She Was There: Women, the Early Church, and the Old-Catholic Witness
- Justin Hurtado
- Jun 2
- 7 min read
She was there.
At the tomb, before the men showed up.
At the table, when the church was still a house.
At the pulpit, though history tried to write her out.
She was there—and she’s still here.
The Church didn’t create her calling. God did.And God has never revoked that call.
I. Women in the Early Church
The early church wasn’t just full of women—it was shaped by them.
And I don’t mean shaped in the “they made the coffee and cleaned up” sense.I mean: they led, preached, funded, and bled for the Gospel.
Let’s name names.
Mary Magdalene was the first to preach the Resurrection. Jesus appeared to her first. Not Peter. Not Paul. Her.John 20 makes that clear.
Phoebe, in Romans 16, is called a deacon—diakonos—and a leader—prostatis. She delivered Paul’s letter to the Romans. She probably read it aloud. She probably explained it. She did theology in real time.
Junia is named in Romans 16:7 as “outstanding among the apostles.” She’s not “adjacent” to apostolic leadership. She’s in it.
Priscilla co-taught Apollos alongside her husband Aquila (Acts 18). Her name usually comes first.
Lydia, in Philippi, was the first European convert and hosted a house church. That meant she oversaw worship, discipline, and leadership.
The early church wasn't a boys’ club.It was a Spirit-led movement—and the Spirit didn’t check genitals before giving gifts.
II. Then Came the Erasure
As Christianity institutionalized and cozied up to empire, patriarchy took over.
Suddenly, women were “helpers.”Their titles were “spiritual mothers,” not bishops or presbyters.Their authority got lost in translation—or intentionally misinterpreted.
Some church fathers—God bless them—did theological gymnastics to argue women couldn’t lead, all while relying on them to keep their communities running.
The result: centuries of exclusion.Not because God changed—but because men wanted control.
III. Our Bishop Is a Woman
This isn’t theory for me. It’s not a progressive pipe dream.
My bishop is a woman.
The Rt. Rev. Romanoff, PhD.
She is ordained, consecrated, and called.She presides at the altar, lays hands in blessing, and carries the crozier not as decoration but as declaration: God calls women to lead.
When I kneel for her blessing, I don’t think about her gender. I think about her wisdom. Her presence. Her prayer life. Her fire.
That miter didn’t come with an apology.It came with authority.
She doesn’t just wear the symbols of her office.She embodies them.
She stands in a long line of women whose names are in Scripture and whose blood is in our sacraments.
Mary. Phoebe. Thecla. Catherine. Macrina. Her.
She is not an exception. She is the continuation.
IV. Voices of Our Mothers in Faith
This isn’t new.
The early church had women theologians, mystics, and martyrs.They wrote. They led. They taught men.
Macrina the Younger (c. 330–379)
A philosopher, ascetic, and theological force.Gregory of Nyssa, her brother, learned from her.
“The process of healing shall be proportioned to the measure of evil in each of us, and when the evil is purged and blotted out, there shall come in each place to each immortality and life and honor.”
Macrina taught resurrection not as a consolation prize, but as transformation—deep, sacred, personal.
Thecla
A first-century disciple of Paul. Fought wild beasts in the arena. Baptized herself. Preached the Gospel.
“I am a daughter of Christ, Son of the living God. He alone is the Way, the Truth and the Life; He is the one who protects me.”
Thecla didn’t ask for permission to lead. She lived it. She was called equal to the apostles.Try erasing that.
Catherine of Siena (1347–1380)
Doctor of the Church. Advisor to Popes. Mystic. Writer. Unrelenting.
“Be who God meant you to be, and you will set the world on fire.”
“Proclaim the truth, and do not be silent through fear.”
Catherine didn’t lead despite being a woman. She led because she was faithful—and fearless.
She didn’t wait to be invited. She called the Church to conversion.
V. Why We Ordain Women
As Old-Catholics, we ordain women because:
Scripture shows women leading, preaching, and blessing.
Tradition, when fully unearthed, reveals women in liturgical and theological roles.
The Spirit still calls, and we have no right to refuse her.
We don’t do this to be trendy.We do it to be faithful.
To Christ.
To the Gospel.
To the women who were always there.
VI. This Is Personal
Let me show you what this actually looks like.
These are photos from my ordination.
Not a reenactment. Not an argument.The real thing.
That’s +K. Romanoff, my bishop, laying hands on me.
That’s Pastor Forbes, a Lutheran minister and my spiritual guide through seminary, steadying me with prayer.
And that’s me—kneeling into a call I had run from and returned to more times than I can count.
Before the Mass, +Romanoff asked me quietly, “Are you hearing the Spirit?”
