04/10/2026
The United Holy Caribbean Apostolic Church
“Daughters of Jethro”
An Apostolic Missive On The Canonical Invalidity of The Argument Against The Ordination of Women
8th April 2026 AD
“Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came and drew water and filled the troughs to water their father 's flock. The shepherds came and drove them away, but Moses stood up and saved them, and watered their flock.”
~ Exodus 2:16-17
+Trevor ELIHU, a son of God Most High by my faith in His power, Metropolitan of Port-of-Spain and Patriarch of all the West-Indies by the grace, decree, and favor of God and those abroad submitted to this Apostolic See, to you the believers in Christ Jesus our Lord scattered abroad in the United States of America, Canada, England, the great continent of Africa, the Caribbean Sea, and the Catholic Church the world over:
Grace, peace, love, and prosperity to you all.
Christ is Risen!
He is Risen Indeed! Alleluia!
It is with a heavy heart and yet a great joy that I write this missive to you. As Easter Sunday has passed and we reflect on the resurrection of the King of kings, I also reflect on the most recent events and our current existence within the Church. The Church of England recently enthroned Sarah Mullaly as the 106th Archbishop of Canterbury. Sarah Mullaly, a woman. Sarah Mullaly, the former “Bishop of London” - a see in the Church of England which ranks third behind the “Archbishops of Canterbury and York”. Sarah Mullaly, a wife.
While I do not agree with her enthronement and consecration, it is not for the same reasons as others have been so bold to speak about. Her stance of anglicanism which includes a shift away from various sacraments, proper Christian theology, and the acceptance of homosexuality are doctrines not compatible with the faith once delivered unto the saints. These are the arguments that I raised concerning her election and consecration in October of 2025 ad in my missive entitled “Honor Thy Mother”: An Archpastoral Missive on Heresy of The Church of England & The Hypocrisy of The Hierarchs of The Catholic Churches; these issues remain today.
The argument of her being a woman is not the hindrance to her episcopacy. For years we the Caribbean Apostolic Church have advocated for the ordination of women not as an act of “civil rights”, nor as a “feminist movement” participant. Both paradigms are in fact heretical attempts to speak in favor of the ordination of women. As Patriarch of the West-Indies, I uphold the standing that the ordination of women stands firm within the sacramental theology of the one holy catholic apostolic church as a perpetual truth.
While many will state that such was never spoken by the apostolic fathers, I return the statement with the reply that “absence of mention does not mean absence of presence”. The Ecumenical Councils were theologically truth and canonically right by the All-Holy Spirit before the foundations of the world, not when they were spoken into time and space by men. These treasures were hidden in God who is Living Truth, awaiting the day when men would mine them and present these gems of truth within the royal diadems and pectorals of the bishops who taught them, seated as kings and priests, for as it is written in Proverbs 25:2 “it is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honor of kings is to search out a matter”, and again in 1st Corinthians 2:7 “But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory”, and again in 1st Corinthians 4:5 “judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God”.
I am not so ignorant or arrogant to say in heretical gnosticism that these things are hidden from all. We must be clear in that the truth is blinded from the eyes of men who would already choose to reject it before it is properly sown into their hearts. If you chose a lie, would not God leave you to it for the good of others and even the grace and mercy to yourself? Was it not Saint Paul the Apostle who told the Church “for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness”? Likewise, there are those who are simply not ready for the truth of the matter, for it is too weighty a matter for their usual upbringing.
Not all truths are revealed to all people at the same times. Saint John Chrysostom was considered one of the most celebrated saints in all of Christianity. Are people ready to embrace the fact that he and Mar Nestorius of Constantinople share a mirror image not as to say that one is false and the other true, but that both have the same sources and same outlooks. Both came from the Church of Antioch and were popular priest who’s preaching was hailed by all in their day. Why would this be a surprise? After all, Mar Nestorius came up under the Antiochian teachings of Saints Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia, meanwhile Saint Diodore of Tarsus instructed John Chrysostom in the faith, and Saint Theodore of Mopsuestia was his good friend and fellow student, both being ordained priests together. Both Nestorius and John were elected Archbishop of Constantinople because they were popular preachers. Both became enemies of the state and the Church when they attacked the heresies of their day, resulting in the combined efforts of both heretics and “orthodox catholic” bishops plotting against them. Both were summoned to apologize to a synod hosted by their enemy the Pope of Alexandria, when in fact the synod was originally scheduled and called to call into question the acts of their enemy, the Pope of Alexandria. Both refused to attend said synod, being deposed based upon trumped up charges in their absence.
