From the far reaches of New Zealand to the very heart of Catholicism in Rome, the Pink Shoes Into The Vatican Campaign is making a bold statement on gender inequality within the Church.

Led by Be the Change Aotearoa New Zealand, this grassroots initiative will take the form of an eye-catching art installation in October, featuring worn-out women's shoes adorned with pink ribbons.

However, these aren't just shoes; each pair tells a tale of women's hardships within the Church.

Christina Reymer, an active member of Be the Change, is personally taking the shoes to Rome.

The Pink Shoes Into The Vatican campaign, launched in Auckland and Wellington last year, is set to be a vivid reminder of one of the Church's largest overlooked constituencies — its women.

It has already sparked international interest and seems certain to ignite conversation — and possibly even controversy.

"While the official synod will for the first time include lay people, including women, the concern is that this will still be a highly orchestrated event with vain hope for real change" says Reymer.

"We want to cast the net wider, to hear from the ‘majority', most of whom have already left, having felt marginalised by the church's abuses of gender discrimination, clericalism, patriarchy, sexual and emotional abuse, colonialism and other injustices, including the environment."

The Pink Shoes art installation will stand as a graphic illustration of one of the largest marginalised voices in the Church, the voice of women.

Spirit Unbounded

While in Rome, Reymer will also attend the Spirit Unbounded lay-led synodal assembly from October 8-14.

Spirit Unbounded is an independent gathering that will run parallel to Pope Francis's Synod on Synodality.

"While the Pope's initiative is a step in the right direction, many worry it's too controlled, too orchestrated," Reymer told CathNews.

"We aim to hear from those who've already left the Church, disheartened by its failure to fully address gender discrimination, abuse and other social and environmental issues."

Spirit Unbounded seeks to create a global network of Catholic reform and other Christian groups that actively embrace diversity and work to include groups marginalised by the hierarchical Church.

Spirit Unbounded currently enjoys 43 companions.

The Spirit Unbounded event, which is both an in-person and online event, will feature more than 100 global speakers including notable figures such as Benedictine Sr Joan Chittister and Dr Mary McAleese, former President of Ireland.

Other Spirit Unbounded voices include Pa Ropata, Professor Thomas O'Loughlin, Dr James Alison, Professor Leonardo Boff, Cherie Blair, Bishop Bridget Mary Meehan, Dr Tom Doyle and Fr Diarmuid O'Murchu.

The ‘Human Rights in the Emerging Catholic Church' event aims to push the envelope even further, insisting that the Church must evolve to address contemporary global challenges from social injustice to environmental degradation.

Sources

• Supplied - Be the Change Catholic Church Aotearoa
• CathNews NZ
• Spirit Unbounded

Held on International Women's Day, the event at Auckland's St Patrick's Cathedral plaza included a display of well-worn pink shoes.

The event was timed to coincide with midday Mass.

'Be the Change' invited Auckland Catholic bishop Steve Lowe to attend; however, he was unavailable. It also extended an invitation to Dean of the Cathedral, Fr Chris Denham, who, last year, attended in place of Lowe.

"Be the Change' seeks to change the Church by allowing gender equality at all levels of the Church.

By encouraging the Church leadership to enlarge the space of the Church's tent and be more inclusive of women, the group invites the Vatican to walk its own talk.

As well as the pink shoes, the women also pitched a small tent with a sign reading, "Enlarge the space of your tent."

"Enlarge the space of your tent" is the title of a recently released Vatican document for the next phase of Pope Francis' synodal process.

The group says the phrase, "Enlarge the space of your tent," promotes a profound re-appropriation of the common dignity of all the baptised, starting with a desire of radical inclusion where no one is excluded.

In 2022, 'Be the Change' conducted similar events in Auckland and Wellington.

"A vibrant church requires a synodal structure in which all members share full equality by right of their baptism," say the women.

"We chose International Women's Day because we stand with our sisters across the world who seek justice and equality, not only in Church life, but in a multitude of areas of their lives."

Also at the event, 'Be the Change' women gave out key rings, each with a little pink resin shoe, which they say is a tangible reminder of the journey for justice and equality for women in the Church.

