This Synod is wide, shallow, and contrary to Vatican II

To me, the single most disappointing and aggravating thing about this Synod is the almost total lack of any theology at all, let alone a deep and profound theology.

Pope Francis at the Synod on Synodality, Oct. 4, 2023. / Credit: Daniel Ibáñez

I am now home from Rome and want to try to summarize what I had learned while there and my overall impressions about the Synod.

Let me start with an anecdote.

Fifteen years ago, I was hosting my eight-year-old nephew on a vacation to my home in Pennsylvania. We were driving to Gettysburg and as we were crossing the Susquehanna river I said to him that the river is very beautiful and “wide and shallow”. To which he responded with an impish grin: “You’re wide and shallow.”

Those words came to my mind as a most apt description of the big Meeting on meetings that the Vatican has strangely decided to call a “Synod on Synodality”. I say “strangely” because we still do not know what synodality means in any specific theological sense. And the various synodal spokesmen have even insinuated that the very attempt to pin down a precise theological definition is a violation of the open-ended and wide-ranging dialogue that is the very essence of the thing.

Therefore, and quite literally, the organizers of the Synod view it as something “wide” insofar as it aims to include, as the Pope says, the opinions of “everyone” (Tutti!!) on a very wide range of hot-button topics. And this casting of a wide net of opinion gathering seems to be all that they mean by “synodality”.

Yet the Synod’s “wideness” is also strange in the sense that it seems engineered by the Vatican’s army corps of engineers to stay within certain well-defined parameters. Instead of the wide and free-flowing wildness of a river, it appears to be closer to a channelized irrigation canal with high concrete levees in place lest it spill over its defined boundaries. The majority of the Vatican’s hand-picked synodal voters lean in the progressive direction. The Relator General of the Synod, Cardinal Hollerich, is a public dissenter from Church teaching on sexual morality. The priest who led the pre-Synod retreat, Father Timothy Radcliffe, is a well-known theological progressive who dissents from Church teaching. Meanwhile, Pope Francis just granted a one hour private audience to Sister Jeanine Gramick of New Ways Ministry (itself a dissenting organization) knowing full well what the optics of that meeting imply. Fr. James Martin, SJ, has enjoyed his usual visibility and approval from Vatican apparatchiks.

So there is an apparent “wideness” to a progressive reading of LGBTQ+IAA issues, but not in the other direction. Where is a private papal audience with the leaders of the orthodox, outreach ministry “Courage”? Why are none of their leaders voting members of the Synod? The Synod was treated to heart-rending stories about the pain of LGBTQ people and how the Church’s “unwelcoming” teachings have inflicted incalculable harm on them. But there were no equivalent testimonies about the spiritual toxicity and death-dealing nature of much of the homosexual subculture in the West and how thousands of homosexuals have found their way out of that mess via the path of sanctification in the Church. Those “experiences” seem unwelcome in this Synod and the voices of those people are summarily ignored and suppressed as unhelpful. I have heard from many such homosexual Catholics who now think this pope has just thrown them under the bus as just a bunch of self-loathing neurotics who have imbibed the ideology of their oppressor. And in this case the “oppressor” is the Catholic Church and her traditional teachings on sexuality.

This synodal wideness is strange indeed. There is constant chatter and bloviations about a Church “on the move” and a “listening Church” and a Church that is “open to the development of doctrine” and a Church “discerning the Holy Spirit and the God of surprises”, and so on, ad nauseum. We are told to cast a wide net and be open to change in ways that may make us uncomfortable. But there is no equivalent emphasis on the stability of doctrine over time or of the need to hold fast to those doctrines as the only true antidote to our culture’s pornified apotheosis of the most weird and dark erotic fetishes. There is no apparent awareness of the profoundly unChristian nature of our culture’s nihilistic and runaway reductive naturalism, as the Synod rushes in to baptize these “signs of the times” as the very voice of the Spirit.

It is also a strange kind of “wideness” when around 360 people claim to be speaking for all of the “people of God”. Once again, this has every appearance of a channelized wideness, with the faith of 1.4 billion Catholics now funneled through the narrow choke-point of a few hand-selected synodalists. How strange that the Vatican decided that these spokespersons for the people of God should remain silent in public about what it is they are discussing at the Synod in the name of the People of God.

And so we have the bizarro world spectacle of the People of God being left in the dark about what it is their representatives are saying about what it is that the People of God want. Apparently, the People of God are to be selectively listened to, but not trusted, and therefore the synodal deliberations must be free of interference from the pesky People of God so that the People of God can get things done. You can’t make this stuff up.

We are told that the listening sessions gauged the mood of the whole People of God and that the Synod is basing its deliberations on those responses. However, in all of the press releases and interviews I have seen, I have not noticed any mention whatsoever of those listening sessions. And among the few synodal participants I have spoken to, there was no mention of the listening sessions. Perhaps they are being discussed in the synodal sessions, but once again, how would we know? And the public face of the Synod has made no mention of the listening sessions.

In the run-up to the Synod over the past year much was made of those listening sessions as a widening of the Church’s arc of governance and a widening of her structures to include, finally, a true listening to everyone. But it seems they have been left behind and were a mere façade meant to portray a wide arc of discourse when in truth they were a mere rhetorical device designed to act as a catalytic jumping-off point for something else. And that something else was the use of the language of “wideness” as a synonym for deconstruction and a subterfuge for an ecclesial revolution in doctrine.

I am not saying this was and is the agenda of Pope Francis. But it is the agenda of those he has put in charge of the thing; you can do the math and connect the dots. I am done trying to figure this Pope out and I am done with the “popesplainers”. Over a decade into his pontificate, it is clear that he is really good at one thing, and that is sowing confusion. For ten years he has pitted doctrine against compassion, truth against mercy, and theology against ordinary experiences. And therefore the “wideness” of the Synod is a reflection of this message and even a kind of capstone to it. No doctrines will be changed because doctrines are for immature Christians who need such props. What we need to change is pastoral praxis so that it privileges the wide boulevard of modern secular values. And this is what the Pope means when he says everyone (Tutti!) is welcome in the Church. He does not mean unrepentant rapists, neo-Nazis, misogynists, climate change deniers, or Latin Mass lovers are welcome. He means that broad swath of “average modern people” in all of their secularity are welcome.

