    Pentecostalism

    Pentecostalism is a renewalist religious movement within Christianity that places special emphasis on the direct personal experience of God through the baptism of the Holy Spirit....
     church
    in Germany
    Germany

    Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
     allows ordination of women.
  • The Presbyterian Church (USA)
    Presbyterian Church (USA)

    The Presbyterian Church or PC is a Mainline Protestant Christian religious denomination in the United States. It is part of the Reformed family of Protestantism, descending from the branch of the Protestant Reformation over which John Calvin had a strong, early influence....
    .
    In 1893, Edith Livingston Peake was appointed Presbyterian Evangelist by First United Presbyterian of San Francisco. Between 1907 and 1920 five more women became ministers. The Presbyterian Church (USA)
    Presbyterian Church (USA)

    The Presbyterian Church or PC is a Mainline Protestant Christian religious denomination in the United States. It is part of the Reformed family of Protestantism, descending from the branch of the Protestant Reformation over which John Calvin had a strong, early influence....
     began ordaining women as elders in 1930, and as ministers of Word and sacrament in 1956. By 2001, the numbers of men and women holding office were almost equal.
  • The Presbyterian Church in America
    Presbyterian Church in America

    The Presbyterian Church in America is a conservative Protestantism Christian religious denomination, the second largest Presbyterian church body in the United States after the Presbyterian Church ....
     does not ordain women. In 1997, the PCA even broke its fraternal relationship with The Christian Reformed Church over this issue.
  • The Orthodox Presbyterian Church
    Orthodox Presbyterian Church

    The Orthodox Presbyterian Church is a small conservative Christianity Presbyterianism denomination located primarily in the United States. It was founded by conservative members of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America who strongly objected to the pervasive Modernist theology during the 1930s ....
    es
    do not ordain women.
  • The Reformed Churches in Switzerland
    Switzerland

    Switzerland is a landlocked Swiss Alps country of roughly 7.7 million people in Western Europe with an area of 41,285 km?. Switzerland is a federal republic consisting of 26 states called Cantons of Switzerland....
     and in the Netherland
    Netherland

    Netherland is a critically acclaimed novel by Joseph O'Neill . It concerns the life of a Dutchman living in New York in the wake of the 9/11 attacks....
    s ordain women.
  • The Salvation Army
    Salvation Army

    The Salvation Army, an international movement, is an evangelical part of the Christian Church. It has a quasi-military structure and it was founded in 1865 in Great Britian as the East London Christian Mission by William Booth and Catherine Booth....
     ordains women.
  • The Seventh-day Adventist Church
    Seventh-day Adventist Church

    The Seventh-day Adventist Church is a Christianity Religious denomination which is distinguished mainly by its observance of Saturday, the original Days of the week of the Judeo-Christian week, as the Sabbath and Seventh-day Adventism....
     officially does not ordain women. Recent votes at the worldwide General Conference Session
    General Conference Session

    The General Conference Session is the official world meeting of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists of Seventh-day Adventist Church....
    s turned down a proposal to allow ordination of women. There was a strong polarization between nations, with Western countries generally voting in support and other countries generally voting against. A further proposal to allow local choice was also turned down. In practice, there are numerous women working as ministers and in leadership positions. The most influential co-founder of the church, Ellen G. White
    Ellen G. White

    Ellen Gould White , born to Robert and Eunice Harmon, was an United States Christian leader whose ministry was instrumental in founding the Sabbatarian Adventist movement that led to the rise of the Seventh-day Adventist Church....
    , was a woman.
  • The United Church of Canada
    United Church of Canada

    The United Church of Canada, one of the largest Christian churches in Canada, is an evangelical Protestant denomination with strong Methodist and Presbyterian roots....
    .
    Divided during the 1930s by this issue inherited from the churches it brought together, the United Church ordained its first woman minister, Lydia Gruchy, in 1936.
  • The United Church of Christ
    United Church of Christ

    The United Church of Christ is a mainline Protestant Protestantism Christian denomination principally in the United States, generally considered within the Reformed churches tradition....
    .
    Antoinette Brown
    Antoinette Brown

    Antoinette Louisa Brown, later Antoinette Brown Blackwell , was the first woman to be ordained as a minister in the United States. She was a well-versed public speaker on the paramount issues of her time, and distinguished herself from her contemporaries with her use of religious faith in her efforts to expand women's rights....
     was ordained as a minister by a Congregationalist Church in 1853, though this was not recognized by her denomination. She later became a Unitarian
    Unitarianism

