In 2013, after his election, Pope Francis had faced demands of bringing changes regarding women’s position in the Roman Catholic Church. To some extent he had delivered as well since he opened key meetings to women and also allowed women to take on “senior roles within the powerful central bureaucracy of the Church” as reported by Aljazeera.
Pope Francis had also appointed the first female head of the Vatican governorate. While these were indeed great steps in regards to making the church more inclusive, there are many more milestones left to achieve when it comes to church’s treatment of women and allowing them in positions of power.
Now, as the process for electing the next Pope is in motion, the role of women within the church remains a major issue. Women who are already associated with the church or want to be associated in future are waiting to see if the next Pope takes forward what Pope Francis had started or if they see a wave of regressive thoughts taking them backwards.
Talking about the same, Kate McElwee, the executive director of Women’s Ordination Conference, a nonprofit focused on women’s rights within Church institutions, said, “Women are not holding their breath.
There is some anxiety on whether the next papacy will see some backsliding on the progress because there is a real desire for the project of [women’s] inclusion to continue.”
Commenting on how Pope Francis helped women in regards to holding key positions in the church, McElwee further said, “It feels like he unlocked the door but didn’t fully open it.” It should be noted here the stark gender disparity that is present in the church is extremely evident in the fact that an all men committee is deciding the next Pope.
As reported by Aljazeera, “At pre-conclave meetings in Rome, cardinals are discussing what they believe are the core issues and priorities that a future pope should be able to tackle – from the Church’s sexual and financial scandals and the global crisis of faith to the ties with China and the importance of canon law.”
While it is true that most of the pontiffs who will be voting for the new cardinal do share Pope Francis’ vision regarding social justice and other issues, their stance regarding allowing women to be more active members of the church remains unknown.
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Back in 2023, Cardinal Anders Arborelius, the bishop of Stockholm, Sweden had mentioned that there should be alternative ways for women to be able to serve the church in place of “ordained ministry.”
Moreover, Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Muller from Germany, a leading conservative was also not happy with Pope Francis’ decision of appointing nonclerical people to top positions as he was critical of Sister Brambilla’s appointment last year.
Pope Francis himself had not sternly been vocal for women’s equal participation in the church. As Aljazeera reported, “Pope Francis set up two commissions – the first in 2016 and the second in 2020 – to consider whether women could serve as deacons by studying if that was the case in the early centuries of the Church.”
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It further added, “The report produced by the first group was never released to the public as the commission was not able to agree on the issue, according to Francis, while the second never concluded its work. In 2024, during an interview with US broadcaster CBS, Pope Francis gave a flat ‘no’ to the ordination of women deacons.
But a few months later, he signed off on the final document of a synod, saying the issue should remain an ‘open’ question.”
While there are still a lot of hurdles when it comes to women getting equal rights in the church, it cannot be denied that the church can no longer ignore the questions regarding women’s role in the church.
As Sabina Pavone, a professor of history of Christianity at the University of Naples L’Orientale and member of the Italian Society of Historians said, “The Church has already changed. And the Church has to keep pace with this reality.”
