Will the Synod Benefit Women?

Yes, I say. I am going to trust the outcome regarding the ordination of women as deacons or as priests. How can I say that?

First, Germany. The church there is in the midst of a “Synodal Path,” on which representatives of the clergy and the laity gather to discuss “power and checks and balances,” “sexual morality,” “the priestly lifestyle,” and “women’s place in the Church.” The second session ended October 2 but I found only one specific result: 83% in favor of “power checks and balances,” positive if not remarkable.  I assume that the new chairman of the German bishops’ commission for faith, Bishop Franz-Josef Overbeck, endorsed it; he more notably endorsed women’s ordination. “For people with the deep conviction of the equality of all human beings, the current approach to church ministries and access to them is factually no longer comprehensible,” he said, and he is not the only German bishop to take such a position. 

One of those sliding quite close is Bishop Georg Bätzing of Limburg:

Texts have been debated that are not just texts but dreams put into words of how we want to change the Church in Germany: a Church that is participatory, gender-just and walking this path with the people of God.

While Maria 1.0, a “conservative” women’s organization, worries that the left wing has already caused a schism – as does Pope Francis, not as explicitly – others at the session were surprised by “the fair debates and very constructive discussions.” A group that includes bishops has an honest and calm discussion of women’s ordination is remarkable to me. 

Second, Australia. The Plenary Council of Australia began October 4. The agenda is summarized by The Tablet:

how the Church can move forward after the damning findings of a child sex abuse royal commission, shrinking church attendances, a shortage of priests and how to increase the role of women.

Sound familiar? 262 representatives are considering these questions, but 222,000 people gave input in the preparatory processes and generated 17,500 submissions to answer the question, “What do you think God is asking of us at this time?”

Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge on the ABC [Australian] answered with “The episcopate as autocracy has got to go,” but the most substantive piece I find is by Tracy McEwan and Patricia Gemmell.

In arguing for women preachers, they note that “In Germany, the [progressive] grassroots movement Maria 2.0 is calling for women’s ordination, a gender equitable Church and a re-examination of the scandal of clerical abuse,” in contrast to Maria 1.0, above. The Council document says: “the perceived underrepresentation of women in formal leadership and decision-making roles is a challenging issue for many in Australia;” the authors find that “the inequality is not ‘perceived,’ it is stark.” Parramatta Bishop Vincent Long endorses the weekly streamed Australian Women Preach initiative:

The Church cannot have a better future if it does not listen to women’s voices, wisdom and insight. So long as we continue to make women invisible and inferior in the Church’s language, liturgy, theology and law, we impoverish ourselves.

The Council puts this episcopal endorsement of the Grail project before the public eye, not a bad outcome. 

Third, visible women. From the choir of young women behind the clerics at the opening of the German Synodal Path to French Sister Nathalie Becquart’s role as one of the undersecretaries of the Vatican Synod itself, women are seen. Becquart took the opportunity of a behind-the-scenes interview at Synod headquarters to comment on the Sauve report on sex abuse in France: “It is clear that synodality must lead us out of the clerical culture that has allowed abuse.”

Kerry Robinson of the Leadership Roundtable struck a similar theme:

Clericalism is at its most pernicious when it excludes, invalidates, or dismisses the voices of laity. The opposite of clericalism is co-responsibility — lay, religious, and ordained leaders working together to advance the mission of the church.

I always get a little scared when I am asked to be responsible for something I feel others are much more responsible for, but I’m willing to hear those who often seem to be reinforcing the current system endorsing changes to it.  

Becquart highlights the need to listen “to everyone” and “to the Holy Spirit.” Is she predicting the future when she says: “the synodal process can be a bit disruptive, precisely because not everything is ‘mapped out in advance’” – or is she issuing us a call to action? 

The only American member of the Synod staff is Marie Kolbe Zamora, a Franciscan of Christian Charity Sister from Green Bay, Wisconsin. She speaks five languages, so we are sure to see a lot of her in press conferences, as well as the three other women in the US delegation: Mercy Srs. Marie Mechtild Wasserthal and Mary Simone Haakansson, and U.S. bishops’ conference representative Joanna Kohorst. 

Already, Dominican Sr. Donna Ciangio, chancellor of the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, addressed the opening ceremonies in a video presentation, saying that people who have left the Catholic faith must also be listened to. How much change is that?

Finally, the whole church. Here’s Pope Francis at the opening ceremonies; just remember that “encounter, listen, discern” is the new “observe, judge, act” of so many movements. Also remember Cardinal Dearden and the NCCB [US Bishops] Call to Action 1976 conference and its great hopes, eventually dashed, a sobering reminder that “encounter, listen, discern” is really hard. Yet this document formed the platform of Call to Action-USA and eventually Catholic Organizations for Renewal. Raising ideas in open forum is never a bad idea.

In Commonweal, Massimo Faggioili riffs on what “the people” means and has meant in the church; it’s not encouraging if your image is true representation.

Yet, Christopher Lamb concludes his Tablet piece on the opening with “a significant intervention” by Cardinal Mario Grech, the secretary Becquart is under. He floated the idea that the final document produced by the Synod in Rome could be sent back to local churches for the “consent” of Catholics across the world, and then presented to Francis. This is similar to what happened with the Amazon report; though the Pope eventually wrote his own conclusions, he did not exactly invalidate the conclusions of the assembly. The opportunity to be “cafeteria Catholics” comes to my mind immediately, but I will stay open to the Spirit. Lamb says:

The proposed changes point to an emerging model of the Church that is permanently synodal, and where ordinary Catholics, priests and bishops share joint responsibility for the future mission.

There’s that “co-responsibility” again, but I got involved in women’s ordination in order to save the Church from the misogynists. Maybe I’m being called to that again—with a lot more people. And that benefits women.