    Unitarianism as a theology is the belief in the single personality of God, in contrast to the doctrine of the Trinity . It is the philosophy upon which the modern Unitarian movement was based, and, according to its proponents, is the Early Christianity of Christianity....
    . Women's ordination is now non-controversial in the United Church of Christ.
  • The United Methodist Church
    United Methodist Church

    The United Methodist Church is a Christian Church that understands itself to be a part of the one Holy catholic Church of Jesus Christ and the Communion of Saints....
     
    does ordain women. In 1880, Anna Howard Shaw
    Anna Howard Shaw

    Anna Howard Shaw was a leader of the History of women's suffrage in the United States. She was also a physician and the first ordained female Methodism minister in the United States....
     was ordained by the Methodist Protestant Church
    Methodist Protestant Church

    The Methodist Protestant Church is a regional Church body which was officially formed in 1828 by former members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, retaining John Wesley in doctrine and worship, but adopting Congregational church governance....
    ; Ella Niswonger was ordained in 1889 by the United Brethren Church
    Church of the United Brethren in Christ

    The Church of the United Brethren in Christ is an evangelicalism Christian Christian denomination based in Huntington, Indiana.Overview ...
    . Both denominations later merged into the United Methodist Church. In 1956, the Methodist Church in America granted ordination and full clergy rights to women. Since that time, women have been ordained
    Holy Orders

    Historically, the word "order" designated an established civil body or corporation with a hierarchy, and :wikt:ordinatio meant legal incorporation into an ordo....
     full elders (pastors) in the denomination, and 21 have been elevated to the episcopacy
    Bishop

    A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
    . The first woman elected and consecrated Bishop within the United Methodist Church (and, indeed, the first woman elected bishop of any mainline Christian church) was Marjorie Matthews
    Marjorie Matthews

    Marjorie Swank Matthews was an United States Bishop of the United Methodist Church. She was born 11 July 1916 in Onawa, MI.Marjorie married early and divorced after World War II....
     in 1980. Leontine T. Kelly
    Leontine T. Kelly

    Leontine Turpeau Current Kelly is a retired United States Bishop of the United Methodist Church. She was born 5 March 1920 in Washington, D.C., one of eight children....
    , in 1984, was the first African-American woman elevated to the episcopacy
    Bishop

    A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
     in any mainline denomination. In Germany Rosemarie Wenner
    Rosemarie Wenner

    Rosemarie Wenner is the current Presiding Bishop of the United Methodist Church in Germany.Rosemarie Wenner studied in Reutlingen, Germany. After her ordination she worked in Karlsruhe-Durlach, Hockenheim and Darmstadt/Sprendlingen....
     is since 2005 leading bishop in the United Methodist Church.
  • The United Reformed Church
    United Reformed Church

    The United Reformed Church is a Christian denomination in Great Britain. The URC is the result of a union between the Presbyterian Church of England and the Congregational Church in England and Wales in 1972 and subsequent unions with the Re-formed Association of Churches of Christ in 1981 and the Congregational Union o...
     in the United Kingdom ordains women.
  • The Unitarian Universalist Association
    Unitarian Universalist Association

    Unitarian Universalist Association , in full the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations in North America, is a Liberal religion religious association of Unitarian Universalism congregations formed by the consolidation in 1961 of the American Unitarian Association and the Universalist Church of America....
    .
    The Unitarian Universalist Association has a long history of welcoming women to the ministry, reaching back to 1963 and its predecessor, the Universalist Church. In 1999, it became the first major religion in the US with women outnumbering men in the clergy.
  • The Universalist Church. Olympia Brown
    Olympia Brown

    Olympia Brown was an American Women's suffrage. She is regarded as the first woman to graduate from a theological school, as well as becoming the first full time ordained minister....
     became the first woman to be ordained as a minister in 1863, as an ordained Universalist minister.


Women as bishops


Some Protestant and Anglican churches have allowed women to become bishops:

  • 1907 Church of the Nazarene
    Church of the Nazarene

    The International Church of the Nazarene, often referred to as the Nazarene Church is an international evangelicalism Christian denomination that began in the Wesleyan tradition of the 19th century Holiness movement....
     - (does not have BISHOPS--same office is called District Superintendent) http://www.nazarene.org they have been ordaining women for every office since their inception and more than 1/2 of their ministers were women. Today however, women are in prominent positions but less than 1% of all ordained ministers are women and women are largely relegated to subordinate roles and not given large churches. Mostly they are told to work with children, despite official claims to the contrary.
  • 1929: Mariavite Church
    Mariavite Church

    The Mariavite Church is an independent Christian Church body that emerged from the Roman Catholic Church of Poland at the turn of the 20th century....
     in Poland
    Poland

    Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe. Poland is bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian Enclave and exclave, to the north....
     - abp. Antonina Maria Izabela Wilucka - Kowalska and 11 sisters.
  • 1980: United Methodist Church
    United Methodist Church

    The United Methodist Church is a Christian Church that understands itself to be a part of the one Holy catholic Church of Jesus Christ and the Communion of Saints....
  • 1989: Anglican Church of New Zealand - Penny Jamieson
    Penny Jamieson

    Penelope Ann Bansall 'Penny' Jamieson, New Zealand Order of Merit is a former elected Anglican Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Dunedin, the second woman in the world to hold the position of bishop in the Anglican Communion, and the first to be elected a Diocesan bishop....
  • 1989: Episcopal Church in the United States of America - Barbara Clementine Harris
    Barbara Clementine Harris

    The Rt. Rev. Barbara Clementine Harris was the first woman ordained a bishop in the Anglican Communion....
  • 1992: United Evangelical Lutheran Church of Germany
    United Evangelical Lutheran Church of Germany

    The United Evangelical Lutheran Church of Germany was founded on July 8, 1948 in Eisenach, Germany. Its total membership is estimated at over 10.5 million people....
     - Maria Jepsen
    Maria Jepsen

    Maria Jepsen is the current bishop of Hamburg in the North Elbian Evangelical Church. She became the first Lutheran woman bishop in the Evangelical Church in Germany and worldwide in April 1992, and since then she has been re-elected for a second ten-year period....
  • 1993: Church of Norway
    Church of Norway

    The Church of Norway is the state church of Norway. The church confesses the Lutheranism Christianity faith. It has as its foundation the Christian Bible, the Apostles' Creed, Nicene Creed, Athanasian Creed, Luther's Small Catechism and the Augsburg Confession....
     - Rosemarie Köhn
    Rosemarie Köhn

    Rosemarie K?hn was a bishop in the Diocese of Hamar of the Church of Norway who retired from her post as of November 1, 2006. Bishop K?hn was born to a German father and Norwegian mother and immigrated to Norway in the late 1940s....
  • 1995: Church of Denmark
    Church of Denmark

    The Danish National Church, Church of Denmark or Evangelical Lutheran Church of Denmark is a state church and is the largest Christian church in Denmark, including Greenland....
     - Lise-Lotte Rebel
    Lise-Lotte Rebel

    Lise-Lotte Rebel is a master of theology from the University of Copenhagen .She has since 2. April 1995 been bishop of the Diocese of Helsing?r in the Danish National Church....
  • 1996: Church of Sweden
    Church of Sweden

    The Church of Sweden is the largest Ecclesia in Sweden. The Church of Sweden professes the Lutheran branch of Christianity, and is a member of the Porvoo Communion....
     - Christina Odenberg
    Christina Odenberg

    Christina Odenberg is the retired bishop of the Diocese of Lund in Sweden between 1997 and 2007. Appointed June 5, 1997, she became the first woman bishop in the history of the Church of Sweden....
  • 1997: Anglican Church of Canada
    Anglican Church of Canada

    The Anglican Church of Canada is the sole Canada representative of the Anglican Communion. The official French name is l'?glise Anglicane du Canada....
     - Victoria Matthews
    Victoria Matthews

    Victoria Matthews is Anglican Diocese of Christchurch in the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand, and Polynesia. At her ordination to the episcopate in 1994, she became the first ever female bishop in the Anglican Church of Canada....
  • 1998: Moravian Church in America
  • 1998: Presbyterian Church in Guatemala
  • 1999: Czechoslovak Hussite Church
    Czechoslovak Hussite Church

    The Czechoslovak Hussite Church is a Christian Church which separated from the Roman Catholic Church after World War I in former Czechoslovakia....
     - Jana Šilerová
  • 2000: African Methodist Episcopal Church
    African Methodist Episcopal Church

    The African Methodist Episcopal Church, usually called the "AME Church", is a Christian denomination founded by Rev. Richard Allen in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1816 from several black Methodist congregations in the mid-Atlantic area that wanted independence from white Methodists....
  • 2003: Scottish Episcopal Church
    Scottish Episcopal Church

    The Scottish Episcopal Church is a Christian denomination in Scotland and a member of the Anglican Communion, although it itself has pre-Anglican origins....
  • 2003: The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church
    The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church

    The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church is a mainline Protestantism denomination under the General Conference of Evangelical Protestant Churches ....
     (GCEPC)USA - Nancy K. Drew
  • 2008: Anglican Church of Australia
    Anglican Church of Australia

    The Anglican Church of Australia, a member church of the Anglican Communion, was previously officially known as the Church of England in Australia and Tasmania ....
     - Kay Goldsworthy
    Kay Goldsworthy

