It highlights some of the inherent tensions between the use of synods and the power of the papacy in modern Catholicism.

Speaking to Jesuits in Belgium on September 28, Francis said Eastern Christians have not lost synodality, but the Western Catholics "have lost it."

In the Eastern Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox churches, synods of bishops are responsible for the election of new bishops and the establishment of inter-diocesan laws within each province. Eastern Catholic Churches also use synods for such purposes.

In the West, synods were often held in the early centuries of the Church, and included important theological debates.

However, as the powers of the papacy grew, the synods became less common, although "councils" - which are arguably synods by a different name - still continued.

Ecumenical Councils, such as Vatican II, continue to issue theologically definitive statements, but more localized councils generally tackle administrative affairs, with theological questions reserved to the Vatican.

However, synods did take on some different definitions in the West.

First, diocesan synods - which used to be required to happen once a decade (admittedly, a rule observed more in the breach than in the execution) - involved both clergy and laypeople. Much like the more traditional synod, it involved looking at local diocesan laws and reforming them if needed.

More prominently, after Vatican II, Pope Paul VI established the Synod of Bishops, which had no real authority at all.

This synod could make "proposals" which could be accepted or rejected by the pontiff.

Soon, these meetings became talking shops, where many of the participants were more interested in Church gossip at the local restaurants in Rome than the official issue being discussed at the Synod meeting in the Vatican.

When Francis was elected, he wanted to make the Synod a more prominent feature of the life of the Catholic Church - but which Synod was he talking about?

"Synodality is very important. It needs to be built not from the top to the bottom, but from the bottom to the top," he told the Jesuits on Sep. 28.

Yet, historically, synods at best were built from the top down, although the little-used diocesan synod did allow lay participants.

"Synodality is not easy, no, and sometimes this is because there are authority figures that do not bring out the dialogue aspect. A pastor can make decisions by himself, but he can make them with his council. So can a bishop, and so can the pope," he said.

However, in the case of the papacy, his council is usually very much "his." The Ecumenical Council of Vatican I confirmed the doctrine that the Bishop of Rome has universal primacy over the Church and is "infallible" when he speaks ex cathedra.

In practical terms, this means a "Synodal Church" is whatever the pope says it is. Read more

• Charles Collins is an American journalist currently living in the United Kingdom, and is Crux's Managing Editor.

Bishops, priests, and laypeople will vote on new consultation and decision-making processes in the Catholic Church.

The working paper, Instrumentum Laboris, is the crucial guideline for this process and is expected to be available soon.

The Synod Secretariat announced at the end of June that the working paper should be available from the beginning of July.

It will serve as the basis for the reform debates needed across the Universal Church, and the decisions made then will serve as a foundation for the Pope's decisions that follow.

Once the Working Document is available, it will have undergone several consultation stages with bishops' conferences across the globe.

Hopefully, the bishop's consultation reflects their local consultations with parishioners and clergy.

From June 4 to 16, twenty theologians from four continents gathered in Rome to compile the Working Document, based on feedback from more than 100 bishops' conferences, so it is clear that not every bishop's conference has taken the opportunity to participate.

In addition, the consultation material was sent to around seventy people worldwide who represent the diversity of the positions.

This group included priests, religious, laypeople, and theologians.

The last part of the preparation is reviewing the current draft document by the Council of Cardinals. After the Synod Council reviews the Cardinal's feedback, the final draft version of the document will be submitted to the Pope for approval.

Consultation and feedback

Consultation with parishioners, religious and a wide range of church groups was crucial in the first round of the synodal process.

Various methods were used, and specific vital sometimes challenging ideas emerged internationally, such as

• Gay rights and participation in the Church,
• priestly celibacy and lifestyles, and
• the admission of women to the ordained priesthood.

In many countries, these issues were backgrounded by the clergy abuse scandal and the episcopal avoidance of responsibility over many decades.

The lack of clergy feedback prompted this year's meeting with parish priests from April 28 28 to May 2 near Rome.

This meeting's focus was parish life, with particular attention on mission, participation and discernment as aspects of parish life and renewal.

The feedback from the English-speaking participants (Parish Priests for the Synod - Group 7 Report, April 30 2024) reported the participants "renewed understanding that the Synodal Church is the community of all believers open to transformation and change, which happens through the reciprocal accompaniment and confident acceptance of the journey we are already walking with the Risen Christ and each other."

Where this is true, the practice of synodality, as the shared participation and collaborative voice of all the baptised in the life of the Church, will go a long way toward fulfilling Vatican II's liturgical precept of Active Participation, which was affirmed in the Novus Ordo but missing in the performance of the 1962 Rite.

The parish priests wrote of their "excitement" in participating "in Christ's saving mission present and fulfilled in a renewed culture/mindset, attentive and inclusive of all people, their diverse gifts, needs, cultural backgrounds and life situations."

Here is an apparent reference to the purpose of the synodal process and an antidote to a harking back to a past ideological or idealised age that is counterproductive to the spread of the Gospel today.

Synodal consultation

The synodal process's use of consultation as a critical platform for ecclesial change is only sometimes well-defined.

Synodal consultation has four characteristics:

• dialogue
• discernment
• decision-making, and
• communication, which are elements in the more extensive process of ecclesial change.

In his work, 'I and Thou,' Martin Buber describes dialogue as the prerequisite of an authentic relationship between people, humanity, and God.

Buber characterises "true dialogue" as open, honest and mutual. Vatican II also emphasised dialogue with the world, other Christians and political authorities.

In the English translations, the Latin words colloquium, meaning discussion and dialogus, meaning dialogue these terms became fused.

Physicist David Bohm wrote of dialogue as a conversation between people that explores their assumptions on meaning, values, society and communication.

In this process, the participants do not debate but seek to listen and consider what they hear.

An authentic dialogue starts with a question and the intention of discovering the answer.

Dialogue is inclusive and, at times, time-consuming.

Finding the answer to the question in dialogue also means that the answer is not a single given but a response to various influences.

Dialogical answers are not set in stone but will be further discussed as situations and needs change.

Discernment, as in the Ignatian concept, is a process of contemplation, meditation and prayer, individually and in groups, to consider if the one calling to change is the Holy Spirit.

Discernment is judging between right and wrong, truth and error.

It involves making careful distinctions, not only in significant matters but also in seemingly insignificant areas. It concerns paying attention to the small things, inner peace or disquiet, and external realities as positive or negative influences.

Discernment enables an individual or a group to evaluate information, test it against God's Word, and make wise choices that honour God and, in doing so, guide us in the journey of holiness.

The first phase of the synodal process firmly focused on discernment, which surprised many participants.

Still, in preparing for October's Working Document, there has been very little communal discernment at the parish and diocesan levels.

Synodal decision-making is about power-sharing, but unfortunately, these are not always free from power games!

Consultative decision-making models in the Church tend to drift between being

• a consultative conversation with the laity and priests, where the bishop listens to the opinions of others and then makes his decision, and
• a consultative decision-making process, where the bishop and others jointly discern, decide and share the responsibility for the decision's outcomes.

The tension is between a pastoral view of the world and a clericalist one.

Parishioners and clergy get caught in the middle of this process, as the common-sense world says the clergy are not skilled to make all parish decisions, and the clericalist view says that clergy are ordained to make decisions.

In New Zealand, this is further confused by the discrepancy between the parliamentary establishment of the dioceses, where all the goods and wealth of a diocese and its parishes are invested in the person of the bishop and the Church's Canon Law that separates the rights, ownership and decision-making between a bishop, a parish priest, a diocese and a parish.

