Posted on 05/12/2016 5:42:08 AM PDT by ebb tide
VATICAN CITY - In an opening with historic import, Pope Francis has said he wants to study the possibility of ordaining women as deacons, a step that could for the first time open the ranks of the Catholic Church’s all-male clergy to women.
The order of deacons was reinsitituted in the Catholic Church following the reforms of the 1960s, and while deacons cannot celebrate Mass like a priest, a deacon can preach at Mass, celebrate funerals, and perform baptisms.
But in restoring the diaconate, the church also restricted ordination as a deacon to “mature married men” over 35.
Many protested that limitation, saying the earliest Christian texts also speak of “deaconesses” and arguing that the modern church should also allow women deacons.
Saint John Paul II and Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI were both theologically conservative pontiffs who said that such a move was unjustified and could undermine the concept of the all-male priesthood.
But Francis said Thursday (May 12) he agreed the matter should be given more careful consideration, telling hundreds of nuns from around the world that he himself always wondered about the role of deaconesses in the early church.
“Constituting an official commission that might study the question?” the pontiff asked aloud in response to questions from some of the sisters.
“I believe yes. It would do good for the church to clarify this point. I am in agreement,” he said, according to an initial report from National Catholic Reporter.
“I accept,” the pope said later. “It seems useful to me to have a commission that would clarify this well.”
The devil will be in the details, of course.
As Francis’ own questions indicated, there are debates about who the deaconesses were and what they did.
Some will argue that deaconesses played a different role in the early church from that of deacons, an office established by the Apostles to focus on caring for widows and the poor so that the Apostles could focus on preaching.
That could mean that the papal commission could re-establish an order of female deacons that falls short of actual ordination.
Or the commission could say there is no justification for establishing the office of deaconess.
But whatever happens, the fact that Francis has opened the door to the debate and the possibility of ordaining women is groundbreaking.
Deacons must be married? So single men who don’t want to be priests can’t become deacons or what? Or they have to have been married or widowers or what?
Freegards
Isn’t this the same religion that thinks enforced celibacy was such a brilliant idea? What kind of demented doublethink do you have to engage in to have that and this belief simultaneously?
My cousin was married and became a Deacon. At his Ordination the wives of the married Deacons stood up during the ceremony and acknowledged their husbands would be doing God’s work. The unmarried Deacons had to remain unmarried.
Every liberal Catholic and every liberal of any faith or none invariably hates the Catholic discipline of celibacy and wants it to end. Only conservatives are divided on the issue.
Find one liberal that supports the homosexualist agenda, female clergy, and abortion but also thinks the catholic discipline of celibacy is valuable and should continue.
Freegards
great and spot on analysis. I am in Formation and couldn’t have said it better. (btw, Deacons don’t have to be married men, but if married, once ordained, cannot remarry if their wife predeceases them)
Exactly correct. The ancient sources are very clear that “deaconesses” didn’t receive Holy Orders, and didn’t do the things we associate with modern deacons, like preaching at Mass, officiating at baptisms and weddings, or proclaiming the Gospel reading in the liturgy.
Permanent deacons may be married before they take Orders, transitional deacons are unmarried because they will become priests.
You also said that about Holy Communion for the divorced and remarried.
And you were wrong then, too.
My bad... Deacons must be married before they become deacons. If they are single when they become a deacon, they are to remain unmarried and celibate.
Why study this? It was done already in 2002.
The only answer they will reach is No.
Because there's a new pope in town now and his name is Francis, "This is my Church!"
Pope St John Paul II had also ruled out Holy Communion for the divorced and remarried but that didn't stop Humble Jorge's Mercy Train.
Right that is my understanding, but I’m not sure I ever met a deacon that wasn’t married at one time. Are there men who become deacons who have never been married?
Freegards
No doctrine has been changed. These are all “off the cuff remarks.”
Nothing serious.
Scripturally, priests must be married too, but they aren't.
I guess you think cancer isn’t serious either?
Francis to create commission to study female deacons in Catholic Church
12/05/16 10:07
After crippling moral theology, opening the door to Eucharistic sacrilege and undermining Catholic doctrine on Matrimony by means of the latest Synods and Amoris Laetitia, Francis now turns his sights to the possibility “woman deaconesses.”
It’s almost as if he lies awake at night thinking, “What can I disrupt next?”
In this he aligns himself with the destructive program of Modernists, warned of by St. Pius X in Pascendi: “There is no part of Catholic truth which they leave untouched, none they do not strive to corrupt.”
Francis has also learned, by means of Amoris Laetitia, that he can mangle Catholic doctrine and practice with virtually no resistance from the hierarchy, except for some ‘careful’ responses from a tiny handful of conservatives. He has good cause to believe there will be no organized opposition from prelates.
Oremus. - J. Vennari
Saying he is “open” to having a commission study the question to “clarify” it is different than saying he wants to study “the possibility” of ordaining women deacons. In other words it can be said he’s saying a clearer definition (or explaination) of the current ban would be useful. Not that the “possibility” should ever be considered. Note the word “possibility” isn’t a quote from him the word “clarify” (in relation to the question) is his quote.
Now he could have (and it’s certainly reasonable to say he should have) simply said, “No, women can’t be deacons, there never was such a role for women in ancient times. The “deaconess” role back then was not the female equivalent of the male office”. He most certainly could have said that and I would agree it would be better if he would have. But he himself has admitted he’s no “scholar” so maybe it’s entirely possible he doesn’t even know that historical fact.
To quote Dick Mora, former coach of the New Orleans Saints:
“I’m sick of coulda, woulda, shoulda, coming close, if only.”
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