There’s an old joke that a camel is what you get when a horse has been designed by a committee.
I arrived in Rome late on Wednesday night last week, just as the synod was heading into a break day on Thursday during which the final document was being prepared by the drafting committee. (It was far from a complete day off, however: On Thursday afternoon, Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, met with delegates and answered questions about the study group to which the topic of women deacons had been assigned).
I cannot imagine any situation in which writing a document representing a month’s worth of discussions among almost 400 people from every corner of the world, in multiple languages, would go perfectly smoothly. Writing an editorial at America with input from the whole editorial board is stressful enough with a tiny fraction of that number and all of us working in English.
Even with those caveats, it was fascinating, and deeply hopeful, to see how the synod worked through producing its final document, which Pope Francis then adopted in full, choosing to let the synod’s work become part of the ordinary magisterium rather than writing his own apostolic exhortation to finalize it.
One paragraph can serve as a microcosm of why this document strikes me as hopeful even while it bears the camel-like appearance of committee drafting.
Paragraph 60, on the role of women in leadership, is a bit long and unwieldy. It begins by acknowledging that “women continue to encounter obstacles” in exercising roles of leadership and ministry within the church, and then runs through a catalog of some of those roles from Scripture through to contemporary experience. Often during the synod, such a list of roles was given as a way of saying “no” to the question of ordaining women to the diaconate, as if saying, “See how many ways women can already minister?” would resolve the question of whether or not God was calling some of them to minister as deacons.
But that paragraph continues past the list. It calls for a “full implementation” of all the possibilities for women’s leadership already available in canon law, saying that “no reason or impediment” should prevent women from exercising such leadership, for “what comes from the Holy Spirit cannot be stopped.” And then it goes further, saying: “Additionally, the question of women's access to diaconal ministry remains open. This discernment needs to continue.”
I can’t help but wonder if this is what the initial draft said. I think almost certainly not—though of course, we outside the synod hall are not privy to the specifics of drafts and revisions. But we do know that this paragraph, while it passed with almost three-quarters of the delegates voting for it, got more “no” votes than any other in the document (97 against, 258 in favor).
Nor has this paragraph fully satisfied everyone (or perhaps anyone). People who think that any ordination of women, including to the diaconate, is a theological impossibility are frustrated that the question has not been definitively shut down, and many advocates for women deacons, along with many observers outside the church, see this as a merely “punting” on the question, to use the language of The New York Times headline on the document.
In listening to delegates, however, I hear something far different. There was not sufficient unity around the question of women deacons to resolve it in the synod hall. Even if there had been, Pope Francis has been clear in saying “no” to ordaining women as deacons, and Cardinal Fernández of the D.D.F. has repeatedly said that the theological question is not “ripe.”
Since the synod is not a parliament of the church, a question like this cannot be resolved by a majority, or even a supermajority, overruling opposing voices in a vote. Yet since synodality is a “constitutive dimension” of the church, as the final report says, neither can the synod’s continued asking of the question be entirely dismissed by theological authorities or by the pope. In fact, as Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich pointed out in the press conference presenting the final document, by adopting it into the ordinary magisterium, the pope has effectively now said that the question remains open.
One theme that the synod document references several times is the distinction between unity and uniformity, reminding us that the church is called to the former rather than the latter. Unity is a lofty goal. It requires careful conservation where it has already been realized and patience in fostering it where it is not yet evident. But uniformity is no shortcut to unity; it cannot simply be imposed before it has been nurtured and experienced.
On the topic of women deacons—and on other complicated topics as well, such as the teaching authority of bishops’ conferences or ministry to people excluded because of their “marital situation, identity or sexuality”—the synod is searching for unity while recognizing that the experience of and judgment on these matters is not uniform across the church. The final document has been able to name those realities without pretending to be able to resolve them by theological, ecclesial or synodal fiat.
Some people will find that frustrating or may think it a laughably small result after years of effort and consultation. But as I sat in St. Peter’s Basilica for the final Mass of the synod yesterday, I found it a source of hope and a cause for gratitude. This complicated reality is where the church is, and where the Holy Spirit is at work.
That may look like a camel when we thought we wanted a horse. Please God, it may also be able to walk across deserts where the horse would die of thirst.
More from the synod:
