Vatican City, Jun 5, 2018 / 07:53 am (CNA).- In a letter to Catholics in Chile on May 31, Pope Francis said he is ashamed of the Church’s failure to listen to victims, and urged all the baptized to make a commitment to ending the culture of abuse and cover-up.
Please find below CNA’s translation of the full text of Pope Francis’ May 31 letter:
To the Pilgrim People of God in Chile
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
This past April 8, I called my brother bishops to Rome to seek together in the short, medium and long term the ways of truth and life in face of an open, painful and complex wound which for a long time has not stopped bleeding.[1] And I suggested that they invite the entire faithful Holy People of God to place themselves in a state of prayer so the Holy Spirit might give us the strength to not fall into the temptation of getting wound up in empty word games, in sophisticated diagnostics, or in vain gestures which would not allow us the necessary courage to look directly at the pain caused, the face of its victims, the magnitude of the events. I invited them to look to where the Holy Spirit is moving us, since “closing our eyes to our neighbor also blinds us to God.”[2]
With joy and hope I received the news that there were many communities, towns, and chapels where the People of God were praying, especially the days we were gathered together with the bishops: the People of God on their knees who implore the gift of the Holy Spirit to find the light in the Church, “wounded by her sin, granted mercy by her Lord, and so that every day she may become prophetic in her vocation.”[3] We know that prayer is never in vain and that “in the midst of darkness something new always buds forth, that sooner or later bears fruit.”[4]
1. To appeal to you, to ask for your prayers was not a practical recourse nor was it a simple goodwill gesture. On the contrary, I wanted to frame things in their precise and valuable place and put the issue where it ought to be: the condition of the People of God “the dignity and freedom of the sons of God, in whose hearts the Holy Spirit dwells as in His temple.”[5] The faithful Holy People of God are anointed with the grace of the Holy Spirit; therefore when we reflect, think, evaluate, discern, we must be very attentive to this anointing. Whenever as a Church, as pastors, as consecrated persons, we have forgotten this certainty, we have lost our way. Whenever we try to supplant, silence, look down on, ignore or reduce into small elites the People of God in their totality and differences, we construct communities, pastoral plans, theological accentuations, spiritualities, structures without roots, without history, without faces, without memory, without a body, in the end, without lives. To remove ourselves from the life of the People of God hastens us to the desolation and to a perversion of ecclesial nature; the fight against a culture of abuse requires renewing this certainty.
As I said to the young people in Maipú, I want to specially tell each one of you: “Holy Mother the Church today needs the faithful People of God to challenge us […] you need to take out your adult ID card, as spiritual adults, and have the courage to tell us ‘I like this,’ ‘this is the way I think we should go,’ ‘that’s not going to work,’ …Tell us what you feel and think.”[6] This is capable of involving all of us in a Church with a synodal character which knows how to put Jesus in the center.
The People of God does not have first, second or third-class Christians. Their participation is not a question of goodwill, concessions, rather it is constitutive of the nature of the Church. It is impossible to imagine a future without this anointing operating in each one of you, which certainly demands and requires new forms of participation. I urge all Christians to not be afraid to be the protagonists of the transformation that is demanded today and to propel and promote creative alternatives in the daily search for Church that every day wants to put what is important in the center. I invite all the diocesan organizations from whatever area they may be to consciously and lucidly seek areas of communion and participation so that the Anointing of the People of God may find its concrete mediations to express itself.
The renewal of the Church hierarchy by itself does not create the transformation to which the Holy Spirit moves us. We are required to together promote a transformation of the Church that involves us all.
A prophetic Church and, therefore, full of hope, demands of everyone an eyes-wide-open mysticism, that questions, that is not asleep.[7] Do not let yourselves be robbed of the anointing of the Spirit.
2. “The wind blows where it wills, and you can hear the sound it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes; so it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” (Jn 3:8) This is how Jesus responded to Nicodemus in the conversation they were having on the possibility of being born again in order to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.