Consequently, decision-making through power-sharing is complex in highly clericalised, hierarchical institutions such as the Latin Rite and Catholic Church, where so much of the historical lived Tradition.

The dogmatic formulations support a particular worldview where decision-making is a function of the ordained clergy.

It is not easy when partners are not seen as equal, and in this context, shared decision-making based on shared power almost always fails.

Consultation is a form of communication.

Communication is about sharing information and providing opportunities to include voices.

It is more than just giving information about events; it is about engagement.

Communication is the first job of any management group in the Church; indeed, the sacraments themselves are forms of communication that we revere, but they are, as the Second Vatican Council teaches authoritatively, not the only form of communication.

Synodal communication processes seek to communicate and engage the baptised through dialogue, discernment and decision-making in difficult conversations about how we live our Christianity in our current, unique contexts.

Communication opens up conversations on complex issues but does not resolve them or shut down irritating conversations.

Communication is about giving people a voice and allowing different opinions to be heard, except those opinions framed in hate language or ideological rhetoric.

According to Cardinal Grech, Secretary General of the Synod, the purpose of the synodal process is "not about solving individual problems" in each country or every instance.

Instead, it is about achieving synodality as a form of being Church.

The object of the exercise is to move away from being a clericalist or clericalising church to a church that talks and decides together.

Thus, a Synodal Church doesn't want to be a clericalist church.

As a result, its management functions (parish, diocese, bishops' conference) also want to be consultative at their core.

This means reshaping decision-making, management, communication, and pastoral dialogue processes to reflect this change.

Where this is possible (where it is wanted), it will provide what Cardinal Grech describes as "a dynamic of pastoral conversion."

Consultation frees us from the bind of "knowledge is power", and that power belongs to some and not others because they have the power to know and decide.

• Dr Joe Grayland is a Liturgical Theologian and is currently a visiting professor at the University of Tübingen (Germany). He has been a priest of the Diocese of Palmerston North for nearly thirty years. His latest book is: Catholics. Prayer, Belief and Diversity in a Secular Context (Te Hepara Pai, 2021).

Pope Francis's revision of the statutes of the Pontifical Academy of Theology is an important development within the discipline of contemporary theology.

Francis emphasises the need for an open theology within a synodal, missionary, and open Church.

Updating the statutes also encourages a robust exchange with various sciences and fosters an inter- and transdisciplinary approach to theological investigations. It is an invitation to scholars from diverse denominations, religions, and academic disciplines to participate in the life of a church that is "open" and engaged in in contemporary questions.

Antonio Stagliano, the Academy President, expressed enthusiasm for this new mission, emphasising the goal of promoting dialogue across all knowledge areas.

For him, the objective is to engage the entire people of God in theological research, transforming their lives into theological experiences.

Theologians wishing to pursue this line of reflection would do well to consider the theological and social perspective of the German Reform theologians of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

More specifically, they should consider the work of Romano Guardini (1885-1968), whom Pope Francis references both directly and indirectly in his writings.

With his first major work, "The Spirit of the Liturgy" (1918), he set standards for the Liturgical Movement and liturgical renewal and contributed to the shape of the liturgical reform of the Second Vatican Council.

Two other books among his many publications, "Liturgie und liturgische Bildung" (1966) and "Das Ende der Neuzeit" (1950) are also seminal for contemporary theology.

Industrial society of the late 19th century

Guardini's perspective reflects the significant process of change that occurred from the late 19th to the mid-20th century.

He pays attention to the impacts of:

• social transformation through industrialisation, war, and new and often unstable republics;
• the philosophical movements of rationalism and the critiques of positivism and Neo-Kantianism, through Life-philosophy and Existentialism and
• reform theology movement's critique of Neo Scholasticism.

Life-Reform Movement

The Life-reform Movement (Lebensreform) movement was a politically diverse social reform movement in France and Germany that found renewed interest in the Romantic movement.

Wilhelm Dilthey (1833-1911), a leading German proponent, differentiated between the individual's life and life as a whole, emphasizing that understanding life required accessing the full, unblemished experience.

He criticised the traditional modern philosophy, focusing on rationality that neglected dimensions of will and emotions.

Like Dilthey, Guardini placed experience at the centre of his reflections on liturgy and life.

While Dilthey argued against limiting sciences to deterministic natural scientific methods, Guardini criticised the restriction of theology by Neo-Scholasticism.

Guardini's criticism of modernity and Neo-Scholasticism mirror each other insofar that an industrial model of living fundamentally changes people's perception of time and alters how individuals relate to others, to their bodies, to society and to nature:

• Industrialisation also brought about a significant change in the human-earth or human-nature relationship.
• Nature became a resource to be exploited, not a "brother" or "sister" or "mother" to be cherished and cared for as we read in Laudato Si'.
• Theologically, God and belief became functions of each other in a mechanism of ritualisation.

The issue for Guardini with respect to theology is that the systemisation of theology (as an academic discipline) especially through Neo-Scholasticism has resulted in theologies loss of contact with its base: namely how people live, work, pray and believe.

Catholic Reform Theologians

Catholic reform theology explored a heightened synthesis of theological and religious knowledge, and Guardini's primary focus was the youth movements of Juventus and Quickborn.

The Catholic youth movement continued the broader movement that emerged at the beginning of the German Empire, emphasizing the importance of educational reform, body, and self-improvement.

Although initially apolitical, it was still exposed to contemporary ideological currents and oriented itself accordingly.

The First World War and the politically polarized phase of the German Youth Movement were transformative events.

The Nazi seizure of power in 1933 forced all other youth organisations into compulsory integration into the Hitler Youth or dissolution.

Theology and life

Among the Reform theologians, Guardini represents the openness to the world and questions of faith posed in the context of culture, that the Pope has offered to theologians.

Guardini advocated for reforming Catholic believers through liturgy, using a liturgical experience that would address the true essence of humanity and not stunt it through tired ritualisation.

True liturgical encounter awakens and glorifies life through the liturgical act when it is intimately connected to the life of God present and active in the whole of creation.

Like Guardini, and as Pope Francis has written, we live in a "change of epoch" that requires deeper theological engagement with societal and cultural changes that mould our understanding of faith, worship, salvation and God.

Just as Guardini's work focused on the relationship between liturgical practice, lived faith and an openness to the world in the Catholic Church, today's cultural context is as central to theological reflection as Scripture and Tradition.

Guardini proposed that liturgy and life are fundamentally connected experiences, and it is the person, as a whole, integral being who prays and lives.

The notion of context is central to theological reflection. Culture is a third source of theology.

To do theology — in any context that considers how people believe and how they pray — theologians must use Scripture, the Living Tradition of the Church and Culture as their sources of reflection when considering how a transformative event becomes a theological experience.

In the context of contemporary theological reflection is seen in an openness to the world and questions of faith and culture.

Paralleling Guardini's focus on the relationship between liturgical practice, lived faith, and an openness to the world Pope Francis emphasises the importance of theological engagement with societal and cultural changes.

Canon Law - not the answer

Francis has set a new direction in the discussion of key theological debates around ordination, blessings of couples and questions of sexuality and gender that the juridic discipline of Church Law cannot answer because it is not a theological discipline.

Starting with Canon Law to solve these theological questions only ends in frustration.

Instead, starting with what people do when they pray when they call on God's name or when they praise God is an utterly theological starting point because it is thoroughly incarnational.