Again, it is a strange wideness with a tendentious predilection for all things modern, Western, bourgeois, and sexually antinomian built into its teleology. And the privileging of this kind of wideness is what we now call “synodality”.

In all of this, there is also an extreme theological shallowness–a shallowness that seems to be in the service of its pseudo “wideness”. To me, the single most disappointing and aggravating thing about this Synod is the almost total lack of any theology at all, let alone a deep and profound theology. The incessant appeal to the language of “inclusion”, “welcoming”, and “dialogue with the marginalized” is almost completely framed in the thought categories of modern pop psychology and armchair sociology. There is a crackpot, cracker-barrel preachiness about it that divides people, very simplistically, into the shopworn typology of those open to the Spirit and those rigid, pharisaical backwardists who are closed to the Spirit.

It is rarely phrased in such blunt terms, but the mentality is everywhere in the Instrumentum Laboris and in the many public comments made by various Synod leaders.

Of particular note is the lack of a profound theological anthropology, grounded in Christ, as was called for by Vatican II. As Gaudium et Spes put it, “In reality it is only in the mystery of the Word made flesh that the mystery of man truly becomes clear” (GS 22). The Council developed this Christocentric anthropology, and the theology of grace it implies, in deep and profound ways. And the linchpin of it all is the affirmation that human beings are constitutively oriented to Transcendence and are thus radically open to the transforming power of grace.

Pope John Paul II, who was at the Council, developed this theology beautifully and therefore emphasized in Veritatis Splendor that there is no sin too great for grace to overcome. Yes, he mentions mitigating circumstances and the role they play in limiting moral guilt. He was not a naïve and doctrinaire objectivist devoid of a sense of the spiritual psychology of the soul. But he also understood that the theological anthropology of the Council demands an emphasis upon the universal call to holiness and that the quest for holiness is a requirement of all Christian discipleship. We fail and we stumble and we sin, but we must always keep the moral commandments in view and we must always strive to overcome our sins because we are indeed beings meant for spiritual greatness beyond our wildest imaginings.

But the theological shallowness of this Synod appears intent on blunting such spiritual imaginings and denying the efficacy of grace to truly transform lives. Instead, there is an almost Lutheran sense of the intractable perdurance of sin in some people that is impervious to grace which is why these people must just be “accompanied” since this is “the best they can do right now in their complex circumstances”.

But this is not the theology of Vatican II. Indeed, it is barely theology at all. And so it is doubly galling to read comments from synodal participants that the Synod is “finally” implementing Vatican II, as if the conciliar project had been rudely interrupted by John Paul II and Benedict XVI (who both were present at the Council!), but has now been retrieved for the first time by Francis. It is galling because it is both false and shallow. It is galling because it speaks as if 360 people sitting at round tables chatting about the hot button issues of the day in near-total secrecy is the governing style that Vatican II had in mind.

By contrast, the Council took years to bring together with hundreds of theologians and thousands of bishops developing schemata after schemata that had been carefully crafted by the Church’s best and brightest, and which were then publicly debated on the floor of the Council over many years, before finally being brought forward for a vote by almost all of the bishops of the Church. And it is an insult to the depth and vast richness of that project that it is now reduced to such shallowness and wrongly invoked as a justification for this current exercise in an elitist and bureaucratic implementation of the vision of Joachim of Fiore that we are now in an unfettered and unpredictable “age of the Spirit” where God now blesses that which He once forbade.

In this regard, I am reminded of the vice presidential debate in 1988 between Dan Quayle and Lloyd Bentsen. Quayle was young and defended his youthful inexperience by appealing to the fact that John F. Kennedy had also been inexperienced and young when elected President. Bentsen pounced on this and said to Quayle, “Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy. I knew Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. And Senator, you are no Jack Kennedy.”

That is what I want to say to those synodalists wrapping themselves in the mantle of Vatican II while promoting an extreme theological shallowness contrary to that Council. I want to say to them, “Synodalists, I grew up with Vatican II. I studied Vatican II. Vatican II formed me. Vatican II is a friend of mine. And synodalists, your Synod is no Vatican II.”


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About Larry Chapp 69 Articles
Dr. Larry Chapp is a retired professor of theology. He taught for twenty years at DeSales University near Allentown, Pennsylvania. He now owns and manages, with his wife, the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker Farm in Harveys Lake, Pennsylvania. Dr. Chapp received his doctorate from Fordham University in 1994 with a specialization in the theology of Hans Urs von Balthasar. He can be visited online at "Gaudium et Spes 22".

88 Comments

  1. You write: “You can’t make this stuff up”.

    Yes, you can. I think much of this article is “made up”, a product of an imagination clouded by fear. Reminds me so much of the conspiracy minded.

    • You seem to be fearful and timid, unable to articulate exactly what is wrong with the article. But, you have been told by your masters to come to faithful Catholic publications and register your hatred for the Catholic church. You have done that successfully.

      • It’s very difficult to articulate what is wrong with this article. I am reminded of a monk from Mount Athos. I was introduced to his writings about 20 years ago and was very inspired, and when the educational institution I taught for gave us all a $375 bonus to buy books, I ordered three volumes of this Monk’s writings. But soon his articles became a barrage of whining (about the secular world, etc). I figured it would subside and eventually he’d get back to some good inspiring and positive mystical theology. But it didn’t. It was such a disappointment, and the three volumes were rather expensive–I should have used the funds more prudently. Reading Larry Chapp is becoming very much like this experience.

        Pope Francis recently addressed the question of priestly celibacy. If any change was on the horizon, I figured it would be clerical celibacy, making it optional, perhaps for diocesan clergy. But no, he didn’t change that, and gave some rather interesting reasons for keeping it. Do you really believe for a minute that after this synod, the Church is going to change her teaching on same sex marriage, ordination of female decons, or sexual acts between two people of the same sex? You’d have to be completely delusional to think it is even remotely possible.

        Dialogue is always good. Becoming a more listening Church is a very good thing, for all parties involved. The Church is guided by the Holy Spirit, so there is nothing to fear. If the Church has the charism of infallibility, then you can expect that fundamental teachings on faith and morals will be preserved. Nothing is going to be “undone”. If anything, this synod will result in new insights as a result of dialogue with others who operate on a different level and come from very different backgrounds. All this whining and negative press about the synod is just bad behavior–shameful behavior. So many on this forum come across as know-it-all cranks. Don’t be so arrogant. It is highly plausible that Pope Francis sees something that many here on this forum, in their complacency and all-encompassing worldview, just don’t see. I think it is best to just shut up, wait patiently, recognize your limits, pray and don’t worry, and in the meantime, start writing some inspiring pieces that will make a difference in this world.

