In second week, synod to discuss authority in the church

Role of women in church was key topic in first week

Participants in the assembly of the Synod of Bishops gather in the Paul VI Audience Hall at the Vatican to pray before the opening session Oct. 2, 2024. (CNS photo/Lola Gomez) (Courtesy photo of Lola Gomez)

VATICAN CITY -- Members of the Synod of Bishops have begun looking for ways to make relationships within the Catholic Church "more transparent and more harmonious, so that our witness may become more credible."

Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich of Luxembourg, relator general of the synod, told members that that was their task as the second week of the monthlong assembly began Oct. 7.

Opening discussions about the second module of the synod's working document, the cardinal said it would be easy for the assembly to "remain on a general level and simply reiterate the importance of relationships for the development of people and communities."

But, he said, "the people of God are waiting for guidance and suggestions from us on how to make that vision concretely livable."

The question, the cardinal said, is: "What is the Holy Spirit inviting us to do to move from a pyramidal way of exercising authority to a synodal way?"

During the first week of synod proceedings, members discussed their understandings of the foundations of synodality in the church.

Cardinal Hollerich said that during the second week, members will "seek ways to make operative today the ecclesiological perspective outlined" by the Second Vatican Council.

The challenge, he said, will be to avoid the risk of falling "into an excess of abstraction on the one hand, and in an excess of pragmatism on the other."

The cardinal asked members not to be afraid "to draw an outline of concrete proposals that individual churches will then be called upon to adapt to different circumstances."

Offering a reflection on the morning's Gospel reading in which Jesus recounts the Parable of the Good Samaritan, Benedictine Mother Maria Ignazia Angelini, a spiritual adviser to the synod, said that the story "reveals that the commandment of God is understood through an instinctive 'seeing'" of the other and a call "to surrender to the relationship."

Today, when "fratricidal wars divert one's gaze from seeing, in a never-ending spiral which leaves humanity half-dead," the Gospel calls for a "relational transformation," she said.

"The Samaritan is the living symbol of relational transformation," she said, because he forms a sense of relationship that testifies "to God, not himself."

"We are called by the synodal way to see the other in weaving, complementary relationships, stemming from that moment in which we are both the Samaritan and the half-dead man," she said, "saved, pitied and called to be merciful."

Members vote to dialogue with study groups set up by pope

Members of the Synod of Bishops have voted to give up one of their few free afternoons to "dialogue" with the leaders of the study groups Pope Francis set up to reflect on important questions raised by the synod in 2023.

Paolo Ruffini, president of the synod's communications committee, said synod leaders received Pope Francis' approval for putting the idea to a vote Oct. 5. It was approved overwhelmingly, and the dialogue is scheduled for Oct. 18.

The study groups are investigating questions such as how bishops are chosen in the Latin-rite church, how to improve seminary education, how to improve relations between bishops and the religious communities that minister in their dioceses, ministry to LGBTQ Catholics and possible ministry roles for women in the Catholic Church.

Short videos about the work of each of the 10 groups and a brief report on what had been accomplished thus far were shared with synod members Oct. 2. Synod officials also said that synod members and any other Catholic could share their perspective or concerns with any group by writing to the synod office -- [email protected] -- before June, when the groups are due to report to Pope Francis.

Global approach stressed over role of women, doctrinal development

Controversy over women's ordination, even at the synod, detracts attention from the plight of women in the Catholic Church and society, said an Australian bishop, who is a member of the Synod of Bishops.

When Catholics in the global North are "obsessed" with the issue of women's ordination, "women who in many parts of the church and world are treated as second-class citizens are totally ignored," Bishop Anthony Randazzo of Broken Bay, Australia, said during a press briefing Oct. 4, the third day of the synod on synodality.

In a written report delivered to synod members Oct. 2, Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, wrote that his dicastery, assigned to study the question of women's roles in the church, "judges that there is still no room for a positive decision by the magisterium regarding the access of women to the diaconate, understood as a degree of the sacrament of holy orders."

While Bishop Randazzo said he sees no problem with the topic of women's ordination being discussed and studied at the synod, he said such attention should "absolutely not" come at the cost of the dignity of women in the church and in the world.

"Can we stop talking about women and listen to, and speak with, women?" he asked. "This is how the church is called to act."

According to a 2024 Pew Research Center poll, a majority of Catholics surveyed in several Latin American countries, including Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru and Colombia, believe the Catholic Church should allow women to become priests. In the United States, 64 percent of Catholics surveyed agreed and a majority of Catholics in Italy, France and Spain support women's ordination. Data is not readily available on the sentiment of Catholics in Asia, Africa and Oceania.

Sister Xiskya Lucia Valladares, a member of the Religious of the Purity of Mary, said that although synod members received the report from Cardinal Fernández, the topic of women's ordination continues to be raised in both in small groups and assembly-wide discussions since there is an environment of "complete freedom of expression" encouraged by the synod organizers.

Cardinal: Synodality, an antidote to polarization, helps mission

At the end of a multiyear process of listening, praying, discussing and discerning, Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin of Newark, N.J., said he hopes the Synod of Bishops can give Catholics four practical suggestions for being a more "synodal" church.

"What four things? I can't tell you right now, but I sure wish we could give four pieces of guidance to the people of God across the world," the cardinal told Catholic News Service on Oct. 4.

In a message to the people of his archdiocese, Cardinal Tobin said synodality -- which involves listening to one another and the Holy Spirit and helping every baptized person take responsibility for their role in the church -- "is not an end in itself; we're not pursuing synodality as the ultimate goal."

Instead, he said, synodality "is a way of carrying out the mission that has been entrusted to us, and is, without a doubt, the responsibility of every baptized person."

Asked why it is so important to the church now, Cardinal Tobin said that in the "marvelous mosaic of the North American church, I think synodality is absolutely necessary as an antidote to polarization and division."

For instance, he said, "it struck me a year or two ago that we as bishops in the United States, in our assemblies, have never been able to speak about any of the exhortations of Pope Francis" -- from "Evangelii Gaudium," or the "Joy of the Gospel," to "Fratelli Tutti" -- when discussing the plans and priorities of the church in the United States.

"It dawned on me that perhaps we lack that sense of synodality that unlocks those documents and shows us the way forward," he said. It is important "to listen to others, so that when we propose priorities, we're actually speaking because we've listened to the people."