Pobal Dé

Dublin, Thursday, 6th November 1987

'I should hope to be surprised' . . . Well, I wasn't. Not once in the thirty days of the Synod. A little shocked perhaps over the 'secrecy' farce, in that one might reasonably have expected old and very simple lessons to have been learned by now — but not really surprised. It was said of the Bourbons that they learned nothing and forgot nothing. I'm afraid that this great institution in which we serve does forget, and learns, if at all, very slowly. I regret I shall have to return once again to the subject of communication (or non communication), before I hand in these last few pages to my patient publisher, for I do believe the matter is of the essence. But first let us cast an eye on what the thirty days seem to have produced. Concretely there are two documents: the 'Message to the People of God' and the Elenchus Ultimus Propositionum, the final list of proposals, as amended, voted on and approved 'by a very large majority'.

This second is, of course, the core document submitted by the Synod to the Pope, as provided for by the synodal regulations, with the expressed hope that its content will contribute to a papal 'exhortation' on 'the Vocation and Mission of the Laity in the Church and the World', to be issued to the universal church 'in due course'. (The last phrase is taken to mean a matter of months.) According to Awenire (which, as the daily voice of Communione e Libemzione, must be right!) the Fathers' submission has been accompanied by another text 'of a hundred pages' entitled 'Clarification of the Amendments'. This, we are told, explains to the Pope how the various proposed amendments were dealt with — one criterion for acceptance being, it is said, 'their theological and pastoral validity'. Hmm . . . !

At any rate, all is now presumably on the papal desk, awaiting the attention of one of the world's busiest men. How soon he gets around to it, and how he will deal with it, are matters for, as they say, speculation - a suitable game, perhaps, for the long advent evenings.

In the meantime what can we say? Well even A wenire finds it difficult to suggest that a new era dawns for the people of God. It does its best with headlines, like 'Laity at the frontier of history', a phrase taken from the papal homily at the concluding liturgy, which also spoke of 'an experience without precedent which could become a model, a point of reference for the future'. Predictable, in its own way as A wenire, the headline in Ri'pubblica reads 'For the female sex, the altar remains forbidden.' And it quotes Archbishop Weakland as saying: 'The problem, now, is how to go home and explain how the Synod has produced nothing'. (And this is the gentle committed Benedictine who said to me two weeks ago that he was fighting hard to promote the 'extreme centre' . . .) On the last leg of my own journey home, I saw by the Irish Times that Cardinal O Fiaich said: 'I will go home with renewed enthusiasm and with a need to promote the laity in the church, but I will go home with nothing revolutionary.' And he was 'one of those most disappointed' by the Synod's failure to make some 'big gesture' towards women . . .

The official summary of propositions gives an overall view of the text. A closer look at some of them (in my own 'bootleg' copy) may however be useful. After a brief introduction (propositions 1 and 2), the first part of the document seeks to provide a vocational basis for action. Here the theological and ecclesiological approach (propositions 3-5) must be regarded as an improvement on the pre- synodal documents, in emphasising that all Christ's faithful, men and women, are of equal dignity as members of God's people in the prophetic, priestly and regal community which is the Church: however lay people participate in this community especially through their own secular dimension. (Interestingly, the word 'especially' here was inserted by amendment.) It is also made clear that the laity's 'spiritual life' is essentially ecclesial, and also that they too must 'proclaim' Christ in word as well as deed. Charisms, or, more simply, gifts of the Holy Spirit 'who breathes as he will', are seen to apply to all the faithful, although their 'discernment' may demand accurate and authoritative criteria.

Part two, concentrating on lay activity within the Church, does so under three headings:

•    The diocese and parish (propositions 10, 11)

•    Associations and movements (propositions 13-17) •

•    The 'idea' of ministry (18), lay offices and ministries (19).

•     

The parish is seen as the ordinary structure in which most Catholics gain the experience of 'being church': parish councils and basic communities are ways of promoting a lively cooperation between laity, religious and clerics. Inter-parish and inter-diocesan bodies are also recommended . . . Where priests are few, the parish can maintain its ecclesial character in Sunday worship under lay leadership.

The five proposals on 'associations and movements' reflect recent developments which, in spite of reservations (expressed by several bishops in their interventions), are known to be congenial to the Pope. Two interesting points. In its diocese of origin a movement's authenticity is to be judged by the bishop: if it spreads to other dioceses, the Episcopal conference will decide on whether to permit or encourage this: any wider extension of action is for the Holy See to approve. And the propriety of admitting 'non-Catholics' to movements is to be referred in each case to the Pontifical Council for the Laity and to the Secretariat for Christian Unity.

