WOC responds to final document of Pope Francis' October 2023 Synod on Synodality 

October 28, 2023



Following the month-long 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops convened by Pope Francis at the Vatican, the Women’s Ordination Conference (WOC) expresses its support for the ways in which the need for the greater participation of women in the pastoral life and governance of the church were outlined in the final document, released on October 28, 2023.  

However, at the same time, WOC is dismayed by the failure of the synod to take seriously the overwhelming calls to open all ordained ministries to women. The indication that the conversation on women in ordained ministries should be limited to the permanent diaconate or undefined “new ministries,” simply does not reflect the needs of the church today, nor the fullness of women’s vocations. 

While WOC celebrates the significant development of the Vatican’s decision-making process that allowed 54 women to vote for the first time alongside their male contemporaries, the document’s superficial treatment of the injustice of the inequality of more than half of the members of the church is cause for concern. On some level, the document seems to reflect a recognition of the wounds women have experienced at the hands of the church, but it falls short of engaging substantially with the healing of those wounds, opting instead to leave those issues to ever more studies and commissions. 

For the synodal process to retain any credibility, it will need to take seriously the full equality of women and LGBTQ+ people in every aspect of church life. A “listening church” that fails to be transformed by the fundamental exclusion of women and LGBTQ+ people fails to model the Gospel itself. 

Our ongoing witness, especially in the coming year, will be essential to ensuring women’s voices, experiences, and vocations are not further erased in the synodal process. If the synod assembly did not notice the urgent cries, prayers, and hopes of women, or is unwilling to take concrete steps to dismantle church structures and policies that oppress and diminish women, then the Women’s Ordination Conference and our supporters will simply need to make ourselves even more visible.

We will continue to work for accountability to the grassroots, and be an uncompromising voice for equitable inclusion of women at every level of the church. We have now seen women vote in the halls of the Vatican — there is no turning back.  

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