Are people such as the Monophysites ready to address the fact that they celebrate John Chrysostom as a saint even though his Christological definitions would mirror that of Mar Nestorius of Constantinople, Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia? Therefore, men like Saints Paul the Apostle and Ignatius of Antioch would teach that there are things that men are simply not ready for, and thus such knowledge would choke the believers. We are judged by what we know in Christ and held accountable for what the All-Holy Spirit reveals to us, and by God’s grace He allows ignorance on many matters, including this.
Some, however, speak as though they possess perfectly knowledge of the ecclesiastical formation of the Church, especially when discussing this topic. Many dare to declare a thing a heresy by the will of the Trinity and the Church when the Church has not spoken such ever.
Imagine the catechumen who just learned the definitions of certain words a month or a year ago speaking and teaching the mysteries of the Church! Imagine the new canon law students – a class that very few ever consider taking – speaking on all things canonical! Many of these are the voices who have raised the arguments against the ordination of women to the level of declaring that churches that ordain women to the episcopal, presbyterial, or even diaconate roles have no claim to holy orders or apostolic succession. From the local independent “bishops” – many of which lack a valid argument for their own holy orders – attempting to quote and agree with the unvetted statements of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI of Elder Rome that the Church has no power to ordain women. Some have boldly stated that the entities that perform the acts are not churches in the sacramental and canonical sense.
From what canonical foundation do these arguments stand on? Even the Popes of Rome did not deny the validity of the Old Catholic Union of Utrecht in the midst of their consecration of women as deacons, priests, and bishops. Their catholicity and the validity of their sacraments are fully acknowledged without hesitation. So again, what canonical foundation do these arguments stand on? Is it based upon sacramental theology? Then let us talk in line with sacramental theology.
The several thousand local and ecumenical councils held within the holy catholic apostolic church have never once denied the rite of ordination to women though ordinations were not performed outright and openly throughout most of these Christian centuries. The lack of ordinations does not mean the theological inability and impossibility to perform such. Absence of mention does not equal absence of presence. The Gentiles were not physically within the Church until they were baptized, but they were in the Church when God foreordained them to be. The women were not ordained to their posts because those women were not candidates for said posts. They were as unqualified to the posts as other men beside them were. Just as Justus was not chosen to be the 12th Apostle, but Saint Matthias, these women were not chosen for the episcopacy, presbytery, or diaconate in their time and day. With that said, when a bishop i chosen, you must speak to who was chosen by God to lead said God-created diocese. If a woman is chosen, are you saying that the diocese is not a diocese, or that the Holy Synod chose wrong? If the synod chose wrong, then who do you count to be the rightful holder of the diocese? Most cannot speak about this matter. If the diocese is not a diocese at all, what did you use to determine and disqualify it as a Church? I wrote the following concerning the sacraments of our Church in August of 2015 ad and encourage you all to read and judge the words for yourselves:
“Our clergy consist of Bishops, Apostles, Presbyters, and Deacons. The Presbyters are made up of Prophets, Pastors, Teachers, and Evangelists. The sacramental ministry shall be fulfilled by all clergy with exception to the Eucharistic ministry, which shall be fulfilled by the Apostles, Bishop, and Presbyters. There is no true sacrament that can be done outside of the Church, who is the body of Christ; there is no true sacrament that can be regarded apart from the leaders of the Church, which are the eyes, ears, mind, and tongue of God; there is no true sacrament that can be valid apart from the apostolic and episcopal authority, which stand steadfast as Christ commanded them, which have the watch and charge over your souls. Therefore, the sheep of God’s flock are to be subject to their apostles just as they are subject to the words of the Scriptures, subject to their bishop as though they were subject to the Father, be subject to their elders according to the commandment to “honor thy father and thy mother that it may be long and well with your days”, and be subject to their deacons who stands as their servant to free the hands of the bishop, to ease the hands of the people as Christ did for us all.