'Be the Change' says it has created its own faith community that is helping bring justice, equality and an inclusive Catholic Church.

Core to the group's beliefs is exploring how women can be part of the governance role of the Church and, to this end, it will stand alongside women who feel called to leadership and ordained ministry.

"Synod 2024 feedback from people across the world asks to the end of injustice and inequality for women and their inclusion in ordained priesthood and leadership roles in the Catholic Church," say the group.

'Be the Change' Catholic Church Aotearoa is coordinated by Christina Reymer, Jo Ayers, Louise Shanly and Mary Thorne.

Sources

• Supplied
• Be the Change
• Evening Report NZ
• NCR

A media release from a group called "Be the Change, Catholic Church, Aotearoa" notes New Zealand women's suffrage was granted on 19 September 1893, and this month's anniversary shows the Catholic Church is 129 years behind New Zealand in recognising the leadership skills of women.

To mark the event on 18 September, Catholic women in Wellington are mounting an installation of shoes between Parliament and Sacred Heart Cathedral.

The organisers are highlighting God's call for the Church to allow women to exercise their gifts.

They say women are often the majority of any Catholic congregation and are usually the ones organising the various tasks that need to be done at every liturgical celebration.

Yet the Catholic Church continues the injustice of refusing to recognise women's worth by denying them equality in leadership roles, their media release says.

The shoes signify the largely unpaid work women have done for the Church throughout the ages. These contributions have been recorded in short, printed vignettes accompanying the shoes.

There will be splashes of pink, including on some of the shoes, and music, singing and speeches.

The day starts at midday with shoes being placed in a walking pattern from the steps of Parliament onto Molesworth Street, around the corner into Hill Street and across the road to the cathedral.

The event is due to finish around 2pm when the shoes will be gathered up and donated to charity.

The idea for the project came to light two years ago, but the action was postponed several times because of Covid-19 lockdowns.

The women invited Cardinal John Dew to meet them again outside the Sacred Heart Cathedral on 18 September. They would like to give him a "suffrage charter" of requests about women's role in participation in decision-making at all levels.

With Dew in Rome, Coadjutor Archbishop of Wellington Paul Martin has responded.

Martin denied the group the opportunity to promote the event around the Archdiocese's parishes and wrote to parishes reinforcing his decision to prevent their publicising the event.

"I appreciate your recognition of the synodal process and what has emerged as part of that, some of which supports what your group wishes to promote regarding the role of women in the authorised leadership and decision-making bodies within the Church," he said.

"My sense is that the gathering ... on the 18th has more of a focus of making a statement and furthering a particular point of view, rather than for the building up of the Church community, especially at a time when we are fragile.

"There are many ways we can celebrate the role of women in the Catholic church and also laymen over the years.

"This is something for us to do as a Church community in our own places rather than starting at Parliament and then moving to a church that is currently closed.

"I do struggle with the idea that the participation of women has been and is invisible," Martin said.

"There are so many who do work, have worked and worshipped in our Church community, and who have made a significant contribution to the life of the Church and have served it in the way we are all called to do.

"There are many women who have leadership roles in the Wellington Archdiocese and in parishes also.

"I do not think that our church communities see them as invisible, and I know that I don't.

"I think that is a different issue to being part of the authorised leadership and decision-making bodies within the Church," he said.

New Zealand's Catholic Bishops Conference (NZCBC) says six themes have emerged from the diocesan phase of the 2023 Synod on Synodality.

These are: inclusion, gathering, leadership, education and formation, mission, and synodality and change.

The leadership theme is particularly relevant to the women's request, saying "Collaborative ministry should become the norm, with greater sacramental involvement for lay people."

• NZ Catholic
• Supplied
• This article has been updated to include Coadjutor Archbishop Paul Martin's publicity denial in the archdiocese. CathNews regrets the glaring omission from the original piece.

The group, which is part of Be the Change Aotearoa New Zealand, is inspired by the concept of Te Whariki, or the 'woven mat'. Its purpose is to reflect on the interconnectedness of each strand of church and society with the ecological crisis which highlights the ever more craven workings of western capitalism.