On the subject of lay ministry (19,20), the Synod is extremely cautious, finally passing the question back to the Pope with a suggestion that Paul VI's Motu Propria on 'certain ministries' (1972) should be reconsidered in the light of local usage, especially in relation to the selection of ministerial candidates. An over-liberal appointment of such ministries could obscure the many gifts and functions of the laity in family and civil affairs(!). However it appears that certain forms of lay munus (office, function, job) are more welcome: those relating to social and charitable activities in parish and diocese, matrimonial and family affairs, catechesis and other pastoral activities, and administration — where lay competence in financial matters is especially welcome. (This will produce a few wry smiles.)

The bulk of the proposals are in part three and are mainly 'secular' in content, or at least in context. The first nine (20-28) deal with political and socio-economic affairs: lay Christians are urged to take an active part in bringing the Church's social teaching to the world. Evangelisation, ecumenism, inculturation, secularism, persecution, the new technology, the media, account for another nine (29-37): on the whole, there seems little here of specifically lay application. 'Popular devotions' and 'the activities of the sects' account for two more (28-39), and lay 'formation' and education generally are dealt with in numbers 40 to 45 - again nothing remarkable.

Then come the two proposals dealing specifically with women: 'Women's special dignity' (46) and 'practical ways of recognising the dignity of women' (47). What do these add up to?

Apart from expressing 'firm' opposition to all forms of 'discrimination and abuse', and deploring discriminatory language, the proposals seem to offer two practical moves: that women should have an equal place with men in administrative and judicial processes in the Church, and that they should be involved in the preparation of pastoral and missionary documents and initiatives. Beyond this the Synod seems unwilling to go - except to propose further anthropological and theological study leading to a definition of'the true significance and dignity of both sexes'.

Proposals 48 and 52 are concerned with the family and young people, 'not forgetting those who for various reasons do not live within the family ambit and especially children and young people left to roam the streets and exposed to grave dangers' (italicised words represent an amendment). The 'sick and sorrowing' are the subject of number 53, with special reference to health-care workers (and their 'formation'). The final proposition invokes the patronage of Mary.

*

I'm afraid it must be admitted that even the most sympathetic, objective observer will regard such an outcome from thirty days deliberations as very thin gruel. And if my summary may seem unduly sparse, I don't think that the official summary, though wordier and certainly more enthusiastically stated, presents a more nourishing dish. The hungry sheep have at last been fed, but on slender rations . . .

So we seem to be thrown back on the 'process-experience-affective collegiality' argument, as expressed in different ways not just by Pat Jones and Cardinal O Fiaich and Gerald O'Collins and Peter Hebblethwaite but by many others, directly or indirectly, officially and informally. I recall Archbishop McGrath of Panama, at a chance encounter at Pro Mundi Vita: he saw the Synod as a valuable institution but which needs to get its act together. (His actual words were more dignified, but no less blunt.) He believes that rules and procedures which may have been suitable twenty years ago need radical reform.

Whether in need of reform or not, the value of the Synod process is not, I need hardly say, being seriously advanced as a substitute for more tangible results. Those I have quoted are undoubtedly sincere in their positive evaluation of that process, objectively as well subjectively, and see it as of great, perhaps indispensable, importance to the Church, at this point in post-conciliar history. Undoubtedly any form of collegial activity is better than none — one doesn't have to resort to Chesterton's maxim: 'Anything worth doing is worth doing badly.'

The collegial idea, which excited us all so much twenty-odd years ago, and which seemed destined to give a new face and shape to the magisterium, and to the church's governance in general, does seem to have faded somewhat. Indeed some of us saw the idea as spreading to the diocesan and parish levels, with the bishop, or parish priest, presiding over the representatives of the local church, as the Pope over those of the church universal. It wasn't worked out, but we were sure that it would be, as God's people became more and more actively aware of their mission.

This seemed all the more inevitable as the local churches assumed their autonomous (not, as I've said before, sovereign) roles. There would be a great movement of decentralisation, of 'devolution', which, as inculturation became a real force, would bring a new and vibrant life to the great network of communities, east and west, young and old. And far from this weakening the centre of Catholicity it would lead to a new sense of fraternity, in which unity of faith and love with the bishops of Rome would shine out as a beacon and exemplar in a divided world.

It didn't happen that way. To say that is not to indulge in nostalgia or in speculation over might-have-beens. But one may wish that things were different and legitimately try to make them so. Not all is negative. Thus, the growth of basic communities and the like, rooted in the local church, has been one of the great unforeseen developments of the conciliar era, and has been of incalculable and providential benefit in areas where the institution seemed moribund, and removed from a marginalised, though still believing, people.

