March 20, 2006VOL. 44, NO. 6Oakland, CA

Pope: Discuss women’s role in church decisions

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- While insisting women cannot be ordained priests, Pope Benedict XVI said it is right to discuss how women can be more involved in church decision-making.

On March 3, the Vatican released a transcript of the pope’s remarks during a March 2 meeting with priests of the Diocese of Rome.

Father Marco Valentini asked the pope why the church does not recognize that women’s experience, wisdom and points of view would complement those of the men in decision-making positions.

Pope Benedict said, “Everyone certainly has had this experience” that Father Valentini described of being assisted by women in growing in the faith.
“The church owes a great debt of thanks to women,” the pope said.

Women not only have exercised a charismatic function in the church, being prompted by the Holy Spirit to found religious orders, expand charitable projects and develop new forms of piety, he said; they have had “a real and profound participation in the governance of the church.”

“How could one imagine the governance of the church without this contribution, which sometimes has been quite visible, like when St. Hildegard criticized the bishops or when St. Brigid and St. Catherine of Siena admonished and obtained the return of the popes to Rome” from Avignon, France, the pope said.

The contribution of women, he said, “always has been a determining factor without which the church could not live.”

Pope Benedict said priestly ministry is reserved to men, but “it is right to ask” if it would not be possible “to offer more space, more positions of responsibility to women.”

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