A global network of Catholic women has called on male prelates to include more female experiences and voices in discussions at the synod on the family.
A collection of 40 short essays by Catholic women, titled Catholic Women Speak: Bringing Our Gifts to the Table, is to be launched in Rome on October 1.
Pope Francis has appointed 30 women to attend the synod as auditors, making contributions to the discussions, but only the 279 male members of the meetings can vote.
The collection of essays is the fruit of a yearlong online networking project to connect Catholic women from around the globe.
Italian historian Lucetta Scaraffia said: “The absence of women’s perspectives at times of reflection on these issues is not only an act of disdain toward women, who make up more than half of religious and believers, it is also an impoverishment of Catholic life.”
Ms Scaraffia is one of the auditors at the synod to be held next month.
She also edits a monthly edition of the Vatican newspaper l’Osservatore Romano, dedicated to women’s issues.
The women in the essay collection deal with issues like same-sex marriage, divorce and remarriage and widespread use of contraception.
But they also discuss issues like struggles faced in interfaith marriages, specific challenges for women in Africa and Latin America, and the impact poverty has on women.
In their introduction, the editors of the new volume state: “The hierarchy . . . speaks about us, but seldom with us.”.
Citing Francis’s call in 2013 for the Church to study a theology of womanhood, the editors say “such comments reduce women to objects of study, a separate category of reflection”.
“We resist . . . any suggestion that the Church needs a theology of ‘Woman’ or ‘womanhood,'” they continued.
“Rather than a deeper theology of women, we say that the Church needs a deeper theology of the human . . . “
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