Chad Pecknold , associate professor, theology, and Melissa Moschella , assistant professor, philosophy, were interviewed on EWTN News Nightly on the Pope's commission to study the possibility of female deacons (Min. 7:43). Pecknold was also interviewed by PBS Newshour. A quote of his from an October Washington Post story on female deacons was printed in a Religion News Service. See below.
From: EWTN News Nightly Date: May 12, 2016
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From: PBS Newshour Date: May 12, 2016 Author: Dominique Bonessi
... The audience pressed the Pope, according to McElwee's report, noting that women served as deaconesses in the early Catholic Church.
That statement is true to some extent, said Chad Pecknold, professor of theology at Catholic University of America in Washington D.C.
"The [Catholic] Church made it very clear that that the deaconess was not part of holy orders," Pecknold said in a phone interview. "She had a job at baptism. Baptisms in the early [Catholic] Church were done when the individual was completely naked. The deaconess's job was to protect the modesty of a woman during the baptism ritual." ...
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From: Religion News Service (via USA Today ) Date: May 12, 2016 Author: Rosie Scammell and David Gibson
... During a global meeting of bishops at the Vatican last October, a Canadian archbishop asked that the church set up a process for ordaining women deacons, a proposal that seemed to go nowhere and which was quickly opposed by conservative commentators.
"If you've opened the diaconate to women, you are opening up the door to female priests," Chad Pecknold, a theologian at Catholic University of America, told the Washington Post at the time. ...
Read more about Pecknold's expertise .