A lot of people I know say, "unless the church allows women to be priests or have more of an active role, they're not gonna be part of it. " Yeah, it's a famously complicated issue, and I can't possibly get into all the angles of it, I'd just make this observation: A lot of it has to do with power and the right construal of power. Power for us is not primarily an institutional matter, as though unless and until I get institutional power, I'm not really powerful.
In the church, power comes from being a saint. The Saints are those who have so surrendered their lives to christ that he's able to work powerfully through them, so for example, in the 19th century, in France, who were - no question about it - the two most powerful Catholics were Bernadette of Lourdes and Thérès of Lisieux: two women, two saints who allowed the power of Christ to move through them in this deeply transformative way. I would say to those who want power in the church, look first for that power, and you can start being a saint today.
Nothing stopping you: man or woman, child, anyone can be a Saint. Thomas Aquinas said 'you want to be a Saint? will it, want it, desire it'.
And that can happen today, and there's no institutional obstacle to you and then you really channel the power that can change the world. "So you don't have to be a priest to do that? " No!
Priests exists for one purpose in the church: to serve the laity. Priests are there to make the laity holy, that's our job. The whole purpose of the church for everybody is to become a saint.
There's that line from Leon Bloy I love, which is: "there's only one real sadness in life: not to be a saint. " Everything else is trivial. The one sadness is that you miss your opportunity to be a saint, so the whole purpose of sacraments, liturgy, prayer, priesthood: everything is to make saints, you know, so people can overstate the importance of priests and priesthood.
Priests are servants of Sanctity. Well, start being a saint today.