Now long accepted, indeed as someone said 'taken for granted', the communities have been, as we have seen, given positive mention in the propositions. Their beneficial activity is by no means confined to the Third World, while some of those nearer home have developed in special ways. Thus the Sant Egidio community in Trastevere in Rome, who work mainly in partnership with the poor, are not confined to the area whose patron they share, although they have many ties with this most attractive, perhaps, of all of Rome's inner-city districts. They were responsible for organising a celebra­tion of prayer for peace during the last week of the Synod, involving Christians of all traditions, and representatives of world religions from the Jews to the Zoroastrians: it was centered on the basilica and piazza of Santa Maria in Trastevere, and marked the anniversary of the Pope's inter-faith peace initiative at Assisi last year. What I saw and heard this time was moving, and rang true as a popular enterprise, deeply impressive but without triumphalism.

However the organisational scale of the event led me to ask one of the community's leaders where the money came from. He said it was mostly from popular collections, though they had hopes of some of­ficial funding (mainly to cover expenses of visitors). Did he not see the community as becoming dangerously like a movement?! He denied the suggestion and declared they had no territorial ambitions elsewhere. They had become the model for other communities, as far away as the US, but there were no organisational links.

I have perhaps written enough about the movements (especially Communione e Libemzione), and am frankly out of sympathy with what I perceive them to be. CL (as it's known) began in a modest way in Milan (as far back as the 50s), and only very slowly developed its rather aggressive present stance and status. Its founder Monsignor Giussani, interviewed in Awenire, expressed satisfaction at the boost given by the Synod, and so well he might. He spoke of their critics more in sorrow than in anger.

No one could deny the potential of such a successful and powerful organisation. Already they have a political wing — the Movimento Popolare - and have long outstripped the influence of Italian Catholic Action, which deliberately distanced itself some time ago from its own political partners, the Christian Democrats. (It was noticeable that references to the older movement at the Synod tended to be politely reverent . . .) But, as I have indicated, any movement within the Church which achieves a certain degree of 'clout', has established itself internationally, and enjoys papal favour, can be a very mixed blessing indeed. And, in the present context, I can only regard with grave misgivings its 'large-scale' approach, which could all too easily bulldoze small, local growths and impose a centralist, 'cosmopolitan' form of Catholicism, which in the long run can only be a travesty of catholic reality, and of small service to communio.

?

Small, in the church is not only beautiful: it is, quite literally, vital. The world's flowering can come only from the mustard seed. One must then question the collective wisdom of an assembly which, with some outstanding exceptions, seems to have 'bought' the mass- approach. But perhaps it hasn't really. There are undoubtedly many indications that the little cells of which the ecclesial body is made up are also seen as centre’s of mission and growth.

Cardinal 0 Fiaich regrets the Synod's failure to make one 'big gesture' to women. In this he was by no means alone. Actually, at one stage during the early plenary sessions, women's role was being promoted almost to excess: it seemed unthinkable that the final statement would not include something fairly solid. Were the anti- feminists a silent majority? Or, as has been claimed, did the cultural reservations of a sizeable group (mostly of the Third World) force a withdrawal in the interests of consensus?

The more sober expectations were not in the area of ministry, or not mainly so. It was fairly clear early on that the very concept of lay ministry did not recommend itself to quite a number of the Fathers: in this connection, while the final proposal that Paul VI's Ministeria Quaedam should be reviewed is ambiguous in its intent, such a review might open non-ordained ministries to women as well as to men (section 7 of the Motu Proprio applies). Of course, the ordina­tion of women to the ministerial priesthood could not even be discussed (nec nominetur . . .!), while tentative suggestions about their admission to the diaconate were shot down in a shower of scholarly flak.

But it did appear that something substantial might emerge in regard to the structures of government and administration - certain­ly something more than the rather weak gestures in that direction contained in proposition 47.

It may be argued that far from being gestures, there is considerable substance in this proposal. But even if justice is being done here, it isn't clearly seen to be done. I had some hopes of a general move towards the declericalisation, not of ministry (that would be too much) but of government/administration. In other words, the struc­tures of power. A cynic might say: never!, and, undoubtedly, one doesn't have to imagine the Roman curia (or its local equivalents) as being staffed by power-crazed bureaucrats to recognise that those who are used to doing a job, maybe to a point of monopoly, in any society are usually reluctant to hand it over to anyone else. But, in fact, clerical shortages have already led to a laicising of many of the lower ranks, and, with a little collegial pressure, the senior posts might soon follow. After all, as was said in an early session, why does a nuncio or prefect of a congregation have to be a bishop - or in holy orders at all? Why not a layman, or lay woman?

And I must confess that personally I had come around to the view that while, as I have said, the declericalisation of the ordained ministry is not on, for the foreseeable future, a similar declericalisa­tion of the decision-making structures would not alone be an ex­cellent thing in itself (yes! I know the dangers: never mind for the moment), but would inevitably lead to the other, even if later rather than sooner. And, certainly, women as decision-makers could be ex­pected to make more than a few changes, not least in regard to their sisters in, and out of, ministry.