In the end, all theological questions of any significance concern the relationship between what is believed and what is prayed.

Thus, all important theological questions are essentially liturgical questions that refer back to the interrelationship between living, praying and believing as transformative experiences of God's Grace.

• Dr Joe Grayland is a priest and theologian in the Diocese of Palmerston North. Currently on Sabbatical, he is lecturing at the University of Tübingen, Germany.

"A synodal Church is a listening Church… but it needs to go a step further: a synodal Church is an accountable Church and an accountable Church needs to be synodal," said Myriam Wijlens, (pictured) a canon law professor at the University of Erfurt, Germany.

The synodality and accountability in Catholic Church are deeply interconnected, Wijlens, a member of the Coordinating Commission of the Synod on Synodality, said during a wide-ranging interview with Polish Catholic quarterly Wiez.

The first phase of the 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops started in the Vatican on 4 October and is scheduled to end on 29 October.

The second phase will be held next October.

The bishops' synod is part of the ongoing global Synod on Synodality which was started by Pope Francis on Oct. 10, 2021.

The synod in the Vatican "is a meeting within the larger Synod. It is a special moment within the Synod of the Church," Wijlens said.

Pope Francis's suggestion to bishops' conferences to reflect on the accountability aspect of its members in 2019 was due to the inefficient response from bishops towards abuse allegations, she said.

"The Church became aware that there was the abuse of minors by clergy, but there was also a severe problem in that those in leadership had not acted in accordance with the responsibility flowing from their office as bishop," Wijlens said.

The "Instrumentum laboris" - the guiding document for the synod had questions that discussed the accountability of bishops and the role of women in it, she pointed out.

The document has questions such as "How can bishops be more accountable?" and a separate section on women which asks, "How women [can] assist the Church in being more accountable?"

Wijlens said that the priority was to "complete the work of making accountability well seated in theory, in theology and canon law."

In 2020, Pope Francis through a motu proprio, a papal document personally signed by the pope, titled "Vos estis lux mundi" (You Are the Light of the World) ordered bishops worldwide to report cases of clergy sex crimes to the police even when not legally bound to do so.

The Vatican's manual for bishops and religious superiors details the process for conducting in-house investigations into allegations of priests who rape and molest minors and vulnerable adults.

Wijlens suggested that independent judges who take a neutral approach toward the evaluation of abuse cases are better suited than local bishops as there is a possibility of bias when they may have to investigate each other.

"We need independent judges not only because the bishops might need to investigate each other and that would not help the issue of credibility.

"We also see that those who conduct these investigations need to have expertise in collecting evidence, weighing it, etc," she said.

She recommended the engaging of laity or "judges in civil courts who have special training," to investigate abuse cases.

She also pointed out that the implementation of any changes related to accountability or women's participation in the Catholic Church cannot be achieved at a uniform scale globally.

"A challenge is certainly that not all places go with the same speed and that thus not all are at the same point in implementing being an accountable Church," Wijlens said.

Based on her experience in the Synodal consultations in Europe, Wijlens said that a desire for transparency was exhibited by the Church leadership.

She referred to the synodal meeting in Prague which was open to journalists.

"Their presence gave expression to the desire to be transparent. That too had an impact on the meeting," she said.

Wijlens pointed out that the meeting had 49 women as participants in contrast to only 42 bishops among the total 200 participants, showing increased participation of women in Church reforms.

She also called for the need to develop various structures of accountability based on the "context of where people live."

"We should strengthen diocesan pastoral councils, parish pastoral councils and search for ways how this participation may be better developed," Wijlens said.

She pointed out that one of the key needs is to create an awareness among the Catholic clergy "to bring the laity as the center of the Church."

"We first need a change of mentality. Because we may have rules and procedures for everything, but it will not stop people from not implementing them. Internal awareness is absolutely crucial," she said.

"This change will not happen overnight, but things are developing already. A synodal process is a journey in this direction. The train has begun to ride, and we won't be able to stop it," she added.

• Professor Myriam Wijlens is a Dutch theologian and professor of canon law at the University of Erfurt (Germany), a clerical sexual abuse expert in civilian courts regarding Church liability, a canonical delegate for penal investigations and a policy writer.
• Republished from UCANews.com

Flores (pictured) is a member of the global assembly's preparatory commission.

He says the Synod aims to share Christ and his Gospel more effectively. We can't respond with the Gospel if we don't know the reality people face, he says.

"We can't respond to the air."

He says the synod is designed to teach Catholics to speak with one another - not past one another..

"It's that basic ... Sometimes we're not even addressing the same issues, even though we're using similar words.

"There's a need to hear, think and pray, and hopefully the synod will suggest ... we can integrate certain ways by which respectfully things can be spoken without fear.

"The church can afford to be realistic about what people think - there's no need to be afraid of what people think," Flores says.

"There are voices in the church that are also the voices of our own history, of our own tradition, of our own previous experience — and that too has to be taken into account," he added.

"If we do this right … in our own local churches, we can develop a style of listening and decision-making that involves more hearing from people 'in the trenches,' ..." he says.

Issues of importance to the universal church are being discussed "ultimately so we can be effective in the missionary work of the church," he said.

"The communion of the church is at the heart of it — how we talk to each other, how we work together, how we listen to each other, how we make decisions in the local church and even the universal church" he said.

"There's a way to do that that is uniquely in keeping with the way of Christ, and that's what the synod will be asking about.

"It's really a 'how' question: How can we do this?"

Flores is also leading the US Bishops Conference on the synod process.

Source

• The Florida Catholic

And there are the books by those bishops and cardinals who refer to the late pope and former doctrinal chief in support of their views on the issues at the center of the ecclesial debate today.

Not to mention the flood of supposedly news-making interviews some of these prelates have been giving.

This publishing spree began with remarkable speed in the very first hours after Benedict's death, even before his funeral was celebrated.

This indicates how the media can dominate intra-ecclesial conversations - a point that Ratzinger understood and emphasized often, one that his followers should have received and applied to themselves.

In part, this is all about marketing. But it's also Church politics, vanity and personal revenge, although it's not clear which is more important.

Benedict XVI's death has marked the end of an era and has triggered a "jump start for the conclave", even though Pope Francis is still fully in charge of the Church's governance and shows no signs of slowing down or that he's ready to step aside, as his German predecessor did.

End of the first post-Vatican II era

The first post-Vatican II era has come to a definitive end with Ratzinger's death.

It marks another point of transition within the context of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65), which was called by John XXIII.

When Pope John died in 1963, the papacy and the conclave were part of a larger ecclesial context dominated by Council.

The conclave that elected Paul VI (Giovanni Battista Montini) to succeed the "good pope" was part of the conciliar dynamics between primacy, conciliarity, and collegiality-synodality.

In some sense, the situation of Pope Francis' pontificate almost ten years on, which coincides with the beginning of the crucial phase of the synodal process (2023-2024) is similar to the one of the Catholic Church in 1962-1963 at the beginning of Vatican II.

But there is a big difference today.

It has to do with the way in which the synodal process could change the Church.

It is this, and not the bickering about Benedict XVI's legacy, that is the real target of the some of the statements that have from a number of prominent churchmen these last few weeks. One example was the late Cardinal George Pell's article in The Spectator, written shortly before he died, in which he called the synod a "toxic nightmare".