At this time in the light of this passage it is good for us to look back at our personal and communal history: The Holy Spirit blows where and how he wills with the sole purpose of helping us to be born again. Far from letting us get boxed up in schemes, modalities, fixed or obsolete structures, far from letting yourself be resigned or “letting down your guard” in the face of events, the Spirit is continually in movement to widen your horizons, to make the person who has lost hope[8] to dream, to do justice in truth and charity, to purify from sin and corruption, and always invited to necessary conversion. Without looking at this with faith, everything we could say or do would be useless. This certainty is essential to look at the present without evasions but with bravery, with courage, but wisely, with tenacity but without violence, with passion but without fanaticism, with constancy but without anxiety, and thus change all that which today puts at risk the integrity and dignity of every person; since the solutions that are needed demand facing the problems without getting trapped in them or, what would be worse, repeating the same mechanisms that we want to eliminate.[9] Today we are challenged to look straight ahead, assume and suffer the conflict, and thus be able to resolve and transform it in a new direction.[10]
3. In the first place, it would be unfair to attribute this process just to the recently experienced events. Every process of review and purification that we are experiencing is possible thanks to the effort and perseverance of specific individuals, who even against all hope or stains of discredit, did not tire of seeking the truth; I am referring to the victims of abuses of sexuality, power and authority and to those who at the time believed and accompanied them. Victims whose cry reached the heavens.[11] I would like once more to publicly thank all of them for their courage and perseverance.
This recent time is a time of listening and discernment to arrive at the roots that allowed such atrocities to occur and be perpetuated and thus find solutions to the abuse scandal, not merely with containment strategies—essential but insufficient—but with the measures necessary to take on the problem in its complexity.
In this regard I would like to pause on the word “listening,” since discerning supposes learning how to listen to what the Spirit wants to tell us. And we will only be able to do it if we are capable of listening to the reality of what is going on.[12]
I believe that here resides one of our main faults and omissions: not knowing how to listen to the victims. Thus partial conclusions were drawn which lacked crucial elements for a healthy and clear discernment. With shame I must say that we did not know how to listen and react in time.
The visit of Archbishop Scicluna and Monsignor Bertomeu was born when we saw that there were situations that we did not know how to see and hear. As a Church we could not continue to walk ignoring the pain of our brothers. After reading the report, I wanted to personally meet with some of the victims of sexual abuse, the abuse of power and the abuse of conscience, to listen to them and to ask forgiveness for our sins and omissions.
4. In these meetings, I noted how the lack of recognition/listening to their stories, as well as the recognition/acceptance of the errors and omissions in the entire process impedes us from making headway. A recognition that ought to be more than an expression of goodwill toward the victims, rather that ought to be a new way to for us to adopt a new attitude before life, before others and before God. Hope for tomorrow and confidence arises from and grows in taking on the fragility, the limitations and even the sins in order to help us go forward. [13]
The “never again” to the culture of abuse and the system of cover up that allows it to be perpetuated demands working among everyone in order to generate a culture of care which permeates our ways of relating, praying, thinking, of living authority; our customs and languages and our relationship with power and money. We know today that the best thing we can say in face of the pain caused is a commitment to personal, communal, and social conversion that learns to listen to and care for especially the most vulnerable. It is therefore urgent to create spaces where the culture of abuse and cover up is not the dominant scheme, where a critical and questioning attitude is not confused with betrayal. We have to promote this as a Church and to seek with humility all the actors that make up the social reality and promote ways of dialogue and constructive confrontation to move toward a culture of care and protection.
To attempt this enterprise by ourselves alone, or with our efforts and tools, would shut us up in dangerous voluntaristic dynamics that would perish in the short term.[14] Let us allow ourselves to be helped and to help create a society where the culture of abuse does not find the space to perpetuate itself. I exhort all Christians and especially those responsible for centers of higher education, formal or informal, healthcare centers, institutes of formation and universities, to join together with the dioceses and with all of civil society to lucidly and strategically promote a culture of care and protection. Let each of these spaces promote a new mentality.
