Sep 20 Fri
Do women need to be deaconesses?
The commission established by Pope Francis in 2016 aimed to study the female diaconate rather than to restore the ministry of "deaconess" from the early centuries of the Church.
Today, the question is not whether to reinstate a specific ministry, but rather what ministry the people of God need now.
Three indisputable facts have been established: deaconesses existed in the early Church, there was a specific rite associated with this ministry, and deaconesses have disappeared from the Latin Church.
However, the absence of deaconesses does not mean that women have disappeared from the Church. Women's holiness has always been recognized, and they have served the Church without an "instituted ministry."
So why is it important and urgent to establish ministries for women? Not just to recognize their dignity, but to recognize the true identity of the Church. The Church needs women and must call them to serve.
However, serving is not a right, but a duty. Thus, the hierarchy must serve humanity in its quest for salvation, as commanded by the Master.
When reflecting on ministries, we must return to the source: baptism, from which every vocation arises and thrives.
Baptized individuals participate in the priesthood of Christ.
Their dignity is not reduced to priestly ministry: hence it is a contradiction to think that granting the ministerial priesthood to women would be a way of recognizing their dignity.
What do men and women need today? Salvation, witness, reconciliation, communion, and formation, all grounded in charity.
The Church must listen to the guidance of the Spirit so that the masculine and feminine aspects of humanity can be restored, without using diversity against one another.
The Savior was born as a male child under the Old Covenant, symbolized by circumcision.
But also, to reveal the dignity of women, he was born of a woman who was "full of grace" and became the first redeemed person assumed into heaven in the dwelling of the Trinity.
Thus, men and women are two realities that express a complementarity.
We must avoid reducing the dignity of every ministry to the dignity of the ministerial priesthood, and reducing the dignity of the ministerial priesthood solely to the priesthood of Christ as "man." This reduction is not in line with the faith. The Son, the second Person of the Trinity, is our Savior with both human and divine nature. And salvation encompasses everyone, both male and female.
To what reflection does this consideration of faith lead us?
The priesthood of Christ is one and unique. “Only Christ is the true priest; the others are his ministers.” There are two ways of participating in the one priesthood of Christ:
• The common priesthood of the faithful, conferred through Baptism and strengthened by Confirmation; thus, all are called to beget and to bring forth new children to the Church. men and women, equally participate in the common dignity of the children of God.
• The ministerial priesthood of the ordained minister, conferred by the Sacrament of Holy Orders, which is at the service of the common priesthood of the faithful, and in mutual dependence and support.
Pic: Our Lady between Sts. Perpetua and Felicity
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