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Words get tired, and need to be reinvented, to recapture their original meaning. Synodality is simply the most recent way of regenerating traditions of consultation that go back to the earliest days of the Church.
Fifty years ago, the Aboriginal Liturgy was the first attempt by the Catholic Church in Australia to re-shape the Mass, and was the first time we had witnessed and experienced Aboriginal people expressing their Catholic faith in ways that were culturally different from our own.
The two Catholic leaders who passed away this summer both lived in the public spotlight for much of their lives, but they also each lived a private life of which we only ever gained glimpses. Those of us who didn’t know them tend to fill in the details based on which aspects of their public persona best align with our own attitudes.
Many Catholics will have found the news from Germany this past week painful. A law firm, Westpfahl Spilker Wastl, has presented findings in its investigation into historic sexual abuse in the Munich archdiocese. Running to 1,000 pages, the report is shocking: it lists at least 497 victims for the period 1945–2019 and identifies 235 probable offenders including 173 priests and nine deacons.
The Plenary Council (PC) is over and the time has come for assessments. What did it achieve? In positive terms it brought together an enormously generous group of people whose dedication to Catholicism is extraordinary. It also demonstrated the diverse complexity of the community.
It is unfortunate that World Communications Day is celebrated in the middle of an election campaign. We have seen the worst of partisan media coverage, of shouting as a preferred form of communication, of endless experts promising Armageddon if the result is not to their taste. And yet we have also seen the best of media informing us of the issues that concern people in different parts of Australia. Without such public communication, for all its defects and excesses, our society would be the poorer.
The word ‘Catholic’ is derived from the Greek Καθολικός (katholikos) meaning universal, of the whole, and the entire tradition is the very opposite of sectarian, particularist, narrow. It is most truly itself when it’s embracing and inclusive.
In Nicaragua, Catholic priests and institutions are under siege. In the last five months, the Ortega regime has increased its persecution of the Church, accusing them of being ‘terrorists.’ The conflict has been further exacerbated by the detention of Bishop Rolando Álvarez, the most outspoken critic of Ortega. In less than four years, the Church has suffered 190 attacks, including a fire in the Cathedral of Managua. However, the crisis in Nicaragua is not as clear-cut as it might seem.
When those, like myself, seeking reform speak of systemic change to church structures those opposed to change see disrespect towards those holding positions like bishop and priest within the established order. When reformers seek the equality of women in governance and ministry those opposed to change see disrespect towards lay men and male religious as well as to other women.
Last week at the Plenary Council Second Assembly, it seems many of Australia’s bishops, for whatever reason, wanted to bury the talents available to them. They voted down motions related to the equality of dignity between men and women. The reaction according to commentators was visceral with members, not just women, upset and angry. It is likely the anger was more potent for the fact that the motions had become so anodyne that many assembly members are probably regretting the parsing and pruning.
Debate between more traditionalist Catholics and those who want to see reforms more fully implemented has become increasingly heated in the lead-up to the Plenary Council. One thing that could prevent a serious split from happening is the simple act of talking — and listening — to one another.
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