Lay-led Synod in Rome, October 2023 - Bridget Mary Meehan's Presentation for Spirit Unbounded October 13, 2023 Rome, Italy

https://youtu.be/2TRaZG4scAA?si=HjD9oUkTxVJRKAUb

Upper Room Response to Synod on Synodality in 2023 - View from the Emerging Church

https://youtu.be/j4TVKIIUjxE?si=LLD0b-cZdXk1JUIM

Responses from Mary Mother of Jesus to the Synod on Synodality in 2023

SYNOD on Synodality: RESPONSES from Mary Mother of Jesus Inclusive Catholic Community - 2024

 

In response to the call of Pope Francis for a Synod on Synodality in 2023, We, Members of Mary Mother of Jesus Inclusive Catholic Community in Sarasota, Florida, (USA) offer the following response:

 

Who We Are:

Mary, Mother of Jesus, Inclusive Catholic Community, founded in 2006, are women and men some of whom are year-round Floridians and some seasonal; some who are people of color; some who are physically or mentally disabled; some are LGBTIA; some are divorced; some are divorced and remarried; some of our priests are women and some are men; some are married and some are not with celibacy being a personal decision regardless of marital status.

 

Although most of us have roots in the Roman Catholic tradition, we value individuals of different backgrounds, affiliations, orientations and persuasions. All are welcome. We are Roman Catholics who embrace our diversity, work for equality and the empowerment of the people of God. We are a community supported in love and service to each other, the world and care of the earth.

 

How We Listen:

We listen to God speaking to us through community sharing in the weekly homily voicing personal inspiration and interpretation of the scriptural message. We listen to our members who are so often ignored in general society because of a physical or mental limitation and affirm the value of their input. We listen to the needs of the poor and marginalized in our local and international communities and donate quarterly financial support as well as volunteer service.

 

 

 

How We Speak Out:

We support the ordination of women and gender equality in the Church. We have seven validly ordained women priests and one Bishop who speak out regularly on the local, national and international levels through the media.

 

How We Share Responsibility and Authority:

We have instituted an inclusive, circular model of leadership and decision-making where all members are asked for input on an issue and approval of an action. We employ surveys to hear what our members want. As a nonprofit religious group, we have an elected Board of Directors and volunteer teams who follow up on meeting the members’ needs. We have an annual meeting of all members where the annual budget is presented and approved and issues are discussed.

 

How We Discern and Decide:

We listen to our members’ opinions, discuss them as a group and make decisions in keeping with our commitment to live the way of Jesus in love. Input is requested from the membership either at a meeting where all can participate or through electronic mail feedback to our Board. As mentioned above, we use electronic surveys that analyze the responses and give percentages of agreement. The final decision is brought before the entire membership for further discussion and/or approval.

 

CELEBRATION:

Our liturgical celebration each Saturday afternoon is the center of our community and is open to all both in-person and on Zoom. We believe that God is pure spirit, neither male nor female so we use both feminine and male terms to enrich our liturgy and make all feel worthy. Our liturgies have both ordained and non-ordained leaders and participants. Members share homily interpretations, together bless the bread and wine including the words of consecration and offer communion to each other just as the early Christians did. Following our liturgical celebration, we continue celebrating with each other by going to dinner at a local restaurant in a spirit of true community.

 

In addition to liturgy, we offer a weekly prayer group where interested members gather to pray for the needs of our own community as well as the needs of the world. Other opportunities for spiritual growth are offered through book discussions, spirituality courses offered online at the Peoples Catholic Seminary, ecumenical services in the local community or retreat days.

The community continually adjusts what is done to the needs and desires of its members.

Challenges and Questions:

We need to raise the following questions: Will the institutional Church continue to be a top-down hierarchical organization that punishes faithful dissent and clings to medieval doctrine, practices, and structures that discriminate against women? Will the Church embrace the full equality and moral agency of women in all aspects of their lives and in all ministries –  including priestly ordination?

