There is a technical error in the OP, regardless of how one feels about having female priests and ministers, and that is in antiquity, there existed among Holy Orders one form of ordination specifically for women, that of the Deaconess, who was a minister of the font in the same manner the Deacon is a minister of the chalice. Specifically it was the role of the Deaconess to go down into the water with female energumens (people who had completed their catechumenate and were ready for Baptism, who in the Orthodox liturgies are prayed for with a separate liturgy during Holy Week, and then baptized during the Paschal Vigils, or Vesperal Divine Liturgy, on Holy Saturday, while the fourteen scripture lessons read in the Byzantine Rite, or the similiar set of twelve read in the Roman Rite pre-1955, when Pope Pius XII made changes I don’t understand or agree with, were read (indeed, my understanding is that in antiquity, even more Old Testament lessons, all of which tend to be proof-texts concerning the Crucifixion and Resurrection, would be read, depending on how many people needed to be baptized). This office was particularly important for the sake of propriety because baptismal gowns were not always worn in the early church, indeed I am not sure if they originally existed.
The ancient canons concerning the female Diaconate specifies that deaconesses were to be unmarried women or widows, aged at least forty, later raised to sixty, which is interesting anthropologically compared to the minimum age of presbyters, which was historically thirty, in that it suggests that the gap between the life expectency differential between men and women used to be larger.
My view is that at a minimum, all churches ought to have this office, particularly those that baptize infants via full immersion, as it would greatly help, particularly in the case of younger priests and also monastic priests who have no practical experience handling infants, who are delicate (fortunately Orthodox seminaries do provide training on this). Also given the increased scrutiny in which the church is operating, I, as a male presbyter, would prefer to have a female deaconess assist in this regard. I also would propose that presbyteras (the wives of Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox priests) be trained in how to serve as deaconesses).
Furthermore, I really hope no one will dare to attack the credentials or legitimacy of the ministry of
@Paidiske , since she is not a Roman Catholic and her priesthood does not pose any kind of threat to the Roman Catholic Church or its doctrinal integrity. Indeed it should be noted that in Anglican churches that follow the 39 articles, Ordination is not even regarded as a sacrament.
When I first joined the forum, there were a number of threads in which female clergy were attacked and people criticized
@Paidiske and her vocation, and I really have to object to that. Recently, I have met a superb woman who is in her seventies who is ordained with the PCUSA and serves as a chaplain with the county Fire Department. Her ministry consists of assisting families where the Fire Department, which in Southern California and most of the Western US, is the first responder to medical emergencies, has just determined their loved one to be deceased and beyond their ability to help. In some cases this is because attempts at resuscitation have been unsuccessful, and in other cases it is because the loved one has been found deceased. This ministry would be challenging enough, but she also runs a homeless shelter and is assisting me with plans for a shelter for young men ejected from, and women who want to flee, the sinsister FLDS cult in Colorado Springs, AZ (previously they also controlled the city on the Utah side of Short Creek, but after Warren Jeffs was convicted in Texas of a horrible crime of paedophilia, the State of Utah seized all of their land).
This cult engages in two gross forms of human rights violations, aside from the historic paedophilia, which might well be continuing in secret, particularly when one considers that Warren Jeffs, although in prison, is still the leader of this perverse superstition. Firstly it compels young women to marry men who frequently already have wives, whether they want to or not, and secondly, it exiles young men often on grounds which are arbitrary and capricious from the community, and by young men, I mean teenage boys, leaving them in a position where they wind up homeless on the streets of St. George, Utah, where they are routinely taken advantage of by career criminals, who exist even there despite the very professional St. George Police Department. Law enforcement is very good in Washington County, but this is the place where, coincidentally, the 12 year old boy and his 10 year old sister being abused and denied food by his Mormon mother Ruby Franke and her friend and counselor Jodi Hildebrand were being kept, which is a huge distance from their home in the greater Salt Lake City area, and the 12 year old was able to affect an escape through the grace of God, and the police responded appropriately, and the two women are now in the county jail having been denied bond, and will probably spend the rest of their lives in the Utah state penitentiary system.
So my friend in the Presbyterian Church, who is an ordained chaplain with seminary training, has been able to provide me with invaluable advice in forming my plan, despite working full time as the owner of a real-estate entity whose raison d’etre is to support her charitable work, and which is itself a charity, helping the county with issues involving the property of people who die without relatives or intestate (without a will), in addition to her work as a chaplain for the fire department and her work running a homeless shelter.
So after meeting that woman, I am unsympathetic to attacks on the ministerial capabilities of women.
Now, I am not calling for the RCC to change its doctrine, because that would cause a schism, and there are very complex issues, but I feel this thread ought to have been posted in the OBOB forum as this issue is in my mind internal to the Roman Catholic Church. My position since joining the forum has always been to support female clergy and their ministries, while at the same time respecting religious freedom and also the need to avoid schisms in larger churches where a change in ordination policy would cause a schism. Most Protestant churches however were able to introduce female clergy uncontroversially, as far back as the 19th century. And there are valid arguments as to why the Pauline injunction does not apply.
For my own part however I would be extremely happy to attend a church where Paidiske was the vicar or rector, and what is more, iin the event that I buy the farm, to use an American expression, on my upcoming vacation in Australia Paidiske would be the person I would want handling my funeral if that is possible, since I believe she would be the one capable of providing the pastoral care required for my relatives. Also from an Anglican perspective, her doctrinal orthodoxy is robust.