In a memorandum which he wrote and circulated under a pseudonym in March 2022 the same Australian cardinal warned that "if the national or continental synods are given doctrinal authority, we will have a new danger to worldwide Church unity" and that "if there was no Roman correction of such heresy, the Church would be reduced to a loose federation of local Churches, holding different views, probably closer to an Anglican or Protestant model, than an Orthodox model".

Council and Synod: same but different

The current situation is not the same as that preceding the opening of a new council like Vatican II, which would be impossible today with more than 5,000 bishops and superiors of male religious orders with the right to participate.

Then there is the problem of how representative an assembly of bishops and superiors of male religious orders would be for the Church of today.

Still, the prerequisites for a conciliar event or an ecclesial event with council-like consequences are there, where what has happened up to now in the councils precedes it.

But the "synodal process" now underway is taking place according to a completely different preparation compared to the one that took place between 1959 and 1962 to prepare Vatican II.

The synodal process is much more decentralized and is involving the entire People of God - at that those who could and desired to participate.

This process is also taking place in a Church where, compared to the time of Vatican II, the institutional loneliness of the pope is much more evident: for Benedict XVI when he resigned, for Pope Francis today.

The Catholic Church today needs new ways to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

That proclamation will have to be made more and more by the People of God and less by the clerical elites.

Those who appeal to Benedict XVI are understandably scared by the undeniable fact that the Church is trying to find those new ways and that will require a new form for the Church.

It's clear from the very title of the "working document for the continental stage" that general secretariat of the Synod has prepared: "Enlarge the space of your tent" (Is 54:2).

Attempts to reset the narrative

There are a number of key issues at stake: some kind of de-hierarchisation of the Church's government, a different role for the episcopate, and the relationship between unity and diversity in the one Catholic Church.

One of the questions is what kind of regulation will be part of this new form of the Church, given the highly pluralistic ecclesial system such as the one in which we are and will be part of.

Surely some of the movements of the last few weeks, for example the book-length interview by Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, former prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (2012-2017), are part of the attempts to accelerate and prepare the next conclave.

But no one (or perhaps only one) knows when the next conclave is going to be.

We all know that the Synod is underway and now entering the crucial stage. Cardinal Mario Grech, the Synod's secretary general, put it this way in a recent interview with the Italian Catholic magazine Il Regno:

"The Synod has already begun. According to a new experience. The Holy Father opened it in October 2021 and now there are various stages. The phase completed in August was not a preparatory phase for the celebration of the Synod, but is already part of the synodal process."

The immediate target of those who are trying to reset the narrative in post-Ratzinger Catholicism is not one particular issue or another.

The target is the Synod itself.

• Massimo Faggioli is a Church historian, Professor of Theology and Religious Studies at Villanova University (Philadelphia) and a much-published author and commentator. He is a visiting professor in Europe and Australia.

Clerics, who believe they have all the answers and the power, tell the faithful what they can and cannot do.

On the other side are laity, who nod off in the pews and leave the heavy lifting to priests and religious.

The laity have never been asked to do anything but pray, pay and obey, so why bother?

That reality was sustainable, if not desirable, when there were lots of priests and religious and they were the most educated people in the parish.

Today, most parts of the world have an educated laity and so few priests and religious that the church is in serious decline.

Pope Francis has made a frontal attack on clericalism, telling bishops not to act like princes and telling priests to be more pastoral. With the Synod on Synodality, he is also calling the laity to step up and take ownership in the church.

In this process, it is especially important that the clergy listen to the laity, but it is also important that the laity listen to each other.

The U.S. bishops' report on the work so far — officially the "National Synthesis of the People of God in the United States of America for the Diocesan Phase of the 2021-2023 Synod" — released in September, summarizes 10 months of listening sessions in American parishes and dioceses.

Last month, I detailed in my column the enduring wounds that were exposed in the listening sessions.

They include "the enduring wounds caused by the clergy sexual abuse scandal, the pandemic, polarization, and marginalization have exposed a deep hunger for healing and the strong desire for communion, community, and a sense of belonging and being united."

But the listening sessions were not simply picking at old wounds.

They spoke of a longing for communion and participation in the church.

The laity is waking from its slumber and desires "to draw closer to God and each other through a deeper knowledge of Scripture, prayer, and sacramental celebrations, especially the Eucharist," the bishops wrote.

While there were different perspectives on what constitutes good liturgy, there was agreement on the need for "warmer hospitality, healing services, and more invigorating preaching by clergy."

According to the synthesis, "The most common desire named in the synodal consultations was to be a more welcoming Church where all members of the People of God can find accompaniment on the journey."

The participants in the sessions acknowledged the tension between walking with people while remaining faithful to the teachings of the church.

Yet "for many, the perception is that the blanket application of rules and policies is used as a means of wielding power or acting as a gatekeeper."

Quoting from the account of one consultation, the bishops' synthesis said, "People noted that the Church seems to prioritize doctrine over people, rules and regulations over lived reality."

That account could have been quoting Francis when it said, "People want the Church to be a home for the wounded and broken, not an institution for the perfect. They want the Church to meet people where they are, wherever they are, and walk with them rather than judging them; to build real relationships through care and authenticity, not superiority."

People needing to feel welcomed included, according to the synthesis, LGBTQ+ persons, who "believe they are condemned by Church teachings," and their families, who "feel torn between remaining in the church and supporting their loved ones."

Also divorced persons, "whether remarried or not, often feel unwelcome within the Church," according to the report.

"The annulment process is experienced as unduly burdensome and judgmental."

The divorced described "feeling like they are held to a higher standard while people who have committed other sins continue to receive communion."

Catholic people of colour "spoke of routine encounters with racism, both inside and outside the Church," the synthesis reports.

"Indigenous Catholics spoke of the generational trauma caused by racism and abuse in boarding schools."

The participants offered practical suggestions for creating more community across racial and ethnic lines.

"Providing forums for conversations on race, immigration, and loving openness to others is critical in allowing individuals to be heard and understood," was one.

Masses in different languages were mentioned, but some wondered how to share communion with all parishioners even when they celebrate separately.

"Practically all synodal consultations shared a deep ache in the wake of the departure of young people and viewed this as integrally connected to becoming a more welcoming Church," according to the report.

Young people "want the Church to speak out about issues that matter to them, especially justice, race, and climate change."

The young want to be seen not as the future of the church but as important now. They want to be given a significant voice in the present.

Finally, those taking part in the process felt the church needs to be more welcoming to women, suggesting "a variety of ways in which women could exercise leadership, including preaching and ordination as deacon or priest."

Participants "shared a deep appreciation for the powerful impact of women religious who have consistently led the way in carrying out the mission of the Church," the synthesis reports.

"There was a desire for stronger leadership, discernment, and decision-making roles for women — both lay and religious — in their parishes and communities."

Overall, the listening sessions showed no desire for a smaller, purer church.

Catholics do not seem to want to exclude the wounded or sinners. They prefer a welcoming community where all are called to communion and participation.

The people appear to be in line with Francis' desire for a welcoming church that travels together along the synodal path.

None of this will be surprising to anyone familiar with survey research on the Catholic laity.

What is new here is a papally endorsed process that allows the laity to surface their views in a public way.

The people are speaking.

Is anyone listening?

• Thomas Reese SJ is a senior analyst at Religion News Service, and a former columnist at National Catholic Reporter, and a former editor-in-chief of the weekly Catholic magazine America. First published in RNS. Republished with permission.

I read and eventually tried to synthesize everything that had been submitted.

In the process, I gained a deeper understanding of synodality as well as a sense of the tasks and challenges that face us in the church.

