Women and THE Synod

We were so optimistic in the beginning. We rejoiced over the appointment of Sr. Nathalie Becquart to the Synod of Bishops and wondered what kind of expanded representation her presence portended. Then we looked at the responses and the “handbook” and we had second thoughts. The local bishop as the synthesizer was not good news for most of us. But some may be entertaining third thoughts right now.

NCR’s editorial this week is certainly there. Looking over the preparatory document gives them hope because “the synod ‘is intended to inspire people to dream about the church we are called to be, to make people’s hopes flourish, to stimulate trust, to bind up wounds, to weave new and deeper relationships, to learn from one another, to build bridges, to enlighten minds, warm hearts, and restore strength to our hands for our common mission.’” As they write, we can “use some of that.”

Can we depend on the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to make these aspirations happen, as NCR suggests? Oddly enough, I was thinking something like that after the Catholic Organizations for Renewal panel Wednesday night: “Can the Catholic Church Free Itself from Clericalism?” My “something like that” was actually this: THE Synod cannot ignore the question of women in the Church. Full inclusion and equality are our hopes and dreams; we want to trust in deeper, less contentious relationships among all who care about “our common mission” to live our faith lives and act in the world based on the teachings of Jesus.

I was thinking that Vatican II and the Synod on the Amazon were two genuinely Spirit-filled events. Neither has been implemented to its full potential, but each supported our aspirations. Even only Bishops voting at Vatican II (under the influence of periti and advisors and a few women observers, as we well know) made their conclusions a blueprint for far more change than anyone ever anticipated. The more diverse and inclusive assembly of those who serve and are served in the Amazon did what the Synodal process intended: expressed their real hopes and dreams in a document that relied on their trusting relationships.

I was thinking that if the Spirit is truly present in THE Synod women will not be ignored. We may not get all we want, but things will start moving for the better. I asked my groups and my long list of correspondents what they thought of the panel’s conversation, and one replied: “I believe Pope Francis has opened a door, but many more Catholics have to pass through the door to make a new vision of church a reality.” I liked the parallel with Pope John’s opening the windows at Vatican II; the open door is an even larger welcoming.

You can view the COR panel on YouTube at the link above, but I feel I owe you an explanation of my third-thought optimism. I am thinking today, as I said above, that women are the issue that the church has to address in a formal way, and that we in the Women’s Ordination movement have put it on the agenda. Most recently, the British group, Root and Branch, showed how a synod should be done, but we and our allies have been speaking out for a long time.

Why would women priests be central to the question of “freeing” the church from clericalism? Maybe it was a set-up to put a former Bishop of Roman Catholic WomenPriests on the program, but the other two speakers – men – put the all-male clergy on their initial lists of problems, and in the discussion affirmed the “prophetic” role of RCWP.

Andrea Johnson is that RCWP Bishop, and “showed that much is happening with small groups with a new vision of being church,” according to one of my correspondents. I was most impressed with her stating that we have a “canonically-mandated hierarchy…with canonical consequences for disobedience.” That’s what Francis codified this year. So much for Synodality, I say. Johnson’s historical starting point was the Roman imposition of a hierarchical structure on the small Christian communities of the early church.

James Carroll’s 2019 article in The Atlantic on abolishing the priesthood was the spark that inspired COR to organize this conversation. Carroll returned the favor by acknowledging the COR groups as a “vanguard” leading the church to a new future. His particular emphasis was on democracy and the church’s denial of human rights, as in the UN Declaration. Catholic themes are pervasive in Carroll’s many books of fiction and non, including his most recent, The Truth at the Heart of the Lie, which grew out of that article. He took on Scriptural literalism (the most common argument against women’s ordination), and suggested that Vatican II made change a mandatory requirement to be church.

Richard Gaillardetz looked at Vatican II as well. Chair of the Theology Department at Boston College, he deplored the subsequent marginalization of primacy of conscience and the shift of oversight to the Curia. His history began with the priesthood of all the Baptized. I found especially interesting his identification of the “hyper-interiority” of seminaries in recent years as a barrier to “new ecclesial relationships.” THE Synod can be the way for the church to travel together to those new relationships, he argued, beginning at the local level. A correspondent wrote, “I felt that Richard Gaillardetz was challenged to grow in new ways from what he called his ‘centrist position.’ But he also challenged others to take into account the ‘catholic’ extension/connection of peoples in other cultures and other parts of the world.”

This gets at what I thought was best about this conversation among committed people. All had a clear sense of their different ideas about the church – as those might who are coming into a Synod. The discussion brought out those differences but some surprising shared ideas as well, like the election of bishops and the “full inclusion of women,” as Gaillardetz phrased it. There were a few moments of tension Challenging questions were grouped together from those in a chat room accessible to the nearly 500 listeners, such as clericalism in RCWP and the need for leadership in a universal church vs. the failure of accountability among those leaders now.

What ever made you so optimistic, you might ask? I felt that in THE Synod those who have been hiding their belief in women’s equality because they feared censure or losing their jobs or going to hell – who knows what? – might be willing to tell their truth. And I hope that that might be true for LGBTQ people, especially trans people, who the Pope has such difficulty understanding. All panelists stressed the need for the laity and those on the margins – or those who have left entirely – to participate in the Synod conversations. If they are as intelligent and thoughtful as this one, I will be happy to attend.