        • “It’s very difficult to articulate what is wrong with this article.”

          Then, perhaps it might be wiser to mull over your difficulties with it and present a coherent commentary about them, rather than engage in ad hominems and other logical fallacies. The author outlined several points and just coming on here to dismiss them as “made up” isn’t a rebuttal.

          “I think it is best to just shut up, wait patiently, recognize your limits, pray and don’t worry, and in the meantime, start writing some inspiring pieces that will make a difference in this world.”

          Physician, heal thyself.

          Noting problems with the synod on synodality and how it’s incongruent with the Second Vatican Council isn’t mere whining and negative press. Educated laity are watching this unfold, and not everyone is seeing it as all-inclusive, but rather favoring one part of the Church over others.

          This article is inspiring in its own way. But if you don’t like its type of inspiration, perhaps consider giving the author’s work a pass and find something that is more spiritually nourishing for you.

        • Are you not able to see the self-evident inherent absurdity of “dialogue” given the thousands of trillions of hours that would be necessary to affect a “dialogue” among a billion people? Do silly acts of manipulative language not offend you or concern you knowing how they abuse others? Obviously, there is not and can never be such a thing as “dialogue”, nor should there be. Religion is not a grievance industry. God is not accountable to us. It’s the other way around. Whether we are successful or not in telling God what He should have done when He, according to some synodalists, abandoned the people of the past to an inferior sense of morality that included things like chastity, charity, diligence, patience, temperance, prudence, kindness, and humility, which many Catholics call outdated museum pieces, doesn’t matter. We have no business “dialoguing” about how to talk down to God about how we can do better than His creative plan.

        • So easy to criticize Pope Francis while gloryfying the likes of Benedict and Paul. I was so glad to wake up one day and rejoice they had both gone on to their just rewards and ‘doing’ theology
          in.the skies. You want more theology? How about some good old papal infallibility for starters to stir up the traditionalist juices? Some of us came back at the election of this loving and yes, pastoral Shepherd. Something the last 2 didn’t have any understanding about. I’m here because Pope St. Francis shows me Jesus. May he reign and Shepherd for many more years. Rev. Charles Collier

          • “Pope Saint Francis”? Before he’s even died? Greenspan referred to this sort of thing as “irrational exuberance.” Your pre-mortem hagiographic enthusiasm puts me in mind of the Nobel Peace Prize awarded President Obama in spite of his thin record of service and his passion for drone strikes. Who knows, with you displacing the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, perhaps one day there’ll even be a Saint Marko Rupnik, patron saint of serial rapists.

          • There isn’t a great deal of “infallibility” or “pastoralism” or simple “loving” civil manners involved in behavior in a personal history that ranges, during his papal years alone, of yanking his hand away from those extending theirs, driving contemplative orders to extinction and stealing their property, knowingly aiding and abetting environmentalists intent on abortion policies regardless of his lip service of opposition, abandoning the interests of the Church subject to its hardships in the third world, orchestrating protection schemes to sexually depraved clerics, and vocalizing vulgarity like a beaten down laborer towards his critics.

          • You were “so glad” and “rejoiced” when people you disagreed with died? Why should we trust your take on what’s loving and pastoral at that rate?

        • Ad Thomas James. Your unhappy Mount Athos book experience apparently has marred your fine intellect’s sense of judgment, and has caused you to reserve judgment, a good thing, although not when excessive. After 10 years of this pontificate it should be clear that Pope Francis is bent on changing practice by duplicitous suggestion, while remaining formally adherent to Apostolic tradition.

        • Thomas…All I can say is full on drop mic, sir…That’s the exact same reaction I had. I could say a lot more, but Im gonna stop here before I get myself in trouble. Thank you for your post.

        • Progressives never stop whining about orthodoxy and to a large degree have won the day in promoting a secular humanist vision within the church. But as it gains purchase and visibility, ordinary people begin to recognize the deviancy of it and respond. When they do, the “progressive’s” response is that this discussion has become tiresome. Sit down and shut-up is often their polite suggestion.

        • Wasn’t the Age of the Laity a prominent theme of VII, meaning that the clergy would “listen” to the laity, rather than simply giving them orders? Yet Thomas seems to be telling us to shut up.

    • A “conspiracy theory” here? Not at all, just magic! Two magic tricks:

      FIRST, does the apostolic and “hierarchical communion” (Lumen Gentium) of the Catholic Church devolve into simply one option, alongside other options that look more like an inverted pyramid? Who could possibly argue against the Catholic Church (upper case) being still a “welcome” option within a boundary-free and cafeteria-catholic church (lower case)? “Wide and shallow!”

      With moral theology (e.g., Veritatis Splendor: yes concreteness, but still the moral absolutes of “Thou shalt not…”) reduced to an option alongside the “third option” now already open to blessings within some dioceses of the German Synodal Way? (And this, butt one option on the gender-theory spectrum.) Or, with deaconesses in one corner of a polyhedral-church, but then not in another?

      Magic!…

      No longer simply an infiltrating “(c)hurch within the Church,” but now the backwardist (C)hurch cornered within a boundary-free “wide and shallow” (c)hurch! The Pope’s “field hospital” Church now synodally morphed into a three-ring circus tent. Clowns included.

      SECOND, now thinking cross-culturally (Fratelli tutti): Of synodisms 360 delegates, why are we reminded historically of the moment that the newly-enlightened and anti-Trinitarian monotheist, Muhammad, entered Mecca? He descended upon the Ka’ba of universal pagan pilgrimage. Mecca–home to 360 symphonic deities (one for each day of the year), all housed within the wide and welcoming Ka’ba!

      Muhammad banished all of them. But, today, in the Catholic Church founded by the incarnate (!) Jesus Christ, why do we suffer up to 360 contradicting roundtable voices? All speaking for a full three minutes, such that all “polarizations” are then harmonized into silence whilst awaiting the symphonic oracle–the Great Summary Paper! The new Ka’ba?

