[2] In 1994, Pope John Paul II declared in the apostolic letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis that "the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women".
She grew up in Linz with religious parents and attended a Roman Catholic school run by the Holy Cross Sisters.
During her final year of study, she was working at a school for special needs children where she met a divorcee whom she fell in love with.
Gradually, she became bolder and, although she was not an ordained minister, she began to celebrate Mass with friends and perform other priestly functions.
On 21 December 2002, after refusing to acknowledge the Vatican decree declaring these ordinations void, she and the others incurred excommunication.
[9] At a Sunday Mass on 28 June 2009, Mayr-Lumetzberger was refused communion by Bishop Ludwig Schwarz at the Parish of St. Peter in Linz because of her excommunication.