Pope Calls For A Greater Role For Women In Church However, He Stops Short Of Allowing Women To Become Ordained As Catholic Priests

Pope John Paul II issued a new call Thursday to promote the institutional role of women in the Roman Catholic Church and said nuns must be permitted to take part in the church’s decision-making.

The call was included in a 201-page document called Vita Consecrata, “consecrated life,” about service in the church. The section on women, a small part of an overall review of the role of priests, friars, nuns and lay believers following a 1994 Vatican synod, was the latest in a series of statements by the pontiff aimed at elevating the status of women.

Such statements are in effect the Vatican’s response to demands from some congregations and clergy, particularly in the United States and Western Europe, that women be admitted to the all-male priesthood. Without women priests, women cannot hope to be regarded as equal, proponents argue.

John Paul II rejects ordination of women on theological grounds, calling the ban permanent and unchangeable, but he has countered with insistence that women may play roles in the church that are nonetheless equal to those of men.

“It is … urgently necessary to take certain concrete steps, beginning by providing room for women to participate in different fields and at all levels, including decision-making processes, above all in matters which concern women themselves,” the document said.

The Catholic Church must overcome “all discrimination” by placing men and women on an equal footing. “Consecrated women therefore rightly aspire to have their identity, ability, mission and responsibility more clearly recognized both in the awareness of the church and in everyday life,” Thursday’s statement said.

It was left unclear in which decisions women will now play a new role. Still, some observers saw the document as at least an incremental change in the Vatican’s attitude toward the role of nuns in the church.

“The pope is ratcheting up what he has been saying about the promotion of women in the process of decisionmaking,” said Sister Mary Ann Walsh, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Catholic Conference.

The document fell far short of demands of some nuns and allied bishops at the 1994 synod in which the issue of women’s place in the church was heatedly debated.

Some delegates asked that a college of women cardinals be established that would take part in the election of popes. Others demanded that nuns be given positions in the Curia, the church’s central administrative body. Nuns from Third World countries pressed for an end to male domination in the church and recognition of women’s talents.

Vita Consecrata urged a special place for women, although apparently in specific, traditionally feminine areas, including the battle against abortion. “The Church depends a great deal on consecrated women for new efforts in fostering Christian doctrine and morals, family and social life and especially in everything that affects the dignity of women and respect for human life,” John Paul wrote.

The document encouraged “new forms of participation” by women, including teaching and advising in seminaries. Nuns and women theologians are rarely given key seminary positions, since the education of priests by men is traditional.