      Magic! The forwardists moving backwards!

      A real dialogue, but within a script, yes and no? An alleged pyramid-Church plus a synodally massaged inverted-pyramid church, yes and no? Pachamama in a niche alongside the Tabernacle, yes and no? The never-ending study of deaconesses, yes and no? Blessing of the gay lifestyle, yes and no? The Eucharist for all sects and lifestyles, yes and no? “Big and wide,” yes and no?

      Contradictions? What contradictions?

    • “He does not mean unrepentant rapists, neo-Nazis, misogynists, climate change deniers, or Latin Mass lovers are welcome. He means that broad swath of “average modern people” in all of their secularity are welcome.”

      And this is the supreme problem for a hard-core dissenter from the Catholic faith like Francis and all the theologians peddling junk theology from the seventies that he admired. Their faith in inevitable progress, and their personal vanities, rejects original sin and the permanent imperfectability of the human condition. When they talk about soliciting input from everyone about their “experiences,” regardless of how they stack the deck, there is not the slightest evidence of what real Catholic anthropology has to say about the human condition, that as a fallen humanity of sinners, every one of God’s children lives with self-delusions, lots of self-delusions, delusions that all of God’s sinful children create into systematic ideologies of sin denial.
      With all the stupid chatter about discernment and dialogue and accompaniment and walking together and guitar circles, is there any talk at all about remorse for sins? For those who crave silly speech, we can even call remorse “modalities of restructured alignments.” With all the chatter about not taking sexual sin seriously, have any of these brilliant minds even mentioned the word chastity, just once, anyone? In the new Catholicism of no sins anymore below the belt, has anyone even dared to mention that there is more than an incidental correlative connection between sins below the belt and abortion? At least for the benefit of the dwindling number of designated Synod Catholics who might hold a grudging unpleasant aversion towards killing babies.
      And with all the silly talk of global concerns, has anyone given a moment’s thought, out loud, to the crimes a morally unhinged Church promotes by hysterical abandonment of its witness?

    • Wow Thomas, what Mr. Chapp has over many others (perhaps even yourself) is a far deeper and much wider understanding of the vast amounts of theological precision that typifies the church at the high-water mark, e.g. Trent. Given his profession and time in it, he would have had no choice otherwise. The captains of the synod in Rome risk running the Barque into the shallow waters. Mr. Chapp knows where the deeper waters are and, from the tone of his article, laments the fact that those at the helm are steering the Barque recklessly, even in a mutinous manner. Sadly, this synod (sin-nod?) might run the same risk to the church as V2 (here’s where I differ, respectfully, from Mr. Chapp) by embracing a telos quite in contrast to a regard strictly focused on eternal salvation. I believe there to be good reason to tuck V2 and its derivative “fruit” into the rolodex under “Ecclesiastical Rebellion”, next to “those modern movements akin to the French Revolution”. The Church is seeing reality: the world, the flesh and the devil, through “blurry” vision Vatican 2. This synod affirms the fact that it can no longer differentiate the deeper waters from the more shallow.

  2. I am reminded of the words of Thomas Moor to William Roper in A Man For All Seasons: “See here Will. Two years ago you were a loyal Churchman. Now you have fallen in with the Lutherans on account of being persuaded by their logic. I can only hope that when your head stops spinning it is affixed as God intended.”

    See here Francis…
    See here Synodalists…

    • Thomas More, but also this, More to Cromwell:
      “Some men think the Earth is round, others think it is flat; it is a matter capable of question. But if it is flat, will the King’s [or Hollerich’s or Grech’s] command make it round? And if it is round, will the King’s [or Hollerich’s or Grech’s] command flatten it? No, I will not sign.”

    • The Church has always welcomed the afflicted and those who struggle to repent of sin – but the Church cannot say that grave psychsexual disorders are “normal”, nor can the Church blasphemously “bless” sodomite unions.

      And increasing the “tent” of the Church does not mean accepting the false teaching and aberrant lifestyles of bold and rebelliously unrepentant abortionists, sodophiles and eco-witches.

      Holy Communion was never thought of as a “reward for the perfect” – but Holy Communion is not a “reward for perversion” either.

      As souls who obstinately remain in a state of mortal sin cannot receive the “res et sacramentum” ( grave effect) from Holy Communion, Pope Francis gives a false teaching by saying that repentance and absolution are not needed to receive the Blessed Sacrament.

      As he dignified sodomite “blessings” by listing this subject as a topic of discussion at his “synod on synodality”, Pope Francis blasphemously infers that the eternal teaching of the Church is not eternal – and that the “Spirit” was unavailable to the Church until his arrival.

      In an attempt to achieve his “different” Church, Pope Francis is deliberately loading the Vatican and the College of Cardinals with his sodophile friends.

      Pope Francis is flying in the face of God, foolishly tempting the wrath of the Lamb.

      • You state that the current pontiff “gives a false teaching by saying that repentance and absolution are not needed to receive the Blessed Sacrament.” Correct me if I’m wrong — would that I were! — but didn’t he also tell seminarians that they must absolve sins even if the person confessing does not express repentance? Apparently repentance isn’t even needed to receive absolution.

      • Thank you Father and God bless you! This Pope wants to allow people in mortal sin to partake of the Flesh and Blood of Christ our God Incarnate Savior. This will not end well. May the Lord Jesus have mercy on him and rescue His Church to proclaim His Truth again.

  3. Thank you for articulating clearly all the concerns and uneasiness that have crowded my mind about this Synod. I pray daily for our Holy Father. He makes statements that are at first clear but then immediately proceeds to muddy the waters with ‘however’ statements. I want to understand but I can’t. While I have been praying for the Synod (the Holy Father’s intention for October) there’s a part of me that dreads the outcome. God forgive my lack of trust!

  4. Much ink has been spilled about those nasty sedevacantists who aver that this is an illegitimate pontificate and ought to be condemned. After having read this most excellent piece by Dr. Chapp, it occurs to me that it is not the so-called “backwardists” who depart from the unity of the Church but this Pope and his Synodalistas who have themselves walked away from the Church. It is they -the progressive dissenters – who do not want to be a part of the Church and prove it by doing everything in their power to destroy the structures of the Church even to the point of ignoring Christ in their sessions, their documents and in their practices. No, the Catholic Church remains strong led by the Holy Spirit who is NOT to be found in discussions, meetings, endless talk, listening sessions, surveys, interviews aboard plane flights, sensitivity traing sessions, t-groups, interviews with apostates of all stripes, and endless (and I might say mindless) chatter. No, the Holy Spirit is to be found in the gentle whisper of a wind and, in order to hear that Sacred Whisper, you need to SHUT UP!.

