Will A Woman Become Pope?

A wave of female pastors may make the Vatican look like a lonely male bastion

Are you kidding? Not in this century, anyway. But let's drop down the hierarchy a little to a more approachable rank of shepherd. Forget, for a moment, Catholic or Protestant, priest or minister. What are the odds that your primary spiritual guide and mentor will be a woman? Fifty percent, minimum.

That shouldn't surprise anyone who's been paying attention over the past three decades. In the early 1970s, women streamed into the seminaries at the same time they were marching into other white-collar professions. Many, notably the Episcopalians, did so literally on faith, since their denominations barred female ministers. Today half...

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