In February 2020, my brother Jesuits and I returned home to our novitiate in St. Paul, Minn., after spending 30 days in silence. We had completed the Spiritual Exercises and were to spend the following days reflecting on our experience and preparing for our next mission.
As novices, our daily routines were governed by the ordo, a white sheet of paper push-pinned to the central corkboard in our community that detailed what communal prayer, classes and other activities were scheduled for the week. Saturdays were typically the freest days, so we were slightly surprised (irritated, really) to see that our presence was expected for five hours that Saturday morning.
The Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis was beginning a process none of us were familiar with at the time: a synod. (This archdiocesan synod was unrelated to the worldwide Synod on Synodality launched by Pope Francis in 2021.) The first stage of this process would involve several “Prayer and Listening Sessions” where the archbishop hoped to hear about what was working and what needed work in the archdiocese.
We were not sure what to expect as we climbed out of our minivans that Saturday morning. We walked into the church, where we were given name tags and an order of services. After a simple hymn, a short prayer and a reading, Archbishop Bernard Hebda thanked everyone for coming, spoke about the spirit of prayer we were aiming for and exhorted us to listen carefully and respond charitably.
I began to feel less jaded about my lost free time, and more grateful to be present. After the archbishop finished his comments, we sang another hymn and concluded with the Prayers of the Faithful.
These Prayers of the Faithful, however, were unique. There was no lector with a binder to lead the congregation; instead, participants were invited to voice whatever was on their hearts. This practice can be beautiful, personal and moving. It can also devolve into warring petitions. The people of God chose the latter that morning.
One person stood up and exclaimed that if we just brought back altar rails, all of our problems would be solved. Another person stood up and gave a pseudo-ad for their parish and its experimental liturgy, inviting people to see what “real Catholicism” looked like. What was meant to be a time for prayer was replaced with statements of opinion and odd attacks.
The Jesuit to my right visibly winced with each statement. The Jesuit to my left watched one prayer unfold with raised eyebrows and wide eyes. I am embarrassed to admit that I do not remember how the prayer concluded as I was too busy praying that I might evaporate from the room.
After what felt like hours, we concluded and were dismissed to our small groups. In randomly selected groups of eight to twelve, we met in classrooms and were given questions to discuss.
•••
My small group was off to an interesting start. The first question we were asked to consider was how the church could better address the needs and concerns of young people.
A man in his 60s talked about social media and his concern that the prominence of impurity was contributing to growing immodesty. A woman in her 30s complained about the music in our parishes, suggesting we think of how to avoid making Mass “so damn boring.”
I and a few other group members tried to draw our focus back to the question that had been posed to us. We reflected on efforts taken by parishes and campus ministries that were drawing in young people and bearing fruit. Just as our conversation began to build, the polemical voices took back control, and my frustration with this whole process began to set in.
Then, a mother in her 50s explained that she had three children who had gradually become disinterested in the church. Two of them had stopped attending Mass altogether, and the third was leaning in the same direction. Beginning to cry, she said, “I’m scared that I’m not fulfilling the promises I made at my children’s baptisms.”
My small group became very quiet. This woman’s honesty and courage was humbling. The synod was not a moment for her to air her hot take on the liturgy or church doctrine. It was an opportunity for the love she bore and the desperation she carried to be heard and received by the church.
This mother’s words have remained with me to this day, and frankly, they haunt me. I have heard many worries about the declining numbers of young people in our pews. I have never heard this concern voiced as personally and tragically as I did that day.
I can no longer read statistics on religious disaffiliation or listen to presentations on pastoral plans without seeing the face of this mother. Her cry for help has been etched in my memory and has repeatedly returned to me in prayer over the past five years of my formation and ministry.
The brief encounter I had at that listening session didn’t solve any issue facing the church. It did, however, seriously influence how I personally minister to young people unsure of their place in the church. More importantly, that mother’s witness fundamentally changed the way I pray about my role in this task. Four years later, I have come to believe this is the true hope and desire of the global synodal process.
I understand some of the confusion as we enter the second session of the Synod on Synodality. Questions and concerns regarding what is to follow and how the church will respond after this period of discernment are legitimate. I also recognize that a personal, local engagement with a synod is a privilege many of the faithful have yet to experience.
But while frustration and confusion with the synodal process are fair, we ought to be wary of allowing these feelings to lead us to a place of cynicism and despair. What some see as a lack of tangible, actionable results from the first session has led some to dismiss the synod as yet another bureaucratic process, a mere “meeting about meetings.”
But if we continue to approach the synod with a disgruntled spirit, I fear we will be no different from those polemical voices I encountered several years ago. I can remember the opinions shouted out during the Prayers of the Faithful and the complaints voiced in my small group, but they did not change me. The witness of that mother, however, has never left me. What a shame it would be if her voice were lost amid the clamoring.
Perhaps it seems foolish to put so much stock in one mother’s cry for help. But then again, the cries of our forefathers and foremothers have been central to our faith for centuries. As the Psalmist writes:
Surely, I wait for the Lord
who bends down to me and hears my cry,
Sets my feet upon rock,
steadies my steps,
And puts a new song in my mouth (Ps 40)
As we near the end of this second session of the Synod on Synodality, I hope we can see this process not as a singular event but as a formative opportunity for the whole church. To do this well will require patience, hope and faith. Truly giving ourselves to this deep listening, I hope we can better recognize the “new song” the Spirit is working in us and, there, find our pathway forward.
