We’re now halfway through the four weeks of the second session of the Synod on Synodality. And a fair question to ask is: What have we done? Without breaking any confidence as a delegate (I can’t share what was said at our tables or what anyone, including me, said at the “plenary” sessions), I can give you an overview of what we’ve been doing—for God and for our church.
We began with a two-day retreat directed by Mother Maria Grazia Angelina, O.S.B., and soon-to-be cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, O.P., the latter of whom brilliantly used the image of St. Peter’s nets, with their “bonds” and “spaces,” as an image of the church. Then it was down to business.
Without going into too much detail about our “methodology” (that’s a very popular word here), I can say that our process is a combination of roundtable discussions (we began with what I think of as our “homeroom” table and then switched for two weeks to another table before we’ll return to our homeroom table at the end) and “interventions” given before the entire assembly. Secretaries and “rapporteurs” summarize the roundtable discussions, which are brought to the various language groups (English, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese) for further summarizing. While all this is happening, a group of writers, overseen by delegates from each continent who were elected by us, are gathering the input. At the end of the process, we will approve a final document to present to the Holy Father, who is with us most days, for him to sign or use as a jumping-off point for an apostolic exhortation. One thing to keep in mind is that even if we issue an abstract document, Pope Francis could put some teeth into it.
What most people want to know is “What are you talking about?” As you’ve probably heard, the specific issues—I don’t like the term “hot-button issues” because it makes it sound like they are inconsequential or a media creation when they are crucially important—were taken off the table. That means that they are not the focus of our conversations; synodality is, which some argue is more foundational than any of those topics. But the topics naturally come up. If you’re talking about ministries in the church, then the question of women’s roles in leadership and ordained ministry comes up. And if you’re talking about listening to people who feel on the margins of the church, then the topic of L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics (and, in Africa, those in polygamous relationships) will come up.
One major difference from last year is the feeling in the room. Last year many delegates felt, if not suspicion, then caution. After all, unless you lived in, worked in or visited the Vatican often, you probably didn’t know most of the people in the room. At the beginning of last October, there were a lot of tentative conversations, but ultimately there was the building of friendships. As Father Radcliffe said last year, quoting St. John Paul II, “Affective collegiality precedes effective collegiality.” I find that to be true: Tackling tough subjects is easier when you know the person as a friend.
But where is all this going? That’s a good question! The danger of such a collaborative process involving Catholics from across the globe—at my homeroom table I was seated between someone from Tanzania and someone from Fiji—is that anything that achieves consensus will naturally be general: “A missionary church must be a synodal church.” “Transparency and accountability are central to church governance.” (I’m not quoting anyone, just giving you a sense of how general the convergences are.) The challenge will be for the synod to let concrete proposals rise to the top and find their way into the final document.
But there is a catch: What seems obvious in New York may not work at all in Nairobi. What is pastorally effective in France might be a disaster in Fiji. To take a simple example, focusing on, say, Sunday Masses may not work in a place where there aren’t any priests for hundreds of miles and the faithful have Mass celebrated for them only every month. Universal proposals are a challenge.
Nonetheless, the experience of bringing in all voices to church decision-making, letting everyone see how complex the universal church is and, most important, allowing every person to speak to the group—time-consuming though that is—is itself a sign. A sign of where the church is going: more open to listening, more consultative, more inclusive, more welcoming, more attuned to the voice of the Holy Spirit, who is active and alive in all of us. As one bishop said this year, echoing something I heard last year: We can’t go back after this. In other words, we should never again have a synod without lay men and women, priests and religious or, as we’re called here, “non-bishops.”
Let me add one last observation: This is hard work. The schedule is tiring, sometimes even grueling. (And I’m a bit of a workaholic.) I have joked with other delegates that while the synod believes in the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, I wonder if it believes in our incarnation. After all, we have bodies that need rest! But we’re pouring ourselves out, as St. Paul said, “as a libation,” to help the church as much as we can.
For all that work, and for our work to amount to something, we rely on your prayers.
•••
News from in and around the synod hall:
- Pope Francis presided over a candlelight vigil on Friday, Oct. 11, the anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council in 1962, and texts from council documents introduced the prayers of praise and the prayers of petition. The pope and synod participants prayed that God would “remove the divisions between Christians” so that they could proclaim the Gospel together. The synod participants at the prayer service included the 16 “fraternal delegates” representing Orthodox, Anglican and Protestant churches, as well as the Rome-based representatives of the Anglican, Methodist and Reformed churches to the Holy See and other Christian ministers and faithful in the city.
- After leading the recitation of the Angelus prayer with visitors in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Francis called for “an immediate ceasefire on all fronts” in the Middle East, and for the pursuit of diplomacy and dialogue. He also appealed in particular for “respect” for the United Nations peacekeeping forces in Lebanon that have been hit by Israeli forces this past week, and for an end to the air strikes against the civilian population in Ukraine.
- In a letter addressed to the 21 new cardinals, who will receive their red hats at a consistory Dec. 7, Pope Francis asked that they “make every effort as a Cardinal to embody the three attitudes with which an Argentinean poet—Francisco Luis Bernárdez— once characterized Saint John of the Cross,” namely: “eyes raised, hands joined, feet bare.”
