Pope: Women have ‘legitimate claims’ for justice, equality
POPE FRANCIS said on Tuesday that women have “legitimate claims” to seek more justice and equality in the Catholic Church, but stopped short of endorsing more sweeping calls from his own bishops to recognise the “urgency of an inevitable change” to give them leadership roles.
Francis issued a document inspired by an October 2018 meeting of the world’s bishops on better ministering to today’s young Catholics. The meeting was marked by demands for greater women’s rights, and the bishops’ final document called the need for women to have positions of responsibility and decision-making in the church “a duty of justice.”
In his lengthy document, ‘Christ is alive,’ Francis endorses no such conclusion. He says only that a church that listens to young people must be attentive to women’s “legitimate claims” for equality and justice, and must better train men and women who have leadership potential.
“A living church can look back on history and acknowledge a fair share of male authoritarianism, domination, various forms of enslavement, abuse and sexist violence,” Francis writes.
“With this outlook, she can support the call to respect women’s rights, and offer convinced support for greater reciprocity between males and females, while not agreeing with everything some feminist groups propose.”
Asked at a news conference yesterday about the lack of reference to both women in leadership positions and the need to welcome homosexuals better, synod organiser Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri noted that Francis acknowledged in his text that he couldn’t rewrite everything from the final synod document and referred readers back to it.
Francis writes that he was inspired by all the reflections at the synod but that he wanted to use his text to “summarise those proposals I considered most significant”.
The document, known as an apostolic exhortation, covers a wide range of issues confronting young people today, noting that many feel alienated from the Catholic Church because of its sexual and financial scandals, and are themselves suffering from untold forms of exploitation, conflict and despair.