The Pope: the ministries of the reader and the acolyte are open to women

Vatican News

Pope Francis established with a motu proprio that the ministries of the Reader and the Acolyte are now also open to women, in a stable and institutionalized manner with a special mandate. Women who read the Word of God at liturgical celebrations or who perform altar service, as ministers or dispensers of the Eucharist, are certainly not new: in many communities around the world, they are now a practice authorized by the bishops. However, until now, all this has been done without a real and adequate institutional mandate, in derogation from what had been established by Saint Paul VI who, in 1972, by abolishing the so-called “minor orders”, had decided maintain access to these ministries. reserved for men only because he considered them as preparatory to a possible access to sacred orders. Now, Pope Francis, also following the discernment that emerged from the last Synods of Bishops, wanted to make this female presence at the altar official and institutional.

With el motu proprio “The Spirit of the Lord “ modifying the first paragraph of canon 230 of the Code of Canon Law and published today, the Pontiff therefore establishes that women can access these ministries and that they are also assigned by a liturgical act which institutionalizes them.

Francis specifies that he wanted to accept the recommendations from various synodal assemblies, writing that “in recent years, a doctrinal development has been achieved which has shown how certain ministries instituted by the Church are based on the common condition of the baptized and from the royal priesthood received in the sacrament of baptism “. Therefore, the Pope invites us to recognize that these are lay ministries “essentially distinct from the ordained ministry received in the sacrament of Orders”.

The new wording of the canon reads as follows: “Lay people of an age and gifts determined by decree of the Episcopal Conference may be employed permanently, by the established liturgical rite, in the ministries of readers and acolytes.” Therefore, the specification “of the male sex” which referred to the laity and which was present in the text of the Code until today’s amendment is deleted.

The motu proprio is accompanied by a letter addressed to the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Luis Ladaria, in which Francis explains the theological reasons for his choice. The Pope writes that “on the horizon of the renewal outlined by the Second Vatican Council, there is today a growing sense of urgency to rediscover the co-responsibility of all the baptized in the Church, and in particular the mission of the laity. “. And quoting the final document of the Synod for the Amazon, he observes that “for the whole Church, in the variety of situations, it is urgent that ministries be promoted and conferred on men and women … ‘Church of the baptized men and women. that we must consolidate by promoting ministeriality and above all awareness of baptismal dignity ”.

Francis, in his letter to the cardinal, after having recalled in the words of Saint John Paul II that “with regard to ordained ministries, the Church has absolutely no power to confer priestly ordination on women”, he adds that “for the Unordered ministries are possible, and today it seems opportune, to overcome this reservation. The Pope explains that” to offer lay people of both sexes the possibility of accessing the ministries of the Acolyte and of the Lectorate , by virtue of their participation in the baptismal priesthood, will increase the recognition, also by a liturgical act (institution), of the valuable contribution that many lay people, including women, have long offered to the life and mission of the Church. Church. “And he concludes that” the decision to confer these positions, which imply stability, public recognition and the mandate of the bishop, also on women makes more effective the participation of all in the work of evangelization of the Church. ‘Church”.

The measure comes after a deepening of theological reflection on these ministries. Post-conciliar theology has indeed rediscovered the relevance of the Lectorate and the Acolyte, not only in relation to the ordained priesthood, but also and above all in relation to the baptismal priesthood. These ministries are part of the dynamic of reciprocal collaboration that exists between the two priests, and they have increasingly emphasized their properly “lay” character, linked to the exercise of the priesthood which belongs to all baptized as such.