Church Reform
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Leo’s slavery teaching opens door for women’s ordination
In “Magnificent Humanity,” Pope Leo describes the Church’s condemnation of slavery as a genuine development in doctrine, not a clarification of existing teaching. That admission, echoing Cardinal Newman, creates a powerful precedent for revisiting the supposedly final ban on ordaining women as priests.
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Insufficient Courage
A boy raised on Mass, confession and Saturday novenas in the West of Ireland took his vows at eighteen. Now nearing eighty and suspended from ministry for fourteen years, he finds the certainties of his upbringing replaced by searching questions about the Church.
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Can the church compete?
We do not live the faith alone — but fewer young people are choosing to live it at all. With church attendance competing with sport, children’s parties, and endless leisure alternatives, parishes need to actively reimagine how they engage young people, or there maybe no one left!
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The theology of chairs
There is a particular irony in celebrating free elections and participatory governance from behind a lectern while your audience sits in silent rows. The Vatican’s meeting with lay leaders exposed a contradiction at the heart of the Church’s synodal project.
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Women’s ordained ministry serves baptised unity — do it now
The first witness to the risen Christ was a woman. Bishop Ludger Schepers argues a Church that honours Mary Magdalene liturgically while barring women from the altar is acting in direct contradiction to its own founding narrative and the witness of Apostle Junia.
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Open church doors through respectful dialogue
Mission is not a one-way broadcast but an invitation to mutual learning. Parishes and ministries are called to open their doors, engage in respectful dialogue with their neighbours and discover how Christ’s message of mercy can be heard, experienced and lived together.
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The theological emptiness of the Petrocchi report
Phyllis Zagano’s analysis in America and in Flashes dismantles the Petrocchi Commission’s conclusions on women’s diaconate, showing they rest on no historical, theological, or anthropological documentation.
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Ancient ordination rites for women deacons sit in Vatican
Medieval liturgical manuscripts housed in the Vatican’s own library describe women being ordained to the diaconate during Mass, with the laying on of hands, invocation of the Holy Spirit and the placement of the stole by the bishop. Zagano’s research brings these forgotten rites back into focus.
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Synodality won’t trickle down
Expecting clerics; hierarchical leaders alone to drive Synodality may be unrealistic. Parish communities in Australia already demonstrated their readiness for a synodal church during Plenary Council preparations. The path forward may require complementary action from the bottom up.
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Synodal journey shifts from excitement to episcopal control
When Irish bishops launched the Synodal Pathway in 2021, they had no idea Pope Francis was about to announce a global process weeks later. The coincidence forced a rapid restructuring of Ireland’s entire approach, folding its national ambitions into Rome’s wider timeline.
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