Vatican body rejects female deacons but says matter not final
A new summary text of nearly 10 years of Vatican work into whether women can access Holy Orders has now been published.
(Pelican+) — The Vatican’s long awaited study on female deacons reported Thursday that it is impossible to admit women to the sacrament of Holy Orders, but bizarrely tried to simultaneously claim that a “definitive judgement” on this could not yet be formed.
Published without warning online, the Vatican presented the findings of the second commission formed to study the question of the female diaconate. Led by Cardinal Giuseppe Petrocchi, the commission was convened upon the request of Pope Francis in 2020, after the initial 2016 commission’s work petered out.
The crucial passage from his summary reads:
“The status quaestionis of historical research and theological investigation, as well as their mutual implications, rules out the possibility of moving in the direction of admitting women to the diaconate understood as a degree of the sacrament of Holy Orders. In light of Sacred Scripture, Tradition, and the Church’s Magisterium, this assessment is strongly maintained, although it does not at present allow for a definitive judgment to be formulated, as is the case with priestly ordination.”
This is a mixed bag. One the one hand the first line clearly reflects the teaching of the Church of a male only priesthood, and that the sacrament of Holy Orders is reserved solely for men.
But the second line undermines the one which went just before it, when it reads that “it does not at present allow for a definitive judgment to be formulated, as is the case with priestly ordination.”
Petrocchi and his commission cite Scripture, Sacred Tradition and the unchanging Magisterium as all agreeing women cannot be ordained. If this is not definitive, then the Church has erred for 2,000 years.
Petrocchi’s summary also seems to casually downplay the definitive judgement of the Magisterium and treat the question as an open one, whilst at the same time saying that ultimately it is the Magisterium who will have the final say on the topic:
“Therefore on issues relating to the ordination of women as deacons remain open to further theological and pastoral study, while maintaining the principle of ‘communio hierarchica,’ which assigns the final decision on these issues to the Magisterium of the Church, as an authoritative response to questions present in some sectors of the People of God.”
The Catholic Church teaches that the sacrament of Holy Orders is reserved to men only and is in three degrees: bishop, priest, and deacon.
Just a few decades ago the Church’s unchanging teaching was outlined anew by Pope John Paul II in his 1994 Apostolic Letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. “I declare that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful,” he said.
To continue reading this correspondent’s in-depth analysis of the Vatican text find the full article at Pelican+ where it was originally published.
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