Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, the secretary general of the synod, said that married couples will address the gathering immediately after each topic is opened by a bishop.

The synod runs from October 5-19 in Rome and Pope Francis has streamlined its operation.

Each day will deal with a theme from the Instrumentum Laboris, a working document on the synod that was published on June 26.

Topics will include polygamy and abandoned women, but are also expected to cover the challenges posed by the Church's teaching on contraception and abortion in modern society.

The cardinal told the agency Rome Reports: "We will discuss the problems that have also been highlighted by the media, regarding failed marriages, separations, divorces, etc.

"The topics that are relevant to the West, are much more sensitive without a doubt.

"But I would like to point out that each continent has its own specific issues."

Speeches by bishops will be limited to a maximum of four minutes.

At the end of each day, there will be one hour of open debate, but each participant will be allowed to speak only once a day.

Small group sessions will make up most of the second half of the synod and are meant to be the heart of the gathering.

National Catholic Reported editor Dennis Coday expects Pope Francis will be actively involved as president of the synod.

"When Pope John Paul II attended synod assemblies, he was known to pray his breviary," Coday wrote.

"Pope Benedict XVI was a quiet observer. Francis, on the other hand, at meetings likes to engage speakers with questions, jokes and comments."

Coday wrote that this synod will discuss the lived experiences of families today.

It is expected to produce a summary report be sent to dioceses around the world in preparation for another synod next year.

"Any changes to Church practices on marriage and family life will come not this year, but next," Coday wrote.

He quoted Rome reporter Robert Mickens who stated: "Francis has repeatedly said he wants to develop the Synod of Bishops as one of the major components for the governance of the universal Church".

Sources

• The Tablet
• National Catholic Reporter
• Image: CathNews USA

There is only one problem with the dour and dismal portrait of heterosexual marriage painted by Liza Mundy in this month's Atlantic cover story. It's wrong.

In her bleak rendering, contemporary marriage comes across as unequal, unfair, and unhappy to today's wives. Wives are burdened with an unequal and unfair "second shift" of housework and childcare, husbands enjoy "free time" while their wives toil away at home, lingering gender inequalities in family life leave many wives banging "their heads on their desks in despair," and one poor woman cannot even have a second child because she does "everything" and her husband does nothing. Mundy also suggests that recent declines in women's happiness can be laid at the feet of "lingering inequity in male-female marriage."

Of course, it's true that some marriages are unequal and unfair, leaving a minority of wives (and husbands) unhappy. And most husbands and wives experience moments or even periods of frustration with their work-family arrangements. Nevertheless, the big picture for marriage in America—for those Americans fortunate enough to have tied the knot—is markedly more rosy than Mundy's portrait would suggest. Most husbands and wives make about equal total contributions to the paid and unpaid work needed to sustain a family, judge their marriages to be fair, and are happily married.

Take family work. When you combine paid work, housework, and childcare, today's married parents both put in about 55 hours, according to a recent report from the Pew Research Center. It's true that married mothers do more of the housework and childcare, but in most households this doesn't amount to an onerous burden for them. That's because most married mothers do not work full-time (43 percent work full-time) and do not wish to work full-time (just 23 percent wish to work full-time, a fact rarely mentioned in media accounts of work and family life). Continue reading

Sources

• The Atlantic
• Image: beliefnet