The “Hateful Women” series tells about the fight for equality, which is still ongoing, from different perspectives.
Johanna Korhonen photographed in 2016. Petteri Paalasmaa
Women’s priesthood has been debated from decade to decade and the debate is still not over.
The Church Council made a decision to open the priesthood to women in 1986. The first women were ordained as priests two years later.
– It has been a surprise how the opposition to female priesthood has continued in the church as a virus-like phenomenon that is always passed on to new generations. Even today there are these young men for whom it seems like a life mission, journalist Johanna Korhonen wonders in a series about the fight for equality Hated women.
Korhonen served in the years 2012–2020 as a representative of the Church Assembly. The church assembly is the decision-making body of the church and the representatives are elected in elections.
– The church is the last bastion in our society where old structures are still actively maintained. It is a hierarchical organization in many ways. More than average people apply to be the decision makers of the church, for whom authorities and hierarchies are important. They are often associated with a male-led world view and human perception. When ordinary rank-and-file members do not vote in parish elections, power is left to the old-fashioned clique, Korhonen describes on TV.
Professor Elina Vuola recalls the events of the 1980s on TV today. Over
The church assembly voted on women’s priesthood for the first time already in the early 1960s. The issue was brought up in the following decades. A professor who studied at the Faculty of Theology Elina Vuola recalls on TV the birth of the women’s movement in her own faculty. It was also connected to the initiative made by Vuola, which was forwarded to the church council. Its purpose was to give the congregants information about what young women studying theology thought about female priesthood.
– We went to hand over the signatures, Archbishop For John Wikströmwho in that situation said that “thank you for this, this is really important, don’t give up, this will change.” No one else heard it. He said that to us girls.
Hated women today on TV1 at 19:55 & Areena. See all TV programs and broadcast times in Telku’s TV guide.