Women and the synod – mission and participation

The final meeting of this synodal journey has begun in Rome. The three pillars of the current synodal working document, the Instrumentum Laboris, are communion, mission and participation. These are wonderful words that invite Christians to think about the role they have in the sharing of God’s love in the world.

In theory, they apply to all of us. The difficulty is not in the words but in the definition of what the words mean and who controls the meaning and focus of these words. I want to think about the last two words as the first word is so closely linked to the sacrament of the eucharist and hence the ordained ministry that it already dominates the vision of the church. The words mission and participation offer a new starting place to consider what it means to be an outward facing church. 

The Instrumentum Laboris asks: “How can the Church of our time better fulfil its mission through greater recognition and promotion of the baptismal dignity of women?” B2.3. The key word in that question, I suggest, is “recognition”. A look at space travel might give an insight into how women already participate in mission though their contribution is not fully recognised.

Fifty-five years ago in July 1969, Neil Armstrong landed on the moon. Space travel has usually been termed as a mission. The mission of Apollo 11 was President Kennedy’s desire to see a crewed spacecraft land on the moon and return home safely. Many will remember the buzz of excitement watching the grainy pictures on the TV and hearing the crackle of voices as the success of landing on the moon was broadcast across the world. There were several other objectives to the flight, such as collecting rock samples, photographing the area and the retrieval of specific data. However, these seem incidental to the more major achievement of the mission which was safe arrival, walking on the moon and the return home.

It is interesting to compare the mission of the Apollo 11 flight with the mission of Christ. That mission being, in accordance with St Athanasius and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, that Jesus became human so that we might share in his divinity. The arrival and return of Jesus from heaven to earth is certainly core to our creedal affirmation of faith. The creeds are composed of statements that detail Jesus’ birth, death, resurrection and ascension. There is no mention of the works and ministry of Jesus, nor of his teachings or commands to baptise and share the eucharist.  The Nicene creed mentions believing in a baptism for the forgiveness of sins, but the Apostles and Athanasian creeds have no mention of baptism.  In contrast, the gospels spend little time on the incarnation (arrival) and the death, resurrection and ascension (return) of Jesus but focus predominantly upon Jesus’ public ministry.

Yet, at Pentecost, when the mission of the disciples begins with Peter talking to the crowd in Jerusalem he focuses as much upon the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, as he does on Jesus’ works. The same with Paul, as in Acts 13 – the focus is upon the death and resurrection of Jesus and the witnesses of those events. Paul did not have the written gospel accounts and so it is not surprising that the focus is upon these events.

When we consider that the essentials of faith depend upon the incarnation, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, we see that women take an extremely important role. Mary, as mother is the “vehicle” of Jesus arrival on earth; without her there is no incarnation. Mary Magdalene is noted as appearing at the crucifixion in all four gospels along with other women including, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, Salome, Mary the mother of Jesus, Mary the wife of Clopas and the mother of the sons of Zebedee. When it comes to resurrection, all four gospel writers name Mary Magdalene as one of the first women to meet Jesus after he rises from death.

John has Mary, not only as the first witness of the resurrection but also the messenger to the other disciples of his ascension into heaven. “Go and find my brothers and tell them: I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God”.

We know that Jesus chose 12 men to accompany him on his journey through Galilee to Jerusalem. We also know from Luke’s account that women accompanied Jesus on his journeys and contributed to the expenses of the travelling. What is clear from the gospels is that the mission of descending to earth to share in our life and ascending to heaven to allow our participation in the divine life, is primarily facilitated and witnessed by women. In the same way today, we can say that the primary witnesses of birth and death are universally women.

If Jesus became human so we could share in his divinity and the mission of the church is to make known the birth, death and resurrection of Jesus, then women are ideally placed to share their experience of the Gospel at times of birth and death, along with offering the story of resurrection. The Christmas and Easter stories are probably the most well-known of all biblical stories for Christians. It is not education of lay women that is needed but encouragement to share the Gospel.

