Women's Ordination Conference
Encyclopedia
The Women's Ordination Conference is the oldest and largest national organization that works to ordain women as deacons, priests, and bishops into the Roman Catholic Church. Founded in 1975, it primarily promotes an agenda with the objective of ordaining women within the Catholic Church. The idea for the Conference came in 1974, when Mary B. Lynch asked the people on her Christmas list if it was time to publicly ask "Should Catholic women be priests?" 31 women and one man answered yes, and thus a taskforce was formed and a national meeting was planned. This first meeting was held in Detroit, Michigan, on Thanksgiving weekend of 1975, with nearly 2,000 people in attendance.
, has incurred an automatic excommunication
by decree of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith
. Leaders of the WOC that have attempted female ordination or who have worked alongside RCW also join them in a state of latae sententiae
excommunication.
Controversy
The WOC's sister organization, Roman Catholic WomenpriestsRoman Catholic Womenpriests
Roman Catholic Womenpriests is an Independent Catholic international group that asserts a connection to the Catholic Church. They are descended from the Danube Seven, a group of women who claim to have been ordained as priests in 2002 by Rómulo Antonio Braschi, an independent bishop...
, has incurred an automatic excommunication
Excommunication
Excommunication is a religious censure used to deprive, suspend or limit membership in a religious community. The word means putting [someone] out of communion. In some religions, excommunication includes spiritual condemnation of the member or group...
by decree of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith , previously known as the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition , and after 1904 called the Supreme...
. Leaders of the WOC that have attempted female ordination or who have worked alongside RCW also join them in a state of latae sententiae
Latae sententiae
Latæ sententiæ is a Latin term used in the canon law of the Catholic Church meaning literally "given sentence".Officially, a latae sententiae penalty follows automatically, by force of the law itself, when the law is contravened....
excommunication.