Women Leaders in the Ministry of St. Paul – An evening at my New York City Parish
On a spring evening in the middle of May, about 50 parishioners gathered for an exploration of “the Women Leaders in the Ministry of St. Paul” sponsored by our Faith Formation Committee. We used FutureChurch’s simple prayer service and had an insightful presentation by Dr. Deirdre Good.
Dr. Good, who is a New Testament Professor at the General Theological Seminary in New York City, dug into the rarely heard Romans 16:1-16 passage. In this last chapter of what was probably his last letter, Paul introduces us to a number of remarkable women who so few Catholics today know about. First named is Phoebe, a deacon and leader of the community in Cenchreae and Paul’s benefactor. She is most likely carrying Paul’s letter and therefore will explain its meaning to the community in Rome. Paul then greets the leaders in Rome among them: Junia, “prominent among the apostles” and Prisca with her husband Aquila—“co-workers” who “risked their necks for my life.” Many in our group were delighted to learn this—but some concerns were raised – Could a woman be an apostle? Was a woman actually a deacon? (The answers are, “Yes,” and “Yes.”) We saw first hand that, as Dr. Good said, “These texts are hot; they are far from dead."
Dr. Good then led us through the mystery of Ephesians 5:22, “Wives should be subordinate to their husbands…" (New American Bible) We learned that the early Greek manuscripts have an ellipsis where the text now has the word “subordinate." Deirdre defined an ellipsis as, “an omission for the reader to fill in based on common usage.” For example in the Beatitudes, the phrase “Blessed are the poor…” does not have the word ‘are’ in the Greek text. Readers automatically insert it based on common usage. Over the years scribes inserted the word “subordinate” even though there was an ellipsis in the original. They probably took “subordinate” from the prior sentence, which uses it in a completely different way. Husbands and wives are to “Be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ.” (Eph 5:21) So today we really don’t know how to interpret Ephesians 5:22 and yet it is part of our Lectionary.
It was a wonderful way to get to know these early women leaders – indeed it is “… an honor we have, in that there are such women among us…. the women of those days were more spirited than lions.” (John Chrysostom in Biblical Affirmations of Women, L. Swidler, p. 295). May their spirits be with, and inspire all of us.
Written by Rita Houlihan, Vice Chair of the FutureChurch Board
