In our democracies, women have full-scale citizenship and are entitled to the same human, civil and social rights as men are. Even if mentalities develop sometimes more slowly than laws, it is encouraging that significant progress of the feminine status can be noticed : parity makes it possible for women and men to build an ever more just and human society together.

Why, in such context of deep mutations, does the Institution of the Roman Catholic Church keep rejecting the ordination of women? To which extent does such interdiction impact our society in all its aspects ?

The challenges for society

- The issue of power and responsibility sharing arises in every political as well as economic, scientific and societal field. It can be noticed everywhere that women have no equal access to management positions. Would such resistance to power sharing not be linked to the women's ordination issue which threatens the power structures ? If women themselves become mediators of the "sacred", new, equal relationships between the sexes will take place, a new symbolic of the masculine and feminine will be created which will have repercussions for the whole society.
- The catholic Church emphasizes the value of maternity and puts an excessively strong emphasis on the role of mother at home. The priesthood would imply that women take charge of a community as a real job involving, as for civil life, unavoidable constraints. How should one react to the overwhelming visibility of men in the political and professional arena and their absence from family life !
A better sharing of the roles is really timely.

The challenges for Church

In the catholic Church, Women's ordination is a highly symbolic issue, which has become a source of tensions and conflicts; it implies a change of anthropology involving contradictory streams between tradition and transformation, theory and practice, law and necessity. The ecclesiastical institution has regularly attempted to lock that issue, stating that excluding the women from ordained ministry is a permanent doctrine, an unbreakable law and/or God's will. This is neither consistent with the Gospel nor in compliance with the mentality of our time. Thus following stakes will be raised :
- Equality of all baptized women and men.
- Giving up the sacred aspect of the functions and sharing the ministries.
- Possible strategies : protest, internal pressure, transgression, escaping,… What can be done when a religion doesn't recognize the norms and values of democracy ?
Women who have been ordained priests or deaconesses for several years will explain their itinerary.

That 15th Symposium will be totally in line with the "Femmes & Hommes en Eglise" commitment for parity and partnership. Women's ordination could deeply affect relations between men and women and become a token of progress, peace and conviviality between cultures, nations and religions. Notwithstanding, those positive stakes don't avoid the risk that women's ordination may in some cases strengthen a system which finds benefit of the tradition force.