The synodal dialogue can chart a new path forward by affirming the primacy of conscience for all Catholics, including women priests who are called to serve their sisters and brothers in public ministry in the Church.

 

Conclusion:

Mary, Mother of Jesus, Inclusive Catholic Community has shown over 16 years that a new model of church based on synodality is possible!

PCS Forum: Women’s priestly ordination in the Catholic Tradition with the focus on the subversive praxis of the Roman Catholic Women Priests

Presented by Rev. Dianne Willman and Dr. Jakub Urbaniak

April 20, 2023

1:00pm-2:30pm Eastern Time

            Zoom Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84965259983?pwd=VFl1cWhjV2UvMGl1cWFyR05mU2xKQT09 

Meeting ID: 849 6525 9983

Passcode: 868236

This forum aims at engaging with a recently published article on the Roman Catholic Women Priests (RCWP) movement. The article focuses on the “alternative ecclesiological model” that is embodied by RCWP in response to the ban on women’s ordination in the Roman Catholic Church.  It reveals the “unique form of dissent” that is pursued by the movement, namely that it is one that offers a different model without seeking rupture from the Church. The forum is intended to unpack the praxis of the movement that offers a way through the “doctrinal impasse” on the issue of women’s ordination, even if it only holds a “transitionary space within the larger land- scape of the new forms of priesthood emerging across Christian churches.”

Presenters

Dianne Willman, RCWP

Dianne Willman, RCWP, is a Roman Catholic woman priest ministering to an international community largely based in Johannesburg, South Africa. She was ordained in 2019. She is also a trained spiritual director and retreat facilitator in the Ignatian tradition. By profession, Dianne is a lawyer who has served in the South African prosecution organisation for 20 years. Dianne holds two Master's degrees - one in theology and the other in law. Dianne is passionate about justice and transformation, and is motivated by liberation theology: to see, judge, act.

Jakub Urbaniak (PhD – UBO Brest; DTh/MTh – UAM Poznan) 

As a teacher, researcher and community activist, Jakub believes that the pursuit of a more just and sustainable world requires diverse collaborations and a true spirit of togetherness (ubuntu). Between 2010-2022, he lived in Johannesburg, South Africa, where he was originally sent as a Fidesco volunteer. For over a decade, he worked as an academic in the fields of Theology, Philosophy, and Ethics, and published extensively on topics spanning decolonisation, Black Theology, African spiritualities, and the role of religion in the public sphere. He has also been involved in youth training and community development projects as a volunteer and in campaigns against racism and the discrimination of women and LGBTIQ+ people. Currently, he is teaching at the Innovation Academy, University College Dublin, focusing on social sustainability, climate justice, and refugee rights.

PCS 507: After Jesus, Before Christianity

PCS 507 - After Jesus, Before Christianity

Cohort begins Wednesday, October 5, 2022 at 7pm EDT

Cost: $100

Register now at:

https://pcseminary.teachable.com/p/pcs-507-ajbc

The course begins with a recognition of assumptions of those earliest years after Jesus and which ones we ought to question. The main topics we plan to cover include examples of women in leadership roles, ancient understandings of gender, the painful reality of living with Roman violence; diverse ideas regarding self-identity, suffering, and death among Jesus’s followers; wide-ranging views of Jesus, Paul, and Mary, the Magdalene; the variety of texts available before there was any such thing as a New Testament, and new perspectives on so-called “Gnosticism” and “heresy.”

 

The content is divided into six sections which include inspirational introductions, lectures, and resources for further study. Throughout the course, there will also be opportunities for reflection and sharing with fellow students.

 

Dr. Shirley Paulson and Dr. Deborah N. Saxon

Course Facilitators

Shirley and Deb were active participants in Westar Institute’s Christianity Seminar that led to the production of the book, After Jesus Before Christianity. They bring insider knowledge of the work of the seminar over its eight years and the conclusions that have now come together in book form. This course highlights the most important of these findings—new discoveries regarding the followers of Jesus in the first two centuries C.E. These breakthroughs in understanding have implications for our thinking and practice today. To be forewarned, some of these realizations challenge traditional views, but they also liberate us from outgrown practices that probably never even started with Jesus or his apostles.

