ABSTRACT
On 8th April, 1916, the Catholic Church’s Congregation of the Holy Office (now called the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) published a decree of the Cardinal Inquisitors General, which condemned the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary dressed in priestly garments. The Cult of the Virgin had been enjoying a revival particularly amongst women who themselves wished for ordination. Indeed the Roman Church had cause for concern as during the 20th century, two churches with strong Marian identities, both of which were formed by breaking away from the Catholic Church, have enabled women to receive priestly and episcopal orders. From being used to support calls for women’s ordination to being used within liberation and feminist theology as a model of empowerment, the Virgin Mary influenced a great deal of 20th-century theology.
