Conclusions & Recommendations
Conclusions
If one assumes that we Catholics began the process of officially proclaiming the full equality of women just 40 odd years ago, today's Church is a far cry from its pre-Vatican II self. This is especially true in the context of our liturgical celebrations. Women and girls perform liturgical functions previously reserved only to men or boys. While many parishes have had altar girls and female lectors and Eucharistic ministers for 20 years or more, Cathedral masses were generally far more segregated. This is no longer the case.
Despite Vatican pressure, most bishops in the dioceses surveyed do include women as well as men in the church's foot-washing ceremony reenacting Jesus' example and explicit instructions to his disciples that leaders must be servants to the people they serve. This annual ritual occurs on Holy Thursday, when we celebrate the institution of the Holy Eucharist. This ritual is a very important symbol of the underlying equality of all Christ's followers, regardless of social or ecclesial rank.
We are gratified to see that women and men are included in roughly equal numbers as Eucharistic ministers and lectors in Cathedral liturgies, and that when the bishops are not present, girls are more frequently allowed to serve on the altar. We urge all bishops to welcome young girls as altar servers. Such affirmation sends an important message to young children and to young priests who are still in formative stages of development.
It is especially significant that most bishops recognize the importance of providing at least some economic assistance to the devoted men and women who answer the Church's call to lay ministry. We applaud this important development, and urge its strengthening.
Nonetheless, as the report card indicates, there is certainly room for improvement. We see a pattern that indicates our seminaries fail to provide priestly candidates with a deeper appreciation of the role of women and their manifold contributions in the history of the church, and the church's own history of misogynist teachings. It is deeply troubling that women constitute only a very small proportion of faculty teaching core courses in seminary education in too many seminaries. Not only is this practice unjust, this discrimination in education contributes to attitudes that are destructive of seminarians' capacity to recognize the intellectual and leadership capacities of women.
This survey of 23 U.S. dioceses and archdioceses points to significant lags in the bishops' follow-through on key Church teachings regarding women. We urge the following six specific recommendations for change:
Recommendations:
End Faculty Discrimination and Teach Seminarians About the History of Women in Christianity: We call for the bishops to end discrimination against women faculty in seminaries and to stipulate that curricula for seminarians specifically incorporate the developments in church history and biblical interpretation in curricula, and to incorporate courses on the historical contributions of women, and the teachings that legitimated discrimination against women.
The view that women were morally, mentally, and physically inferior to men was widely accepted for many generations of Catholics. All Catholics, including and especially future priests, need a deeper understanding of how the church's theology of the reality of sin in human life has changed, together with the theological basis for restricting holy orders to men only. This is necessary so new priests can appreciate the urgency with which many women press their just call for continued reform and renewal.Incorporate Biblical & Historic Roles of Women in Catholic Education: We call for the bishops to require age-appropriate education for children, adolescents, and adults alike about women's role in the church's salvation history. As important as it is for children and adults to fully comprehend the centrality of the sacraments, Catholics need a deeper understanding of the church's roots and the nature of theological development. Jesus' respect for women and his inclusive practices must be placed in historical and cultural context, so that Catholics can better comprehend the radically egalitarian nature of his ministry, which was unheard of in his day.
It is well and good for church leaders to assert that women are equal, but when to all appearances their assertion is manifestly not so, it is all the more important to emphasize the important contributions of women to the church, including the scriptural foundations for their equality and their role in the early church. It is also important for Catholics to comprehend the history and evolution of teachings regarding the nature of women and their gradual rise to the status of fully human beings. Models of competent and inspiring women leaders abound throughout church history, especially through the development of religious orders in the United States; the history of U.S. women religious is uniquely our history, and should be taught.Representation of Women on Advisory Boards: The bishops are well on their way toward integrating women on their advisory boards. There is no limit as to how bishops may choose persons to serve on advisory bodies. We call for the bishops to begin instructing the churches to elect one or two delegates to serve on each pastoral advisory board. We especially call for bishops who have not yet established pastoral advisory boards to do so, and to consult with them regularly.
In the same way, we call for the bishops to promote a diversity of representation on financial advisory councils and Catholic Charities boards. Including representatives with differing ethnic, socioeconomic, and educational backgrounds has the potential of helping the church rediscover its Gospel roots and reclaim its soul in service to the poor and disadvantaged. Lay advisory bodies were envisioned by the writers of the Constitution of the Church in the Modern World not as a thorn in the side of the bishop, but as a crucial instrument to call forth the gifts of all Catholics for service to the Church.Representation of Women in Top Administrative Positions: We celebrate the historic strides made by the U.S. bishops, especially when contrasted with the situation of women in the Vatican bureaucracy.i In fact, the bishops outshine secular industry. We call for the bishops to continue to strive for greater representation of women in the church's upper management and we ask them to share their experiences of working with competent women with their brothers in Rome.
Just Employee & Conflict Resolution Practices: Some of the key contributors to poor relationships between bishops, their employees, and the laity are poor hiring and conflict resolution practices. We call on the bishops to adopt and implement the excellent guidelines available through the National Association of Church Personnel Administrators and the Emerging Models for Parish Leadership Project of the Lilly Endowment, which is partnering with six Catholic organizations to develop model resources for pastoral leaders.ii
Future Studies About Justice for Women in the Church: We call for the Catholic academic community to undertake more definitive studies of the church's journey toward equality for women. As the Catholic Church seeks to move beyond its historic ambivalence and even hostility toward women, she has the capacity to change the world for the better.
i See "Women Chip Vatican's Glass Ceiling with Increased Numbers, Influence," By John Thavis
Catholic News Service, (Mar. 2, 2007).
The National Association of Church Personnel Administrators has a listing of publications which may be ordered from its Web site at www.nacpa.org. The Emerging Models Project lists publications on its Web site at http://www.emergingmodels.org/.