As a Church, we have decided to continue to permit the married episcopacy to work within our walls as first established within the Church by the first Apostles, for it benefits us pastorally. We have seen where some Eastern Orthodox, Anglicans and Old Catholics, and various Protestant Churches adopting the married episcopacy, and some having it from their very beginning; we have likewise seen other Eastern Orthodox and various Catholic jurisdictions speak about adopting it yet not stepping towards such hesitating so not to anger the rest. We firmly believe that if it did not hinder the Apostles who died as brave martyrs, then surely it will be no hindrance for us today. We stand firm likewise in the acceptance of the ordination of women to all positions of holy orders, for this is the will of God. One cannot say that the Church has “fathers” as presbyters and not mothers. The nun for the Catholic Church has indeed been long considered a Church Mother, but has she truly? Does the woman hold the same parental authority as a father over her children? If she truly is a parent, then she must sacramentally stand side by side in all things with the Church Fathers. If the woman cannot stand sacramentally equal, then we are truly shamed and not redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, but still under the curse. Before the Great Fall, the man and woman stood equally, “male and female created He them, and called them Adam” according to the words of Moses the great Prophet and Law Giver. The curse was to set her subservient to the man, in a position that she never naturally held before. Likewise, this same Moses spoke saying “thus saith the Lord, honor thy Father and they Mother, that it may be long and well with your days”. We preach about the virtuous woman using Proverbs chapter thirty-one, yet if on looks, they shall see the earliest typology of the presbytera and even the episcopa at work in full authority in this chapter. Was it not the Church Fathers themselves who understood that we are sacramentally and spiritually female, seeing that “no man can have God as their father without having the Church as their Mother”? Is this to say that homosexuality reigns? Heavens forbid, no! It is a grave sin for Christians to be homosexual, but not a sin to be a woman. Therefore, we reject a homosexual Clergy, but accept a motherly figure as a Presbytera as Priscilla and Chloe, Episcopa as Brigid and Theodora, and Apostle as Junia, all women who the Church universally salutes. How can any argue against our orders, yet validate and hide child rapists, or hide and even sanction homosexuals, or schismatics, or the simonistic, or those who would bond with false doctrines from false religions, or anything else that would present Christ as defiled in the eyes of men? Our women stand as holy mothers to the children of God, and so this issue shall remain closed for all discussions until Jesus comes. They are no more the exception to the rule as we men are, for we are all washed clean and born again by the same blood of the lamb in the same waters and empowered by the same All-Holy Ghost to be parents of the same flock of God.”
Is this Gnosticism? Is this some form of wisdom hidden from all, as if I alone and those with me are wise in God? If I alone understood this, then I could not claim to have been befriended by and be in line with the great cloud of witnesses. All clouds are recently formed and shaped, though water has always been since the days of the creation of the earth by the Father through the Son. Likewise, the great cloud of witnesses has not always looked the same, for not all have been members of the great cloud of wisdom and witness, though the water of the Word and the Spirit moved among and through the Church, watering us gently. As the great clouds of water mysteriously blow from east to west and back, so it is that the Spirit of God moves among the cloud of witnesses from the Eastern and West Churches. As we cannot ignore the sounds of thunder and the voice of the waters raining, so it is we cannot ignore the sound of wisdom raining from these clouds speaking of the ordination of women. You say “it is but a small amount and a cloud”? I say that it was a small cloud that the holy prophet Elijah seen in the Godly weather forecast that caused a downpour that would water the earth ending a two and a half year drought. A small cloud produced so much by God’s command!
By grace and God’s command, His Eminence José da Cruz Cardinal Policarpo, the reposed Patriarch of Lisbon (Memory Eternal) rained upon us what water he held, saying in his observance “women’s ordination will happen when God wants it”, that “theologically there is no fundamental obstacle. We could say there’s a tradition, because it’s never been done”, and more before being immediately pressured by the Vatican. With his episcopal motto being “through obedience, to freedom”, meaning that through obedience to God, we will gain freedom from sin and death and gain eternal life, the reposed Patriarch of Lisbon gave witness and rained upon us.
By grace and God’s command, His Eminence Jean-Claude Hollerich, the Cardinal-Priest and Archbishop of Luxembourg, the former general relator of the Synod on Synodality, has publicly called for the ordination of women, declaring “I cannot imagine in the long run how a Church can survive if half of the people of God suffers because they have no access to ordained ministry”. His Eminence serves as the Cardinal-Priest of San Giovanni Crisostomo a Monte Sacro Alto, a church in Rome named in honor of Saint John Chrysostom.