Bishop Robert McElroy recently made a persuasive case in America for the need to carry the work of the synod into the future and to guard against viewing it as a closed-end process.

My experience confirms his intuition.

We face an immense formational task that involves helping the church to claim its reality as a people on the road together, rooted in the Gospel and inspired to carry that Gospel into the world.

One way to understand synodal formation is to note, as I did in the course of reading our archdiocesan-wide feedback, what seemed to be missing.

This via negativa can open up a positive way to understand the tasks and challenges ahead of us. Let me share three significant deficits that I noted and which can, in fact, point us in positive directions.

In so many ways, the synodal process that is deeply embedded in our history has also become unfamiliar to us.

An exercise in prayer

In our consultation, most people had not accurately or fully grasped the path of synodality as Pope Francis had presented it.

For so many respondents, the synod consultation was about figuring things out or sharing a personal opinion about how things ought to be, or some form of need-based planning.

The Holy Father's hope for the synodal process aligned things much differently.

For Pope Francis, everything about the synodal path begins in prayer.

Out of their prayer, believers encounter each other.

In their encounters, they are summoned to listen deeply to each other.

And finally, in their listening, they discover where the Holy Spirit might be prompting them to move.

The essential elements are

• prayer,
• encounter,
• listening and
• discernment.

This process is a clear reflection of the way the early church gathered and organized itself, as we know from the Acts of the Apostles, and of the very best moments of the life of the church throughout her history.

But in so many ways, the synodal process that is deeply embedded in our history has also become unfamiliar to us. The gravitational pull seems directed to figuring things out, sharing opinions or doing need-based planning. Clearly, the formational task is to help the church retrieve that synodal spirit that marks her earliest beginnings and her best moments.

This growing and unfolding formation replicates the beginnings of the church as chronicled in the Acts of the Apostles.

From the church, not to the church

As I studied the synod responses, I also discovered another anomaly that future synodal formation will need to address.

As people offered their comments with true sincerity and, sometimes, with great passion, their way of speaking gave me pause.

At a certain point, I realized that so many of the respondents were speaking more to the church rather than from the church.

In other words, they commented on the church as if it were an object outside of them.

This is in sharp contrast to what Pope Francis has in mind.

We are the subjects, the actors and—in his words—the protagonists in this process.

In other words, we are the church. And in a synodal context, then, we speak from the church.

All this means much more than quibbling over prepositions.

From a formational perspective, it involves carefully cultivating an internalized sense of identity with the church.

After studying the synod responses and reflecting on them, I can more clearly see the need the people of God have for synodal formation.

Looking outward

The third and final deficit that I found in the responses was something that Pope Francis has called "ecclesial introversion;" a sticky attachment to the internal life of the church and its structural-institutional organization.

The whole point of synodality is to be "on the road together" in mission, going outside of ourselves.

So many comments in the responses spoke to recommended changes in church life or, even more accurately, within church life.

The sense of outward mission was generally faint.

Formation for mission, an ever-expansive sense of our purpose in the world, needs to take hold of our communities of faith. Continue reading

The enthusiasm of some for the Synodal Way is one side of the way all human societies make deliberate change. Likewise, the fears of Cardinal Walter Kasper and some other bishops are exactly what we should expect.

If we could see the future clearly, then it would be different - but no one has a crystal ball. The future always contains surprises. Some of these will be more wonderful than anyone has imagined; other will be worse than our greatest fears. That is simply the way it is!

One might imagine that it would be different with the Church - the Body of the Christ animated by the Spirit - and it has been the illusion of some Christians in every age that because they "had the faith" or "the Bible" or the "gift of magisterium" that their steps into the future were guaranteed!

Alas, we are always engaged in a process of discernment: we pray for the light of the Holy Spirit and we then try to glimpse the way forward. We walk forward by faith. The Church's prayer is always that "by the light of the Spirit we may be truly wise and enjoy his consolation" (da nobis in … Spiritu recta sapere, et de eius semper consolation gaudere).

Wrong signals

If we cannot now know the outcomes of our decisions, what we might suspect, with Cardinal Kasper, will be a disaster. But it may turn out completely the opposite - and vice versa - so we can exercise some foreknowledge with regard to the signals our actions send out in the present.

Right now, I can know that something is being wrongly interpreted or wrongly used. What will happen tomorrow is, in an absolute sense, unknown; but what is faulty now can be known through an examination of evidence that has been building up for some time and is available to us. This is where we can take definite action for the better.

This is such a basic element of our thinking that we tend to ignore it and spend our time in more distant - and so imprecise - speculation.

We can easily illustrate this: will there be a fire in the house or will it be OK? I simply do not know, and I hedge my bets by having house insurance. Contrast that with the definite event that I smell smoke and hear the fire alarm now, right now. In this case, I do not speculate but act: I call the fire brigade.

Liturgy is not costume drama

We see this same decision process in the Church.

Some weeks ago, Pope Francis did not speculate that some clergy might or might not really want to take the reforms of Vatican II to heart. Rather, he saw that their actual activity now - wearing lace and birettas - sent out a signal that they did not like modernity.

This was not a "might be" or "might happen" but a definite signal to people by those priests that they preferred a former time. So the pope sent a clear and definite signal to them!

In effect, he told them that helping the People of God celebrate their liturgy - it belongs to all the baptized because when we assemble we are "wholly celebrant" - is what their ministry is about. It is not costume drama in which they, as clergy, have the leading roles and take the bows!

The view out of a Roman window: the view from outside, looking in, is very different!

But there are many other areas where the Church, or clergy, are right now sending out signals that indicate an actual problem - a fire that needs fighting urgently. And if these are not tackled, then it will make the whole synodal process, for both the fearful and the hopeful, little more than hot air.

Seen to be transparent

Long trained to discretion, indeed secrecy, most clergy are happier dealing with anything "scandalous" far from the public view. Hence, one episcopal conference after another has been found to have been involved in cover-ups! It would be interesting to know just how many bishops have had to resign in the last 25 years because they were seen "to have swept matters under the carpet".

But this attitude - quite apart from the fact that it is morally unjust (criminals were allowed to create more suffering and went un-punished) and ecclesiologically inept (every member of the Church is as much a member as anyone else) - also failed to appreciate our cultural situation.

Lace inside the head

Many years ago I heard praise of a new bishop - arrived from a job in Rome - by some of the canons of his chapter: "He is the soul of discretion - his Vatican training is in his every move!"

I hope that would not be a vote of approbation by those priests today if they got a new bishop. Anyone who is so naturalized to secrecy, even to holding up the so-called "pontifical secret", is actually unfit for a job in the Roman Curia, much less in a diocese.

Such a man is an inhabitant of a world that is long past. Such a man is wearing lace inside his head.

A world that craves transparency

Whenever we find examples of people doing things in a "smoke-filled room" or "behind closed doors" or without full reporting, we become suspicious. Sad experience has taught us that such "back room" procedures are usually the fore-runner of greater problems.

So, for example, we are not surprised to hear that there is a crackdown on a free press and open discussion in Vladimir Putin's Russia. What might be labelled "judicious discretion" among two bishops in purple cassocks seems little different from "suppression" and "repression" when done by a military junta.

But time and again we see a minimalist approach to transparency from bishops. It is simply the wrong signal: it creates the impression that they cannot be trusted. Then it generates the question: why do they want to keep things back? Then: what have they to hide?

