VOA新闻杂志2025--Pope Francis Names First Woman to Lead Major Vatican Office

Pope Francis has named the first woman to lead a major office of the Roman Catholic Church. On Monday, he chose an Italian nun¹, Sister Simona Brambilla, to head the department responsible for all the church's religious orders.

The appointment is the latest effort by Francis to give women more leadership positions in governing the church. In the past, women have been named to secondary leadership positions in some church offices. But the pope's latest appointment is the first time a woman has been named head of a department of the central governing body of the Roman Catholic Church.

Official media for the church reported "Sister Simona Brambilla is the first woman prefect in the Vatican." A prefect is a chief government officer in the church. Since the Vatican - the place in Rome where the church is headquartered - is officially considered a country, prefect leaders serve like officials in other governments.

The position held by the 59-year-old Brambilla is one of the most important in the church. It is officially known as the Dicastery for the Institutes of Consecrated² Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. This means Brambilla is now responsible for every Catholic religious order churchwide.

Pope Francis also named a male church official, Ángel Fernández Artime, as a co-leader to Brambilla. The reason for having a co-leader is that only men can lead religious services, known as masses, in the Roman Catholic Church.

Brambilla has been a member of the Consolata Missionaries³ religious order. Since last year, she had served as secondary leader in the religious orders department. She will be replacing the current prefect, retiring Cardinal⁴ Joao Braz de Aviz, who is 77 years old.

Brambilla is a nurse who worked as a missionary⁵ in Mozambique and led a religious order from 2011-2023. In 2023, Francis appointed her to be secretary of the religious orders department.

Francis made Brambilla's appointment possible with reforms made in 2022 to the church's founding constitution. The changes permit individuals who are not authorized⁷ to lead church services, including women, to head a dicastery and become prefects. While the constitutional changes give women more possibilities to serve, they are still not permitted to officially lead church services.

Catholic women already do much of the church's work in schools and hospitals and teach many young members. But Francis has continued a longtime ban on women being local church leaders, called priests. He also does not support women becoming deacons, a position just below a priest.

However, under Pope Francis' leadership, there has been a marked increase in the number of women working in church positions since he was elected in 2013. The Vatican News reports the percentage of women in leadership positions rose from 19.3 percent in 2013 to 23.4 percent today.

Among the women holding high leadership positions are Sister Raffaella Petrini, the first-ever female secretary general of the Vatican City State. She is responsible for the territory's health care system, police force and Vatican Museums.

Another nun, Sister Alessandra Smerilli, is the second-in-command in the church's development office. Several other women have been appointed to under-secretary positions. These include a French nun, Sister Nathalie Becquart, who serves as an advisor⁸ to the pope.

I'm Jill Robbins.

Nicole Winfield reported this story for the Associated Press. Jill Robbins adapted it for Learning English.

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Words in This Story

nun - n. a woman who is a member of a religious community and who usually promises to remain poor, unmarried, and separate from the rest of society in order to serve God

prefect - n. a chief officer or government official who is responsible for a particular area in some countries

nurse - n. a person who is trained to care for sick or injured people and who usually works in a hospital or doctor's office

missionary - n. a person who is sent to a foreign country to do religious work (such as to convince people to join a religion or to help people who are sick or poor)

secretary - n. a government official who helps a minister, an ambassador, or the like

authorize⁶ - v. to give official permission to do something

1 nun   

n.修女，尼姑

参考例句：

• I can't believe that the famous singer has become a nun.我无法相信那个著名的歌星已做了修女。
• She shaved her head and became a nun.她削发为尼。

2 consecrated   

adj.神圣的，被视为神圣的v.把…奉为神圣，给…祝圣( consecrate的过去式和过去分词 )；奉献

参考例句：

• The church was consecrated in 1853. 这座教堂于1853年祝圣。
• They consecrated a temple to their god. 他们把庙奉献给神。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 missionaries   

n.传教士( missionary的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Some missionaries came from England in the Qing Dynasty. 清朝时，从英国来了一些传教士。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The missionaries rebuked the natives for worshipping images. 传教士指责当地人崇拜偶像。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

4 cardinal   

n.(天主教的)红衣主教；adj.首要的，基本的

参考例句：

• This is a matter of cardinal significance.这是非常重要的事。
• The Cardinal coloured with vexation. 红衣主教感到恼火，脸涨得通红。

5 missionary   

adj.教会的，传教(士)的；n.传教士

参考例句：

• She taught in a missionary school for a couple of years.她在一所教会学校教了两年书。
• I hope every member understands the value of missionary work. 我希望教友都了解传教工作的价值。

6 authorize   

v.授权，委任；批准，认可

参考例句：

• He said that he needed to get his supervisor to authorize my refund.他说必须让主管人员批准我的退款。
• Only the President could authorize the use of the atomic bomb.只有总统才能授权使用原子弹。

7 authorized   

a.委任的，许可的

参考例句：

• An administrative order is valid if authorized by a statute.如果一个行政命令得到一个法规的认可那么这个命令就是有效的。

8 advisor   

n.顾问，指导老师，劝告者

参考例句：

• They employed me as an advisor.他们聘请我当顾问。
• The professor is engaged as a technical advisor.这位教授被聘请为技术顾问。