    Kay Goldsworthy is a bishop within the Anglican Diocese of Perth, Western Australia. In April 2008 she was chosen to become an assistant bishop in the diocese by the Archbishop of Perth, Roger Herft....
  • 2008: African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church
    African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church

    The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, or AME Zion Church, was officially formed in 1821, but operated for a number years before then....
  • Others: Protestant Churches in German Lutheran, Reformed and United churches (EKD), Protestant Church of the Netherlands, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada
    Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada

    The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada is Canada's largest Lutheran denomination, with 182,077 baptized members in 624 congregations. It is a member of the Lutheran World Federation, the Canadian Council of Churches, and the World Council of Churches....
    .


Islam


Although Muslims do not formally ordain religious leaders, the imam
Imam

File:Medaillon chiite.jpgAn imam is an Islamic leadership position. Often the leader of a mosque and the community. Similar to spiritual leaders, the imam is the one who leads the prayer during Islamic gatherings....
 serves as a spiritual leader and religious authority. There is a current controversy among Muslims on the circumstances in which women may act as imams—that is, lead a congregation in salat (prayer). Three of the four Sunni schools, as well as many Shia, agree that a woman may lead a congregation consisting of women alone in prayer, although the Maliki
Maliki

The Maliki madhhab is one of the four madhab of Fiqh or religious law within Sunni Islam. It is the third-largest of the four schools, followed by approximately 15% of Muslims, mostly in North Africa and West Africa....
 school does not allow this. According to all currently existing traditional schools of Islam
Islam

Islam is a Monotheism, Abrahamic religion originating with the teachings of the Prophets of Islam Muhammad, a 7th century Arab religious and political figure....
, a woman cannot lead a mixed gender congregation in salat (prayer). Some schools make exceptions for Tarawih
Tarawih

Tarawih is an Arabic language phrase referring to extra prayers given by Sunni Muslims at night in the Islam month of Ramadan ....
 (optional Ramadan
Ramadan

Rama?an is an Islamic religious observance that takes place during the ninth month of the Islamic calendar; the month in which the Qur'an was revealed to the Prophet of Islam Muhammad....
 prayers) or for a congregation consisting only of close relatives. Certain medieval scholars—including Al-Tabari (838–932), Abu Thawr (764–854), Al-Muzani (791–878), and Ibn Arabi
Ibn Arabi

Ibn Arabi was an Arab Sufism Muslim mysticism and philosopher. His full name was Abu abd-Allah Muhammad ibn-Ali ibn Muhammad ibn al-`Arabi al-Hatimi al-TTaa'i ....
 (1165–1240)—considered the practice permissible at least for optional (nafila) prayers; however, their views are not accepted by any major surviving group.

Some Muslims in recent years have reactivated the debate, arguing that the spirit of the Qur'an
Qur'an

The Qur?an is the central religious text of Islam. Muslims believe the Qur?an to be the book of divine guidance and direction for mankind, and consider the original Arabic text to be the final revelation of God....
 and the letter of a disputed hadith
Hadith

Hadith are oral traditions relating to the words and deeds of the Prophets of Islam Muhammad. Hadith collections are regarded by all traditional madhab as important tools for determining the Muslim way of life, the sunnah....
 indicate that women should be able to lead mixed congregations as well as single-sex ones, and that the prohibition of this developed as a result of sexism
Sexism

Sexism, a term coined in the late 20th century, refers to the belief or attitude that one gender or sex is inferior to or less valuable than the other....
 in the medieval environment, not as a part of true Islam.

Judaism


Jewish tradition and law does not presume that women have more or less of an aptitude or moral standing required of rabbi
Rabbi

Rabbi , in Judaism, means a religious ?teacher?, or more literally, ?my great one?, when addressing any master. The word rabbi derives from the Hebrew root word , rav, which in biblical Hebrew means ?great?, used in many senses, including the sense of a ?master? and apprentice, whence someone who is a distinguished ?teacher?....
s. However, it had been the longstanding practice that only men become rabbis. This practice continues to this day within the Orthodox
Orthodox Judaism

Orthodox Judaism is a Jewish denominations of Judaism that adheres to a relatively strict constructionist and application of the laws and ethics first canonized in the Talmudic texts and as subsequently developed and applied by the later authorities known as the Gaonim, Rishonim, and Acharonim....
 and Hasidic communities but has been revised within non-Orthodox organizations. Reform Judaism
Reform Judaism

