Women and Church Governance: What Pope Francis’s Reform Changed—and What it Left Open

Francisca Pérez-Madrid is Professor of Law and Religion at the University of Barcelona.[1]

Pope Francis once described clericalism as “one of the greatest deformations” in the life of the Catholic Church. It is a strong diagnosis. What is striking, then, is how resistant that clericalism has proven to reform—even after Praedicate Evangelium, the most ambitious overhaul of the Roman Curia in decades.

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Pope Francis and His Legacy in Theology, Canon Law, Interreligious Dialogue, and Religious Leadership

Pope Francis greets believers in Vatican City / Shutterstock

The series brings together a group of Catholic thinkers to reflect on Pope Francis’s pontificate and legacy. The authors discuss the late Pope’s contribution to peacebuilding, human dignity, social justice, and environmentalism in addition to his reforms, often revolutionary, of Catholic theology, canon law, and the Church’s internal life. Pointing to peaks and valleys of the first Jesuit pope’s rule, they depict him as an extraordinary religious leader, tireless promoter of peace across the globe, and persistent defender of the vulnerable.

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