    • The informed conservatives possibly as window dressing…participating in, and therefore validating deformed synodality.

      But might we propose, here, that the tension within the Church is not as misconstrued between “conservatives” and “liberals” (these are misappropriated political labels), BUTT rather between “backwardists” and “forwardists”?

      Where the forwardists are lockstep “walking together” like lemmings toward the open sea of toomorrow, and where the so-called backwardists actually are not trying to set the clock back, but only to set it right.

  5. This synodal wideness is strange indeed. There is constant chatter and bloviations about a ‘Church on the move’ and a ‘listening Church’ and a Church that is open to the development of doctrine (Chapp).
    Strange indeed. Participants, some Church movers and shakers repeat the word Synod in various forms, synodality, synodal disposition, a synodal life not seeming to comprehend what synodality is, simply repeating variations similar to some mystery incantation. A wideness absent of doctrinal specificity. What comes across is an exclusivity of expectant knowledge similar to Gnosticism. A freedom of self realization not identical to Christ’s revelation, rather a wizened, unfettered perception by which one can freely express their personal vision. Honestly, I perceive it as cultic, a presumed superior vision of things formulated in the darker regions. Fearful. Abhorrent.

    • Beautifully stated Father Morello. All the language about the Holy Spirit smacks of the infiltration of therapeutic religion into the Church as well. The presumption that one’s subjective interior feelings must represent and correspond to the will or activity of the Holy Spirit is just new agey, gnostic narcissism.

  6. “Open to the Spirit” is a theme of Pontiff Francis and his “ideology” of the “apostasy-synod.”

    What “spirit” is the key question…

    The motives of the synod apostates are publicly asserted by the apostate spokesmen and their celebrity apostate guests, among these:

    A. The Cardinal Hollerich (etc), who publicly declared that the apostolic teaching that homosexual acts (sodomy) are sinful is “wrong” because it is “unscientific.”
    B. The Rev. Ratcliffe leading the pre-synod retreat, who teaches and preaches as does Hollerich.
    C. Ms. (no sister in Christ) Gramick, a leader of “New Ways Ministry,” who, as disclosed by the Catholic League last week, publicly defended and praised the homosexual sex-predator “priest” Rev. Paul Shanley, raper of boys, and a central perpetrator in the 2002 sex abuse story in the explosive Boston Globe story.
    D. The Bishop Overbech from Germany, who publicly admitted, in answer to the persistent questioning of journalist Diane Montagna, that (while “Jesus is always at the center”) their intention is to “set aside APOSTOLIC tradition.”

    I am grateful to journalist Montagna that she was persistent enough to coax Bishop Overbech to say exactly what they all above intend, in serving the inspirations of the Pontiff Francis.

    As to “the spirit” these men and women declare themselves “open to,” they don’t mean the Holy Spirit, because we know, according to the very words of Jesus to the Apostles, that after his resurrection, he had to leave them so that the Holy Spirit could come, and “reveal all truth” to them.

    Hence this scene:

    And Pilate said to the Bishop Overbech: “I have heard it reported that this Jesus, whom you say is your God, declared that the Holy Spirit would follow him, to reveal all truth to his Apostles. And yet I have heard it reported that now you yourself, and your cohorts, say you will set aside these revelations made to the Apostles by this Holy Spirit. Are these reports accurate?”

    And Bishop Overbech replied: “It is as you say.”

    And Pilate said to Overbech: “If this is so, then the Emperor says you have no god but Pachamama, and Pontiff Francis is her prophet.”

    And Overbech made no reply to Pilate, and went his way.

  7. Meanwhile, ask any of the gathered “pastoral experts” how to experience God and KNOW God is real, and watch the REAL waffling commence.

  8. While the observations made are probably correct, the issue I see with the whole of the Synod, as well as your observation of it, Dr Chapp, is, where is God in all this? This seems to be an argument of intellectuals. I am no expert on anything, but it seems as though the problem is in fact Vatican 2. Is the synod simply a form of Vatican 3? Is that what we really need or want? Christ, the head of my church, my judge and my king, and the true wisdom that guides my every step has something to say about all this. What is it?

  9. Very well put Larry! I could read the passion in your thoughts throughout the article. Most ordinary Catholics are being thrown under the bus, but I’m not going anywhere. I am going to stick close to Jesus in the Eucharist. By the grace of God they’ll have to pry these weary hands away.

  10. Thank you Prof. Chapp for your candid observations. Indeed, there is shallow theological reflection in the Synod, because (if I might be so bold to suggest) the purpose has never been theological, but rather, psychological—the Synodal Way is an application of the humanist psychological movement, and is a “psychological seduction”–an expression coined by psychologist William Kilpatrick in 1982, to describe a spreading infection in the Church; Paul Vitz and William Coulson also sounded the alarms so many years ago. The bottom line on humanist psychology can be summarized by the following statements: 1. the human spirit is by nature free and good and the Church and its traditions crush it; 2. sexual abstinence creates mental disorders, and it is an act of cruelty to demand that someone refrain from sex to abide by some Church law. It is worth noting that the humanist psychology movement had thoroughly infected the Jesuits at the time that Bergoglio was in training, and he seems now, with James Martin and Antonio Spadaro, to be the standard bearers of the catholic humanist movement.

  11. In its beginnings Protestantism used Catholic terms that deceived the unwary.
    Secular ideologically driven systems in praxis likewise play language games.
    We appear to have a meeting of minds here.
    Fudge and distort the language, profit from the confusion and glory in the power of the «praesidium»
    You’re all welcome, have a great day around the relativity shredder of neo modernism.

    • Confusing? Who’s confused?
      Within the multiple sola-Scriptura Protestant sects founded by whomever, by some counts there are now some 30,000 factions. Shallow and wide…?

      The problem now within the Catholic Church—about which some walkaways gloat and harbor an exhibitionist resentment—occurs when the Protestant predisposition infiltrates this Church, itself, established by Jesus Christ.