Reform Judaism refers to the spectrum of beliefs, practices and organizational infrastructure associated with Reform Judaism in Reform Judaism and in Reform Judaism ....
 created its first woman rabbi in 1972, Reconstructionist Judaism
Reconstructionist Judaism

Reconstructionist Judaism is a modern American-based Judaism Jewish denominations based on the ideas of the late Mordecai Kaplan . The movement views Judaism as a progressively evolving civilization....
 in 1974, and Conservative Judaism
Conservative Judaism

Conservative Judaism is a modern Jewish denominations of Judaism that arose out of intellectual currents in Germany in the mid-19th century and took institutional form in the United States in the early 1900s....
 in 1985, and women in these movements are routinely granted semicha
Semicha

Semicha , also semichut , or semicha lerabbanut is derived from a Hebrew word which means to "rely on" or "to be authorized". It generally refers to the ordination of a rabbi within Judaism....
 on an equal basis with men.

The issue of allowing women to become rabbis is not under active debate within the Orthodox community, though there is widespread agreement that women may often be consulted on matters of Jewish religious law. There are reports that a small number of Orthodox yeshiva
Yeshiva

Yeshiva or yeshivah , or metivta or mesivta ) also frequently referred to as a Beth midrash, Talmudical Academy, Rabbinical Academy or Rabbinical School is an institution unique to classical Judaism for Torah study, the study of Talmud, Rabbinic literature and History of responsa....
s have unofficially granted semicha to women, but the prevailing consensus among Orthodox leaders (as well as a small number of Conservative Jewish communities) is that it is not appropriate for women to become rabbis.

The idea that women could eventually be ordained as rabbis sparks widespread opposition among the Orthodox rabbinate. Norman Lamm, one of the leaders of Modern Orthodoxy and Rosh Yeshiva of the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary
Seminary

A seminary, theological college, or divinity school is a specialized and often live-in higher education institution for the purpose of instructing students in philosophy, theology, spirituality and the religious life, usually in order to prepare them to become members of the clergy....
, totally opposes giving semicha to women. "It shakes the boundaries of tradition, and I would never allow it." (Helmreich, 1997) Writing in an article in the Jewish Observer, Moshe Y'chiail Friedman states that Orthodox Judaism prohibits women from being given semicha and serving as rabbis. He holds that the trend towards this goal is driven by sociology
Sociology

Sociology is a branch of the social sciences that uses systematic methods of Empiricism and critical theory to develop and refine a body of knowledge about human social structure and activity, sometimes with the goal of applying such knowledge to the pursuit of social welfare....
, and not halakha
Halakha

Halakha ? also Hebrew transliteration Halocho and Halacha ? is the collective body of Judaism religious law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions....
.

Shinto


While the priesthood was traditionally male in Shinto, ordination of women as Shinto priests has arisen after the abolition of State Shinto
State Shinto

has been called the state religion of the Empire of Japan. The term was not used until after World War II and in a broad sense is used to classify those Shinto ideals, rituals and institutions created by the government to promote the emperor worship and the uniqueness of Japan ....
 in the aftermath of World War II.

Tenrikyo


Tenrikyo
Tenrikyo

Tenrikyo , is a panentheism Shinshukyo. Tenrikyo is estimated to have about 2 million followers world-wide with 1.5 million of those in Japan....
 was founded by a woman, Oyasama.

Some beginning dates for ordination of women


A partial list with the approximate dates of either the approval of female ordination in principle or the ordination of their first women clergy by Christian and Jewish faith groups appears below:

  • Early 1800s: A fundamental belief of the Society of Friends (Quakers) has always been the existence of an element of God's spirit in every human soul. Thus all persons are considered to have inherent and equal worth, independent of their gender. This led naturally to an acceptance of female ministers. In 1660, Margaret Fell (1614–1702) published a famous pamphlet to justify equal roles for men and women in the denomination. It was titled: "Women's Speaking Justified, Proved and Allowed of by the Scriptures, All Such as Speak by the Spirit and Power of the Lord Jesus And How Women Were the First That Preached the Tidings of the Resurrection of Jesus, and Were Sent by Christ's Own Command Before He Ascended to the Father (John 20:17). In the U.S., in contrast with almost every other organized religion, the Society of Friends (Quakers) has allowed women to serve as ministers since the early 1800s.
  • 1853: Antoinette Brown was ordained by the Congregationalist Church. However, her ordination was not recognized by the denomination. She quit the church and later became a Unitarian. The Congregationalists later merged with others to create the United Church of Christ.
  • 1861: Mary A. Will was the first woman ordained in the Wesleyan Methodist Connection by the Illinois Conference. The Wesleyan Methodist Connection eventually became The Wesleyan Church.
  • 1863: Olympia Brown was ordained by the Universalist denomination in 1863, in spite of a last-moment case of cold feet by her seminary which feared adverse publicity. After a decade and a half of service as a full-time minister, she became a part-time minister in order to devote more time to the fight for women's rights and universal suffrage. In 1961, the Universalists and Unitarians joined to form the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA). The UUA became the first large denomination to have a majority of female ministers.
  • 1865:' Salvation Army is founded, which ordained both men and women. However, there were initially rules that prohibited a woman from marrying a man who had a lower rank.
  • 1879' Church of Christ, Scientist founded by a woman, Mary Baker Eddy
    Mary Baker Eddy