PCS Fall Programs 2022

Please join us for our fall forums and new course.

Blessings,

Bridget Mary and Mary Theresa

PCS FORUMS – Fall 2022:

 

Unpacking the Aramaic Prayer of Jesus
Presented by Rev. Dr. Patricia Fresen, RCWP

Thursday, September 15, 2022

1pm EDT – FREE

 

Zoom Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82317381167?pwd=YkpwaGJTcldBVXNnczhIT2dhZjVpUT09 

Meeting ID: 823 1738 1167

Passcode: 073283

 

Rev. Dr. Patricia Fresen was born in South Africa, studied theology in

Rome at the University of St. Thomas and the Gregoriana, and was then invited to join the faculty of the National Seminary in Pretoria.  She later completed the Doctorate in Theology and after that she taught theology at the Catholic University in Johannesburg.   However, as a direct result of her ordination to the priesthood in 2003, Dr. Fresen was forced to leave the Dominican Order, of which she had been a member for 45 years; and she had to vacate her position at Catholic University. She subsequently left her homeland to take up residence in Germany.  In recent years, Dr. Fresen has returned to South Africa.  Ordained a bishop in 2005, Dr. Fresen has ordained many women priests in Europe, Canada the USA and now South Africa.  She has been a well-respected conference speaker and retreat leader in all those countries.  At present, her most frequently-requested topics are on the translation of the Gospels from the original Aramaic, which was the language of Jesus.  She did a course with Prof. Neil Douglas-Klotz on the Aramaic of the Gospels and she says it was life-changing.   She will speak in a PCS forum on 15^th September about the Our Father translated from the Aramaic.

PCS FORUM: A Conversation with James Carroll 

author of The Truth at the Heart of the Lie: How the Catholic Church Lost Its Soul - FREE

Tuesday, September 27, 2022

7pm EDT

Zoom Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89017542054?pwd=UXlXWmxabUkzdnlkY0MvQVBFSkZMZz09

Meeting ID: 890 1754 2054

Passcode: 955561

James Carroll weaves together the story of his quest to understand his personal beliefs and his relationship to the Catholic Church with the history of the Church itself. From his first awakening of faith as a boy to his gradual disillusionment as a Catholic, Carroll offers a razor-sharp examination both of himself and of how the Church became an institution that places power and dominance over people through an all-male clergy. 

 

Carroll argues that a male-supremacist clericalism is both the root cause and the ongoing enabler of the sexual abuse crisis. The power structure of clericalism poses an existential threat to the Church and compromises the ability of even a progressive pope like Pope Francis to advance change in an institution accountable only to itself. Carroll traces this dilemma back to the Roman Empire and the Middle Ages, when Scripture, Jesus Christ, and his teachings were reinterpreted as the Church became an empire. In a deeply personal re-examination of self, Carroll grapples with his own feelings of being chosen, his experiences as a priest, and the moments of doubt that made him leave the priesthood and embark on a long personal journey toward renewal - including his tenure as an op-ed columnist at The Boston Globe writing about sexual abuse in the Church. 

Ultimately, Carroll calls on the Church and all reform-minded Catholics to revive the culture from within by embracing anti-clerical, anti-misogynist resistance and staying grounded in the spirit of love that is the essential truth at the heart of Christian belief and Christian life.

Please read the book before participating in the forum. James will be focusing on his Epilogue: A Catholic Manifesto. 

 

NEW PCS COURSE: 

PCS 507 - After Jesus, Before Christianity

Cohort begins Wednesday, October 5, 2022 at 7pm EDT

Cost: $100

Register now at:

https://pcseminary.teachable.com/p/pcs-507-ajbc

The course begins with a recognition of assumptions of those earliest years after Jesus and which ones we ought to question. The main topics we plan to cover include examples of women in leadership roles, ancient understandings of gender, the painful reality of living with Roman violence; diverse ideas regarding self-identity, suffering, and death among Jesus’s followers; wide-ranging views of Jesus, Paul, and Mary, the Magdalene; the variety of texts available before there was any such thing as a New Testament, and new perspectives on so-called “Gnosticism” and “heresy.”