The breakdown of trust in the Church - which just might be generating those attitudes which cause the fears expressed by Cardinal Kasper - is a fact right now. Once people spontaneously generate that wonderful expression, the hermeneutic of suspicion, then there is a rupture in the magisterium.

This rupture is not a possible fruit of a mistaken approach to synodality (i.e. the equivalent of "will the house go on fire?" or "will there be a sea-battle tomorrow?"), but a simple fact for many of the baptized - they do not trust the official statements of bishops as anything more than statements intended to preserve power and prevent necessary change.

This level of suspicion of bishops has probably not been seen over wide areas of the Western Church since the sixteenth century.

An interesting slogan

Among disadvantaged groups this very significant statement is often repeated: Nothing about us, without us, is for us.

It is worth thinking carefully about the implications of this maxim.

It speaks of suspicion, the desire for transparency, and the desire for real - not token - consultation.

It also speaks about the experience of women who hear statements made about them and their bodies by men.

It speaks about married people hearing about the demands of the Christian life from celibates who have never had to worry about being out of work, never had to cope with the pressures of providing food or shelter or repaying a mortgage each month, nor dealing with the worries that are part of every relationship and family.

It speaks about hearing of "child protection measures" from men who do not have children but have profound professional identification with clerical abusers.

And the list goes on ….

Signs of the times

Let's not worry about tomorrow's potential problems, we have enough actuals that need urgent attention.

"So don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today" (Mt 6:34).

Time is short! Some things are urgent! Transparency is a 'sign of this time'

Time is short! Some things are urgent! Transparency is a 'sign of this time'

We need to take heed of the signs of the times - and stop sending out the wrong signals.

You might say, "But transparency is not that important, and certainly not part of our moment! Let's just ignore it!"

Well, some people in the Vatican have already seen that it is part of our historical moment - hence the accounts for Peter's Pence have just been published for the first time. This is the transparency that is appropriate to a community such as the Church.

Anything that is less than full transparency - and being transparent about transparency - is a skandalon (a stumbling block) to evangelization.

• First published in La-Croix International. Republished with permission.
• Thomas O'Loughlin is a presbyter of the Catholic Diocese of Arundel and Brighton and professor-emeritus of historical theology at the University of Nottingham (UK). His latest book is Discipleship and Society in the Early Churches.

The two-year synodal process is a consultative phase involving Catholic dioceses around the world.

Chosen by the Polish bishops' conference president Archbishop Stanisław Gądecki, Professor Aleksander Bańka is the first lay person to represent the Church in Poland at an inaugural session.

He is one of 10 representatives from Europe at the official opening. The others include the president of the Council of European Bishops' Conferences, two bishops and seven lay people.

The Vatican says immediately after its official opening in Rome next moth, the two-year "synodal path" will begin in dioceses throughout the world.

Continental assemblies will follow the diocesan consultations. The process will culminate in the October 2023 synod of bishops at the Vatican.

The synod theme is "For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, and Mission".

The Synod of Bishops general secretary, Cardinal Mario Grech, says the synod has been transformed "from an event into a process."

Bańka, a husband and father, works at the Institute of Philosophy of the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Silesia.

He specializes in the history of philosophy, the philosophy of religion and the intersection of philosophy and psychology with Christian spirituality.

One of his particular concerns is the decline in young Polish people's participation in the Church.

"Often actions undertaken within the scope of the New Evangelization are taken tongue-in-cheek or even with hostility or as an oddity, clutter spreading, or cheap entertainment," he wrote in an article in 2017.

"Often it is connected with some reluctance towards new communities and Church-renewal movements, which in some parishes are — speaking openly — unwelcomed or treated as an element of local parish color."

"Potential hidden in these communities remains undiscovered and unused; it even happens sometimes that the laity organizing in a given community — mainly young people — are left to their own means."

His experience includes serving as chairman of the Commission for the Laity during the second synod of the Archdiocese of Katowice.

Source

• Catholic News Agency
• Image: eKAI

"It is hardly an exaggeration", says a Vietnamese-born former boat refugee, a survivor of clergy sexual abuse and Paramatta Bishop, Vincent Long.

There's an "unprecedented momentum for deep reform, the model of the Church based on clerical hegemony has run its course", the bishop said, 30 June, while delivering the Dom Helder Camara Lecture at Newman College, Melbourne.

For the Church to flourish, "it is crucial that we come to terms with the flaws of clericalism and move beyond its patriarchal and monarchical matrix," he says.

"We have struggled under the weight of the old ecclesial paradigm of the clerical order, control and hegemony with a penchant for triumphalism, self-referential pomp and smugness."

It has to change "into a more Christ-like pattern of humility, simplicity and powerlessness as opposed to worldly triumphalism, splendour, dominance and power."

He says he agrees with Gerald Arbuckle that we need to re-found the Church rather than renew it, going to the very cultural roots in a hope-filled journey under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

"What is urgent is that we need to find fresh ways of being Church and fresh ways of ministry and service for both men and women disciples. New wine into new wineskins."

Long says the tone for sweeping Church reform in Australia was set in 2016 when Archbishop Mark Coleridge proposed a Plenary Council to discuss "the critical issues of the times".

Concerns in Australia include dwindling Mass attendances, a decline in priestly and religious vocations and the critical and damaging public fallout of the royal commission into child sexual abuse.

Cosmetic changes, mediocrity or restorationism dressed up as renewal won't work anymore.

It will not be a simple restoration project or doing old things better; the Church needs to focus on new horizons says Long.

He says it will be a Church in which women and men are aware of their baptismal dignity.

"So long as we continue to exclude women from the Church's governance structures, decision-making processes and institutional functions, we deprive ourselves of the richness of our full humanity.

So long as we continue to make women invisible and inferior in the Church's language, liturgy, theology and law, we impoverish ourselves.

"Until we have truly incorporated the gift of women and the feminine dimension of our Christian faith, we will not be able to fully energise the life of the Church.

Long is of the view that the Church in Australia is uniquely positioned to move into a new fresh future.

The painful Royal Commission brought about a heightened level of consciousness and an unprecedented momentum for deep reform.

"The Church cannot have a prophetic voice in society if we fail to be the model egalitarian community where those disadvantaged on account of their race, gender, social status and disability find empowerment for a dignified life."

As he notes, Australians are offering goodwill, enthusiasm and hope in the Plenary Council.

"Could we be a leading light in the struggle for a more fit-for-purpose Church in this place and in this time?"

"Could Australian Catholics rise to the challenge and co-create the synodal Church that Pope Francis has envisaged?"

In October 2021, the Catholic Church in Australia will gather for the first Assembly of the Plenary Council.

The initial phase of listening drew nearly 220,000 people across Australia and 17,500 individual and group submissions.

These submissions were distilled into the six national theme papers and then further distilled again into the working document and finally the agenda.

Momentum for the Plenary Council ebbed and flowed during this process, which has been disrupted by the pandemic but by and large, there has been considerable goodwill, enthusiasm and even a sense of hope for the future of the Church in Australia

Submissions have been distilled into six national theme papers, which were further distilled into the Council's working document and agenda.

Source

• CathNews
• The Tablet
• Image: The Australian

"Pope Francis has frequently called for the bishops, priests and people to walk together in a common mission of the Church," says Conference president Cardinal John Dew.

"He believes it is imperative to listen to the People of God, which means going to local churches to hear what they say."

Francis wants all Catholic dioceses to consult with parishioners from 17 October to get local-level views on the topic for the next synod, entitled a "Synodal Church: Communion, Participation and Mission".

