section_path: Papacy (2013–2025)/Role of women
section_name: Role of women
paragraph_text: Role of women
  
  Francis categorically rejected the ordination of women as priests. Early in his papacy, he initiated dialogue on the possibility of deaconesses, creating in 2016 a Study Commission on the Women's Diaconate to research the role of female deacons in early Christianity. Its report was not made public, but Francis said in 2019 that the commission was unable to come to a consensus. In April 2020, Francis empaneled a new commission, led by Cardinal Giuseppe Petrocchi with a new membership, to study the issue. Francis delayed a decision on the issue for several years. In interviews in late 2023 and 2024, he appeared to reject the idea of women deacons, saying that " holy orders is reserved for men." Francis said that "the fact that the woman does not access ministerial life is not a deprivation, because her place is much more important" and that women had a charism separate from "the ministerial way."
  
  In January 2021, Francis issued Spiritus Domini, allowing bishops to institute women to the ministries of acolyte and lector. While these instituted ministries were previously reserved to men, Catholic women already carried out these duties without institution in most of the world. Francis wrote that these ministries are fundamentally distinct from those reserved to ordained clergy. The following month, Francis appointed women to several positions previously held only by men: a French member of the Xaviere Missionary Sisters, Nathalie Becquart, was appointed co-undersecretary of the Synod of Bishops, and Italian magistrate Catia Summaria became the first woman Promoter of Justice in the Vatican's Court of Appeals.
  
  In April 2023, Francis announced that 35 women would be allowed to vote at the Sixteenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops ("just over 10%" of all voters), marking the first time women are allowed to vote at any Catholic Synod of Bishops.