Not do you understand, not are you ready, not have you studied hard enough—but are you hearing her?
That’s feminine leadership.
She wasn’t managing a process.She was midwifing a priest.
She taught me—without fanfare—how to listen again.To the God I already knew.To the voice I had stopped trusting.
When people ask me why I serve in a church that ordains women, this is why:
Because a woman bishop didn’t just ordain me.She saw me, calmed my fear, made space for silence, and asked the right question at the right time.
That day didn’t bend tradition.It bent me toward the Spirit.
VII. And Then I Turned Around
Right after the ordination liturgy, I gave my first blessings as a priest.
I was still shaking.
The oil hadn’t dried.The prayers were still echoing in my bones.And then she stepped forward.
My mother.
The woman who raised me in faith—not the “shiny and safe” kind, but the kind that holds you through sickness, questions, and grief.The kind that prays over you and yells at God in the same breath.
She stood in front of me—this woman who had survived too much and given even more—and I laid my hands on her head.
I don’t remember what I said. Not really.
I remember her hair in my hands.I remember her tears.I remember the silence in my body as I realized:
I was blessing the one who blessed me first.
There’s an old tradition that speaks to this.
At a priest’s ordination, the cloth used to catch the oil during the anointing of hands—the maniturgium—is given to the priest’s mother. She keeps it for the rest of her life. At her death, it’s placed in her hands.
Legend says when she meets the Lord, he asks her, “I gave you life. What have you given me?”And she replies, “I have given you my son as a priest.”
That cloth, like Mary’s fiat, becomes a sign of surrender and trust.
Priests don’t drop from the clouds.They are raised—in faith, in love, in stubborn hope—by women who say yes long before anyone else does.
My mother nurtured my calling before I even knew I had one.And I gave her my first blessing with hands still soaked in oil, trembling with gratitude.
VIII. She Still Makes the Sacraments Possible
Let’s tell the truth.
The sacraments didn’t survive because of councils or creeds.They survived because women carried them.
In whispered prayers over hospital beds.In whispered resistance under empire and institution.In whispered instruction at kitchen tables and communion rails.
Women have always made the sacraments possible.Not just by receiving them—but by living them.
They’ve baptized children in secret.Heard confessions no priest ever could.Broken bread with trembling hands and holy defiance.
So when we ordain women, we’re not breaking from tradition.We’re finally catching up to it.
And when we bless them, we’re not giving them something new.We’re recognizing what God already did.
To the women who have led, anointed, preached, protected, and persisted—
we see you.
We hear you.
We follow you.
The Church is still standing because you never stopped standing.And this priesthood is possible because you made it believable.
Sources Cited
Biblical References
All scripture citations are taken from the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV), unless otherwise noted.
Early Church & Church Mothers
Gregory of Nyssa. (1893/2007). The life of Macrina (W.K. Lowther Clarke, Trans.). London: SPCK. (Original work written ca. 380 CE)
Gregory of Nyssa. (1893/1993). On the soul and the resurrection (C. Musurillo, Trans.). Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press.
The Acts of Paul and Thecla. (2nd century). In R. Valantasis (Ed.), The gospels and related writings (pp. 377–387). Polebridge Press.
Catherine of Siena. (1980). The Dialogue (S. Noffke, Trans.). Paulist Press. (Original work published ca. 1378)
Catholic & Liturgical Tradition
Roman Catholic Church. (2003). General instruction of the Roman Missal (3rd typical ed.). USCCB Publishing.
Roman Catholic Church. (2000). The rite of ordination of priests: Pontificale Romanum. Vatican Publishing House.
Winters, J. J. (2023, June 23). Priests revive traditional gifts of cloth to mothers (Ordination 2023). The Archdiocese of Newark. https://rcan.org
Old-Catholic Sources
Union of Utrecht. (1889). Declaration of Utrecht. Retrieved from https://www.utrechter-union.org
International Old Catholic Bishops’ Conference. (2006). Statement on the ordination of women. Retrieved from https://www.utrechter-union.org
Ecumenical Catholic Communion. (n.d.). Position on ordination and inclusive ministry. Retrieved from https://ecumenical-catholics.org
Contemporary & Scholarly Works
Fiorenza, E. S. (1983). In memory of her: A feminist theological reconstruction of Christian origins. Crossroad.
Kienzle, B. M., & Walker, P. J. (Eds.). (1998). Women preachers and prophets through two millennia of Christianity. University of California Press.
Macy, G. (2008). The hidden history of women's ordination: Female clergy in the medieval West. Oxford University Press.
Zagano, P. (2016). Women deacons: Past, present, future. Paulist Press.
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