"The Holy Father wants to hear the voices of all the baptised," Dew says.

People contacted by CathNews were generally pleased the New Zealand bishops were so quick off the mark and, at an early stage, outlined how the New Zealand Church will participate.

Some had heard of the Synod but were unaware of the October 17 date.

Reading the document though some felt sidelined by the process and hope there might be room for a significant change.

Most of these people consider they are no longer regular parishioners and wonder how limiting the process to going to parishes and consulting parishioners will work.

Jerome De Rosario is a 40-year-old Wellington professional. A "retired catholic", he thinks the Church needs a different strategy and fresh ideas and hopes the Synod might accomplish this.

However, he expressed surprise the Church did not factor in what it already knows, that most Catholics don't belong to parishes and do not go to Mass.

Alex Jordan, a university student from Massey, Auckland, also picks up on the parish emphasis.

"The voice of the bulk of baptised Catholics won't be heard because they don't belong to the outdated parish structure, he said.

"At most, they're gathering 5% of the baptised.

"The data will be skewed from the outset", he said.

"If this is worth doing it's worth doing well. I hope the Church gets good advice."

Non-parishioners also need to be considered says Richard McKenna, a 30 something manager in Wellington.

"By focussing on parishes many people who are still fringe Catholics but not regular parishioners, and may feel excluded. This statement seems to confirm our exclusion".

He hopes it is not the 'last word' and the criteria and methodology will also consider non-parishioners may wish to contribute and have valuable ideas.

"I much prefer the Vatican's focus, consulting with 'The People of God'", he said.

However, Kathleen Field, the Parish Council chair at Holy Spirit Cathedral in Palmerston North, thinks that parishes are an obvious place to start.

"The people are involved", she said. "It's a starting point".

On a pragmatic note, she is looking forward to seeing the methodology for collecting the data and how it might be redacted.

"The wording of the questions will be important.

"If the questions are too ethereal, people won't engage," she said.

Field is impressed by the established timeline and is keen to learn more about the process when it is available.

In terms of the process, Dew says each bishop will appoint representatives to lead the consultations of all New Zealand Catholics in their dioceses, before the bishop's conference meets early next year.

After that, they will prepare a report for the Federation of Catholic Bishops Conferences of Oceania.

That regional body and others like it around the world will draft documents that will go to the Synod office in Rome to help prepare the assembly's working document.

The bishops will then take these views to the synod in Rome in 2023.

Dew says hard details of the consultation - including the matters to be discussed during it - will be promulgated as soon as they are announced from Rome.

Source

• NZ Catholic Bishops Conference
• Image: Catholic Outlook

Any such stress carries with it twin dangers.

First, that we then assume that somehow that is all the Spirit does, the Spirit is there - almost functionally - to produce unity and the bonds of peace (Eph 4:3).

Second, that we then further simplify this action of bringing unity to it being the sort of unity that we produce: uniformity, rigidity, and blandness.

So it is useful to remember that the Spirit is simultaneously the giver of diversity - and that in a divine economy that unity and diversity are not in contradiction. It is this richness that can be the richness of a synodal Church.

The notion of synodality scares many in the Church - they see it only as messiness and chaos. They never see this the other way: diversity is richness.

The Spirit's gifts

The Spirit unites, heals, and any true unity is the fruit of the divine presence.

When we recall our unity in the Christ, our unity in baptism, and in discipleship we are not recalling our common commitment, nor shared acceptance of a system of ideas, nor collective adherence to a structure; rather it is the Spirit's presence that makes us one royal priesthood, a chosen people, and a holy nation.

It is through our sharing in the Spirit that we become what we are.

And it is through the Spirit's power that we are able to know and declare the wonderful deeds of the Father who called us out of darkness into his marvellous light (cf. 1 Pet 2:9).

This unity that is formed by the Spirit is manifold: it unites us with the Christ, it reverses the human tendency to fragmentation, challenged us to reject asserting differences to bolster our sense of identity, it helps us towards a true catholicism which is the overcoming of sectionalism, and confronts our pride and jealously.

The gift of unity is a positive addition to our human state, it is not to be imagined along the lines of human unification which thinks in terms of mergers, alliances, pacts, and the destruction of differences so that all looks the same, works together, and behave with the sort of unity that is essential in a clock, a computer, or a regiment.

In the unity of the Holy Spirit, the whole is more than the sum of the parts, but each element's distinctiveness and individuality as a creature is preserved. When we think of the Spirit's unifying and reconciling presence we are hard-pressed to find parallels in human experience.

So rather than search out 'parallels', it is more useful to think of the Spirit as the source for what we imagine as the opposite of unification: the act of diversification.

Diversity is a mark of the Spirit's work

The Spirit is present in all creation, yet everywhere we see its diversity.

• How many types of life are there?
• How many species of plants and animals?
• How many human beings are there: each clinging to their individuality, distinctiveness, and identity.

Diversity is everywhere.

Diversity is richness and the source of beauty.

Diversity is what makes life worth living.

The Spirit is the giver of life, and life is filled with difference, interest and wonder. This is the diversifying Spirit at work.

Paul rejoiced in the diversity of the human body as part of the creation so that he could recall the diversity of the Church in the Spirit.

Before any talk about the Spirit in the Church, it is a good idea to read 1 Cor 12:4-30.

A Church sharing in the same Spirit is full of diversity and is not short of the multiplicity of talents, each distinctly expressed that will build the community of love.

By contrast, when we forget that the Spirit diversifies we tend to imagine the community of the Church as a structure, become blind to the richness of his diverse presence and gifts in those around us, and even begin to wonder if the Spirit is abandoning us.

Enlighten our hearts and minds

The Spirit brings enlightenment, and this too takes the character of its richness from diversity. It is the diversity of human insights that build up human knowledge, is the spark of excitement, interest and genius.

And again, only diversity allows us to appreciate the wonder of the good and the beautiful: what if there was only one beautiful image or poem?

• Why is a diversity of languages better than just one?
• Why is it better to have four rather than one gospel?
• Why is there such diversity of insights in the Church?

Those who would reduce diversity have a low view of human nature, a lower view of the value of human living, and little or no awareness of the transcendent.

Every tyrant in history has eventually sought to destroy differences of opinion - in everything from politics to art - and then usually sought to eradicate humans that appeared too different from his image of perfection. In contrast, the Spirit produces diversity upon diversity, and we can marvel and rejoice in the Spirit's creativity.

Many clergy fear diversity

Diversity has a bad history in Christian practice.

Diversity is not richness but fragmentation, schism, heresy.

We look back to the story of the Tower of Babel as a punishment for pride. In this myth the earth had only 'one language and few words' (Gen 11:1) and all acted as single people (11:4 and 6), then people came to think that nothing would be impossible for them (11:6), so God confused their language to thwart them and he scattered them (11:7-8), and so the place came to be called Babel (11:9).

It is a powerful myth: sin splits and destroys unity- and we so easily convert the idea and imagine that diversity is the result of a broken unity!

So whenever we see variation, the difference we do not see is the distinct aspect of a mystery greater than us, where all those aspects might call us to see the limits of any one of them, and seek to grow in understanding and appreciation?

Yet just reflect on the rhetoric that we have used over the centuries to stress the lack of diversity as a sign of unity of faith: one ritual, one language, one method of doing things, one standardised theology, and on and on - it was as if we could not imagine that God could be greater than our love of imposed orderliness and uniformity!