Participation in sharing the Gospel is not only confined to these moments but in any aspect of life where people share stories. As recently noted in The Tablet by Lavinia Byrne and Jane McBride, the stories in the Bible are a mirror: “By gazing into it and learning from their experiences, we are offered a way forward in our own lives.”  By participating in sharing stories, women are involved in being able to share the mission of the Church and make Christ known to the world. This is wonderful news, but it often happens outside the walls and structure of the church. It is often not seen and documented in the same way that numbers of people who attend mass are counted for example.

Section B2 of the Instrumentum Laboris points to an awareness of the hidden mission of women and the need to have more women involved in the governance and administration of church life and this seems a positive step forward. However, there still needs to be a paradigm shift to include a view of mission that is not solely centred on the numerical evidence of Christian life primarily through liturgy. When the church is asking “Can lay people perform the role of community leaders in places where the number of ordained ministers is very low?” (B2.4), it is still prioritising the ordained priestly model above the experience of women’s ministry and mission. Whilst the liturgical focus of the church is seen as the source of mission, the document obliquely asks how other ministries, charisms and vocations could be enhanced to promote inclusion and belonging. This seems to be a question from a stance of privilege rather than a recognition that these ministries already exist but are not seen as essential.

When a “transfiguring” of the landscape of mission is allowed for, participation is seen not as an extra but an existing working out of women’s baptismal calling in a culturally sensitive way. The synod document repeatedly asks how women and lay men can be involved in governance and shaping an accountable church, but it is a long and painful process for power to be shared more evenly and lay people’s role to be acknowledged and respected as central to the mission of the church. Again, the authors of the document are aware of the urgency of the task: “Gradually the conversation between brothers and sisters in faith opens the space for a ‘hearing together’, that is, a listening together to the voice of the Spirit. It is not conversation in the Spirit if there is not a step forward in a precise, often unexpected direction that points to concrete action.” (My italics.)

Throughout the document there is a recognition of the failings of the institutional church and hope for the future. Pope Francis is both encouraging of a dialogue whilst at the same time sending ambiguous messages about the role of women. Whilst he has chosen Sr Natalie Berquart as the first female under-secretary of the Synod of Bishops, he has also overseen the 2018 document Cor Orans which sees the time from aspirancy to solemn profession for contemplative nuns extended from five years to a minimum of nine years whilst remaining the same four to five years for male orders. Participation for contemplative sisters within their own congregation is delayed, therefore limiting their inclusion in their wider church, despite the document asking “What new ministries could be created to provide the means and opportunities for women’s effective participation in discernment and decision-making bodies?”

The 2016 book Hidden Figures told the story of three Afro-American women, Katherine Goble Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan and Mary Jackson, who had been part of the Apollo 11 mission. Their experience, acumen and knowledge were often overlooked and the film details obstacles they had to overcome to be accepted as team members. Its author Margot Lee Shetterly noted that when a Space Task Group was formed in 1958, Katherine Johnson was also part of it. Tellingly, Shetterly says, there was no one moment when it was decided to accept Katherine onto the team, she just persisted in asking to join and showing up and in 1960 NASA published a report of the Flight Research Division co-authored by Johnson; it was the first time a woman received credit as an author of a report.

A woman persisting in asking to be heard and for justice to be done sounds exactly like a gospel story Jesus told. Perhaps that is really the only way women will be able to change the composition of the ecclesial structure. Persistence and turning up will one day see that women already contribute to the mission of the church and that they are more than willing to participate in the structural accountability of the church.  

Women have already made known their aspirations in the first synodal meeting. “The women who participated in the first phase expressed a clear desire that society and the Church be places of growth, active participation and healthy belonging for all women. They ask the Church to be at their side to accompany and promote the realisation of this.” We wait to see what happens this October.

The Rev’d Caroline Worsfold is an Anglican priest who worked as a chaplain in the NHS for over 30 years. She now works as a psychotherapist in private practice and continues to work in local parishes as a priest. She lives in Stockton-on-Tees.