By most accounts, Pope Francis wants the synod on the family to be a messy, earnest affair — high on dialogue and low on posturing. By most accounts, Pope Francis wants the synod on the family to be a messy, earnest affair — high on dialogue and low on posturing. The Oct. 5-19 extraordinary Synod Read more
A Latin teacher at the seminary I attended described Italian and the other modern Romance languages as “corrupt provincial dialects of Latin”. Pope Francis has decided that the working language of the Extraordinary Synod for the Family being held at the Vatican should not be Latin, but one of those modern descendants, Italian. That decision Read more
The biggest news to come out of the bishops’ synod in Rome so far is the acknowledgement that when it comes to talking about issues of family and sexuality, language matters. Among the examples of “harsh” rhetoric that bishops discussed as doing more harm than good in terms of “inviting people to draw closer to Read more
An interview with Cardinal André Vingt-Trois, Archbishop of Paris, one of the three presidents of the Synod on the Family. La Croix: The synod was preceded by a questionnaire sent to the parishes. Were you surprised by the influx of replies from local churches? Cardinal Andre Vingt-Trois: Yes, I was. There was very little time Read more
More than half (106 bishops) of the almost two hundred individuals participating in the Extraordinary Synod on the Family hail from Asia, Latin America, Africa and Oceania. It would be very short-sighted of us to therefore focus our attention exclusively on hot issues affecting European societies and Churches which are facing the challenge of secularism, Read more
On Sunday, Pope Francis convenes a special type of meeting of bishops — one held only two other times — meant to start a frank debate about the church’s teachings and practices with which Catholics seem to most disagree, struggle with and ignore: family, marriage and sexuality. The Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Read more
In the mid 1990s my husband and I lived together before we were married. In the interest of family peace we kept our living arrangement secret from my devoutly Catholic grandparents who would not have approved. I wonder what my grandparents, who died a few years ago, would have thought about Pope Francis’ decision last Read more
Cardinal Walter Kasper says some prelates who have taken a hard line ideological position prior to the synod on the family have got the Gospel all wrong. In an interview with America Magazine and Argentina’s La Nacion, Cardinal Kasper said some cardinals and bishops fear a domino-like collapse in the Church’s moral structure. “That’s their Read more
The Extraordinary Synod for the Family that will be held in Rome next month has attracted more attention than any synod since their introduction following Vatican II. The media are focused on the possibility that changes may be made in such matters as birth control and reception of the Eucharist by Catholics who have divorced Read more
A prominent American cardinal in the Roman Curia has accused the media of attempting to hijack next month’s synod on the family. Cardinal Raymond Burke, who heads the Apostolic Signatura, said the media has created an expectation of changes to Church teaching that can’t happen. The Apostolic Signatura is the highest judicial body in the Read more