A Catholic woman who regularly celebrates Mass in her Dublin home has been warned by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin that she could face excommunication. Soline Humbert, who believes she has a vocation to the priesthood, insisted, however, that Archbishop Martin did not mean the warning as a threat.
In September 2004 she met Archbishop Martin to discuss the issue of women priests and her own situation. "He was extremely courteous and really listened," she recalled.
"Then he said that in conscience he had to warn me I was risking excommunication. It did not come across as threatening, and of course he is right from where the rules of the church are [ on women priests]," she said.
Ms Humbert, who is French and has been living in Ireland for 33 years since arriving here as a student at Trinity College in the 1970s, is featured in tonight's Last Judgement programme on RTÉ 1 television at 10.15pm.
It addresses the issue of women priests and shows Ms Humbert celebrating the Eucharist in her home. She speaks on the programme of her unhappy dealings with a former papal nuncio to Ireland, Archbishop Emmanuele Gerada.
She recalled that he told her when she requested a meeting with the pope to discuss the women priests issue: "The pope does not meet people like you."
When she asked the nuncio why he did not respond to any of her letters, he said, "Your letters do not deserve reply."
Archbishop Gerada, previously papal nuncio to El Salvador, had, while there, described Archbishop Oscar Romero as irresponsible, imprudent and inconsistent for standing up to the military authorities on human rights abuses.
Archbishop Romero was murdered some years later while celebrating Mass in San Salvador.
Tonight's programme includes footage of police being called when a woman in clerical dress walked towards St Peter's Square in Rome. The Vatican later withdrew its permission for the crew to film in the square.
The programme also features other devout Catholic women who believe there should be women priests in the church. They include Dr Mary Malone, a former professor of theology who had been a nun for 17 years.
She points out that "women were foundational figures in the early church" and there had been women deacons "for almost 1,000 years".
