Groups continue to hope for ordination of women to priesthood

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This article was published 03/05/2025 (202 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s been almost two weeks since Pope Francis died. Accolades and appreciation have been expressed for his 12 years as leader of the Roman Catholic Church — all of them well deserved. When he died, it felt like we all lost a friend, even if we weren’t Catholic or even Christians.

Among those who felt great sadness at his passing were Catholic women’s groups. They expressed appreciation for what he did for them in the Church — but also wished he could have done more.

One of those groups was the Catholic Network for Women’s Equality (CNWE), a Canadian grassroots movement of women working for justice and equality in the Catholic Church.

CNWE remembered Francis for his “humility and compassion, his faith-filled life of service, and his vision of a welcoming Catholic Church as a beacon of hope in the world.” It also praised his vision of the church as a “field hospital” for the wounded, his desire to include lay people more in the church and his apology to Indigenous people in Canada.

But CNWE was disappointed that, under Pope Francis, the Church continued to bar women from ordained ministries and from decisions that affected their lives, something that, they said, “contradicts church teaching on the equality of all members given in baptism.”

While Pope Francis was to be commended for seeking to involve lay people more in the Church, “the exclusion of women must be dismantled for the Church to become truly synodal,” CNWE said.

Roman Catholic Women Priests Canada also weighed in, stating that while they recognized and applauded Francis’ “positive actions and forward-looking vision for the Church and the environment,” at the same time “we lament the opportunities lost to bring about full inclusion of all baptized members of the Roman Catholic Church in its formal ministries.”

Although Catholics “petitioned and begged” Francis to allow the ordination of women and married men to the priesthood, “no such action was taken,” they said. “Rather, the topic of women’s ordination was studiously avoided” when the Church convened in Rome last year for its Synod on Synodality.

As a result, “gender inequalities in the Church remain today, despite Francis’ own advice to move with the ‘signs of the times,” adding the all-male hierarchy “tragically supports the subjugation of women by ignoring that women’s rights are human rights.”

While they mourn his death, the group also mourns “the wasted opportunity to help move the Roman Catholic Church into the 21st Century,” they stated.

Women’s Ordination Worldwide (WOW) also mourned his passing, noting he challenged the Church to “be a more open and loving place and to show mercy and empathy for the most marginalized in society.”

Although he didn’t go as far as they wished, WOW was grateful he ended “the culture of silence around the question of women called to ministry and leadership in the Church.”

This included the Synodal process, which enabled ordinary Catholics all over the world to “express their overwhelming desire to see women recognised officially for the ministering work they do in every parish.”

WOW also recognized how he took steps to reform church laws and practices to allow more women to serve in administrative and managerial positions in the Vatican — roles previously reserved only for ordained men.

Looking ahead, WOW said it hopes the next pope will “continue the process of listening and changing that Pope Francis left unfinished,” noting that “women continue to be on the sidelines of decision-making and dismissed from the possibility of answering their sincere calls to ordained ministry.”

Closer to home, Louise Dowhan, a lay Catholic in Winnipeg, saw Pope Francis as “a dedicated pastor who lived his life in service of the Church.”

When he was elected, Dowhan was hopeful that women “would finally be recognized as equal members of the Church.” But Francis seemed to be in a “no-win position,” she said.

“He wasn’t enough of a traditionalist for the conservatives, and he wasn’t progressive enough for those who wanted reform,” she said. “This polarization may have held him back from making the changes we need in the Church to finally respect and recognize women as fully baptized members of the Church.”

While Dowhan appreciated the way Francis expanded the roles women could play in the Church, “I was deeply disappointed when he gave a firm ‘no’ to the idea of women’s ordination,” she said.

Dowhan was also disappointed in 2024 when discussion of women’s ordination was removed from the official Synod discussion in Rome and put in a study group “that turned out to be two male Vatican officials as opposed to a genuine study group consisting of diverse members to discuss and discern, as was done in the other study groups arising from the Synod,” as she put it.

For Dowhan, “this felt like a slap in the face to those of us who participated in the Synod in good faith. Women were being patronized and discounted once again.”

Her hope is that seeds planted by Francis through the synodal process will “strongly take hold and an inclusive, listening Church will emerge where we can walk together in renewal of the Church.”

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