After the Synod’s continental phase, Instrumentum Laboris set to be ready for late May
A press conference was held in the Vatican to mark the end of continental assemblies held in recent months in preparation of the final phase in October. A commission is currently working on a synthesis that will guide discussions. A thousand “digital missionaries” were involved in parallel work online. The experience of synodality of other Churches was also cited.
Vatican City (AsiaNews) – A press conference was held in the Vatican to mark the conclusion of the continental phase of the Synod, which saw seven continental assemblies formulate their priorities in the first months of 2023.
One thing that emerged from the process is that the Instrumentum Laboris of the Synod scheduled for October will not be an academic exercise nor a statistical analysis of the topics most addressed during the synodal journey; instead, it will be a spiritual discernment that the General Secretariat plans to publish by the end of May.
Undersecretary of the General Secretariat of the Synod, Sister Nathalie Becquart, who participated in four of the seven continental assemblies, stressed some significant features of these meetings.
While “the documents give something of the experience, really, we see the centrality of experience beyond the documents,” she said. “For example, the Assembly of Churches of the Middle East held in Lebanon a few days after the earthquake in Turkey was an opportunity to bring consolation. For some, in Africa, coming to the ecclesial meeting in Addis Ababa was the first opportunity to leave their own country.”
"Another important fact is that with the increase in migration, no local Church today can really think of itself starting only from its native community.
“It is interesting that the communities in the Arabian Peninsula – where Christians from so many different nationalities are present – brought to the Assembly of the Middle East the testimony of a beautiful synodal journey.”
Another crucial issue is inculturation. “How can we be one Church in this diversity of cultures and contexts?” asked Sister Becquart. “The question of what should be decided at each level is one of the emerging topics. So is the desire to strengthen this continental dimension.”
A commission of experts that includes bishops, priests, religious and lay people – men and women with different points of view, origins and experiences – met last week in Rome to start to work on the final documents sent to Rome by each continental assembly.
Archbishop Timothy John Costelloe of Perth, president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Australia, spoke about the work the commission will do to draft the Instrumentum Laboris.
“We gave ourselves time to pray and reflect on what we were reading, to speak openly and listen to each other,” he said. “Only then did we begin to discern together the topics, priorities and points of tension in order to offer our discussions as a contribution to the drafting of the Instrumentum Laboris.”
The meetings this week with the dicasteries of the Roman Curia were an important aspect of the process, providing a good example of the style that lies at the heart of the synodal journey: open, attentive, and respectful speaking and listening.
The "Digital Synod" also continued over the past few months, offering digital spaces to reach the people who are not involved with Church institutions yet still want to follow the Church in this journey.
Fr Lucio Adian Ruiz, secretary general of the Dicastery for Communication, provided a summary, speaking about the thousand or so “digital missionaries” involved and their “potential 20 million followers”. This is a large pool of people, especially those aged 18 to 40, including 30 per cent of non-believers or people far from the Church, with some 150,000 participants in a questionnaire in 115 countries.
"Young people have found a way that is more suited to them in terms of time, formats and methodologies,” Fr Ruiz said. “For non-believers,” this means “a path of rapprochement and dialogue that has allowed them to express themselves more freely.”
Ecumenism was another important aspect of the synodal journey, noted Fr Hyacinthe Destivelle, from the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity. In his view, “one of the gifts Catholics can perhaps receive from other Christians is precisely their synodal experience.”
To this end, his dicastery organised four international conferences in 2022 and 2023 to understand the synodal experience of other major Christian traditions, namely the Orthodox, ancient Eastern Churches, traditional Protestants, and new ecclesial groups.
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