Intervju med en av de kvinnliga prästerna

Några utdrag ur en intervju med Barbara Zeman, en av de kvinnor som vigdes i Chicago nyligen.

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ZEMAN: I have had a call to minister to minister to God's people and to be a minister, a priest, most of my life.

/.../

Midway through the ceremony, Zeman and the other women are called up to the altar and lie face down in prostration before the cross. Zeman says that's when she felt a holy presence.

ZEMAN: There was a moment that just felt like light and spirit and delight and joy was entering the room and it stayed for the rest of the ordination.

/.../

There are several organizations that ordain women as priests. But the ordination of women by the Roman Catholic Womenpriests has stirred up the most controversy because they claim full apostolic succession. Apostolic succession refers to the connection of every ordained priest in the Roman Catholic Church back to the first disciples of Jesus. Because the women who started this movement were ordained by a male bishop, they claim that succession. Newly ordained priest Barbara Zeman says this is the reason she was drawn to the Roman Catholic Women Priests.

ZEMAN: We really are coming down in the tradition of the Roman Catholic Church. We are not a movement outside of the Church. We are inside the Church.

The ongoing ordination of women prompted the Vatican to release a decree in May. It said that anyone who attempted to ordain a women, and any woman who attempted ordination is automatically excommunicated. A spokesperson for the Chicago Archdiocese echoes that decree stating, "Anyone who simulates the sacrament of holy orders is automatically excommunicated." But Zeman doesn't see it that way.

ZEMAN: I don't see myself as excommunicated because I did not excommunicate myself. I stepped forward, following my conscience and following Jesus.

Här finns hela intervjun.