German Embassy to Holy See presents book on role of women in the Church
The German Embassy to the Holy See is organizing a presentation on the occasion of the publication of a Herder-Verlag brochure entitled “Strong Daughters of God – Women and Functions in Catholicism Worldwide”, focused on the current synod on synodality and the “question of the condition of women”. rights.”
By Stefanie Stahlhofen
In a special issue of Herder-Verlag, a German publication, published last fall, 36 women and three men provided information on the situation of women in the Church in different countries around the world.
One of the authors is Chilean theologian Catalina Cerda-Planas. She is a research associate at the Institute for Global Church and Mission (IWM) at St. Georgen in Frankfurt, which has conducted a global study on the topic of women and ordained ministries.
The question of a possible ordination of women deacons is to be discussed by a new study group.
“I believe that the diaconate could be a subject in which different local Churches would have the freedom to consider whether or not it corresponds to their pastoral needs. If we had different measures or rules for different local Churches in certain regions, we “We can then make progress on this. Issues such as the female diaconate, I believe,” Cerda-Planas said in an interview with Vatican News.
Mgr Gmür on women in the service of the Church
Mgr Felix Gmür, Bishop of Basel, President of the Swiss Bishops' Conference, also notes significant local differences on this issue and therefore pleads for different solutions.
“For Western European cultures, and certainly for cultures present in Switzerland, it is not a question of women having the same opportunities as men in the service of the Church,” he said . Rome, however, is not an easy affair. What I like is decentralization: not everything needs to be regulated uniformly everywhere. I can't predict the future. But the theme of decentralization is on the agenda, as are women – as a transversal theme so to speak: women are present not only in services and ministries, whatever these services and ministries may be, but also in the mission, in the transmission of the faith, in the construction of the Body of Christ. involved everywhere. »
As a representative of the Swiss Bishops' Conference, Archbishop Gmür will once again participate in the second session of the Synodal General Assembly at the Vatican in October 2024.