    Mary Baker Eddy was the founder of the Christian Science movement. Deeply religious, she advocated Christian Science as a spiritual practical solution to health and moral issues....
    .
  • 1880: Anna Howard Shaw was the first woman ordained in the Methodist Protestant Church, which later merged with other denominations to form the United Methodist Church.
  • 1888: Fidelia Gillette may have been the first ordained woman in Canada. She served the Universalist congregation in Bloomfield, Ontario, during 1888 and 1889. She was presumably ordained in 1888 or earlier. ((or))
  • 1889: The Nolin Presbytery of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church ordained Louisa Woosley.
  • 1889: Ella Niswonger was the first woman ordained in the United Brethren church, which later merged with other denominations to form the United Methodist Church.
  • 1892: Anna Hanscombe is believed to be the first woman ordained by the parent bodies which formed the Church of the Nazarene in 1919.
  • 1909: The Church of God (Cleveland TN) began ordaining women in 1909.
  • 1911: Ann Allebach was the first Mennonite woman to be ordained. This occurred at the First Mennonite Church of Philadelphia.
  • 1914:' Assemblies of God was founded and ordained its first woman clergy
  • 1917: The Congregationalist Church (England and Wales) ordained their first woman, Constance Coltman (nee Todd) at the King's Weigh House, London. Its successor is the United Reformed Church (a union of the Congregational Church in England and Wales and the Presbyterian Church of England in 1972. Since then two more denominations have joined the union: The Reformed Churches of Christ (1982) and the Congregational Church of Scotland (2000). All of these denominations ordained women at the time of Union and continue to do so. The first woman to be appointed General Secretary of the United Reformed Church was Roberta Rominger in 2008.
  • 1920's: Some Baptist denominations start ordaining women.
  • 1922: The Jewish Reform movement's Central Conference of American Rabbis stated that "Woman cannot justly be denied the privilege of ordination." However, Reform Judaism takes a few more decades to actually ordain women.
  • 1922: The Annual Conference of the Church of the Brethren granted women the right to be licensed into the ministry, but not to be ordained with the same status as men.
  • 1935: Regina Jonas was ordained privately by a German rabbi.
  • 1936: United Church of Canada starts ordaining women.
  • 1944: Anglican communion, Hong Kong. Florence Li Tim Oi was ordained on an emergency basis.
  • 1947: Czechoslovak Hussite Church starts ordaining women.
  • 1948: Evangelical Lutheran Church of Denmark starts ordaining women.
  • 1949: Old Catholic Church (in the U.S.) starts ordaining women.
  • 1956: A predecessor church of the Presbyterian Church (USA) ordained its first woman minister.


  • 1956: Maud K. Jensen was the first woman to receive full clergy rights and conference membership in the Methodist Church.
  • 1958: Women ministers in the Church of the Brethren were given full ordination with the same status as men.
  • 1960: Evangelical Lutheran Church in Sweden started ordaining women.
  • 1967: Presbyterian Church in Canada started ordaining women.
  • 1971:' Anglican communion, Hong Kong. Joyce Bennett and Jane Hwang were the first regularly ordained priests.
  • 1972: Reform Judaism starts ordaining women.
  • 1972: Swedenborgian Church starts ordaining women.
  • 1972: Sally Priesand became the first woman rabbi to be ordained by a theological seminary. She was ordained in the Reform tradition.
  • 1970's:' Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
  • 1974:' Methodist Church in the United Kingdom starts ordaining women.
  • 1974: Sandy Eisenberg Sasso became the first woman rabbi to be ordained within the Jewish Reconstructionist movement.
  • 1976:' Episcopal Church (11 women were ordained in Philadelphia before church laws were changed to permit ordination)
  • 1976:' Anglican Church in Canada ordained six female priests.
  • 1976: The Rev. Pamela McGee was the first female ordained to the Lutheran ministry in Canada.
  • 1977: Anglican Church of New Zealand ordained five female priests.
  • 1979: The Reformed Church in America. Women had been admitted to the offices of deacon and elder in 1972.
  • 1983: An Anglican woman was ordained in Kenya
  • 1983: Three Anglican women were ordained in Uganda.
  • 1984: Community of Christ
    Community of Christ

