Dreaming Of A Woman Pope: What Keeps The Church Stuck So Far Behind

-Essay-

TURIN — When I was a little girl, I wanted to be a priest. Not a nun, no — a priest. I went to church regularly to prepare for my First Communion, and during that year of catechism I memorized all the prayers, even the Creed, which only two or three of us in the whole class could recite by heart.

I answered every question about the most complicated theological matters without hesitation. Where is God? God is in Heaven, on Earth, and everywhere. What is the nature of God? God is one and a trinity at the same time. What did Jesus teach us? To love your neighbor as yourself.

I sang in the church choir, and after Mass I would collect the leaflets people had left behind on the pews. Then, back home, I would celebrate Mass for my dolls lined up in rows.

My faith began to falter when I realized that, because I was a girl, I would never be able to officiate Mass, never wear the sacred vestments, not even preach to a congregation. And, in the end, that any possible career within the Church was off-limits to me by birth. I could never follow the shining example of John Paul II. I could never look out over St. Peter’s Square with a benevolent gaze, never offer words of comfort and faith urbi et orbi.

From a different angle

My disappointment wasn’t really about gender injustice. I wasn’t offended by the fact that no woman could ever lead the Church. I was just heartbroken that I could never become pope. Maybe I felt it was my calling. I don’t know. As a child, everything seems within reach.

Of course, old boys’ clubs still exist, but they’re no longer socially acceptable.

Now, just days before the start of the conclave, that childhood memory comes back to me from a different angle. If not long ago it was perfectly normal to see a debate made up entirely of men, today it is almost unthinkable to witness a conference, a TV or radio show without a single woman’s voice.

Of course, old boys’ clubs still exist, but they’re no longer socially acceptable. Yes, it’s still an uphill battle and full of complications, and not every woman in institutions, finance, or culture represents or feels she represents other women.

Open to everyone?

Still, there is no denying that something is changing. And for that reason, watching 133 cardinals elect both the head of state and the head of the Christian world is a scene that now feels jarring. Even visually, it seems to belong to a different era.

I certainly don’t want to wade into theological debates or dispute canon law regarding the election of a pope, or the question of women in the priesthood. I haven’t been a believer for many years now, but I still think that every religion has the right to set its own rules, as long as they don’t clash with the secular nature of the state or individual rights. If you disagree with those rules or don’t identify with them, you are free to turn to atheism or choose a different church or faith.

But I still carry a regret, perhaps rooted in that childhood dream. How can an institution so anchored in history and geography, like the Catholic Church, and how can a voice so powerful and influential for millions of people, like the pope’s, ignore the female perspective on the world, on faith, on doctrine? How can someone be a shepherd of souls without taking into account the views, needs, demands, and intellectual richness of what Simone de Beauvoir provocatively called “the second sex”?

There is a deep-rooted fear that a woman might one day cunningly take control of the Christian community.

If women in the Church were truly given a voice, not metaphorically but in reality, what would the Catholic position be on issues like same-sex couples, trans people, euthanasia, abortion, or divorce? Of course, Pope Francis, whom I had the chance to meet in the Sistine Chapel during an audience with writers, taught that the Church is open to everyone — a todos, as he liked to repeat.

It was a message of great openness, often criticized by conservatives, but it hasn’t been enough to transform the structure of a patriarchal institution built on male authority, in which leadership roles are reserved for men and only men can choose the man who will guide them.

Habemus Popess

In the Middle Ages, around the seventh century, the legend of Pope Joan began to circulate. She supposedly reigned over the Church under the name of John VIII from 855 to 857. Almost certainly untrue, the story reflects a deep-rooted fear that a woman might one day cunningly take control of the Christian community.

Other legends sprang up too, including the tale of a mysterious papal throne with a hole in the middle used for intimate physical inspections. To prevent future embarrassment, an official was said to check the new pope’s anatomy, feeling with his hand for male attributes. Only if satisfied would he cry out, Virgam et testiculos habet! (“He has a penis and testicles”). To which the cardinals, relieved, would respond, Deo gratias — “thanks be to God” — and proceed with the consecration.

The unsettling image of the female pope lives on in the Tarot deck, which dedicates one of the most powerful Major Arcana to her. Her appearance signals intuition, wisdom, and the inner strength to face challenges with awareness.

A woman pope has never existed and probably never will. Religions draw their strength and longevity from a set of values that are traditional and unchanging. Yet we can still hope that the next pope, whoever he may be, will know how to see the world through a woman’s eyes too. And how could that happen? Through the work and the grace of the Holy Spirit. That, at least, is what I learned as a child.