COMMENDING PHOEBE The discussion of female deacons should not forestall a much-needed discussion about promoting laywomen, and laymen, to leadership roles with real decision-making authority.
CATHOLIC WOMEN; GRACIOUS TO A FAULT What do women want from the Church? That’s a good and important question. And an international gathering of women this past Tuesday at the Vatican could have been a place to find some honest answers.
TAKE THESE GIFTS The numbers show advancement in leadership—but not enough. Much more can and should be done to ensure that women have meaningful leadership roles in the church today.
THE BIBLE THROUGH HER EYES Scripture scholar Barbara Reid says women have something powerful to offer when interpreting the Bible.
UNEXPECTED WOMEN A new series of essays from U.S. Catholic Magazine highlights the voices of daring, persistent, stubborn, and defiant Catholic women.
WHAT WOMEN WANT It’s fair to say that no one in the hierarchy has publicly asked such a question of women, who make up more than half of the church’s baptized members.
WOMEN & THE DIACONATE The Catholic Church now has a stronger theology of women deacons than it did during the time of Paul VI, but the political conditions for such a development are now less auspicious.
THE BRONX IS BURNING Not with arson or violence, but with the love of God and the prayers of his faithful ones. What women religious can teach us about the Church.
WOMEN AND THE DIACONATE Jesus knew all too well that the testimony of women would have been received as “nonsense”, but he chose them all the same for a primordial task of witness in the Church and to enlighten the apostles themselves.
WHICH CATHOLIC WOMEN INSPIRE YOU? Inspirational Catholic women are everywhere. Just look around for women to follow. When asked to define what it means to be an inspirational Catholic woman, readers commonly mentioned living the gospel, working for peace and justice, and leading through action.
HOW LAYWOMEN CHANGED THE CHURCH AFTER VATICAN II Catholic women changed, and they changed themselves, even if the church may not have noticed this. Women undertook these conversations when they weren’t supposed to, when they were supposed to let the church tell them who they were.
THE ROLE OF WOMEN IN THE CHURCH [Despite] women being appointed to important roles in the Roman Curia and in dioceses around the world... there are still many obstacles to overcoming the Church’s disparity in leadership.
HERE BEGINS THE REVOLUTION? The Vatican's admittance that the teaching on women's ordination is not a consistently held belief among Catholics reveals a spirit of openness and accountability to the people of God.
THE SYNOD, THE POPE AND THE ORDINATION OF WOMEN Allowing women only in management and not in ministry ignores church history. The church is dangerously close to losing even more members when it seems to state that women cannot image Christ. That is not a good stance for the Vatican.
IS THERE ROOM IN THE TENT? As the Church prepares for the next phase of the Synod on Synodality, one of the most pressing issues is the relationship between women and the Church, combined with the problem of clericalism.