Phyllis Zagano

Last updated
Phyllis Zagano
Born (1947-08-25) August 25, 1947 (age 76)
Alma mater
Occupation(s)Researcher and adjunct professor
Employer Hofstra University
AwardsFulbright Fellow, Mary Immaculate College, Limerick, Ireland, 2009; Fulbright Senior Scholar, Waterford Institute of Technology, 2015

Phyllis Zagano (born August 25, 1947) [1] is an American author and academic. She has written and spoken on the role of women in the Roman Catholic Church and is an advocate for the ordination of women as deacons. [2] [3] [4] [5] Her writings have been variously translated into Indonesian, Czech, French, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish. [6]

Contents

Early life and education

Zagano was born in Queens, New York in 1947. [1] She graduated from Sacred Heart Academy in 1965. She has a BA from Marymount College in Tarrytown, New York (1969); master's degrees in communications from Boston University (1970), in literature from Long Island University (1972), and in theology from St. John's University (1991); and a PhD from the State University of New York at Stony Brook in 1979. [1]

Career

Zagano was program officer at the National Humanities Center from 1979 to 1980, and taught at Fordham University from 1980 to 1984. [1] She was a researcher at the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York from 1984 to 1986 and a Coolidge Fellow at the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1987. [1] She taught at Boston University from 1988 to 1999. [1]

Since 2002, Zagano has taught at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York, where she is senior research associate-in-residence and adjunct professor of religion. [1] In 2005 she held a visiting professorship at the Yale Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut. In 2009, she was a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Limerick's Mary Immaculate College in Limerick, Ireland, where she was a lecturer. [1] In 2015 she was a Fulbright Senior Specialist at the Waterford Institute of Technology, in Waterford, Ireland.

Zagano's scholarship and work as a theologian has been recognized by both awards and critical engagement. She received "Layperson of the Year" award from Voice of the Faithful in 2012. [7] She received the Isaac Hecker Award for Social Justice from the Paulist Center of Boston in 2014. [8] [9] Two years later, in 2016, Pope Francis appointed Zagano to the Papal Study Commission on the Women's Diaconate. [10] [11] Prior to disputing with her ideas, Crisis Magazine described Zagano as "one of the most high-ranking feminists in the Catholic Church" in 2019. [12]

Zagano's career also includes over 30 years as public affairs office in the U.S. Navy Reserve. She retired from the Navy Reserve at the rank of Commander. [1]

Beginning in 2008, she has regularly donated her papers to the Women and Leadership Archives of Loyola University Chicago. [1]

Publications

Zagano's publications include:

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holy orders</span> Sacraments in some Christian churches

In certain Christian denominations, holy orders are the ordained ministries of bishop, priest (presbyter), and deacon, and the sacrament or rite by which candidates are ordained to those orders. Churches recognizing these orders include the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Anglican, Assyrian, Old Catholic, Independent Catholic and some Lutheran churches. Except for Lutherans and some Anglicans, these churches regard ordination as a sacrament.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Deacon</span> Office in Christian churches

A deacon is a member of the diaconate, an office in Christian churches that is generally associated with service of some kind, but which varies among theological and denominational traditions. Major Christian churches, such as the Catholic Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, the Eastern Orthodox Church, Lutheranism, Methodism, Anglicanism, and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints view the diaconate as an order of ministry.

Subdeacon is a minor order of ministry for men in various branches of Christianity. The subdeacon has a specific liturgical role and is placed below the deacon and above the acolyte in the order of precedence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ordination of women</span> Womens ordination in religious groups

The ordination of women to ministerial or priestly office is an increasingly common practice among some contemporary major religious groups. It remains a controversial issue in certain religious groups in which ordination was traditionally reserved for men.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Focolare Movement</span> Roman Catholic new religious movement

The Focolare Movement is a Christian new religious movement and international organization that promotes the ideals of unity and universal brother/sisterhood. It was founded by the elementary school teacher Chiara Lubich in 1943 in Trento, Northern Italy as a Roman Catholic lay movement. It remains largely Roman Catholic but has strong links to the major Christian denominations, other religions, and in some cases the non-religious.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Deaconess</span> Ministry in some Christian churches

