Archbishop of Armagh Eamon Martin also expressed surprise that the study group’s report had been “published in isolation” from those of the other nine study groups set up by Pope Francis to examine more controversial issues following the conclusion of the first gathering of the Synod on Synodality.
The Archbishop said he would have preferred if the report on women deacons “had come out along with the other groups looking at co-responsibility in the Church, the role of lay people in the Church, and so many other aspects which I think would have better balanced what appears to me to be the rather strong views of this particular expert group”.
The Archbishop said: “It’s very interesting that Pope Leo has said that this question remains open rather than that’s it, it is over.”
He said the question of how women exercise their baptismal diaconia, which all lay men and women exercise, needed to be considered.
“In our own Irish Synodal Pathway, we have highlighted baptism and the call of baptism to mission. A really important question for the Church is: how do women fully exercise their baptismal priesthood and therefore the whole question of co-responsibility, of women’s role in decision-making, women’s role in leadership within the Church.
“These are questions which remain very, very pressing because naturally, those who have thought that the path to decision-making, leadership and service in the Church goes through the priesthood will feel now that women are excluded.”
Separately, Archbishop of Dublin Dermot Farrell said he had “no doubt that very many people, both women and men, will have been disappointed at the reported outcome of the study of the question of the ordination of women to the diaconate”.
He added, “It is important however to remember that the report was from a commission established to study the historical background to the possibility of ordaining women to the diaconate. Their conclusion was that the evidence they considered excluded the possibility of proceeding toward diaconal ordination for priesthood.”
He noted that the president of the commission, Cardinal Petrocchi, had observed that this is a question to be decided on a doctrinal level and therefore the ordination of women as deacons remains open to further theological and pastoral study.
“The question of the women’s diaconate specifically now returns to Pope Leo for further discernment, with the most recent magisterial teaching on it being paragraph 60 of the final synod document: ‘The question of women’s access to diaconal ministry remains open. This discernment needs to continue.’”
Archbishop Farrell also stressed that the question of the role of women in the Church is much broader than the question of ordination to the diaconate and that the contribution of women to ministry and leadership is extensive across the Church.
“It is important that we constantly see that leadership and ministry are not the prerogative of the ordained.”
In Dublin, he said, “Women are prominent in ministry not only as ministers of the word and of the Eucharist, but as leaders of prayer services and as funeral ministers, at very important moments in the life of the faithful.”
He added, “I have no doubt that in the near future, women will serve as parish leaders, continuing and developing the ministries they already exercise.”