A new Vatican magazine launched today has criticised the Church for "ignoring the role of women" both in the Church and within wider Catholic culture.

The magazine, Women-Church-World, which started as a monthly section in the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, has run an editorial in its first issue claiming there has been a "hidden revolution" in the Church.

Lucetta Scaraffia, the co-ordinator of the magazine, wrote about the increasing influence of women in the intellectual field of Catholicism, which she said has been "almost ignored" by the Church.

The first issue of the magazine focusses on the theme of the Visitation, and the front cover is adorned with a scene of the moment pregnant Mary meets Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist.

Scaraffia said in her editorial that the moment depicts the prophetic role of women.

"Both are able to see the true and profound meaning of the events that they are living through and are able to perceive the divine even when it is hidden, and they do it earlier than men and before the priests and sages," she wrote, according to The Tablet.

The magazine also features an article analysing the biblical figure Deborah by Debora Tonelli, an Italian political philosopher, and a piece by Elisabeth Parmenthier, a Lutheran pastor who wrote on ecumenism.

Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Holy See's Secretary of State, whose department oversees the semi-official Vatican newspaper, launched the magazine today.

The launch coincided with the Pope releasing his prayer intentions for May which he has devoted to women, focussing particularly on the family and those suffering sexual violence and slavery.