5. The culture of abuse and cover up is incompatible with the logic of the Gospel, since the salvation offered by Christ is always an offer, a gift that demands and requires freedom. Washing the feet of the disciples is how Christ shows us the face of God. It is never by way of coercion or obligation but by way of service. Let us say it clearly, every means that attacks freedom and a person’s integrity is anti-Gospel. Therefore it is also necessary to create processes of faith where we learn to know when it is necessary to doubt and when not to. “Doctrine, or better our understanding and expression of it ‘is not a closed system, deprived of dynamics capable of bringing up questions, doubts, questionings,’ since the questions of our people, their anxieties, their fights, their dreams, their struggles, possess an hermeneutical value that we cannot ignore if we want to take seriously the principle of incarnation.[15] I invite all centers of religious formation, theology schools, institutes of higher learning, seminaries, houses of formation and spirituality to promote a theological reflection that is capable of rising to the challenge of the present time, to promote a mature, adult faith that assumes the vital humus of the People of God with their searching and questioning. And thus, to then promote communities capable of fighting against abusive situations, communities where exchanges, debate and confrontation are welcome.[16] We will be fruitful to the extent that we empower and open communities from within and thus free ourselves from closed and self-referential thoughts full of promises and mirages which promise life but which ultimately favor the culture of abuse.
I would like to make a brief reference to the pastoral ministry of popular devotion carried out in many of your communities since it is an invaluable treasure and authentic school of the heart for our people and in the same act the heart of God. In my experience as a pastor I learned to discover that pastoral ministry of popular devotion is one of the few places where the People of God is sovereign from the influence of that clericalism that seeks to always control and stop the anointing of God on his people. Learning from popular piety is to learn to enter into a new kind of relationship of listening and spirituality that demand a lot of respect and does not lend itself to quick and simplistic readings since popular piety “reflects a thirst for God that only the poor and simple can know.” [17]
To be “the Church that goes out” also is to allow itself to be helped and to be challenged. Let us not forget that “the wind blows where it wills: you hear its sound but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” (Jn 3:8)
6. As I told you, during the meetings with the victims I was able to see that the lack of recognition prevents us from getting anywhere. That is why I think it is necessary to share with you that I rejoiced and it gave me hope to confirm in conversation with them their recognition of people that I like to call “the saints next door.”[18] We would be unfair if alongside our pain and our shame for those structures of abuse and cover up that have been so much perpetuated and have done so much evil, we would not recognize the many faithful lay people, consecrated men and women, priests and bishops who give life through love in the most obscure areas of the beloved land of Chile. All of them are Christians who know how to weep with those who weep, who hunger and thirst for justice, who look and act with mercy;[19] Christians who try every day to illumine their lives in the light of the standards by which we will be judged: “Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.” (Mt 25:34-36)
I recognize and am thankful for their courage and constant example – in turbulent, shameful and painful moments they continue to make a stand with joy for the Gospel. That witness does me a lot of good and sustains me in my own desire to overcome selfishness to give more fully of myself.[20] Far from diminishing the importance and seriousness of the evil caused and seeking the root of the problem, it also commits us to recognize the acting and operating power of the Holy Spirit in so many lives. Without looking at this, we would remain half-way there and we could enter into a logic that far from seeking to empower what is good and remedy what is wrong, it would partialize the reality, falling into grave injustice.
Accepting the successes, as well as the personal and communal limitations, far from being just one more news item, becomes the initial kickoff of every authentic process of conversion and transformation. Let us never forget that Jesus Christ risen presents himself to his own with his wounds. Moreover, it is precisely from his wounds that Thomas can confess his faith. We are invited to not dissimulate, hide, or cover over our wounds.
A wounded Church is able to understand and be moved by the wounds of today’s world, make them its own, suffer them, accompany them and move to heal them. A wounded Church does not put itself at the center, does not think it is perfect, does not seek to cover up and dissimulate its evil, but places there the only one who can heal the wounds and he has a name: Jesus Christ.[21]
This certainty is that which will move us to seek in season and out of season, the commitment to create a culture where each person has the right to breathe an air free of every kind of abuse. A culture free of the cover ups which end up vitiating all our relationships. A culture which in the face of sin creates a dynamic of repentance, mercy and forgiveness, and in face of crime, accusation, judgment and sanction.
