A Spanish nun who has participated in recent meetings of Pope Francis’s top advisory body has said that while women’s priestly ordination is currently off the table, the pontiff is supportive of the female diaconate.
Speaking to the news agency Europa Press, Spanish nun and theologian Linda Pocher said, “There is no reflection on the priestly ordination of women in the Catholic Church,” but the pope “is very much in favor of the female diaconate.”
Pocher was one of three women, including an Anglican bishop, who addressed the most recent meeting of the pope’s Council of Cardinals, a group of cardinals from around the world who advise the pope on matters of Church governance and reform.
For the past two sessions of his Council of Cardinals, called the “C9,” female theologians have been invited to offer input on the role of women in the church, which is among the primary issues the C9 is discussing which is also a key discussion point of the ongoing Synod of Bishops on Synodality, set to conclude this October.
During a Dec. 4-5 meeting of the C9, Pocher, a Salesian and professor of Christology and Mariology at the Pontifical Faculty of Education Auxilium run by her order, was joined by Lucia Vantini, a professor of theology, philosophy and religion, in addressing the council.
Father Luca Castiglioni, a professor of fundamental theology at the diocesan seminary of Milan, also participated in that meeting.
Pocher, Vantini, and Castiglioni published a book on January 24 titled, “Demasculinizing the Church? Critical comparisons on the ‘Principles’ of Hans Urs Von Balthasar,” the preface for which was written by Pope Francis.