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Vision and Mission

General Aims and Objectives

In order to survive as a force for good in the world, the Roman Catholic Church needs to update herself. Human rights – which official Catholic teaching encourage states to respect – should be fully incorporated in Canon Law. “Synodality”, co-responsibility, and democratic accountability should be implemented at all levels of church decision-making. Women should be restored to full equality, including access to ordained ministry. Sexual ethics must be stripped of ancient misunderstandings. Our Institute does the academic groundwork to make such reforms possible. And we do so while abiding by the best scholarly standards: we present the relevant evidence on a given topic, together with the full range of plausible interpretations.

Who We Are

The Wijngaards Institute for Catholic Research is a non-profit think tank dedicated to maximizing the potential of the Roman Catholic Church to contribute to human rights and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

We do so by coordinating leading academics worldwide to collaborate on evidence-based interdisciplinary research reports highlighting the compatibility between human rights and the Catholic tradition, and addressing the religious objections to implementing them in full within the Catholic Church.

That broad area includes some among the Catholic Church’s officially uncomfortable, difficult, and disputed areas:

  • The integration of human rights (as set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and subsequent United Nations human rights conventions) as well as the principle of subsidiarity in the canon law, governance, and life of the Catholic Church;
  • The discrimination against women in the Roman Catholic Church (e.g. their exclusion from any ordained ministry and decision-making power);
  • Christian Sexual Ethics (e.g. the meaning and purpose of sexuality, sexual orientation, LGBT; family planning and artificial contraception, and so on);
  • Church authority and governance (e.g. collegiality and co-responsibility; democratic selection of office holders; the integration of expertise in ecclesial policy-making).

These ‘no-go’ areas affect Roman Catholics every day of their lives. And so we strive for a Catholic Church whose governance at every level is participatory, evidence-based, and accountable; and whose teachings are informed by the evidence from biblical studies, theological research, and the relevant secular scientific disciplines.

Towards that goal we work to change minds, touch hearts and, through that, reform the relevant policies which Catholic institutions have in those areas.

The Problem We Seek to Solve

The Catholic Church exerts immeasurable influence on the lives of over one billion people globally.

Yet there is little doubt that the current decision-making process of the Catholic Church is insufficiently inclusive, participatory, representative, or responsive to the relevant evidence.

Its highly centralized, closed, top-down decision structure discourages public discussion and feedback as well as the integration of independent expertise, not just from theological but also from other disciplines relevant to the ethical issues of today’s complex world. It also continues to exclude laypeople – i.e. 99%+ – from fully participating in the governance of the Catholic Church.

This has produced a number of official teachings emanating from the Vatican that contravene mainstream Catholic theology and pertinent scientific disciplines, and that resist the beliefs or practices of most Catholics worldwide: e.g. the absolute prohibitions of same-sex relationships, “artificial” contraceptives for family planning, and women’s access to ordained ministry.

Theological Research and Library

To address this challenge, our research feeds into evidence-based recommendations for development and capacity-building, and it focuses on two broad areas:

  • the Roman Catholic Church’s governance and decision-making, to make it more participatory, representative, responsive to the relevant evidence, and accountable.
  • Catholic sexual ethics (on sexual behaviour, sexual orientation, long-term relationships and marriage, family planning, divorce and remarriage), to critically assess it against, on the one hand, the evidence from biblical studies, theological research, and ecumenical dialogues, and on the other hand, the apposite findings of other scientific disciplines.

On one specific issue, namely the exclusion of women from the priesthood and the diaconate, we have been pioneers in providing academically rigorous, evidence-based information online, beginning with our first website www.womenpriests.org, launched in 1999, with its key findings available in 25 languages. In 2016 we summarised the historical evidence in a “Documented Appeal to Pope Francis to Request the Re-instatement of the Ordained Diaconate for Women“.

Research for Reform

We do not directly campaign for reforming the Catholic Church – rather we gather the scholarly evidence necessary to address complex theological issues that will help the Catholic Church take enlightened decisions. One of our goals is to create a sort of scholarly Wikipedia on those issues, powered by the theological community at large, and acting as a clearing-house for significant contributions from established and budding scholars alike. For this reason, we are always trying to expand our network of contributors, who volunteer academic material, suggestions, or indeed criticisms. If you wish to join us, please get in touch!

Our main tool for change is information and education, particularly in those areas where institutional censorship within the Catholic Church is the strongest. We do so by bringing to the fore evidence challenging some specific aspects of received Catholic teachings whenever they appear to go against scripture, the Gospel values, or historical evidence. This information service we carry out through our websites that include online libraries, key-points and PowerPoint presentations, podcasts, picture galleries, online interactive courses, historical analyses, facilitated discussion groups, and agreed statements by renowned Catholic scholars.

Target Audience

Our research reports are aimed at the Vatican, Catholic hierarchy, members and leaders of religious institutes, Catholic opinion-leaders, and ordinary Catholics.

In addition, the educational material on our websites deliver more accessible summaries of the key research findings to help ordinary Catholics – particularly those working at the interface of faith and development, and those most affected by controversial official teachings emanating from the Vatican – discern the main ethical issues being debated in their church.

By addressing the tension between these official teachings and some scientific disciplines, we contribute to making Catholic theology less self-referential, and more accountable to the broader academic and social discourse on specific issues.