7. Dear brothers, I began this letter telling you that appealing to you is not a practical recourse or a gesture of goodwill, on the contrary it is to invoke the anointing which as the People of God you possess. With you the necessary steps for ecclesial renewal and conversion will be able to be taken, that will be sound and long term. With you the necessary transformation can be generated that is so needed. Without you nothing can be done. I exhort all the faithful Holy People of God who live in Chile to not be afraid to get involved and go forward moved by the Holy Spirit in search of a Church which is increasingly more synodal, prophetic and hopeful; less abusive because it knows how to place Jesus at the center, in the hungry, the prisoner, the migrant, and the abused.
I ask you to not cease praying for me. I pray for you and I ask Jesus to bless you and the Virgin to care for you.
Francis
Vatican May 31, 2018, Feast of the Visitation of Our Lady.
[1]Cf. Letter of the Holy Father Francis to the Bishops of Chile following the report of His Excellency Archbishop Charles J. Scicluna, April 8, 2018
[2]BENEDICT XVI Deus Caritas Est, 16.
[3]Cf. Meeting of the Holy Father Francis with priests, men and women religious, consecrated men and women, seminarians, Cathedral of Santiago de Chile, January 16, 2018.
[4] Cf. FRANCIS, Evangelii Gaudium, 278
[5]Cf. VATICAN COUNCIL II, Lumen Gentium, 9.
[6]Cf. Meeting of the Holy Father Francis with young people at National Shrine of Maipú, January 28, 2017
[7]Cf. FRANCIS, Gaudate et Exsultate, 96
[8]Cf. FRANCIS, Homily at Solemnity of Pentecost Mass 2018
[9]It is good to recognize some of the organizations and media that have taken up the issue of abuse in a responsible way, always seeking the truth and not making out of this painful reality a means to boost program ratings.
[10]Cf. FRANCIS, Evangelii Gaudium, 227
[11]“The Lord said ‘I have witnessed the affliction of my people in Egypt and have heard their cry against their taskmasters, so I know well what they are suffering’.” Ex 3:7
[12]Let us remember that this was the first word-commandment that the people of Israel received from Yahweh: “Listen Israel” (Dt 6:4)
[13]Cf. Visit of the Holy Father Francis to the Women’s Correctional Center, Santiago de Chile, January 16, 2018
[14]Cf. FRANCIS, Gaudete et Exsultate, 47-59
[15]Cf. FRANCIS, Gaudete et Exsultate, 44
[16]It is essential to carry out the much needed in the centers of formation promoted by the recent Apostolic Constitution Veritates Gaudium. By way of example, I emphasize that “in fact, are called to offer opportunities and processes for the suitable formation of priests, consecrated men and women, and committed lay people. At the same time, they are called to be a sort of providential cultural laboratory in which the Church carries out the performative interpretation of the reality brought about by the Christ event and nourished by the gifts of wisdom and knowledge by which the Holy Spirit enriches the People of God in manifold ways – from the sensus fidei fidelium to the magisterium of the bishops, and from the charism of the prophets to that of the doctors and theologians. FRANCIS, Veritates Gaudium, 3
[17]PAUL Vl, Evangelii Nuntiandi,48.
[18]Cf. FRANCIS, Gaudete et Exsultate,6-9.
[19]Cf. FRANCIS, Gaudete et Exsultate,76, 79, 82.
[20]Cf. FRANCIS Evangelii Gaudium,76
[21]Cf. Meeting of the Holy Father Francis with priests, men and women religious, consecrated men and women, seminarians, Cathedral of Santiago de Chile, January 16, 2018.
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All well and good, but not unlike the half-blessing of irregular “couples,” a platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinusis!) is an irregular half mammal with half marine features (like laying eggs)…
Is the town hall meeting or “assembly” now happily distinct again from hybrid “synodality,” or are synods-of-bishops displaced and no longer functional? Is the ongoing (?) assembly the Germaniac ongoing Trojan Horse, der Synodal Weg, now stabled in Rome?