      So, about some of the wayward synodal “walking together,” and, also historically the protesting response to the not-so-shallow sacramental (!) Real Presence, maybe this: “Will you also walk away?” (John 6:67).

      • Brian, Jesus didn’t die on the cross so that we could be filthy and enter using Him as a shield against God’s just wrath. Are protestants really that naive? When you leave the Truth of the Catholic Faith, you enter the realm of the subjective, incomplete and cognitively dissonant. Luck is more your friend than grace at that point and, from what I witness, even their luck is running afoul.

  12. Thanks, Larry. Once again you have said what needs saying. Much ado about nothing. Hope its findings go the Vatican dustbins and a new pontificate will bring order and clarity to Church teaching and practice.

  13. “Where is a private papal audience with the leaders of the orthodox, outreach ministry “Courage”? Why are none of their leaders voting members of the Synod?” – Well, because if they are “lay” leaders they shouldn’t have a vote anyway in an (episcopal) synod even if they are orthodox… “He does not mean unrepentant rapists, neo-Nazis, misogynists, climate change deniers, or Latin Mass lovers are welcome.” This could be a game-show question as to what term has nothing in common with the others (hint: those who love the Latin Mass)… “Of particular note is the lack of a profound theological anthropology” – can we please dispense with the “theological anthropology” and follow the great doctor Teresa of Avila speaking instead of the “Sacred Humanity” of Jesus. Dr. Chapp is of course right that this synod is not an exercise in theology, but a study of modern man in all his earthly complaints; a demological exercise. I have only one question to which I truly do not know the answer: was Vatican II sourced with an equal number of traditional Thomist, Ressourcement, and Progressive theologians/experts who each participated on an equal footing?

  14. As a brainstorming conference in the service of evangelization, the synod is a good thing. Where the synod goes tragically wrong is when they use evangelization as an excuse to drain the Cross of Christ of its meaning, purpose, and efficacy. This would be a deadly injection into the Mystical Body of Christ.

  15. About two weeks ago the Catholic World reported the immenant publication of a regular report for kids.I can’t find any way to subscribe to this exciting service; Please send me an order form. I want to start the service for two young people who, I am confidant, will be avid readers.

    Sincerely
    Bernard Rowe

  16. Since Chapp’s Communio School dominated the Papacy for a quarter of a century after VII how is it possible that we got from the halcyon days of VII to now? Isn’t that an indictment on the plausibility of the conservative interpretation of the Council?

    • Good point. Why didn’t the John Paul II-Benedict 16 interpretation last? Why did it vanish so quickly, like smoke? How did a majority of the bishops selected, ordained, and appointed by JP & B end up being in mode of Bergoglio/Francis? But I have no clue what the solution to this current situation could be. It will take someone of great wisdom, great courage, and great charity. I guess God will provide, at the right time.

      • Partly because of the incredibly bad episcopal appointments of JP II. He unfortunately selected a large bench of men who were vehemently opposed to everything that he had affirmed: McCarrick, Mahoney, Bernardin, Law, Trautman, May, Pilarczik, Martini Daneels, Kasper and………..one Argentine named Jorge Bergoglio, a previously obscure high school chemistry instructor. Personnel, as the saying has it, is policy.

    • Doubtful. Twenty-five years is a blip in Church history. To claim that an idea somehow didn’t take root because it was “conservative” demonstrates a lack of knowledge of Church history. The correct word is “orthodox”, by the way. Conservative and liberal are not ecclesiastical terms. Orthodox and dissident or heterodox are.

      On a related note, the last three young priests we’ve had at our parish have been strongly orthodox. Our bishop rotates them out every three or four years, and we’ve had three for three that are most certainly not of the mindset of those present at the synod who selectively reject Church teaching. The prior two popes put in place things that reformed seminary entrance and education.

      As the Scripture says, some sow but don’t live to see the reaping. The Holy Spirit is in charge, believe it or not. How He directs things is not always clear, but He’s directing them. Our Lord Jesus promised this to His Church, and Truth Himself speaks truly, or there’s nothing true.

  17. About each roundtable and/versus collectivist synodality, if we ran the zoo, might we propose that the real controversy to be precisely resolved is: (a) the two sides of Cardinal Newman, and (b) the two sides of even a Church Father, Gregory of Nyssa, and (c) the synthesis summarized by St. John Paul II?

    FIRST, on Newman, whom synodal gurus misquote on the meaning of “change.” Said Newman, truly: “…here below to live is to change [!], and to be perfect is to have changed often. [BUT] “[a great idea, or principle] reappear[s] under new forms. It changes with [new challenges] IN ORDER TO REMAIN THE SAME” (“The Development of Christian Doctrine,” Ch. 1, Sec. 1, caps added).

    SECOND, as also explained by Hans Urs von Balthasar about Gregory:

    “When it comes to shaping one’s personal behavior, all the rules of morality, as precise as they may be, remain abstract in the face of the infinite complexity of the concrete.” BUT, “To unravel each one of the problems that life poses for him, man must also act each time according to an immanent rule IN SUCH A WAY AS TO MAINTAIN, in the midst of the most diverse situations, the COHERENCE OF HIS OWN PERSONALITY [….] one may even apply these words to the life of the Church herself [!]. In order to remain faithful to herself and her mission, the Church must continually make an effort at creative invention.” “Creative invention”? Like Newman, Von Balthasar then goes on to explain what it means to still “be faithful to tradition” (“Presence and Thought,” An Essay on the Religious Philosophy of Gregory of Nyssa,” 1988/1995).

    THIRD, an added a very concise SYNTHESIS of the above, and specifically rejoining the Beatitudes WITH the Commandments (the prohibitive, moral absolutes)—this, from Pope St. John Paul II:

    “…the commandment of love of God and neighbor does not have in its dynamic any higher limit, but it does have a lower limit, beneath which the commandment is broken” (Veritatis Splendor, VS, n. 52). And of this lower limit: “The Church is no way the author or the arbiter of this [‘moral’] norm” (VS, n. 95).

    Will the Synod’s creative “experts” behind the curtain craft a Summary Paper that pretends to arbitrate, or instead, that clearly recalls the “coherent personality” and moral norm, and the synthesis ALREADY supplied by the Magisterium: “This is the first time, in fact, that the Magisterium of the Church [!] has set forth in detail the fundamental elements of this [‘moral’] teaching, and presented the principles for the pastoral discernment necessary in practical and cultural situations…” (VS, n. 115).

