The Rev. Dr. Gisela Forster (right) and the Rev. Christine Mayr-Lumetzberger (left) thank participants after their ordinations to the Roman Catholic priesthood.

Seven Roman Catholic Women Are Ordained in Europe
by Georgia E. Fuller

Editor's Note: On June 23, 2002, the Vatican announced the excommunication of the seven women whose ordination is discussed in this article.

Four Episcopal women deacons entered the priesthood in an irregular ordination not permitted by the official Church on September 7, 1975. Decades later, on June 29, 2002, seven Roman Catholic women deacons entered their priesthood irregularly. The 1975 service was at St. Stephen and the Incarnation Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C. The 2002 service was on a cruise ship in the Danube River. On both occasions the weather was beautiful, but tension filled the air. I was present at both, and many words of the 1975 homily spoke to 2002–especially hope that, like St. Paul, we were being "fools for Christ" and not just plain fools.

Some participants and attendees would lose their jobs if identified. Later news reports (July 5) said that because of her ordination, the Franciscans of Hallein had expelled Roitinger after 48 years in their order.

An ordination cruise was a stroke of political and poetic genius! Security was a snap, because there was one entrance from the dock, with company personnel at both ends of the ramp. I had the "inside security" job of repeating the German for "No photos, please." Some participants and attendees would lose their jobs if identified. Later news reports (July 5) said that because of her ordination, the Franciscans of Hallein had expelled Roitinger after 48 years in their order.

Poetically, our ship was the "Ark of the New Covenant." We left Passau, Germany just before ten in the morning. The liturgy began about 10:45am with "Lobet de Herren" ("Praise to the Lord"). We sailed, prayed and read scripture, including John 21 ("feed my sheep"). The candidates were presented, examined and accepted. Then Braschi laid hands on each woman and ordained her. Behind him, in support and solidarity, came Bishop Ferdinand (Rafael) Regelsberger, two Roman Catholic priests, and ordained women from the Old Catholic, Lutheran and Dutch Reformed churches.

Suddenly our Ark began to shudder as the engines changed gear. Horrible noises echoed, as if the hull were confronting an immovable object. But the liturgy did not stop, the ship did not sink and lightning did not strike from the sky.

Contemporary Roman Catholic women have served as priests, beginning with Ludmila Javorova, ordained secretly in 1970 by Bishop Felix Davidek. Rome had ordered Davidek’s consecration to keep its church alive in communist Czechoslovakia. He soon discovered the importance of also ordaining married men and women. Since the police thought only single men could be priests, married men and woman could travel more freely, organizing and presiding at a network of secret house churches. Javorova, the first of six women ordained to the priesthood and six to the diaconate, risked her life as vicar-general of this underground church for twenty years. But when the Cold War ended, the Vatican declared the deceased Davidek insane and refused to recognize her holy orders. (Out of the Depths by Miriam Therese Winter.)

Like these foremothers, the "Danube 7" had been ordained deacons in secret last Palm Sunday by a bishop known only as Aloisio, who was assisted by Braschi. In May, Braschi consecrated Regelsberger, an Austrian, so the women would not be without a bishop in case he and Aloisio could not return.

Regelsberger had served for 24 years as a Benedictine priest, entering the seminary after high school. From 1970-73 he worked in Brazil, where he discovered a new world and a new vision of church. He returned home and began post-graduate studies in psychology and psychiatry. After a few years, his superior ordered Regelsberger to stop studying. Rather than end his studies, he left the community. He later married, but the union did not last.

Many who know Regelsberger still see him as a monk and a priest. Villagers bring him wounded birds to heal. A priest in Linz asks him to say mass at his parish. Life outside the monastery has taught Regelsberger that he had benefited greatly from an isolated, ecclesial world of male privilege. He has dedicated his future to active metanoia (repentance) in the service of women and the Church he loves.

"Since it is clear that employed Roman Catholic bishops are not likely to accompany women as they seek honor, respect, and ways to serve God and God’s people," explained Regelsberger, "I’ve decided that we who are not Church employed should accompany them. This is just and in accordance with the will of Jesus Christ. I also believe that ordained women will re-ensoul the pastoral work of the Church."

Regelsberger lives in an intentional community, patterned after the French worker-priest movement of the 1960s, with Christine Mayr-Lumetzberger and her husband Michael Mayr, who writes and publishes an independent Catholic newspaper. They have built a small chapel where the both the diaconal ordinations and Regelsberger’s consecration occurred.

Mayr-Lumetzberger began her public work for ordination with the 1995 "Referendum of the People of God," which included a call for women’s equality. This petition gained over 500,000 signatures from among 8,000,000 Austrians. The next year, when she represented the Austrian renewal movement in nearby Gmunden at the Women’s Synod organized by local feminist theologians, she heard a public articulation of what she had always felt about her vocation.

"We speak of priestly service, not priestly office," said Mayr-Lumetzberger, who had been a hospital chaplain for ten years. "We advocate a servant priesthood and exercising power with people, not power over them."

In 1999, after years of trying to dialogue with the hierarchy, Mayr-Lumetzberger helped organize a three-year program of seminary training for women in Germany and Austria. Each of the Danube 7 had some participation in this program. Mayr-Lumetzberger also began a quiet witness at the cathedral each June 29, the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, the traditional Austrian day for male ordinations. This June 29 the Linz Cathedral was empty, because there were no male candidates for ordination, only the seven women aboard the Ark.

On July 10, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) issued a monitum (canonical warning) that the women would be excommunicated unless they say their ordinations were invalid and repent by July 22, the Feast of St. Mary Magdalene. Where would Christianity be if Mary had not been obedient to what she received on Easter morning? As Mayr-Lumetzberger acknowledges, their ordinations are illegal but a fact–a reality that must be lived into as the future Church unfolds. "Fundamentally," she asserted, "We are obedient to God."

On July 10, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger issued a monitum (canonical warning) that the women would be excommunicated unless they say their ordinations were invalid and repent by July 22, the Feast of St. Mary Magdalene.

"We understand that we are the reviled pioneers, but my consolation is that we are serving the future of a better church," summarized Regelsberger. Referring to the scandals and criminal pedophilia rocking both the American and Austrian churches he added, "I do not accept excommunication from an institution that protects criminals."

Georgia E. Fuller, Ph.D. is a writer who has contributed stories on feminism and the Roman Catholic Church to The Witness and other publications for more than 25 years. She is a Quaker, but also a graduate of Virginia Theological Seminary (an Episcopal seminary) in 2000. Georgia serves on the board of directors of the Women's Ordination Conference (WOC), a Roman Catholic organization. She may be reached by email at georgiafuller@msn.com