Feminism and the ordination of women as priestesses and ministers.

[TJ in Oregon]

Much of the recent changes that Pope Francis has made concerning the inclusion of women in various positions are pretty minor things that have been announced in such a way to shape a narrative that we're heading for women priests. But we're clearly not.

I suppose deaconesses are potentially plausible provided they do not receive Holy Orders such as deacons do and exist in some other role. No offense to any deacons reading this but personally, I have never really seen much point in the permanent deaconate to begin with.

I think it's also important to bring up what I think is the main underlying issue - and that is the presupposition of radical egalitarianism that makes people even want to have women priests in the first place. Ultimately I think the Church is going to have to come down on this somehow because it simply isn't consistent with the Church's long standing thought on the subject, but I can see why doing so would alienate a lot of people and why they are reticent to do so. As a result they will probably keep making weird minor pr moves that make it look like they are moving in that direction.

[TJ in Oregon]

I’d be interested in hearing the opinion of those who follow the internal affairs of the Catholic Church closely as to how likely they think it is that the Church will in the foreseeable future (or ever) permit the ordination of women. More and more Protestant denominations have been doing so, but my guess for the Catholic Church would be “not very likely”.

It will never happen. John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and now Francis have all infallibly taught the ordination of women is an impossibility.

Theoretically, though, there is nothing to stop a future pope from overruling all of those ones and declaring infallibly that women can be priests, right, despite this being very unlikely to happen?

It is theoretically possible if you take the position that the previous statement was not infallible, but even that would be some level of rejection of the teaching authority of the previous Popes. While technically only ex cathedra statements absolutely cannot be contradicted, the teaching authority of the Pope is considered authoritative on a wider basis. It would be very extreme, basically unthinkable, to overturn point blank statements like JPII's condemnation of women priests, especially while they are in living memory.

One of the more common misconceptions of Papal infallibility is to see it as a power of the Pope when it is really a limit on Papal power, since it also means his predecessors were infallible too.