Could women soon serve as Catholic deacons?

Pope Francis considers women serving as deacons.

(Image credit: TIZIANA FABI/AFP/Getty Images)

last updated 12 May 2016

Pope Francis just might be open to allowing women to serve in the historically male-dominated ordained ministry of the Catholic Church. On Thursday, Francis reportedly told an international conference of nuns that he would commission a study to answer one nun's question of whether women could serve as deacons, the ordained ministers who can perform baptisms and officiate at weddings and funerals. "Constituting an official commission that might study the question?" Francis said, according to the National Catholic Reporter. "Yes. It would do good for the Church to clarify this point. I am in agreement."

Only men can currently serve as deacons, though unlike priests, deacons can marry. However, Francis said women used to serve as deacons in the early days of the church, so the only remaining question now is whether those women deacons were actually ordained.