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March 25th, 2024

Vocations Sunday 2024: Same Baptism. Same Spirit. Same Calling.

Catholics worldwide are hungering for the full and equal participation of women at all levels in the church. So this Vocations Sunday, let’s come together and let the truth ring out: Women are ready, prepared, and called to the priesthood. Women do priestly work. And we need women priests. On Vocations Sunday, April 21, 2024,…
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February 15th, 2024

WOC events in NYC – March 2024

As part of the Women’s Ordination Conference’s status as an NGO in consultative status to the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), we host parallel events at the UN Commission on the Status of Women each year. This year, we have a pair of events coming up coinciding with the CSW in March: About…
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February 9th, 2024

Synod Listening Sessions: Interim Stage 2024

Join WOC for a listening session during the interim stage of the Synod on Synodality. We will reflect on the synodal process thus far and engage with the “Conversation in the Spirit” model to go even deeper into the discernment needed in this moment. All are welcome. Register below: If you are unable to attend either session,…
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January 9th, 2024

U.S. Catholic: Has the synod on synodality changed anything?

By Heidi Schlumpf As the delegates to the Synod on Synodality met in Rome for the first day of the month-long summit to determine the future of the Catholic Church, down the street several dozen women held a gathering of their own. Representing four continents and dressed in episcopal purple, the women unfurled a giant…
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December 21st, 2023

What we learned in 2023

Here at the Women’s Ordination Conference, 2023 will be remembered as the year women voted for the first time at the Vatican. The years-long effort for Votes for Catholic Women, spearheaded by WOC and partner reform organizations came to fruition this past October as 54 women voted inside the synod hall for the first (and…
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December 13th, 2023

NCR: Retiring director of FutureChurch praised as woman of spirit, spunk, hope

By Katie Collins Scott On Oct. 3, 2018, as bishops and cardinals entered the Vatican to participate in the Synod of Bishops on young people, a group peacefully protested the fact that no women would be allowed to vote at the international gathering.  Standing outside the Palace of the Holy Office, near where the synod members…
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November 21st, 2023

Register for Advent Taize: The Sacrament of Darkness

Join WOC on December 21 at 8 pm ET for a contemplative evening of Taize prayer called, “The Sacrament of Darkness.” On the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere, in the heart of Advent waiting and preparation, we will look to the grace that divine darkness offers. Our prayer will also feature preaching from writer…
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November 2nd, 2023

NCR: ‘We will continue to be heard’: Progressive Catholics react to synod report

By Brian FragaStaff Reporter The 41-page synthesis report for the Synod of Bishops on Synodality disappointed several progressive Catholics and others who advocate for the Catholic Church to rethink its approach to issues such as the clergy sex abuse crisis, LGBTQ ministry, women’s roles in the church and the possibility of ordaining women to the…
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November 2nd, 2023

Nota al Pie (Argentina): Women’s Ordination, una organización que lucha por el lugar de las mujeres en la Iglesia católica

 Footnote spoke with WOC executive director, Kate McElwee. She stated that her organization was actively and faithfully engaged, encouraging broad and hopeful participation of women in the process, “despite the Vatican’s minimal credibility to truly listen to women’s voices, vocations and concerns.” Read the full article (in Spanish) here.

October 30th, 2023

AP: Pope’s meeting on church future says it’s ‘urgent’ to guarantee governance roles for women

BY NICOLE WINFIELD VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis’ big gathering of Catholic bishops and laypeople said Saturday it was “urgent” to guarantee fuller participation of women in church governance positions and called for research on allowing women to be deacons to be released within a year. But the meeting didn’t take decisive action on that issue, and…
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October 30th, 2023

Le Temps (France): Lentement, l’Eglise catholique se féminise (Slowly, the Catholic Church is becoming more feminine)

The pontiff carefully examines the badge hanging from a lady’s neck. She managed to find her way to Francis, seated at one of the many round tables set up in the Paul VI Hall at the Vatican. She whispers a word in his ear. Other women, countless, young and old, secular and religious, surround the pope. Two men and…
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October 30th, 2023

RTE News (Ireland): Vatican publishes report on Pope’s month-long synod

By Ailbhe ConneelySocial Affairs & Religion Correspondent A report concluding Pope Francis’s month-long synod on Synodality has been published by the Vatican. It follows a meeting of the 16th Synod of Bishops this month, which was held after the Pope called for a global conversation among Catholics in 2021, about their church. For the first time…
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October 28th, 2023

Women’s Ordination Conference responds to final document of Pope Francis’ October 2023 Synod on Synodality

For Immediate Release: October 28, 2023 Following the month-long 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops convened by Pope Francis at the Vatican, the Women’s Ordination Conference (WOC) expresses its support for the ways in which the need for the greater participation of women in the pastoral life and governance of the church…
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October 14th, 2023

France24: Women set to vote for first time at Catholic Synod of Bishops [VIDEO]

In a historic moment for the Catholic Church, women are to vote for the first time at the Synod of Bishops, later this month. Annette Young asks Kate McElwee, the executive director of the Women’s Ordination Conference, if we are moving closer to the possibility of having Catholic women priests. See the interview with Kate…
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October 10th, 2023

UCA News: Will all voices be heard at the Synod on Synodality?

By Virginia Saldanha Several lay people groups from all parts of the world have been congregating in Rome several days before the start of the Synod on Synodality and continue to do so, to try to get their voices heard. … …From Oct 3 to 6, the Women’s Ordination Conference (WOC), Women’s Ordination Worldwide (WOW),…
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