Women must also listen to each other

During the September 2022 meeting in Frascati (Rome) to write the Document of the Continental Stage of Synod 2021-2024, a Senegalese religious sister marvelled at the disparity in women's voices: in some parts of the world, she said, women are so little recognised that they have almost no voice, if any; in other parts they freely express their thoughts, discuss the women's question and the issues on the table, including women in diaconate and  ministerial priesthood.

So deeply did this remark strike one Franciscan woman who comes "from the global North", and serves in the Synod Secretariat, that it caused her to re-examine some National Syntheses presented in 2022. On the eve of the second session of the Synod for Synodality, which opens on 2 October, she shares the results of her analysis.

The global Church faces a considerable challenge when it comes not only to listening but to documenting that listening. In order to understand what is meant by the Church's ability to document its listening, it is useful to look at how the group of experts from all over the world who met in Frascati in September 2022 to draft the Working Document for the Continental Stage, the DCS, experienced this challenge. Most of the participants in the meeting were theologians and canonists, accustomed by training to citing biblical, patristic or magisterial texts as primary sources. However, the purpose of this particular meeting was to demonstrate that the General Secretariat of the Synod had actively listened to the People of God. Consequently it quickly became evident that in order to document the Church's listening, the primary sources of the DCS would need to be the reports submitted by the People of God.  

The synod reports submitted by the bishops' conferences in the first phase of the consultation vary in this ability to document their listening. Some reports (Latin America) regularly cite the faithful for every single point raised; others cite them for some points, but not all; others, from some areas of the world, hardly mention them at all. These elements are even more contrasting if one examines the reports in the light of three questions: 1) how often were women allowed to speak in the first person? 2) are women ever quoted directly? 3) is the women's experience reported as fact or as the lament of a some?

It should be stated at the outset that of all the National Summaries examined for this article, the only one that directly includes a statement made by a woman during the consultation is that of England and Wales. Nevertheless, the National Summaries from the United States and Australia report women's experiences and desires as fact. The National Summaries from Africa vary, to some extent according to language areas. It is noteworthy, however, that the Summaries of all three African language groups include lists of official church structures established to listen to all, including women, as evidence that they are heard, despite claims to the contrary. In these Summaries, the problems raised by women are often reported as complaints by some of them. 

Listening among women

This shows that they have little or no voice, despite having the daily life of the parishes in their hands. In addition to being silenced, African women suffer the silence of the community, including the Church, with respect to the abuse they suffer in the family and society (and perhaps, by extension, also in the Church, although this is never mentioned in the Syntheses).  The Church's silence in the face of violence was, however, emphasised in one of the reports from  Portuguese-speaking Africa. Of all the Syntheses presented by the bishops' conferences in Africa, only one report mentions female genital mutilation, although recent research has revealed that in sub-Saharan countries it reaches high percentages, 97% in Guinea.

Calls for the ordination of women to the diaconate have been included in fewer than a handful of National Summaries from the African continent,. In a recent issue of Global Sisters Report, Sister Josephine Apiagyei and Sister Rosemary Nyirumbe, who both exercise leadership roles in the African Church, agreed that the call to ordain women to the ministerial priesthood "is not as urgent in African countries as it is in the Global North", although they acknowledged that "greater equality within the Church is needed".

By contrast, the Syntheses of England and Wales, the United States and Australia all mention ordination to the diaconate and priesthood in the context of the Church's ability to better accommodate women's contributions and leadership. The United States, however, is the only country to frame the denial of women's priesthood as an injustice to be corrected: "Women's ordination has emerged not primarily as a solution to the problem of priest shortage, but as a matter of justice.”

If these words are contrasted with the silence of African women, for whom even human recognition would suffice, another challenge to listening within the Church emerges: women must listen to each other.

Those in the Global North must ask themselves how others perceive that which they perceive as an urgent question of justice; they must ask themselves whether women's ordination to the priesthood is the primary issue for African women.  The Gospel provides an inspiration: "Mary stayed with Elizabeth about three months; then she went back to her house" Luke 1:39-56. One must "stay with". It is necessary to “remain with”, to “be together”, to dialogue.

Learning to contemplate the right things

In many societies of the world, women have successful professional and political careers, exercising leadership at all levels of business and government.  In the Church too, their role has grown, perhaps more in some places than in others.

