In may Pope Francis received an hour’s grilling from the International Union of Superiors General and was asked if he would establish “an official commission to study the question” of whether women could be admitted to the diaconate. He replied: “I accept. It would be useful for the Church to clarify this question. I agree.”
The Pope acted promptly and last week released the names of the six women and seven men appointed to the commission.
Once the news was released, the wider world began to ask the inevitable: is the Pope paving the way for deaconesses or even women priests? Pope Francis has insisted that he is not and that the media is spinning the story. During a flight to Armenia in June, he told journalists: “They said: ‘The Church opens the door to deaconesses.’ Really? I am a bit angry because this is not telling the truth of things.”
So how significant is the Pope’s commission? If its purpose is not to introduce female deacons, then why hold it at all?
Fr James Martin SJ, author of Jesus: A Pilgrimage, says the commission’s significance is “immense”. He told the Herald: “It has been asked to examine the controverted history of women deacons in the Church which, quite naturally, raises questions about possible ordination to the diaconate for women today. That is, if the commission judges the historical evidence as supporting the historicity of the female diaconate, it would naturally present the Pope with an argument for including women in what would be an ancient ministry. The question would be: ‘If then, why not now?’”
The commission’s composition should offer some idea of what sort of conclusions it will reach. Although some nominees have raised eyebrows among conservatives, the committee appears to be pretty evenly balanced overall.
While the Pope has named more conservative-minded members such as Fr Robert Dodaro, who edited a book arguing against Cardinal Kasper’s proposal on Communion for the divorced and remarried, committee members also include those who support, or who at least seem sympathetic to, the ordination of female deacons.
Theologian Phyllis Zagano of Hofstra University is a notable member of the committee. She said recently: “Many major scholars, many of them now dead, have opined that women were in the past truly ordained, and that given the cultural conditions today, there is no activity, task or duty of a male deacon that cannot really be performed by a female deacon.”
But she told the Herald: “I think anyone who argues that restoring women to the ordained diaconate paves the way for the innovation of women priests not only seriously ignores history and tradition, but does not agree with the teachings of the Church.”
It is significant that the Pope has created the commission so soon after his predecessors addressed the question. In 2001 a commission charged with looking into the term “deaconess” concluded that there was no basis for ordaining women to the role.
Vatican analyst Fr Mark Drew observed: “Whether he wants to or not, Francis is sending the signal that the decisions of his two immediate predecessors cannot be trusted and that they are effectively up for grabs. A commission established by Wojtyła or Ratzinger was bound to be weighted in favour of the status quo, it would seem, and only Bergoglio can be relied upon for an honest appraisal and an impartial judgment of the historical and theological facts. He represents openness and honesty; they represent obscurantism and closed-mindedness – this might be thought by some to be the implication. That, whether or not Francis intended it, is the impression given by re-opening the question so soon.”
But papal biographer, Paul Vallely said that Pope Francis’s understanding went beyond his predecessors’.
He said: “This Pope understands the frustrations which many modern women have with the Church in a way which goes beyond the instincts of B16 or JP2. But if he understands the questions he also knows he does not have the answers. The elevation of the feast of Mary Magdalen was a key indicator of his instincts. So was increasing the number of women on the International Theological Commission.”
In setting up his latest commission Francis said it would be “useful” to clarify a question of history. But given the competing voices in the commission, that clarity may remain elusive.
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