The ministry of a deaconess is a usually non-ordained ministry for women in some Protestant, Oriental Orthodox, and Eastern Orthodox churches to provide pastoral care, especially for other women, and which may carry a limited liturgical role. The word comes from the Greek diakonos (διάκονος), for "deacon", which means a servant or helper and occurs frequently in the Christian New Testament of the Bible. Deaconesses trace their roots from the time of Jesus Christ through to the 13th century in the West. They existed from the early through the middle Byzantine periods in Constantinople and Jerusalem; the office may also have existed in Western European churches. There is evidence to support the idea that the diaconate including women in the Byzantine Church of the early and middle Byzantine periods was recognized as one of the major non-ordained orders of clergy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Avery Dulles</span> American Jesuit priest (1918–2008)

Avery Robert Dulles was an American Jesuit priest, theologian, and cardinal of the Catholic Church. Dulles served on the faculty of Woodstock College from 1960 to 1974, of the Catholic University of America from 1974 to 1988, and as the Laurence J. McGinley Professor of Religion and Society at Fordham University from 1988 to 2008. He was also an internationally known author and lecturer.

A diaconia was originally an establishment built near a church building, for the care of the poor and distribution of the church's charity in medieval Rome or Naples. Examples included the sites of San Vito, Santi Alessio e Bonifacio, and Sant'Agatha in Rome, San Gennaro in Naples (headed by a deacon named John in the end of the ninth and the beginning of the tenth century. The popes allocated to the Romans bathing through diaconia, or private Lateran baths, or even a myriad of monastic bath houses functioning in eighth and ninth centuries.

Michael William Higgins is a Canadian academic and writer. He was the interim principal of St. Mark's College and president of Corpus Christi College from July 15, 2020- July 31, 2023. Higgins and his wife Krystyna, a professional piano accompanist, liturgical musician and freelance editor, have four adult children---Rebecca, Andrew, Sarah and Alexa.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tina Beattie</span> British writer and broadcaster

Tina Beattie is a British Christian theologian, writer and broadcaster.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ordination of women and the Catholic Church</span>

In the liturgical traditions of the Catholic Church, the term ordination refers to the means by which a person is included in one of the holy orders of bishops, priests or deacons. The teaching of the Catholic Church on ordination, as expressed in the 1983 Code of Canon Law, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and the apostolic letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis, is that only a Catholic male validly receives ordination, and "that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful." In other words, the male priesthood is not considered by the church a matter of policy but an unalterable requirement of God. As with priests and bishops, the church ordains only men as deacons.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Women in the Catholic Church</span>

Women play significant roles in the life of the Catholic Church, although excluded from the Catholic hierarchy of bishops, priests, and deacons. In the history of the Catholic Church, the church often influenced social attitudes toward women. Influential Catholic women have included theologians, abbesses, monarchs, missionaries, mystics, martyrs, scientists, nurses, hospital administrators, educationalists, religious sisters, Doctors of the Church, and canonised saints. Women constitute the majority of members of consecrated life in the Catholic Church: in 2010, there were around 721,935 professed women religious. Motherhood and family are given an exalted status in Catholicism, with The Blessed Virgin Mary holding a special place of veneration.

Pheme Perkins is a Professor of Theology at Boston College, where she has been teaching since 1972. She is a nationally recognized expert on the Greco-Roman cultural setting of early Christianity, as well as the Pauline Epistles and Gnosticism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Phyllis Tickle</span>

Phyllis Natalie Tickle was an American author and lecturer whose work focuses on spirituality and religion issues. After serving as a teacher, professor, and academic dean, Tickle entered the publishing industry, serving as the founding editor of the religion department at Publishers Weekly, before then becoming a popular writer. She is well known as a leading voice in the emergence church movement. She is perhaps best known for The Divine Hours series of books, published by Doubleday Press, and her book The Great Emergence- How Christianity Is Changing and Why. Tickle was a member of the Episcopal Church, where she was licensed as both a lector and a lay eucharistic minister. She has been widely quoted by many media outlets, including Newsweek, Time, Life, The New York Times, USA Today, CNN, C-SPAN, PBS, The History Channel, the BBC and VOA. It has been said that "Over the past generation, no one has written more deeply and spoken more widely about the contours of American faith and spirituality than Phyllis Tickle." A biography of Tickle, written by Jon M. Sweeney, was published in February 2018. Phyllis Tickle: A Life, has been widely reviewed.

Jon M. Sweeney is an author of popular history, spirituality, biography, poetry, fiction for young readers, and memoir. His most frequent subjects are Catholic, particularly St. Francis of Assisi, about whom Sweeney has written The St. Francis Prayer Book, Francis of Assisi in His Own Words, When Saint Francis Saved the Church, The Complete Francis of Assisi, and The Enthusiast, a biography that Richard Rohr calls "An immense and important contribution to our understanding of the great saint."