Pope Francis has moved the needle on female empowerment in the Holy See. The appointments of Sister Alessandra Smerilli (Secretary of the Dicastery for the Promotion of Integral Human Development), Sister Nathalie Becquart (Under-Secretary of the General Secretariat of the Synod), Sister Raffaella Petrini (Secretary General of the Vatican City State) and Sister Simona Brambilla (Secretary of the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Associations of Apostolic Life) are signs of the growing empowerment of women in the Roman Curia.

In October 2023, women voted at the Synod of Bishops; during the first session, women led the assembly work as delegated presidents and were half of the total number of facilitators. Becquart regularly sat at the presidency table alongside Pope Francis and Cardinals Grech and Hollerich. The only sector in which they were under-represented was that of the theologians. Of the 26 summoned, only four were women.

Despite the growth in empowerment, however, synod reports highlight the ongoing existence of double standards that penalise women. While many National Syntheses submitted by the African continent include affirmations that the laity must be recognised and included in the Church’s mission, it is rare to find similar statements regarding women. English-speaking countries, however, more explicitly affirmed that not only the laity in general, but women should hold positions of responsibility within the Church.

Interestingly, the African National Syntheses are are alone in mentioning the prohibition of access to the Eucharist for unwed mothers and pregnant women as a challenge requiring special attention. This theme emerged in at least three of the Syntheses from English-speaking conferences, but only one of them explicitly notes that the stigmatisation of unmarried mothers constitutes an "unjustifiable exclusion".   At the same time, the bishops of the African continent were pleased with the inclusion in the Synthesis Report from the first session of Section 16, paragraph q: “SECAM (Symposium of the Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar) is encouraged to promote a theological and pastoral discernment on question of polygamy and the accompaniment of people in polygamous unions who are coming to faith”.

There you have an unjustifiable double standard.

It would seem that there is still an unnamed obstacle to fully respecting women and their inclusion in leadership and decision-making processes in the Church (both decision-making and decision-taking).

The presence of this unnamed obstacle makes it clear that, in itself, institutional empowerment is no guarantor of authentic justice towards women. The Church must first name this obstacle and then repent of it. Some give it the name 'misogyny'. It is significant that in all the National Syntheses studied for this article, misogyny is named in only one, that of the Bishops' Conference of England and Wales: 'Despite dedicating my life to the Church, I experience profound misogyny: the word of the priest is always considered more credible. Women do the heavy work but feel marginalised. Many are hurt and angry.

Is it possible that we take this attitude so much for granted that we are unable to recognise it, name it, and then repent of it? There may be other attitudes towards women for which we must all repent as a Church; some for which men must specifically repent; still others for which women must repent. The healing and ecclesial reconciliation that Synod 2021-2024 is seeking to bring about will only happen to the extent that this repentance takes place.

Towards evangelical communion

Images and icons of the Visitation often show Mary and Elizabeth not only facing each other, but also embracing. It is clear that the Gospel episode speaks not only of the hospitality that each of the baptised is called to exercise, but perhaps more specifically, it speaks of the relationships that women are invited to cultivate with other women. We are invited to generously and lovingly share ourselves, looking beyond our own need to obey the need of the other; to look into each other's faces to discover ourselves as loved by other women; to remain with each other in need, welcoming each other.

We must not forget that in this episode there are the two children of Mary and Elizabeth, invisible but very present. In the welcoming of these two women is woven the relationship between their children, and also that of future generations.

Conclusion

It is important to recognise that no local church can project itself as the model for all other local churches. Therefore, churches in the global North cannot claim to impose their way of existence on churches in the global South. There are situations of human injustice in all churches that must be addressed. However, the synod process has reached a unanimous consensus on at least one of these situations: the People of God desire a Church in which the presence and contribution of women, including at the leadership level, are better received.

Humanity, on any continent, cannot hope to prosper if half of itself is silenced or ignored. The feminist movement, in all its forms, has worked to overcome the exclusion that men have imposed on women. However, there is another aspect that requires attention and healing: women must recognise where they themselves have not listened to other women and must act to overcome this distance. It seems to me that women must work assiduously so that the voices of all women are heard, especially on those issues where there is no obvious consensus, so that the unifying voice of the Holy Spirit can truly be heard above the fray that so easily divides the Church.

by Marie-Kolbe Zamora
OSF, STD – General Secretariat of the Synod

#sistersproject