Cardinal Fernández Clarifies: “Co-redemptrix” Off Limits in Official Vatican Documents, Permitted in Private Devotion

(Photo credit: Diane Montagna)
ROME, 26 November 2025 — Three weeks after Mater Populi Fidelis sparked debate over its statement that the Marian title Co-redemptrix is “always inappropriate,” the prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith has clarified that the phrase is not a sweeping rejection of the title itself. The Cardinal said the word “always” applies only to official Church usage from this point forward, not to every context in which the title might be used.
In comments after Tuesday’s Vatican press conference on Una Caro, the DDF’s new doctrinal Note on monogamy, Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández said the statement found in MPF n. 22—that “it is always inappropriate” to use the title Co-redemptrix to define Mary’s cooperation—“isn’t meant to judge” past affirmations by saints, doctors, and popes, but that “from now on” it will not be used “either in the liturgy, that is, in liturgical texts, or in the official documents of the Holy See.”
Fernández …