    Reports are that the isolated roundtables were often genuine, but then, what happens in the later combination plate–the Summary Report? Will the “experts” behind the curtain institutionalize synodal schizophrenia?

  18. I keep looking for something positive the pope has said like Abortion is wrong like hiring a hit man and recently he said women will not be allowed to be priests or deacons that is encouraging. I pray for him everyday that after all the opinions are expressed and people get their anger out he will have the courage of pope st.paul VI and proclaim the truths of Jesus Christ and the Catholic church.

  19. Dr Chapp’s timely and trenchant assessment of the current Synod on Synodality’s proceedings recalls the repentant Oscar Wilde’s prescient estimation in his “De Profundis” of the era that was dawning. Its great sins, Wilde warned, would be not unlike his own: vanity and superficiality.
    It is hard to imagine in the stage-managed structuring of the sessions a method more inhibitive of free and candid interaction: quite the opposite of the Holy Spirit’s spontaneity in blowing, like the wind, where it wills and its authoritative discernment bestowed on Peter and the Apostles and conferred on their successors in the Church’s Apostolic tradition.
    Lord, spare us a replication of this elitist Roman gathering’s spiritually eviscerating processes in local diocesan and parish follow-ups!
    The whole ‘synodal’ project itself thus far has been an exercise in – to borrow an architectural term – facadism, whereby the externals of the building under renovation are retained while the interior is gutted.
    Who wants to “walk with” a body whose leadership increasingly appears to espouse and conform to the pontification of Aldous Huxley’s World Controller, Mustapha Mond: “Providence takes its cue from men.”?
    When Vatican II encouraged the faithful to “read the signs of the times”, it expected our reading would be done in the light of Christ’s Gospel and its call to conversion – not in subservience to worldly ‘wisdom’ and its corporate mimicry and machinations of persuasion.

  20. “And it is an insult to the depth and vast richness of that project that it is now reduced to such shallowness and wrongly invoked as a justification for this current exercise in an elitist and bureaucratic implementation of the vision of Joachim of Fiore that we are now in an unfettered and unpredictable “age of the Spirit” where God now blesses that which He once forbade.” Just about sums it up…

  21. i am amazed how the double speak: (eg no this is not a picked parliament, yet the actions of the pope clearly has spelled a picked progressive parliament), now can tell the rest of us “backward” faith filled catholics what we must do to correct our sad course of ways. this new diversity, inclusive, equity, built in spirit of syn o dality smells of the new clericalism devised by the new wave ideologies of the “old “ 1970’s hippy movement where if you did not agree with the sexual revision of culture you were “old fashioned”.
    same old talk just different day.

  22. Infinite thanks for this, it will be forwarded! Unfortunately, it seems that every last one of our Canadian bishops is choking on these truths… Lord preserve us. I tried to respond to our archdiocese website’s ‘questions’ for the laity, in preparation for this ridiculous fiasco of a ‘Synod’, but it was impossible. The questions were cleverly stacked to produce nothing but answers for the pro secular left. It was impossible to answer them as an actual Christian. Well, you reap what sow…

  23. Thanks infinitely for this, it will be forwarded. Unfortunately our Canadian bishops seem to be blind to this.

  24. Thank you for the gift God has given you, through His Holy Spirit, to sum up for all believers what is happening in the Church. You speak truth with knowledge many of us do not have access to. Thank you for your sharing and teaching and encouragement to “keep the faith”, the one handed down to us by the apostles of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Keep it coming!

  25. As a cradle Catholic born well before Vatican II, this synod is nonsense. How can Church doctrine change due to a whim? What I was taught by the Benedictines during 12 years of Catholic education is no longer valid, it seems. Does anyone mention venial sin anymore? How about sanctifying grace, actual grace? Up is down and down is up. Silence and reverence are hard to find these days in the Church.

  26. It’s not “neo-modernism”. It’s Modernism in full flight.

    The vogue seems to be that if you ignore it enough, or, if you ignore it enough in favour of something else, it’ll dissipate. It could dissipate were it purely passive; but it is an conscious and deliberate activity that means to succeed.

    And stay i place for the journey, going the distance of its own visions.

  27. “I am not saying this was and is the agenda of Pope Francis. But it is the agenda of those he has put in charge of the thing…” In that case, by what line of reasoning could anyone fail to infer that this in fact was and is the agenda of Pope Francis, especially since “this” is the agenda of those whom he has put in charge of practically everything in the church?

  28. 1. MEDICINE OF MERCY:
    Vatican II was opened with a speech by Pope John XXIII in which he said that the Church needed to have a brand new spirit which he called “the medicine of mercy.” “The medicine of mercy” is what Pope Francis is talking about when he justifies the blessing of gay unions as being “pastoral charity.” That papal speech is as much a part of Vatican II as the 16 documents formally issued by the Council. Every theologians know that such papal speeches much be used to interpret the Council documents.
    2. COLLEGIALITY:
    Vatican II’S teaching on “Collegiality” of the bishops introduced a major change of in the doctrine of the Church. It’s that new doctrine that is the basis of these doctrine-changing-by-majority-vote synods being convened by Pope Francis. Every theologians knows this.
    3. ECCLESIA SEMPER REFORMANDA EST:
    Vatican II’s document Lumen Gentium uses the phrase “Ecclesia semper reformanda est.” In English this means “the Church must always be reformed”. By using that term “reformanda,” and making this phrase the motto of the Council and the Church going forward, this phrase was meant to be encourage ongoing change (“renewal”). That phrase is also the spirit of the Protestant Reformation. The phrase can be interpreted in a traditonal conservative Catholic way, but it can also be interpreted in the expansive, progressive, radical way that Pope Francis and his majority faction interpret it.

    • 1. The medicine of mercy is not a bad concept. If it is being distorted and misused by those who desire to subvert Church teaching, that does not corrupt it. In context, the late pope meant that harsher methods had been tried in the past, and recommended a kinder, more patient approach. Yes, some took and take that to mean no need for repentance, but that was not what he said. In fact, he wrote an encyclical on practicing self-mortification as a means of regaining baptismal innocence, Paenitentiam Agere. He practiced some forms of personal penance outlined in it.

