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John Wijngaards

John Wijngaards Biography

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“In 1866, the Vicar Apostolic of the Galla region in southern Ethiopia asked the Congregation for Doctrine: 'Is slavery in harmony with Catholic doctrine?' It should be remembered that at the time slavery had already been abolished in Great Britain and all its dominions, in the USA, in Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, Chile, Ecuador, Argentina, Peru, Venezuela and most other civilized countries. In spite of this, the Congregation answered with an emphatic 'Yes'. "Slavery itself, considered as such in its essential nature, is not at all contrary to the natural and divine law, and there can be several just titles of slavery and these are referred to by approved theologians and commentators of the sacred canons.”

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“Aristotle's teaching on slavery was quoted implicitly and explicitly by the Fathers of the Church. It did not stop there. Through the collection of laws known as the Decree of Gratian (Bologna 1140), in entered into the official law book of the Church. St. Thomas Aquinas, the leading theologian of the Middle Ages, followed Aristotle. He agreed with all the pagan views, with just a dash of holy water. Slavery, he said, is 'natural' in the sense that it is the consequence of sin by a kind of 'second intention of nature'. He justified slavery in these circumstances: enslavement imposed as punishment; capture in conquest; people who sold themselves to pay off debts or who were sold by a court for that reason; children born of a slave mother.”

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“Theologians were convinced that slavery belonged to Catholic doctrine. It was manifestly contained, they thought, in the Word of God. "It is certainly a matter of faith that slavery in which a man serves his master as a slave, is altogether lawful. This can be proved from Holy Scripture.”

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“If all the bishops in the world had been asked, two hundred years ago, whether slavery is allowed by God, 95 per cent of them, including the Pope, would have said, 'Yes, slavery is allowed'. Yet in spite of their number, they would all have been wrong.”

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“Some of my friends tell me that the ordination of women is an issue that can wait. 'Rome has decisively turned against it,' they say. 'Change may come, but only in the future — under another Pope, when the heat has died down.' They point to a vast majority of bishops and theologians who have decided to keep their mouths shut, even though they realise Rome is wrong. Tact is needed, they argue. There is a time for speaking and a time for silence... I disagree. Yes, for years I too thought that wisdom would slowly prevail in the Church and that the issue of women priests would ripen in the course of time. That is why, until three years ago, I too had adopted a strategy of wait-and-see. But now I have changed my mind. For the Roman authorities force us to take sides. They impose their own view so strongly as the truth, that by keeping silent now, we would compromise our own consciences.”

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“True loyalty to the Church implies loyalty to the truth. It requires willingness to question rather than readiness to conform. What may seem opposition and dissent at first, will eventually prove to be an active co-operation between the teaching authorities and the theologians towards the one aim of a better-formulated doctrine.”

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“Though, with St. Paul, I fully subscribe to women being treated on equal terms as men in the Church, I am not a feminist. I am a man, and I cannot speak from my Christian experience as a woman, nor judge issues specifically from a womanly perspective as women theologians do. Neither did I enter the field with a feminist agenda, as I narrated in the first chapter. I am approaching the question of women's ordination as a theologian. And like other theologians — both men and women — I have come to the clear recognition that the reasons for barring women from ordination cannot be substantiated from Scripture or tradition. Sacred Scripture leaves the question wide open. In so-called Catholic "tradition", women were excluded from ministries because of social conditions and cultural prejudice. I will validate these claims in the next chapters. I am defending these conclusions as a man, as a professional theologian and as a Catholic.”

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“The presumption that Jesus who had wiped out the ancient bias against women in the common priesthood of the faithful, would reintroduce it in ministerial priesthood defies all logic. The contention that Jesus, who brought worship 'in spirit and in truth' and for whom love and service were the supreme characteristics of his ministry, would then introduce maleness as an essential requirement offends the inner consistency of the Gospel.”

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“Cultural prejudice rather than God's will was responsible for relegating women to a purely passive role in the Church. Through this theological error, enormous damage had been inflicted on the faithful in previous centuries and the harm was still being done today. Cultural bigotry had invaded Christian beliefs and had succeeded in enthroning a pagan prejudice as if it were a genuine Christian practice.”

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“How could such an anomalous, un-Christian practice be tolerated in the Church in the first place? It seems that leaders were not prepared to listen to the prophetic voices raised by conscientious people in the Church.”

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“I remember once visiting an outdoor exhibition of sculpture in Arnhem, the Netherlands. One of the artists had placed this notice at the base of a majestic beech: "Statues are hewn by fools like me: only God could make this tree." The Taoists looked at the inside of the tree. They saw God present, not as the super-sculptor, but as the primal force from which the tree drew its being and its specific form. Becoming aware of this divine origin was for them "great knowledge," to be distinguished from the "small knowledge" of our petty, every-day existence.”

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Author:John Wijngaards
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