The group of Auckland, Hamilton and Wellington people see their kaupapa as focusing on who we are as people of Aotearoa, how we have developed and maintained good relationships between our people, and how we ensure our mission integrates with God's mission so that our work is relevant to the wider human community and aligned with the way the natural world operates.

Decolonisation of Aotearoa is paramount, with its call to take responsibility for action for change framed by the unique relationship between Tangata Whenua and Tangata Tiriti - the place and the people.

This call to action is a refocus on prioritising right relationships with the rest of the natural world.

Last year's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported unprecedented widespread, rapid and intensifying changes in climate, some of which cannot be changed. But by limiting warming through immediate rapid and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, some changes could be slowed and others stopped.

In reflecting on these matters, we realise the importance of bringing ourselves and our beliefs as church into the wider community and to making timely and relevant applications to the way we plan and organise governance action at all levels in the shared public space across those communities.

This will be something very new for the Catholic Church in Aotearoa.

We want to ensure that as a lay-led initiative, laypeople can own it and shape it as we go forward. We plan an initial webinar that will explore the direction of this initiative overall and provide a taster of the three proposed work streams: Ending decolonisation in Aotearoa, Our care for the earth and other parts of the natural world and Practising relational governance.

These workstreams will probably take place on different days which, through smart use of technology, means that the overall length of the programme can be adjusted to fit everybody's needs.

The planning group welcomes any expressions of interest at this stage in the development of our lay-led initiative.

Source

• Supplied by: Christina Reymer, Mary Thorne, Cecily McNeill, Anton Hikairo Spellman

Recently French theologian, Anne Soupa, gained worldwide attention by applying for the position of Archbishop of Lyon. She has since been followed by other French women making themselves available for senior leadership roles in the Church.

Also, in Switzerland Marianne Pohl-Henzen, a mother and grandmother has been appointed as the Bishop's Delegate and Pope Francis has appointed six laywomen to the committee to oversee Vatican Finances.

As a group committed to working for justice and equity for all the Baptised, especially women in the global and local Catholic Church, we are encouraged by this stirring of the Spirit of change.

We happily added our signatures to the global petition in support of Anne Soupa and we wrote to her pledging our support.

Through her symbolic action, Anne Soupa hopes to "ignite the imagination of Catholics to imagine the church of the future", and she challenges us to ask the question, "How can we in Aotearoa New Zealand work towards greater equality and justice in leadership and ministry, to bring about a more inclusive model of Catholic Church?"

The vacant See of Palmerston North

We are all aware that, like Lyon, the See of Palmerston North is currently vacant.

While such a vacancy exists, it is a prompt for us all to discuss what kind of leadership is needed in our Church today.

What alternative models of leadership are there to fulfil the role of a Bishop of Aotearoa-New Zealand in 2020?

First of all what does the Church see as necessary for candidates?

The Code of Canon Law Can. 378 §1. currently requires that Bishops:

• Be outstanding in solid faith, good morals, piety, zeal for souls, wisdom, prudence and human virtues.
• Are of good reputation, are at least thirty-five years old and have been ordained as priests for at least five years.
• They also need to hold advanced qualifications or hold true expertise in scripture or theology or canon law.

We also add, that they have had real pastoral experience, show an ability to work collegially and have skill in administration.

After a short phone survey of friends and colleagues, we were able to make a list of ten lay people who have all these qualifications with of course the exception of ordination.

We are pretty sure that most Catholics will be able to make their own lists! But ten is a good start.

We did not include in this list members of religious orders, many of whom qualify, to really make the point that there are among all the Baptised, ample numbers of people capable of leadership in the Church.

Models of diocesan leadership

Our own answer to the question ‘What alternative models of diocesan leadership can we imagine?' we offer for your discussion and discernment.

Option 1

A fully inclusive shared leadership model - say four people one of whom is ordained - representing the diversity of the baptised:

• Tangata Whenua
• Women
• Men
• Different age groups
• Other key ethnicities/cultures

Option 2

Separating the management and sacramental roles of the Bishop.

