"I have never been at a church meeting where there aren't groups that get together and lobby for a particular direction and that's going on, I assure you," Archbishop Chaput said. "That's what happens when human beings get together."

Discussing a number of proposals he offered the synod fathers to think about, Canadian Archbishop Paul-Andre Durocher said, "I think we should really start looking seriously at the possibility of ordaining women deacons because the diaconate in the church's tradition has been defined as not being ordered toward priesthood but toward ministry."

The lawsuit filed Oct. 1 contends that Trinity Health violates provisions of the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act and the Rehabilitation Act by denying the full range of emergency care, including pregnancy termination when necessary.

California is the latest and largest U.S. state to legalize physician-assisted suicide.

"I would have expected a lot more involvement by the Vatican—the time for cautious diplomacy is at an end," said Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk of Kiev-Halych, major archbishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Church.

Unrest flared in early October throughout the West Bank and Jerusalem, which has experienced tensions during September, largely over the status of the contested holy site of the Temple Mount or Haram al-Sharif.