Is this a coincidence? Nothing is coincidental in God, for by grace and God’s command Saint John Chrysostom, the sainted Archbishop of Constantinople had Saint Olympias (Olympiada) the Deaconess of Constantinople as his close confidant, along with the other deaconesses Pentadia, Proklia and Salbina by his side. Even further, Saint John Chrysostom spoke of Saint Junia the Apostle, co-founder of the ancient Church of Panonia saying “’Greet Andronicus and Junia . . . distinguished among the apostles.’ To be apostles is a great thing, but to be distinguished among them—consider what an extraordinary accolade that is! They were distinguished because of their works and because of their upright deeds. Indeed, how great was the wisdom of this woman that she was thought worthy of being called an apostle!”
By grace and God’s command Saint Nectarios the Metropolitan of Aegina in the Church of Alexandria ordained two nuns as deaconesses in 1911 ad using the ancient Byzantine rite to restore this traditional localized ministry. These women served at the altar with His Eminence and ministered to all he sent them to, especially in monasteries. As the waters of the clouds cling to one another, Saint Nectarios holds hands with Metropolitan Serafim of Zimbabwe who, by holy wisdom and calling, ordained the Reverend Sister Angelic Molen a Deaconess for the Church of Alexandria.
By grace and God’s command, Saint Mel of Ardagh, the disciple and nephew of Saint Patrick of Ireland and son of Saint Darerca “the mother of many saints”, consecrated Saint Brigid Abbess and first Bishop of Kildare. With his own words, Saint Mel said “Come, O holy Brigit, that a veil may be sained on thy head before the other virgins.” When Saint Maceaith his brother who served as the concelebrating bishop present contested this, saying that a bishop’s order should not be conferred on a woman, Saint Mel, full of the Spirit, replied “No power have I in this matter. That dignity hath been given by God unto Brigit, beyond every (other) woman.” The see of Kildare would have a woman as its first bishop, and the succession of Kildare would last until the 1100s when the Roman Catholics pushed their infamous takeover of the sees of the region.
And what more can be said? For the time would not permit me to mention the likes of His Eminence Kallistos Ware the reposed titular Metropolitan of Diokleia under the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople who wrote several articles on the matter said that it should be considered “an open question” for the Orthodox Church to be approached “with an open mind and an open heart”, and reminded us that the priest stands not only “In Persona Christi, but “In Persona Ecclesia”, or of His Eminence Anthony Bloom, the Russian Orthodox Metropolitan of the diocese of Sourozh (a diocese covering the islands of Great Britain and Ireland) and Dr. Elisabeth Behr-Sigel who together taught saying “from the ontological equality of men and women, we can conclude that both men and women can be priests.”
Time will not permit me to go in deeper to discuss the Churches of Armenia and their ancient and continuous history of archdeaconesses, the holy women Amma Theodora, Amma Thekia, and Amma Catherine who all served as the episcopa (female bishop) of their region, Amma Apollonia, Amma Doritha, and Amma Domnika who all served as deaconesses, and the list goes one. As our God and Saviour Jesus Christ has risen from the dead, defeating Death by death, we must rise from the graveyard of the mind and come into the newness in and of Christ. When He returns, we shall all be changed and be judged for our services. Our women shall be judged for their work in service to the Lord, being the shepherds of the flocks.
As Saint Moses the Great Lawgiver met his bride Zipporah the daughter of Jethro, the priest of Midian who served her father as a shepherdess, so the Lord will meet with His bride, the shepherds and shepherdesses of the flock of God. As it was well with God for Zipporah to circumcise her son when Moses failed to do so, so it is that the shepherdesses do well to serve the sacraments to the children of God when shepherds fail to minister accordingly. And if Moses fought against the wicked shepherds who hindered Jethro’s daughter’s from watering their flock and were defeated by him alone, we would do well to stand clear and let the daughters the shepherdesses serve the congregations and dioceses in their ordained places, lest we find ourselves at war with Christ their Groom.
Written with all Apostolic authority on this, the 8th day of April, in the year of our Lord two thousand and twenty-six, the twelfth year of my patriarchate.
Be blessed, speak blessed, to be a blessing, & speak a blessing,
Your Servant, A Defender of the Faith,
+Trevor ‘Elihu’ Greene JCD, DD
Metropolitan Archbishop of Port of Spain City and Patriarch of the West-Indies, The United Holy Caribbean Apostolic Church
President of The Worldwide Communion of Catholic Apostolic Churches
