Glass ceiling still strong in Church

By Anna Woelfel

I never questioned women's roles in the church until my family went to the Berkeley Newman Center one Sunday. During the mass, a woman gave the homily. I was old enough to realize that this never happened in my home parish, and I began to question why I only ever saw men talk about the Gospel.

My family soon informed me that women were not allowed to proclaim the Gospel or give the homily. As a child, my first response was, "Why not?"

No one in my family could answer.

Now, being much more knowledgeable than my eight-year old self, I realize that for centuries women have been excluded from the priesthood and the hierarchy of the Church. In 2010, the Church shows no signs of uprooting this cornerstone of Church tradition.

This exclusion of women may have been the norm hundreds of years ago, or even 50 years ago, but today, women consider themselves to be equal to men in all aspects.

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, women make up roughly half of the workforce, and hold slightly more than half of management positions.

Outside of the Church, women are shattering the glass ceiling, but within Catholicism, women have made only limited progress in 2,000 years.

Today the Vatican has a website, a Facebook account, a Youtube channel, and an iPhone app, all in hopes of appearing to keep up with modern times. While the Vatican may be trying to keep up with technology, they are making only limited efforts to reform the patriarchal hierarchy of the Church.

The very idea of allowing women to serve God and the Church in the priesthood is out of the question. Women now consider themselves equal, but the Church, the Vatican and the Pope refuse to accept this.

Church officials are simply widening a gap between themselves and women. The further women progress and the longer the Catholic Church ignores this, the more members of the Church they will alienate.

"Catechism of the Catholic Church," a book that contains all of the Church's beliefs, states that the organization does not have the authority from God to ordain women as priests. The book "St. Paul Family Catechism" also states that the Church cannot go against "the constant practice and tradition of the Church."

The emphasis that the Vatican places on tradition implies that women have never played a prominent part in Church history. This, however, is untrue.

Jesus surrounded himself by women; he accepted all, whether they were sinners or the faithful. Women were the first witnesses of the resurrection and many parables focus on women. Most powerful is the depiction of the Virgin Mary. Is she not a prominent part of Catholic history?

Of course, tradition is not always correct. Slaves were a common part of life for most of history, yet today everyone recognizes slavery as being a holistically immoral act. The Church needs to realize that being a tradition does not automatically make something right.

In fact, the very purpose of the Second Vatican Council was to allow the Church to catch up to modern times.

Throughout a three-year period, the Vatican met to look at the Church and its relation to the modern world.

As a result of the Second Vatican Council, the Church changed the tradition of saying the mass in Latin and the direction the priest faces during mass. Girls were also allowed to be altar servers and women included as lectors and Eucharistic ministers.

Allowing women to become priests would not be the first change in the history of the Church. There is precedence for change; the Church is just refusing to change.

This fundamental issue within the Church is visible even at Santa Clara.

The mass at Parents' Weekend, concelebrated by Engh, S.J. and the entire Jesuit community, was beautiful. All of the lectors, Eucharistic ministers and the majority of the choir members were women, but seated on all of the chairs near the altar were only the male priests.

I overheard someone near me say, "What's wrong with this picture?"

Anna Woelfel is a freshman communication major.