    Community of Christ, known from 1872 to 2001 as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints , is an American-based, international Christian church established in April 1830 that claims as its mission "to proclaim Jesus Christ and promote communities of joy, hope, love, and peace." The church reports approximately Commun...
     (known at the time as the
    Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) authorized the ordination of women. This is the second largest Latter Day Saint
    Latter Day Saint

    A Latter Day Saint is an adherent of the Latter Day Saint movement, a group of denominations tracing their heritage to the teachings of Joseph Smith, Jr....
     denomination.
  • 1985: According to the New York Times for 1985-FEB-14: "After years of debate, the worldwide governing body of Conservative Judaism has decided to admit women as rabbis. The group, the Rabbinical Assembly, plans to announce its decision at a news conference...at the Jewish Theological Seminary..." Amy Eilberg became the first female rabbi.
  • 1985: The first women deacons were ordained by the Scottish Episcopal Church.
  • 1988: Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland starts ordaining women.
  • 1988: Episcopal Church chooses Barbara Harris as first female bishop.
  • 1990: Anglican women are ordained in Ireland.
  • 1992: The Church of England itself starts ordaining women.
  • 1992: Anglican Church of South Africa starts ordaining women.
  • 1994: The first women priests were ordained by the Scottish Episcopal Church.
  • 1995:' Seventh-day Adventists. Sligo Seventh-day Adventist Church in Takoma Park, MD ordained three women in violation of the denomination's rules.
  • 1995: The Christian Reformed Church voted to allow women ministers, elders, and evangelists. In 1998-NOV, the North American Presbyterian and Reformed Council (NAPARC) suspended the CRC's membership because of this decision.
  • 1998: General Assembly of the Nippon Sei Ko Kai
    Nippon Sei Ko Kai

    The Nippon Sei Ko Kai , abbreviated as NSKK, or the Anglican Church in Japan, is the religious body in the Province of Japan of the Anglican Communion....
     (Anglican Church in Japan) starts ordaining women.
  • 1998: Guatemalan Presbyterian Synod starts ordaining women.
  • 1998: Old Catholic Church in the Netherlands starts ordaining women.
  • 1998: Some Orthodox Jewish congregations started to employ female "congregational interns." Although these 'interns' do not lead worship services, they perform some tasks usually reserved for rabbis, such as preaching, teaching, and consulting on Jewish legal matters.
  • 1999:' Independent Presbyterian Church of Brazil (ordination as either clergy or elders)
  • 2000: The Baptist Union of Scotland voted to allow their churches to either allow or prohibit the ordination of women.


  • 2000: The Mombasa diocese of the Anglican Church of Kenya.


  • 2000: The Church of Pakistan ordained its first women deacons.
  • 2005 The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church
    The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church

    The Lutheran Evangelical Protestant Church is a mainline Protestantism denomination under the General Conference of Evangelical Protestant Churches ....
    ,(LEPC)(GCEPC) in the USA elects Nancy Kinard Drew first female Presiding Bishop.
  • 2006: The Episcopal Church elects Katharine Jefferts Schori
    Katharine Jefferts Schori

    Katharine Jefferts Schori is the Presiding Bishop#Episcopal Church in the United States of America of Episcopal Church in the United States of America....
     first woman Presiding Bishop, or Primate.


See also

  • Women in the Bible
  • Christian views of women
    Christian views of women

    Frank Stagg, Ph.D., was a noted Baptist theologian, seminary professor, author, and pastor over a 50-year ministry career. He taught New Testament interpretation and Greek at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary from 1945 until 1964 and at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky from 1964 until 1978....
  • Deaconess
    Deaconess

    Deaconess comes from a Greek word diakonos . This Greek word means a servant or helper and occurs frequently in the Christian New Testament of the Bible and is sometimes applied to Christ himself....
  • Episcopa Theodora
    Episcopa Theodora

    Episcopa Theodora is the inscription on a 9th century mosaic in the St. Zeno Chapel of the Santa Prassede in Rome. Historically, Theodora was the mother of Pope Paschal I, and he dedicated the chapel to her....
  • Feminist theology
    Feminist theology

    Feminist theology is a movement found in several religions, including Christianity, Judaism, and New Thought, to reconsider the traditions, practices, scriptures, and theologies of those religions from a feminism perspective....
  • List of women priests
    List of women priests

    List of women priests: In many denominations of Christianity the ordination of women is a new phenomenon. This is true enough that those so ordained gain some attention....
  • Mariavite Church
    Mariavite Church

    The Mariavite Church is an independent Christian Church body that emerged from the Roman Catholic Church of Poland at the turn of the 20th century....
  • Women as theological figures
    Women as theological figures

    Women as theological figures, have played a significant role in the development of various religions and religious hierarchy....


