Hofstra professor: Francis addressed key Catholic women's issue

Phyllis Zagano said Pope Francis moved the needle on the Catholic Church's position on women deacons.

Zagano, a Hofstra University senior research associate, was appointed by Francis to a commission to study the role of women deacons, who would not be priests but would perform duties such as preaching at Mass and baptisms.

In the end, Francis did not allow women deacons, but he put the issue on the table and gave tantalizing clues he would like to see it happen, Zagano said.

“He was an extraordinary individual who took chances, and I think one of the chances he took was to introduce the discussion of ordaining women in the deaconate,” she said.

In 2018, Zagano and other members of the commission were eating lunch at the Santa Marta complex at the Vatican where Francis lived when, she recounted, he came up to their table and said in Italian, “Who’s going to be the first woman deacon?”

The bemused group pointed at Zagano, she said.

Zagano said Monday that she is disappointed women deacons were not restored under Francis — she contends they existed in the early church — but is pleased he pushed the issue.

“I think it's important to focus on what he was able to do and not on what he was unable to do,” she said. “This is a pope, I think, who moved the church really forward.”