 

The content is divided into six sections which include inspirational introductions, lectures, and resources for further study. Throughout the course, there will also be opportunities for reflection and sharing with fellow students.

 

Dr. Shirley Paulson and Dr. Deborah N. Saxon

Course Facilitators

Shirley and Deb were active participants in Westar Institute’s Christianity Seminar that led to the production of the book, After Jesus Before Christianity. They bring insider knowledge of the work of the seminar over its eight years and the conclusions that have now come together in book form. This course highlights the most important of these findings—new discoveries regarding the followers of Jesus in the first two centuries C.E. These breakthroughs in understanding have implications for our thinking and practice today. To be forewarned, some of these realizations challenge traditional views, but they also liberate us from outgrown practices that probably never even started with Jesus or his apostles.

PCS Forum: September 15, 2022 - Unpacking the Aramaic Prayer of Jesus - Presented by Rev. Dr. Patricia Fresen, RCWP

PCS FORUM: 

Unpacking the Aramaic Prayer of Jesus
Presented by Rev. Dr. Patricia Fresen, RCWP

Thursday, September 15, 2022

1pm EDT – FREE

Video Recording of forum:

https://youtu.be/m8gVvo2FxEo

Rev. Dr. Patricia Fresen was born in South Africa, studied theology in
Rome at the University of St. Thomas and the Gregoriana, and was then invited to join the faculty of the National Seminary in Pretoria.  She later completed the Doctorate in Theology and after that she taught theology at the Catholic University in Johannesburg.   However, as a direct result of her ordination to the priesthood in 2003, Dr. Fresen was forced to leave the Dominican Order, of which she had been a member for 45 years; and she had to vacate her position at Catholic University. She subsequently left her homeland to take up residence in Germany.  In recent years, Dr. Fresen has returned to South Africa.  Ordained a bishop in 2005, Dr. Fresen has ordained many women priests in Europe, Canada the USA and now South Africa.  She has been a well-respected conference speaker and retreat leader in all those countries.  At present, her most frequently-requested topics are on the translation of the Gospels from the original Aramaic, which was the language of Jesus.  She did a course with Prof. Neil Douglas-Klotz on the Aramaic of the Gospels and she says it was life-changing.   She will speak in a PCS forum on 15^th September about the Our Father translated from the Aramaic.

Message from Dr. Fresen about the Forum:

The language Jesus spoke was Aramaic, and the original texts of the New Testament were written in Aramaic, but unfortunately this is not generally known in the Western world.  In all our Western languages, we have used the Greek translation of the New Testament – and we forget that it was in fact, a translation from the original Aramaic.  Greek is a very different language from Aramaic, so translation is difficult.   In Aramaic, a word or phrase can often be translated in several ways, and usually all those meanings are held together, whereas in Greek the meaning is much more precise and the richness of the layers of meaning is absent. 

There is an Aramaic bible in existence, called The Peshitta, which the Christians in the Middle East use.  Some Aramaic scholars today are rediscovering the Aramaic text and translating it into English, German and other Western languages.  It is often astounding and very beautiful to read a translation directly from the Aramaic.  Because that was the mother-tongue of Jesus, a translation from Aramaic is obviously closer to what Jesus actually said and meant and it gives us a better understanding of Jesus and of his spirituality.  I use the translations by Prof. Neil Douglas-Klotz and some of these have been put to music by Christian Bollman, which you will hear.

I will try to open up for you the beauty of the “Our Father” as translated from the Aramaic language.  You will be amazed at the difference there is between our well-known version, translated from Greek, and the translation directly from Aramaic. This discovery has given me, I believe, a different, deeper understanding of Jesus which I feel compelled to pass on to others.  I am delighted to have the opportunity of sharing this with you.