Nancy Pelosi backs women becoming priests in Catholic Church

Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi spoke at Georgetown on Thursday and said she wanted to be a priest when she was growing up and that she hoped Pope Francis would allow women into the priesthood soon.

According to the National Catholic Reporter, Pelosi said, "Turning bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, that is real power. Maybe one day women will be able to do that as well."

Pelosi was speaking to the director of the Georgetown University Center on Faith and Justice, Rev. Jim Wallis, and said that she hoped the ordination of women into the priesthood would be something Pope Francis would enact.

She was there as part of a new series titled Higher Calling, where "political leaders and public servants will speak about the role of faith and ethics in their lives," reports the outlet, and the two spoke on a wide variety of topics.

Pelosi claimed many Catholic bishops "are willing to abandon the bulk of (Catholic social teaching) because of one thing" in an allusion to abortion.

"Thank God for the nuns because they offset the bishops," Pelosi added.

She also addressed San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, who denied Pelosi communion in May 2022 over her stance on abortion.

"I figure that's his problem, not mine, because I had five children in six years and one week," she said.

"He's made it very clear, maybe we're not all God's children. Maybe we do not have a free will," she added about the Archbishop.

Pelosi later said it was "joy" to defend LGBTQ rights and said, "All God's children, they have their own dignity and worth, their own individuality, their own authenticity, and that's a beautiful thing for us to embrace." 

"I also see kids on the streets of San Francisco who are there because their families disowned them," Pelosi said in reference to children she described as transgender.