Archbishop Dolan on one of the Pittsburgh 12:

Dolan wrote to parishioners at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Waukesha that it was his duty to notify the Vatican of Vandenberg’s action. Dolan said her excommunication could come soon. The Roman Catholic Church prohibits women from becoming priests.

Vandenberg, 64, said Monday that she was "startled" by the letter and surprised that Dolan had "spent so much time and energy" on it when "other important things" might demand his attention.

In his letter to the parish, Dolan said he was "disappointed because Ms. Vandenberg and I had begun a fruitful dialogue on the matter last fall. At that time, . . . I had advised her that any attempted ordination would affect her relationship with the church.

"I believed her sincerity when she assured me that she was unaware of such a consequence, and did not want that to happen."

Vandenberg said Dolan requested the September 2005 meeting, and in a letter the month before it, he told her that "in the interim, you should not be exercising any liturgical or pastoral ministry in the Catholic church lest confusion or scandal arise among the people."

The next day, she said, she resigned her positions as a eucharistic minister and lector. "I cooperated with the archbishop," she said.

Vandenberg called her meeting with Dolan "very cordial . . . very respectful. . . . I told him about my call to ordination . . . and he was trying to give me some reasons to stay" in the church.

She was stung that Dolan made details of their talk public. "We both agreed that the meeting would be private," she said.

Dolan and Vandenberg disagree on what happened after the meeting.

"She promised she would confer with me about her next step," Dolan wrote to the parish. "In two subsequent letters, I have asked for her decision. Her regrettable participation in the protest gives me her unfortunate answer."

Vandenberg said that "wasn’t quite accurate."

"I did respond to him in a letter," she said. "And I said . . . I (was) still deciding what I should do."

She proceeds to say that only she can decide if she’s excommunicated, thankyouverymuch, Archbishop.

I must confess that I am quite confused by these people who are surprised their renegade faux "Catholic" ordinations have, you know, consequences. These are people who yap all the time about the Early Church and their supposed love of those simple Spirit-led days…are they completely dense? What version of "Early Church History" did they read? The People Magazine version, maybe? I mean, did they not read the parts in which unity in faith and practice was a foundational value to Christian identity? Did they skip the years in which sinners who separated themselves from the Body of Christ were you know…separated during years of penance until they were reconciled?

What kind of ecclesiology did these people, many of whom are Church professionals and professional volunteers, absorb? I could almost understand a little bit of confusion, but this massive denial and reconfiguration of the Church as a Body that I personally conform to me rather than conforming myself to it…especially on something kind of major like this – is mind-boggling.

Unless it’s all a pose. Which it well could be.