In a statement, the group warned that the outcome will “cause significant harm to Synodality and to the credibility of the Church”.
Noting that lay Catholics “overwhelmingly support the restoration of women to the diaconate, and many also favour broader opportunities for women in ordained ministry” the priests’ group appealed to the bishops to “listen attentively to the People of God and to show the courage and openness this moment requires”.
Speaking to The Tablet, Fr Roy Donovan of the ACP said the bishops need to be “more honest with themselves”.
The Co Limerick parish priest said he believed a number of the bishops privately are in favour of women deacons but “they are not willing to go public and to disagree with the Commission’s findings even though those findings hold no water”.
He said the decision by the Vatican’s latest study commission raised “massive” questions about the synodal process because that “those at the top can make these decisions even though we have all this listening going on”.
According to the parish priest of Caherconlish and Inch St Lawrence, “a lot of people are very tired” of the Church’s “long-standing pattern of postponement”. He suggested that only Pope Leo could now provide leadership on the issue of women deacons.
Separately, a member of the Association of Catholics in Ireland has questioned if the decision-making process on women deacons was undertaken in a Synodal way “bearing in mind the very many submissions made on the role of women”.
Nessan Vaughan told The Tablet the outcome was “representative of an overly anthropocentric view of Jesus Christ and reductive of His duality”.
He said he had “yet to read or hear a convincing theological case for the exclusion of women from the diaconate or priesthood”.