Fr. Roy Bourgeois - "I Will Not Be Silenced"

From the Boston Globe:

WESTON - A prominent priest whose support for women’s ordination has him in trouble with the Catholic Church ratcheted up his confrontation with the hierarchy yesterday, calling the church’s refusal to ordain women a “scandal’’ and “spiritual violence.’’

“I will not be silenced on this issue,’’ said the priest, the Rev. Roy Bourgeois, to about 100 people in Weston at an event hosted by the congregation of Jean Marchant, a former staffer for the Archdiocese of Boston who claims she was ordained as a priest in an unsanctioned ceremony four years ago.

The Catholic Church views Marchant and Bourgeois as having been automatically excommunicated for participating in unsanctioned ordination ceremonies.
....

“If they choose to kick me out of the church because I believe that men and women are equal, so be it,’’ Bourgeois said. “I will never be at peace being in any organization that would exclude others.

“What’s going on in our church today is spiritual assassination, it’s spiritual violence being done that’s inexcusable. That is a scandal,’’ he said.
....

And in 1994, Pope John Paul II declared that “the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women,’’ citing both tradition and the fact that Jesus’ apostles were male.

That's nonsense, and the pope knows it. He should be ashamed to make such a statement. Jesus' apostles were Jewish, too. He and the cardinals and bishops could huddle and make the change, if they so chose. Or Pope Benedict could simply declare an end to the discrimination by fiat.

In an interview yesterday, Bourgeois, 70, a Louisiana native, said he has stopped wearing a clerical collar and celebrating the Eucharist and other sacraments out of respect for the church’s view that he has been excommunicated.

But, he also said at one point, simply, “I am a priest."

He said he is confident his position on women priests is the correct one.

“If anyone should be excommunicated, it is the patriarchy involved in this discrimination," he said. “But I don’t believe in excommunication - no one has a monopoly on the truth."

Fr. Roy is a priest, a mensch, and a man of courage. He comes of good Cajun stock in Lutcher, Louisiana, across the river, not far from where I live. In fact, we could be cousins, as the Bourgeois name is in the genealogy of the Cajun branch of my family.

He should wear his excommunication proudly, like a badge of honor, except that he does not believe in it, and neither do I.

Oh my goodness! I nearly forgot. H/T to MadPriest for the link. He would never have forgiven me had I not given him his due.