Vision

We strive for a Catholic Church whose governance at every level is participatory, evidence-based, and accountable; and whose teachings are informed by the evidence from biblical studies, theological research, and the relevant secular scientific disciplines.

Mission

  • Offer academically rigorous, evidence-based, and constructive criticisms of those contested official teachings which stray far from Christian equality and love.
  • Represent the majority of Catholics who support the causes we champion, including many priests and religious sisters and brothers.
  • Support those who suffer the consequences of bad theology that bans and condemns contraception, women’s ministries, LGBT relationships, and the full co-responsibility of all Catholics for the governance of the Catholic Church.
  • Support every Catholic in their right to understand the theology that impacts their lives by making a transformative, inclusive, and open-minded education available free of charge all over the world.

Goals – The Change We Seek to Make

  • Highlight the compatibility between human rights and the Catholic tradition, and address the religious objections to implementing them in full within the Catholic Church
  • Raise awareness that the lack of those rights in Canon Law negatively affects millions of people
  • Stand as a pillar of credible, academically rigorous theological research that the Vatican cannot ignore, thus keeping pressure on the Catholic hierarchy to change its harmful teaching and practices;
  • Provide a source of evidence-based education to Catholics globally who are negatively impacted by Catholic teaching, or who question the legitimacy of official pronouncements;
  • Produce peer-reviewed research reports that signal to the world there is a strong body of Catholic theologians and scholars dedicated to showing the possibility of a more inclusive, participatory, and evidence-led church;
  • Empower Catholics to exercise their right to participate fully in the governance and decision-making of the Catholic Church;
  • Partner with UN agencies, independent documentary makers, and other secular organizations to represent the majority of Catholics who support the full incorporation of human rights in Catholic Canon Law, and help navigate and resist the objections to them posed by the Holy See.

A Unique Positioning and Approach

Thanks to our interdisciplinary Academic Advisory Council, we possess a rare combination of expertise in both Catholic theology and human rights law. As insiders knowledgeable about the Catholic Church’s tradition, politics, and way of thinking, we are uniquely positioned to advocate for a more inclusive and participatory Catholic Church by showing its compatibility with both core ethical insights of the Catholic tradition, and contemporary human rights discourse, and to do so using arguments which are convincing to leaders of the Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church exerts significant influence on the lives of over one billion people through its churches, healthcare facilities and schools that span every country in the world. Yet its leadership discourages scrutiny or discussion of its teachings and policies.

The problem is compounded by the reliance of church leaders on a handful of uncritically held beliefs which, while ancient, turned out to be groundless prejudices concerning the inferiority of women and people with same-sex orientation, as well as the purpose of human sexuality more generally.

This has resulted in a number of recent official teachings emanating from the Vatican unsupported by the evidence from biblical studies, Catholic tradition, human rights law, or other pertinent disciplines: e.g. the absolute prohibitions of “artificial” contraceptives for family planning, same-sex relationships, and the ordination of women to the priesthood – with the first explicitly published against the recommendations of the Vatican’s own Pontifical Commission on Birth Control.

Perhaps more significantly still, those contested official teachings appear not to be shared by a majority of Catholics worldwide: a number of major sociological surveys and, more recently, the worldwide consultation of Catholics as part of the Synod on Synodality have suggested that a majority of Catholics believe laypeople should have a voice in church decision-making and they are demanding change.

It is not a coincidence that debate and research on all the above mentioned teachings are among the most censored in the Catholic Church. Many Catholic authorities – bishops, educational institutions, individual theologians – are reluctant to allow free public discussion or research concerning some of those issues, for fear of antagonizing the Vatican or undermining their careers and jeopardizing their jobs.

They can do so in full compliance with Canon Law – the internal legal system of the Catholic Church – which does not yet fully protect a number of fundamental rights: among them, the rights to freedom of conscience and expression, the right to equality and non-discrimination, the right to fair trial, the right to information, the rights of children, and so on.

Related to the above, but of greater impact still, is the fact that, always according to the Canon Law in force since 1983, laypeople – i.e. more than 99% of Catholics – are almost entirely excluded from church governance, and women and LGBTQ people doubly so on account of their gender or sexual orientation. Furthermore, to this day there is no canonical route to keep church leaders accountable to the people they are supposed to serve.

In summary, the hierarchical, top-down character of its governance structures raises a number of obstacles to development: old prejudices informing the current official positions are merely repeated without challenge; public discussion is strongly discouraged; and the evidence-based research and educational material needed to counter such prejudices and inform both public debate and church decision-making is hard to come by, while its dissemination within Catholic institutions remains negligible. In such circumstances, reform becomes very difficult.

As long as this situation persists there will be a need for our work. The Wijngaards Institute is a private educational charity, and can therefore maintain full independence from external pressures. This has made it possible for it to build vast online libraries of high quality academic research on precisely those issues which are the least openly discussed in the Catholic Church.

Where theology remains rooted in cultural prejudice, the ensuing teaching and practices experienced in the millions of churches, schools and hospitals under Vatican control can have catastrophic consequences. Key to challenge and change the status quo is understanding the origins of the current theology, and providing a qualified, constructive criticism that shows how a more inclusive understanding of Catholicism is possible and indeed desirable. This is the mission of the Wijngaards Institute and the unique position we hold in the field of Roman Catholic Church reform.

Output & Impact