Higher Calling
When are you getting started in your new job as a pastor?
Really, as soon as I was ordained, so this week. I've been serving the parish full-time for a few months now, part-time while I was in seminary for the past two years.
Have you received any hate mail?
I personally have not received hate mail, although there are plenty of blogs that I have found online that like to slander my name when they get hold of information about my ordination and ministry. It's unfortunate and sad. The people I serve are excited to see a place where men and women can serve side by side.
The Ecumenical Catholic Communion doesn't think it's a sin for people to be gay, right?
As far as moral teaching goes, we stress the primacy of conscience. It's important for people to form a moral conscience with the help of a church and a faithful community. Ultimately God helps us with our conscience to make moral decisions. Homosexuality is not inherently sinful. Love in all of its forms can be for the glory of God.
Will you raise your kids Roman Catholic?
We'll raise our children Christian because we belong to two different church traditions. We'll let them decide where they want to call their church home. But they'll be baptized Christian, likely in a joint service.
Are you pro-choice?
We go to back to the primacy of conscience. We stress the formation of conscience in moral matters, such as the pro-life/pro-choice debate. No one is excluded from the table in the Ecumenical Catholic Communion. Jesus never turned anyone away at the table, so neither do we. We feel it's our responsibility to help people make responsible choices, but that no single person can dictate what God's will is.
How do you feel about divorced people?
Divorced people are not excluded from our communities.
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Member Comments
Posted By: dva_tsenta @ 05/09/2008 1:13:57 AM
Comment: +1 - This woman is not a Catholic at all, much less a Catholic priest. She is very mistaken and lost. I wish journalists would be more precise with their wording - misleading information like that in this article could lead those who know nothing or very little of the Catholic Church to incorrect conclusions. I must also object to the following comparison: "It [the Church] does, however, recognize the more than 100 already married men who became priests after a conversion to Roman Catholicism." It is very misleading to juxtapose the Church's recognition of married men (mostly Protestant ministers) who converted to Catholicism and were ordained priests with the woman in question here. The Church's tradition of the celibate priesthood is not written in stone as is the tradition, supported by well-considered theology, of only men being ordained as priests. I hope that the author, Karen Springen, will be more precise in the future.
Posted By: mmsiciliana@dls.net @ 05/08/2008 9:00:51 PM
Comment: Sorry, Jessica Rowley is not a "Catholic" priest. The community she "ministers to is Catholic" in name only. Unlike the Catholic Church, which is the Church founded by Jesus Christ, the organization she belongs to was founded by a human being. The Catholic Church is universal, worldwide, not simply for people who live in Webster Groves, MO. And Jesus did not "welcome everyone to the table." Read what he had to say to the Pharisees who thought they knew how God operated.
Posted By: BATPAX @ 12/03/2007 7:58:55 PM
Comment: i have attended st clare and francis on and off for the past year. i have never felt a church environment so full of god's love. as jessica has stated, EVERYONE is welcome at the table there. the people of this church really live the words of jesus.......really live a life of faith that they joyfully share with everyone. it reminds me what the early christians must have felt---the joy, the faith sharing,the love.........all before organized religion highjacked christianity