Catholic Priest and longtime peace activist Roy Bourgeois has been told by the Vatican to end his advocacy for women’s ordination or be excommunicated. He’s chosen excommunication. The independent Catholic paper National Catholic Reporter spoke with Bourgeois:
Hardly a day passes that a phone call or a letter doesn’t bring tears to his eyes. ‘I never knew just how deeply women have been hurt by the church. And after hearing from so many women, I’m no longer comfortable being part of an institution that excludes them. Over and over again, they tell him of their struggles with faith, of the anguish of sexual abuse, of profound feelings of dejection. And of a rising anger. Some — like a woman who wrote him about being sexually abused by a bishop — are livid that the church, while finding women unworthy for ordination, protects pedophile priests and never threatens to excommunicate them.
Many are also incensed that the Vatican would so quickly take drastic action against Bourgeois. Bourgeois has done several stints in federal prison protesting the U.S. Army School of the Americas, which has trained dictators, assassins and death-squad leaders across Latin America. While he has appreciated letters that thanked him for speaking out for women who say they have no voice, Bourgeois is careful to make clear that he is not trying to speak for women, but to stand in solidarity with them.
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