      2. Collegiality is found in the Council of Jerusalem in the Book of Acts. It’s not new or an invention of modernists. The early Church was not heavily governed by Rome. It wasn’t until about the Medieval era that increasing power was given to the pope as an attempt to deal with corrupt bishops and rein in secular rulers. By the fourteenth century, some people in the Church wanted a return to the former model. It’s not unreasonable to consider that the top-heavy ruling by Rome has led to the current cult of personality around its bishop. Properly understood, collegiality means that the pope is first among equals, and that his office does have the final say in matters pertaining to faith and morals binding on the whole Church. But the bishops have authority given to them by virtue of their apostolic lineage. It’s not a CEO/branch managers model by any means.

      3. The Church is always in need of reform because she has people in it. Great saints arose in history to bring about some reforms, and sometimes ecumenical councils were involved. Corruptions such as simony, sexual impurity, and selling indulgences wrongly all needed to be addressed. St. Francis of Assisi helped reform the Church by recalling it from ostentatious luxury to willingly embraced poverty. The entire Counter-Reformation was actually a big reform of the Church in the sixteenth century. The work of Church reform is constant and ongoing, and far predated either the Second Vatican Council or this pontificate. If it is being misused by those in charge now, that does not make it a wrong thing to do. It means real reform is needed to remedy any false things done in the name of reform.

      It’s a great time to be Catholic.

      • The Church is indeed always in need of reform, including the reform of previous failed reforms, as benedict XVI noted.

  29. Thank you for this article. One point about Vatican II: there wer also political shenanigans there. Archbishop Marcel LeFevre and others tried to get issues discussed but were blocked by the modernists. Seems “listening” has always been qualified when the modernists are running things.

  30. Re: the Synod on Synodality…I dont get it. So many agendas. So many players. It simply does not come across as having any real meaning or purpose. I understand what is said about it. Yet, that does not actually seem to be what is happening. It comes across like smoke and mirrors. I do see a point in the comment towards the end of the article about how our pope is crafty at that Marxist notion of perpetual revolution by internally pitting groups against each other. But the downside is that it causes internal strife. Internal strife causes confusion and dilution of mission. In short, this simply seems like another satanic tactic to weaken the efforts of Christ in His Church.

  31. Its “real meaning and purpose” is to confuse, weaken, and divide the Church so that communist sycophants can take control and direct worship to the state. Then the bloodbath of the genuinely faithful will begin.

  32. https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2023/10/31/podcast-a-first-look-at-the-synods-final-report-with-fr-gerald-murray/

    “Strike The Shepherd, scatter the sheep.”

    We who are Baptized and profess to be Catholic, know in Christ, we do not question or challenge the nonnegotiable, The Word Of Perfect Love Incarnate. If has now become clear that the synod exists in order to make it appear as if God’s nonnegotiable Word is up for debate is not enough to make you understand that this synod represents a synod of the anti church, then I suppose you simply refuse to acknowledge the fact that it is a blasphemy against The Unity Of The Holy Ghost to even suggest that it is possible to have Sacramental Communion without Ecclesial Communion, and thus deny The Divinity Of The Most Holy And Undivided Blessed Trinity, Father, Son, And Holy Ghost.
    You can only have a Great Apostasy from The True Church Of Christ, Christ’s One, Holy, Catholic, And Apostolic Church, outside of which there is no Salvation, due to The Unity Of The Holy Ghost (Filioque). The synod exposed itself to be one of Apostasy because, from the beginning, it refused to affirm Genesis, which affirms the Sanctity of human life from the moment of conception, and the Sanctity of the marital act within The Sacrament Of Holy Matrimony.

    It is not possible for a counterfeit church to subsist within The One Body Of Christ due to The Unity Of The Holy Ghost (Filioque), For It Is “ Through Christ, With Christ, And In Christ, In The Unity Of The Holy Ghost” (Filioque), that Holy Mother Church, outside of which there is no Salvation, due to The Unity Of The Holy Ghost (Filioque), Exists.

    Salvation is Of The Jews, from The Father, Through The Son, In The Unity Of The Holy Ghost (Filioque).
    Let no man deceive you, we are in the midst of a spiritual battle of Biblical proportions.
    May Our Blessed Mother’s Immaculate Heart Triumph soon, for the sake of Christ, His One, Holy, Catholic, And Apostolic Church, all who will come to believe, and the multitude of prodigal sons and daughters who, hopefully will soon return to The One Body Of Christ, outside of which, there is no Salvation, due to The Unity Of The Holy Ghost, and let us Pray that there will be a multitude of persons, who, like The Good Thief, will recognize Christ, in all His Glory, and come late to The Fold, The One Body Of Christ, Through The Unity Of The Holy Ghost (Filioque)..

    • No, he doesn’t “wonder how the Church got here.” He has explained it quite well in various essays.

      The rot in the Church predates Vatican II. By decades. Actually, by centuries. It’s been a problem from the start.

      But the Germanic-inspired rot (as much of this is) goes back into the 1700s and 1800s.

      One big lie the “progressives” have gotten away with is claiming Vatican II supports them, while they consistently go contra the texts of the Council: on liturgy, morals, authority, etc., etc.

      • You give Mr. Chapp far more than his due. His graduate school seminar-style essays rarely rise above the pedestrian. The issue is not the remote antecedents of the rot in the Church which have existed from Judas at its very foundation but rather its powerful ascendance in the past 60 years so that the rot has taken control of the highest levels of the Church and spread universally throughout the Western Church. The deliberate and purposeful ambiguities, discontinuities, and novelties of Vatican II are precisely the source that Judas’s progeny whom you identify as “progressives” have used to deconstruct the Church’s dogma, doctrine, discipline, and constitution. Jorge Mario Bergoglio and his Potemkin village Synod on Synodality are the perfectly predictable present stage of what will continue to be a descent into the abyss until Vatican II and its “progressives” are seen for what it and they actually are.

  33. “unrepentant rapists, neo-Nazis, misogynists, climate change deniers, or Latin Mass lovers”

    What an interesting gathering Chapp groups himself with (?)!

  34. “Over a decade into his pontificate, it is clear that he is really good at one thing, and that is sowing confusion. For ten years he has pitted doctrine against compassion, truth against mercy, and theology against ordinary experiences.” It seems we have another politician, not a pope.

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