| Draft document on diaconate leaves tiny
opening for considering women
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.
Rome
A draft document under consideration by the Vatican’s chief
body of theological advisers stops short of saying that women cannot be
ordained as deacons, but offers two “indications” for future
discernment that lean in that direction.
The document, a nearly 100-page treatise on the diaconate, is
before the International Theological Commission, a 30-member advisory body to
the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the
Vatican’s doctrinal czar, chairs it.
While changes are still possible, sources told NCR that the
language on women seems likely to survive. The chief sticking point inside the
commission is instead a debate over to what extent, and how, the diaconate can
be considered part of the sacrament of holy orders in the early church.
The next-to-the-last paragraph of the draft on the diaconate,
which is divided into seven chapters plus a conclusion, contains the crucial
language on women, offering two points for reflection.
First, the document says that deaconesses in the ancient Christian
church “cannot purely and simply be compared to the sacramental
diaconate” that exists today, since there is no clarity about the rite of
institution that was used or what functions they exercised.
Second, the document asserts that “the unity of the sacrament
of orders” is “strongly imprinted by ecclesiastical tradition, the
teaching of the Second Vatican Council and the post-councilor
magisterium,” despite clear differences between the episcopacy and
priesthood on the one hand and the diaconate on the other.
Both points would seem to support a ban on women deacons. The
document, however, does not draw this conclusion. Instead it says that “in
light of present historical-theological research,” there is a need for
“discernment about what the Lord has established for the church.”
In general, the document confirms the post-Vatican II development
of the diaconate, establishing that it is part of holy orders, and is a
legitimate office unto itself rather than merely being a steppingstone to
eventual priestly ordination.
In addition to the document on the diaconate, sources allowed
NCR Sept. 30 to examine two other documents on the commission’s
agenda, one on inculturation and the third on technical progress and ethical
responsibilities.
“Accepting God’s Gift: Revelation and
Inculturation,” is said to be nearing competion. It concerns how far
Christians may go in adapting church teachings and rites to local cultures.
The working title of the third document is “Communion and
Stewardship: Human Persons Created in the Image of God.” It is said to be
a more preliminary stage and, unlike the other two texts, is labeled an
instrumentum laboris or “working paper.”
The International Theological Commission’s last publication,
“Memory and Reconciliation: The Church and the Faults of the Past,”
came in 2000.
Two Americans are among the 30 Catholic theologians on the
International Theological Commission: Dominican Fr. Augustine Di Noia, now the
undersecretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and Fr.
Christopher Begg, a biblical scholar at The Catholic University of America.
John L. Allen Jr. is NCR Rome correspondent. His e-mail
address is jallen@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, October 11,
2002
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