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| | Roman Catholic Church - Gurupedia |
 | | Three other Roman Catholic bishops use the title Patriarch, the Patriarchs of Venice, Lisbon, and the West Indies, but they are not patriarchs in the strict sense, that is the head of a church, and are thus honorary patriarchs. |
 | | The historic Roman Catholic position (as well as that of the Orthodox and other ancient churches), is that women cannot be priests or bishops, because priests and bishops are successors to the Apostles, and that in the sacrifice of the Eucharist the priest acts in representation of Christ. |
 | | Within Roman Catholicism itself, debate on the subject now focuses on whether this statement is meant to invoke extraordinary papal infallibility (see the concept of the extraordinary magisterium) and raise the rule that women cannot be Roman Catholic priests to the level of an irreformable dogma of the Roman Catholic Church. |
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