Mar
13
Washing of the feet
March 13, 2008 |
Fr. Z has a very useful post up on the issue of whether women are permitted to be part of the optional rite of the washing of the feet during Holy Thursday. Long story short, no.
Two main excuses are offered in defense of the abuse of washing the feet of women.
The first excuse concerns a false sense of service and charity: “hospitality” suggests women must be “included”. In the USA some might obtusely cite a note having no canonical authority from the (then) NCCB’s Committee on Liturgy in 1987 which uses this “hospitality” argument.
The second excuse stems from “inclusive” language: the English words in the ICEL Sacramentary, “men” and “man”, can’t possibly mean “males”. That would be sexist! Therefore women must be included.
On the contrary, the Latin rubrics for the foot washing rite has words viri selecti, “chosen men”.
Vir means “a male person”. The mighty Lewis & Short Dictionary say vir is “a male person, a man (opp. femina; cf. mas).”
If you have been properly informed about this, to insist that “men” (viri) means “men and women” is really to lie. Homo or plural homines might be argued to be of both sexes, but absolutely not vir.
I am trying to learn to let some of the liturgical abuses not bother me so much, but this is a biggy. Holy Thursday - among many things - commemorates the institution of the Catholic priesthood. Not only does it violate the law of the Church to have women participate in this rite, but it also destroys much of the symbolism of the rite.
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