Babel undone

By complete contrast, in his presentation of the coming of the Spirit, Luke presents his myth to counterbalance Babel.

On his great day of Pentecost the many nations, the Spirit does not remove the diversity of languages but rather enables the gathered community - itself a diverse bunch of men and women (Acts 1:14) - to begin 'to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance' (Acts 2:4).

Those who heard them did not hear new single language - neither Latin nor Esperanto - but each heard in his own language (a point Luke repeats: Acts 2:6, 8, and 11).

In Luke's myth, the Spirit, even in a miracle of uniting the nations, values diversity.

In the Babel myth that people set out to build a city as a function of their uniformity - there were only one people and they had but few words - and this provoked divine punishment; in the Pentecost myth a new city is being built by the Spirit upon the riches of diversity.

This is the Spirit given diversity of languages, cultures, peoples, and insights. From out of this diversity, the mighty works of God become known and praised in each language.

When we are thinking about the Spirit and seeking to speak about the Spirit we need to ask ourselves which myth is most powerful in our own minds.

At the end of most homilies - or bits of writing like this one - there is a natural human tendency to sum up, to put it all in a sentence, or to attempt a synthesis.

After all, is this not what a good communicator should do? So we might then speak of the Spirit being unifying in diversity and diversifying in unity, or some such seemingly synthetic formula that draws together the conflicting aspects of our reflection.

We see the same tendency in among those who are fearful of synodality: they praise it, but then imagine it can be predictably packaged.

However, such synthetic formulae almost assume that the mystery of the divine can be comprehended or neatly wrapped up. Rather we should live with the staccato insights and not seek to reduce them to what seems to fit our minds.

The Spirit is unifying. The Spirit is diversifying. The Spirit can be seen in any number of other ways. The Spirit is, indeed, infinite, or as we should constantly remind ourselves: Deus semper maior (God ever greater).

• Thomas O'Loughlin is a priest of the Catholic Diocese of Arundel and Brighton, emeritus professor of historical theology at the University of Nottingham (UK) and director of the Centre of Applied Theology, UK. His latest award-winning book is Eating Together, Becoming One: Taking Up Pope Francis's Call to Theologians (Liturgical Press, 2019).

In such a church, women challenge clericalism without being co-opted by it, Ivereigh told a webinar on the role of women in church leadership.

Ivereigh said Francis had indicated the vital need for those women to have recognition and be commissioned by their bishops.

"He often puts women in positions where they can, not just exercise governance, but also challenge governance," Ivereigh noted.

"I would say Francis is dismantling what you might call the imperialist or clericalist model of governance...".

The papal biographer warned webinar participants against a "grievance culture".

In this he referred to Querida Amazonia, in which Francis highlighted the Amazon's lay ecclesial culture, where most Catholic communities have no priest and are run by women.

Another webinar speaker was Sr Patricia Murray (pictured), whom Francis appointed as a consultor to the Pontifical Council for Culture. She is also the executive secretary of International Union of Superiors General (UISG).

Murray noted lay and religious women's voices are missing despite some women taking up significant roles in the Church.

After lobbying, women religious received three places at the synod on the family, three at the youth synod and 20 at the Amazon synod. The body representing male religious doesn't have to lobby, Murray said. It automatically secures 10 places.

Murray says "change has begun to happen" and "as we set out on our synodal journey, we will see the presence and leadership of women flourishing."

The issue of women's leadership in the Church was also the subject of a working group report in Limerick this week. The preparation of the report was a central recommendation from Limerick's Diocesan Synod in 2016.

Acknowledging the difficulties and struggles for women, both lay and religious, particularly in a parish environment that revolves around the priest the working group suggested rethinking the balance of leadership within the Church and the entire Christian community.

It also highlights the "need to honour the dignity of Christian women in ministry" who are generally unnoticed.

Rose O'Connor, who chairs Limerick's women in leadership working group, says there are "very significant challenges" and "opportunities for women in ... leadership roles in the Church."

"While the issue of ordination of women is at the forefront of most people's thoughts when it comes to inequalities ... we concentrated on what is possible within canon law; what we can impact ... what we can change."

O'Connor says two important questions emerged from the report.

One is whether the Church provides women, men and children the spaces and opportunities to exercise their gifts and calling in the service of the common good.

The other is whether the official and de-facto structures within which people operate, facilitate or frustrate them in their ministry.

Canon law does not distinguish between women and men, O'Connor says. "The principal distinction is between ordained and lay. So, if an office or function is available to a lay person, it is equally available to both women and men."

Source

• The Tablet
• Image: Global Sisters Report

Commenting on various issues where the Pope is currently under attack from his critics, Arturo Sosa SJ says there is no doubt there's a political fight going on in the church.

This isn't just against Francis and his convictions. He won't change and his critics know it, Sosa says.

"In reality, these [attacks] are a way to influence the election of the next pope."

As Francis is 82, Sosa says his critics are aiming at the succession.

They "...know that it takes a long time, more than 50 years, to really implement the Second Vatican Council."

One of the points of friction is clericalism - that is, a way of understanding the exercise of power in the church.

"Francis is fighting against clericalism and this exercise of power". He "proposes a synodal church," which encourages greater collegiality and participation in decision making," Sosa says.

"Pope Francis is a son of the Second Vatican Council."

As he is a responsible son, Sosa says "Francis puts all his energy and capacity to incarnate it and to make a reality all that this event has dreamed for the church, and it seems to me that this is a great contribution to the church."

Francis believes the church shows "true reform" the "closer it comes to the design of the Second Vatican Council."

There have always been those who support and those who resist the Council's reforms, Sosa notes.

But the 50 years since the Council "is not so much" in terms of implementing its reforms in the church, he says.

Unlike those who criticised Francis's first two synods and the upcoming one on the Amazon, Sosa believes Francis's synodal process "creates unity."

He said he witnessed this at the synod on young people, and he is now seeing it also in the process of preparation for the synod on the Amazon region.

Source

• America Magazine
• Image: Asia News

But something has largely been neglected. It is the reception of the pope's focus on synodality and its importance for the Church in the world today.

The day after Easter marked one-and-a-half years since Francis gave one of his most important speeches to explain the need for a synodal Catholic Church.

"The world in which we live, and which we are called to love and serve, even with its contradictions, demands that the Church strengthen cooperation in all areas of her mission," the pope said on October 17, 2015.

"It is precisely this path of synodality which God expects of the Church of the third millennium," he insisted.

Then the pope described the three levels of synodality. The first level is that of the local Church. The second is the level of ecclesiastical provinces and regions, particular councils and, in a special way, conferences of bishops. And the third level is that of the universal Church.

Francis concluded the speech by emphasizing the relevance of the synodal dimension of the Church for today's world.

"Our gaze also extends to humanity as a whole," he said.

"A synodal Church is like a standard lifted up among the nations (cf. Is 11:12) in a world which - while calling for participation, solidarity, and transparency in public administration - often consigns the fate of entire peoples to the grasp of small but powerful groups," he stressed.

"As a Church which ‘journeys together' with men and women, sharing the travails of history, let us cherish the dream that a rediscovery of the inviolable dignity of peoples and of the function of authority as service will also be able to help civil society to be built up in justice and fraternity, and thus bring about a more beautiful and humane world for coming generations," the pope added. Continue reading

Sources

• La Croix International article by Massimo Faggioli, a Church historian, Professor of Theology and Religious Studies at Villanova University (Philadelphia).
• Image: National Catholic Reporter