Would like to see CNA “explain” things apart from Cardinal Grech’s talking points. Recalling, here, two earlier and relevant insights of Singapore’s Cardinal Goh (April 2024): https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2024/05/03/cardinal-goh-of-singapore-deep-encounter-with-jesus-is-key-to-passing-on-the-faith/
FIRST, “But I don’t believe that we should try to compromise the Gospel. And that is my fear: that, today, even Church leaders are compromising the Gospel. I don’t think Jesus ever compromised the Gospel, even for the adulterous woman. He says, ‘I do not judge you, I do not condemn you, but please sin no more.’ I think that has to be mentioned. This is where the importance of truthfulness, mercy, and compassion [comes in].”
SECOND: “…as has often been said, or some bishops are suggesting, perhaps there should be another level where it is really a Synod of Bishops, after hearing the laypeople, after journeying with them; there should be that level of bishop synods, where the bishops can come together, because that synod [with laity] cannot really be considered a theological dogmatic synod, because not all are theologically trained.”
Very well said. I, too, share the concern that in this Synodal process, the gospel is being watered down and the governance of the Church compromised by considering the professed religious and lay people on an equal footing with bishops. The Synod of Bishops should be just that. They are the only official teachers of the Church, as determined by Jesus Himself. He gave no other body the authority to teach His commands. I am concerned that this Synodal process is a subservient process to water down Church doctrine and moral teachings.
To paraphrase the reported (but probably fictional) words of Henry II concerning St Thomas of Canterbury: Who will rid us of this turbulent process?
This Vatican might be likened to the Tower of Babel where language no longer has meaning or relevance. There is a profusion of “words” that emanates from this Pontificate none of which helps shepherd Christ’s flock. These Synodal Assemblies of “here comes everybody” is like bureaucratic government gone amok. It reminds me of the bad old days of the 60’s and 70’s when parents abdicated their adult roles in the family and children assumed equal status with parents. We’re now seeing the fruits of that madness in the narcissism of our current cohort of adults which is so evident these days in the Church. This won’t turn out well.
In addition, planning these synodaling event aka assemblies into the future might well be an attempt to define the next papacy. In fact, I would NOT be at all surprised to learn that the fix is already in and the next pope has already been decided upon (something like how Karmala Harris became the candidate for the Dems).
Oh come now, DeaconEdPeitler, why so down on the multiplication of words?
But, yes, instead of a “profusion of ‘words'”, all we really need is a concise acronym for a big tent Church whose center post and stakeholders, both, are everywhere! No longer a Eucharistic and therefore “hierarchical communion” (Lumen Gentium), but mostly geographical and global!
Surely, “not a parliament,” but maybe still a [CO]ngress of sorts; that is, maybe a continuous theology-on-tap or permanent [V]atican III]; and surely not exclusive, or doctrinal, or definitive, or even coherent, but maybe only a fluid process [I]n the “style” of mutual-admiration [d]ialogue…
In a word, something both new and catching, and memorable, like COVID-2028?
You’ve outdone yourself here, Peter.
Like little children who do not get their way the first time, the second, the third, the fourth, the fifth, they will not stop in 2028 either.
Welcome to the Church as the permanent globalist Woodstock Nation, pronouncing its new Jesus. In the words of Niebuhr: “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a Kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a Cross.”
Canon Law has provisions in it for Plenary and Provincial Councils and Diocesan Synods which, at least since the current volume of 1983, provides for the inclusion of “non-clerics” as members. In over 40 years, I think there have been less than a handful of Diocesan Synods, but certainly no Plenary or Provincial Councils. The Conference of Bishops (only) still makes law for the nation at that level. The Annual Meetings of the Bishops of a Province (only) still make law for the Province (for example, changing Ascension Thursday to Sunday without any lay input). Canon Law also provides for Diocesan and Parish Pastoral Councils including lay people as members. Yet, only half the archdioceses and dioceses have them (and not all are active) and only three-fourths of parishes have them. So, even though there have been ways to involved the laity in decision making, it’s been ignored a lot, and they think this “Synod on Synodality” stuff will work? Dream on.
