Nancy Pelosi has appointed a woman to be the Chaplain of the United States House of Representatives, making her the first woman to serve in this role.
I was curious about this whole thing so I looked up more information. The last two chaplains have been Catholic priests. Prior to these there had never been a Catholic in this position, the role instead being filled by various types of Protestants, mostly Presbyterian, Methodist, and Baptist. 52 men have held this position and 0 women.
Since this position has been predominated by Protestants, I guess there is nothing stopping them from naming a woman since many of these denominations have accepted female clergy in their ranks for some time now. Obviously if this was an exclusively Catholic chaplain, it would have to be a man, as only Catholic men can truly be chaplains.
I'm sure she had no other choice really. In this age of political correctness, to appoint a male, especially a white man to this position would be criticized and politicians like her don't want to rock that boat. I know nothing of Margaret Kibben as such so I cannot comment on her qualifications only to say in a Catholic context that only men should be given such roles.
Anyway, just saw that and wanted to point out a few things.
You can get more information from the Wikipedia article here.
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