The first Study Commission on the Women's Diaconate was established in August 2016 by Pope Francis to review the theology and history of the ministry of women deacons (deaconesses) in the Roman Catholic Church. The commission report was not published. After the Amazonian synod, Pope Francis promised to re-open this commission. He established a second commission instead in April 2020.

The Wijngaards Institute for Catholic Research is a British "progressive" think tank producing research on controversial issues within contemporary Roman Catholic theology. It does so by coordinating an international network of academics, most of whom are Roman Catholic.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shawn McKnight</span> American prelate of the Catholic Church (born 1968)

William Shawn McKnight is an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church who has been serving as bishop of the Diocese of Jefferson City in Missouri since 2017.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Milligan</span> American religious scholar (1935–2011)

Mary Milligan was an American theologian, a university administrator, and a member of the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary (RSHM) who served as the tenth general superior of the Institute of the RSHM (1980–1985). She was the first general superior of that religious order who was born in the United States. In 1987, she was appointed by the Vatican as special secretary to the International Synod of Bishops on the Laity as one of three U.S. experts. While undertaking that task, she lobbied for a stronger role for women within the Catholic Church. She served Loyola Marymount University as a professor, as provost, and subsequently as Dean of Bellarmine College of Liberal Arts. She went on to serve on the board of St. John's Seminary in Camarillo, California, and taught theology to seminarians.

Dolores R. Leckey was the founding director of the Secretariat for Family, Laity, Women, and Youth, and was at that time one of the highest ranking women in the Roman Catholic Church in the United States. She served in that role for 20 years. In 1996, she staffed the Bishops' Committee on Women in Society and in the Church. In the foreword to the report issued by that Committee on Women, Bishop John C. Dunne, who served as chairman, praised her skill and leadership in guiding the committee's work. From 1998 to 2012 she was a Senior Fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center of Georgetown University, the first woman who served in that role.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 Maria L. Wagner, Laura Pearce, Melissa Newman (2011). "Phyllis Zagano, Ph.D., Papers 1942-2021, n.d." (PDF). Archived from the original on 2022-11-14.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) Archived 23 June 2015.
  2. "A Woman on the Altar". US Catholic. 3 January 2012. Retrieved 26 April 2012.
  3. "Seeking Larger Role for Women in the Church". Newsday. Retrieved 31 July 2012.
  4. ""Essays boost case for women deacons"". National Catholic Reporter. Retrieved 1 September 2017.
  5. ""Witness Interview: Phyllis Zagano"=". Salt & Light TV. Retrieved 4 September 2017.
  6. 1 2 "Phyllis Zagano, Ph.D." Hofstra College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 14 August 2012.
  7. "Reflections on Catherine of Siena by Dr. Phyllis Zagano after receiving "Layperson of the year" award from VOTF 9/15/12 | FutureChurch". www.futurechurch.org. Retrieved 2018-02-13.
  8. Zagano accepts social justice award, National Catholic Reporter (January 28, 2014).
  9. Dennis Coday, Zagano honored with Paulist justice award, National Catholic Reporter (January 23, 2014).
  10. "Pope institutes commission to study the diaconate of women". Vatican Radio. August 2, 2016.
  11. Laurie Goodstein, Pope Francis Appoints Panel to Study Women Deacons: Q&A With a Member, New York Times (August 2, 2016): "Pope Francis has created a commission to study the possibility of ordaining women as deacons in the Roman Catholic Church. On Tuesday, he named 12 experts — six men and six women — to serve on the panel. ... Phyllis Zagano, a professor of religion at Hofstra University ... was appointed by Francis to the commission."
  12. "The Gnostic Feminism of Phyllis Zagano". Crisis Magazine. 2019-01-22. Retrieved 2022-11-14.
  13. "Book Review: The Dominican Tradition". Spiritualwoman.Net. Retrieved 23 July 2012.
  14. "2012 Catholic Press Association Book Awards" (PDF). Book Award Winners. Retrieved 27 July 2012.
  15. "It's Time to Ordain Women (Again)". Religion Dispatches. 27 December 2011. Retrieved 23 July 2012.
  16. "2017 Catholic Press Association Book Awards" (PDF). Book Award Winners. Retrieved 4 September 2017.
  17. "2021 Catholic Press Association Book Awards" (PDF). Book Award winners. Retrieved 11 October 2021.