Right on Deacon you got it right. Jesus warned us;“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but underneath are ravenous wolves. Mt 7:15
Samuel, in my reading of the Gospels, I’ve never gotten the impression that our Savior, Jesus Christ, was afflicted with the condition known as logorrhea as so many of our hierarchs are.
I believe I discovered “how the stuff works” during the local ‘S of S’ sessions, months ago. I will describe it here because too many believe that “multiplication of words” while being annoying does not pose a real danger to the life of the Church.
If before the model of managing the Church was “I decided – you have to obey” now it is considered to be old fashioned. Instead, “the masses” must decide – so it is tirelessly proclaimed. Both methods can be good and bad, in my opinion. They can both be good if the absolute measure of all decisions is the Person of Jesus Christ. That means, nothing contrary to our faith will be decided – and also nothing contrary to a normal human psyche. Take a case with Rupnik for example and place Rupnik and others, who keep him in the Church, before Our Lord – the decision is clear. Imagine Christ speaking to the Sisters whom Rupnik violated – again, all is clear: one must not violate human persons and even more so in the Church; the offender must be thrown out/defrocked because via his actions he made himself a filthy person unfit to serve at the altar; the victims must be provided with support and healing. It is both good theology and good psychology (which in the Person of Christ become one).
The most important: in both cases, “I decide” or “we decide” there must be Someone above – Christ, God. As long as He is the objective measure of decisions all is OK. However, Christ was dealt away, He is now out of the scope. Hence, we lost the objective Judge of what is good and what is bad or better to say not the Judge but the Person WHO makes good and bad painfully clear, via His presence.
The people who are now “managing” the Church still believe “I decide – you will obey” in their hearts. But to look “nice” they cover it with “we (masses) will decide” – yet they want to do their own will only. How is it done? – Via saying “Yes, I hear you” and then act as if nothing ever was said.
And so, we have nave the suffocating new scheme: “We have a problem – I want to hear from you – Excellent idea! – I am going on as if nothing has been said but trumpet about “listening””. This is literally what I have encountered, not just during the local ‘S of S’ but also during my personal interactions with the clergy slightly higher than a low level. The showcase of that new phenomenon was me pointing at a blasphemous “installation” in the cathedral saying that it must be removed because it is disrespectful to Christ. “Oh yes, you are right, it is horrible indeed, I will remove it before the Sunday Mass”. It has never been removed. “I hear you – I will do – going on my merry way as if nothing was said” has been repeated on other, similar occasions. The fact that I am a specialist in a liturgical art = qualified to make such corrections did not make any difference. My qualifications propelled a priest to go at length about how lucky he was to have such a specialist around and how much he would like to learn blah blah blah. He tried to flatter me; it was beyond him to understand that I do not care. I cared about Christ and a restoration of a proper liturgical space; he cared about pleasing me thus he was unable to hear me. Speaking as a psychologist, he wanted my approval of him and for that purpose he tried to tickle my ego; he failed to understand that he would get my “approval” only if he corrected the blasphemous installation. In fact if he did correct it he would do it for Christ, not for me and thus would get an incomparably bigger approval. But he does not get it.
I appreciate much of what you say. I’ve always hated to concede anything to Catholic dissidents, but one argument they made in the past for a married priesthood was that ordained men go through their whole lives without anyone willing to say to them that they are capable of being a fool from time to time, and this distorts their entire world view, and personal maturity. They have a point. But it ultimately fails because we owe it to the ordained to tell them when they’re fools. This might help rescue them from their habits of vanity, especially as they move up the ladder and can do real harm.
Anna, excellent, indeed!
Word salad.
Exactly!
We are so blessed with the Word of God in the Sacred Scriptures, with the Sacraments, with the true Magisterium handed down through the ages. Synod,synodal, synodaling. What in the world does it all mean? And who needs it?
What might we expect that differs from what has preceded if not unilateral decisions narrowed to the personal preferences of the chosen few? The blessed Amici Curiae. No need for wild guesses.
