UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter
by Phyllis Zagano on Jan. 18, 2012 Just Catholic
About a year ago, I published an open letter to Pope Benedict XVI asking him to make a decision on restoring women to the diaconate. I didn’t hear back.
Priest-pederasts, -philanderers and -embezzlers continue to make the news. Parishes and schools are closing all over. Ordinations — at least in the United States — are beyond way down. The public relations profile of U.S. bishops seems fixed on same-sex marriage, abortion and the “new evangelization.”
Are U.S. bishops carrying the brief for women deacons to their ad limina meetings in Rome?
They may be. The issue is picking up speed.
The Cleveland-based activist group FutureChurch has organized its members nationwide to pay pre-ad limina calls on bishops. The FutureChurch brief includes restoring women to their traditional place in the diaconate. In addition, a national Books-to-Bishops campaign has sent copies of the newly published Women Deacons: Past, Present, Future (by Santa Clara Professor Gary Macy, Monterey Deacon William T. Ditewig and me) to 135 U.S. diocesan bishops to date.
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