Further reading


  • Canon Law Society of America. The Canonical Implications of Ordaining Women to the Permanent Diaconate, 1995. ISBN 0–943616–71–9.
  • Davies, J. G. "Deacons, Deaconesses, and Minor Orders in the Patristic Period," Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 1963, v. 14, p. 1–23.
  • Elsen, Ute E. Women Officeholders in Early Christianity: Epigraphical and Literary Studies, Liturgical Press, 2000. ISBN 0–8146–5950–0.
  • Grudem, Wayne. Evangelical Feminism and Biblical Truth: An Analysis of Over 100 Disputed Questions, Multnomah Press, 2004. 1-57673-840-X.
  • Gryson, Roger. The Ministry of Women in the Early Church, Liturgical Press, 1976. ISBN 0–8146–0899-X. Translation of: Le ministère des femmes dans l'Église ancienne, J. Duculot, 1972.
  • LaPorte, Jean. The Role of Women in Early Christianity, Edwin Mellen Press, 1982. ISBN 0–88946–549–5.
  • Madigan, Kevin, and Carolyn Osiek. Ordained Women in the Early Church: A Documentary History, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005. ISBN 0–8018–7932–9.
  • Martimort, Aimé Georges, Deaconesses: An Historical Study, Ignatius Press, 1986, ISBN 0–89870–114–7. Translation of: Les Diaconesses: Essai Historique, Edizioni Liturgiche, 1982.
  • Miller, Patricia Cox. Women in Early Christianity: Translations from Greek Texts, Catholic University of America Press, 2005. ISBN 0–8132–1417–3.
  • Wijngaards, John. Women Deacons in the Early Church: Historical Texts and Contemporary Debates, Herder & Herder, 2002, 2006. ISBN 0–8245–2393–8.
  • Zagano, Phyllis. Holy Saturday: An Argument for the Restoration of the Female Diaconate in the Catholic Church, Herder & Herder, 2000. ISBN 978–0824518325.
  • Zagano, Phyllis. "Catholic Women Deacons: Present Tense," Worship 77:5 (September 2003) 386–408.


External links

  • —including many Christian and Jewish Faith Groups. — 'For' ordination of women.
  • Photo blog about women bishops in Christian churches.
  • Sarah Sentilles
    Sarah Sentilles

    Sarah Sentilles is a doctoral candidate in theology at Harvard and author of Taught by America: A Story of Struggle and Hope in Compton and A Church of Her Own: What Happens When a Woman Takes the Pulpit ....
      - a doctoral candidate in theology at Harvard and author of
    A Church of Her Own: What Happens When a Woman Takes the Pulpit (Harcourt, 2008) which addresses the struggles and triumphs of women who respond to the call to ministry. See also


Buddhist

  • —Buddhism
  • —Christian Science monitor


Christian


Non-Denominational For


Evangelical—For
  • —Egalitarian Evangelical perspective on gender issues
  • by James H. Boyd


Evangelical—Against
  • —Complementarian Evangelical perspective on gender issues
  • by Wayne Grudem of CBMW
  • (See also Presbyterian churches—Against, below)


Presbyterian churches—For


Presbyterian churches—Against


Roman Catholic and Anglo-Catholic—For
  • Website advocating the ordination of women to the Roman Catholic priesthood. This website sets out both sides of the argument and provides all Vatican documents about women's ordination.
  • type="text/javascript">DisplayLink("http://www.womenpriests.org/circles/", "(*)") is an international discussion board about the case for women's ordination
  • —America, Vol. 192 No. 4, February 7, 2005.


Roman Catholic and Anglo-Catholic—Against
  • —Anglo-Catholic Anglicans in Opposition to Women in the Priesthood
  • —Article on the ordination of women by C. S. Lewis


Roman Catholic and Anglo-Catholic—Balanced
  • from Zenit News Agency
    Zenit News Agency

    ZENIT is a Non-profit organization news agency that reports on the Roman Catholic Church and issues important to it from the perspective of Church doctrine....
    .
  • type="text/javascript">DisplayLink("http://womenpriests.org", "(*)")


Eastern Orthodox—For
  • —St. Nina Quarterly, v. 1, n. 1.
  • —St. Nina Quarterly, v. 1, n. 3.
  • —St. Nina Quarterly, v. 3, n. 2.