There won’t be mega earthquakes like formal change of doctrine, rather something more subtle, in line of precedence of what Christian Brugger and Fr Ryan described as ‘inclinations’ contrary to divine revelation.
See Father Murray’s column today on The Catholic Thing regarding ecclesial assembly.
I second the “word salad” mishmash open to meaning whatever….however, it clearly is meant to be superior to, and sit in judgement over, even a synod of Bishops, even though it will be muchly a non-clergy assembly.
Who knows? Who cares?
We all should know and care very deeply because this “process” if left unchecked, will drive the Church into irrelevance, indistinguishable from every other Protestant community, with no clear guiding principles and meeting all “where they are” with no regard for the concepts of repentance and holiness. Jess said, “Be holy as My Father is holy.” Who will know what that means anymore?
Dr. Dobbins, It’s the VATICAN that will be driven to irrelevance, The true Catholic CHURCH will never become irrelevant (Matthew 16:18).
Is the intent& purpose, the objective to conform the world to God or to conform God to the world? Traditions favors the former, the progressive, not so much, if at all.
Two items seem to move this synodal path: Evaluation and experimentation. In the use of proper reason, evaluation comes before deciding. For example, in the exercise of the human conscience, the judgment of the practical intellect, one considers the principles of faith and reason to evaluate the action’s rightness and wrongness, and then “decides” on a course of action. Only stalwart progressives put evaluation after deciding because there is never a firm decision in the process, just a process; just a continuous evaluation and a never-ending evolution and development. That is why the contents of every synodal document will always require further experimentation and a continuous synodal way. As I think on this, I still try to consider what the endgame is. While for progressives there is always an agenda and a path in place of a goal, the practical implementation of the synodal way must seek the eventual replacement of orthodox bishops (who are litmus tested through their lack of synodal implementation). They are eventually removed to make way for synodal drainlayers who each support an ecclesial congress of the laity. Yet, if this implementation is successful over time (progressives are very patient once they have stopped crying), they may also succeed in forcing and creating their own underground church. At the ground level, below the “celestial” synod, authentic Catholics are already asking, “If these things happen universally, where will be go?”
The “endgame”?
Rather than simply state it, there are some clericalist operatives who would have the Church simply at back into it.
The “Queer-Church-Bureaucracy” messages its “eternal processes” to pursue the goal of The McCarrick Establishment, The High Church of The Decapitated Body.
From the start, this synodal process has been designed to lead the Church to a place where it will no longer be founded on a Rock but on a hill of sand. The firm doctrine and teachings based on the Gospel and apostolic tradition are being replaced with a muddied “everything goes” approach. If you want to be in a same-sex relationship, “who am I to judge?” governs. Everything appears to be on the table for consideration. That is not what Jesus taught. That is not why He founded His Church. We seem to forget it is still His Church. He did not give it away to Pope Francis to change as His Eminence desires. Jesus’ teachings are quite clear and the Apostolic traditions, inspired by the Holy Spirit, have kept on the right path for 2000 years. It takes an extreme degree of pride and self-focus to think you can do otherwise. We needed fidelity, not synodality.
It is commonly overlooked that early in Francis’ pontificate, when Walter Kasper was frequently called “the Pope’s theologian,” Francis endorsed Kasper’s infamous essay from 1968, of process theology advancing the notion that even God is incomplete and in the process of learning how to be God through history. Therefore, there are no truly immutable truths.
The HRCAC has been around for some 2000+ years and now we are told that it is in error and must be reinvented. What a bunch of fools!
Dr. Robbins above – Translation of “Who know? Who cares?” – I’ve had it up to my eyeballs with this nonsense.
Praying for a pope who has a clue that there is real work that needs doing.
The Church has the responsibility to pass on the One,Holy,Catholic Faith given to her by the apostles. There is little to add after 2000 years. Novelty, from any source, is a sign of unfaithfulness to the mission and betrayal of our Lord.
Sticking to the essentials: When you hear the word “Synod”, think “following in the footsteps of the Anglicans.”
There hardly is any civilized level of conversation taking place in this space. More or less the very same people repeatedly vent out venom against renewal, collegiality and synodality.