laywomen

Research on the sex-specific impact of father loss abounds in pediatric literature, as does sex-unspecified parental loss — but finding useful research on the unique needs of female-sexed children and women drowning in mother loss takes the kind of work most laywomen shouldn’t have to do when sobbing with grief.

“The women in the church are doing what they have to do,” she said, adding that the nuns could be helped by laywomen like herself “in the places they cannot be. Like in a pub. You can be evangelized in a pub.”

He was cared for by four laywomen who had taken vows in the Catholic movement known as Communion and Liberation, as well as by Archbishop Georg Gänswein, the German monsignor who was his private secretary throughout his pontificate.

In the Corriere della Sera newspaper, Massimo Franco, a journalist who has interviewed Benedict and written a book about his post-pontificate, said Benedict is at a monastery within the Vatican with his longtime aide and several consecrated laywomen.

He has also named women — laywomen and religious sisters — as consultors to Vatican offices dominated by male clergy, including the one that chooses bishops.