This would enable the former to be filled by one of the Baptised - woman or man - not requiring ordination - but carrying authority in that area. This mirrors Anne Soupa's application.

In a country where the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, the Chief Justice and the Queen's Representative are all currently women, it is not hard to imagine a woman as a diocesan leader.

Option 3

Following the traditional model, a male ordained priest as Bishop, working closely with an inclusive, diverse team, that reflects gender balance, ethnic diversity and generational demographics. A group committed to shared leadership and without the Bishop having a veto.

Option 4

To offer support and encouragement for women who put their names forward for the position of Bishop of the Palmerston North Diocese

In all these models, the team would also work in a way that reflects the principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

In closing

We will continue our discussion and research and invite interested women and men to join with us. Other ideas are:

• Start your own local group and keep the Apostolic Nuncio and your local diocesan leaders informed of your findings and opinions
  Join our group by contacting us on bethechange.aotearoa@gmail.com, and
• Take part in our inclusive prayer gatherings and ongoing ministry of working for equality in the Church
• Keep in touch with what we are doing through our email updates and looking at our website on www.bethechangecatholicchurchaotearoa.wordpress.com/

We offer support and resources to any groups on the journey of discerning new models of leadership in our Church of Aotearoa New Zealand.

Nga manaakitanga

• Ana Maria de Vos Sanchez, Christina Reymer, Jo Ayers, Louise Shanly - Coordinating Group for Be The Change, Catholic Church, Aotearoa
• The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of CathNews.

Calling themselves ‘Be the Change', the group of men and women say their mission is to promote the inclusion of women in leadership of the Catholic Church.

"As a sign of our support for Soupa, we are delighted to put our names to a global petition supporting Soupa's campaign," Jo Ayers of Be the Change told CathNews.

As well as signing the petition, the group also wrote to Soupa.

"We are delighted to learn that you have applied for the position of Archbishop of Lyon. We think you would be an Archbishop with a fresh approach," ‘Be the Change' wrote.

"If Canon Law does not allow a woman Archbishop, we support changes to canon law."

"We feel you have the knowledge and experience to become Archbishop of Lyon," they wrote.

'Be the Change' was delighted to receive a prompt response from Soupa.

"I have not embarked on this enterprise in a spirit of provocation, but to offer my hand to a Church which is imprisoned in a false sense of loyalty to the past.

"I wish candidates would stand all over the place, to show that women are there, ready and able, with a faith in their hearts that would move mountains," wrote Soupa.

"Would you have any candidates you could suggest?"

Saying they understand that Soupa's bid stands little chance of success, ‘Be the Change' say it, however, sheds light on the issue of gender equality in the Church.

"Having a qualified woman as an applicant for the See of Lyon helps us to imagine what gender equality in the Church will look like," they say.

‘Be the Change' points out that Soupa's initiative raises the possibility of a separation of the roles of governance and priesthood, a question raised by Pope Francis some years ago; in other words, does the head of a Diocese have to be an ordained priest?

"Along with many other people worldwide, we saw this as a great opportunity to encourage the discussion about the ‘invisibility' and lack of participation of women in leadership of the Catholic Church," say ‘Be the Change'.

The New Zealand group say they feel close to Soupa because Bishop Pompallier was born in Lyon and was ordained the first bishop of West Oceania.

They say he was the genesis of the fledgling Catholic Church in New Zealand and like Soupa was a pioneer who shared his faith and skill.

"The founders of 'Be the Change' are a small group of men and women deeply committed to and immersed in the life of the Church, and are theologically informed and are dedicated to the work of justice for women in the liturgy and other Church structures," one of the group's founders, Louise Shanly told CathNews.

As a sign of international solidarity, 'Be the Change' has joined the 'Australasian Coalition for Catholic Church Reform' (ACCCR).

ACCCR is a coalition of about 20 groups who are working for reform of the Church in Australia and now New Zealand.

The main focus as a group is the upcoming Plenary Council in Australia where they are lobbying hard for more just and inclusive membership of this Council and to also get items added to the agenda.

Be the Change invites new members. Those interested are invited to get in touch at: bethechange.aotearoa@gmail.com

Source: Supplied