I suppose what, basically, angers women most is precisely having no voice in decisions, most of which affect them to some extent, some very directly indeed - sometimes painfully. I can think of nothing that would do more to remove alienation, and restore their confidence in the institution than a strong, clear indication of prac­tical and immediate moves to remedy this. An unambiguous state­ment that woman's place is not alone in the home or in the pew but in the Church's government.

Strong, clear, unambiguous. That's how the voice of the Synod should sound to the people of God, and a few short sentences of substance would be worth a hundred pious 'messages' ... So we're back with communication. Judging by the style and content of this year's effort, those who compose these messages don't seem to have any idea of whom they're addressing. Admittedly it's hard to form a picture of such a vast and disparate body as is made up of Catholics of the world - let alone all those other Christians and people of good­will. But the problem is not a new one: it is, on an admittedly larger scale, that faced by every preacher and every public speaker whose audience is not of one origin, class, educational background. It is possible to communicate with a mass audience, and the fact that the great majority of those addressed share a common faith and loyalty must make it a little easier.

However, again on Chesterton's principle, even the woolliest, most pietistic utterance is at least an acknowledgement that there are people out there who, perhaps wrongly, expect to be told about things, and, perhaps even more wrongly, believe they have some right to be told. And yet, in the long run, it is not the institutional church's continuing and repeated failure, apparently, to grasp this elementary point that chiefly causes me dismay. It is because all secrecy, censorship, double-talk and pompous platitude are not just plain silly: they are the very negation of how the Church should act, because of what the Church is.

The Church, in Christ, is in the nature of sacrament — a sign and instrument, that is, of communion with God and of unity with all men . . ..

That's how the Vatican council puts it at the very beginning of Lumen Gentium. And it is of course implicit in those two words: 'You are the light of the world' (Matt. 5).

And Jesus went on to point out that a light is meant to bring light. Not to be hidden. To be put where it will do most good . . . We talk of sins against the light, of standing in the way of light - which makes us, whether we realise it or not, agents of darkness.

Since the Church is to be a sign and a light to humanity, it is surely our calling to contribute as we can to the clarity of the sign, the brightness of the light. At the very least, not to get in the way of that brightness, not to obscure it, not to blur the sign. We do these things of course every hour of every day, at least most of us do, when we betray our calling by our behavior, when we, quite literally, 'put out the light, and then put out the Light'.

But, if our special calling is to be 'special agents' of the light, torchbearers, sign-writers - either because of our office or our skills of brain or hand or voice — what then? When we obscure or blur or botch or get in the way, the damage is all the greater.

Worst of all is when we decide that the light may be for us, but not for them. Not under present circumstances. Not without a filter: it might make them blind. Better keep it dark. Keep the sign under wraps.

Put like that, of course, it's all very simple. And I'm not denying that there may be complications at times. But any considered decision to censor, dilute, postpone, conceal, should be taken only for the gravest reasons — like saving lives — and should be a rare exception.

How have the Synod and what has come from it strengthened the Light, made clearer the Sign? What was the effect of whatever news trickled through, including the news about no-news? What impression did the message to the people of God make on the people of God? What do they think of what they have learned of the Synod's submission to the Pope? What do they say to those who praise the 'process' while admitting that little was achieved - or does this make sense at all? How in general do they regard this assembly of a couple of hundred bishops and other church leaders (with a few lay people), which spent a month discussing them and telling them, in the end, very little?

These are not rhetorical questions, and I don't know the answers, though I can make an educated guess at a few of them. In the course of my Diary I have referred (rather sourly) to one or two occasions of synodal communication as 'non-events'. On reflection, I cannot honestly find in me to withdraw the comment. And, equally honestly, I have to say that the whole Synod seems to have been so regarded by most people I've spoken to, in Rome and here in Dublin. If this is an unfair judgement, or at least an inadequate one, who is to blame for it? Certainly not those (given their honesty and goodwill, which I would confirm) who have made the judgement. They can only go on what they have been told, what they have learned, what — in a few cases — they've gone to some trouble to find out.

Once again, communication is the problem. A problem for us, the plain people who are at the receiving (or non-receiving) end: but, far more seriously, a problem for church authority and 'leadership'. And most seriously of all because it isn't perceived to be a problem - or, at least, one of any great importance. It seems to be something like a blind spot . . . May I cite a parallel?

At Mass, in all too many churches, the proclamation of the word suffers all too often from a serious lack of intelligibility and even audibility. Bad reading, bad diction, misuse or abuse of microphones. Now, here is something of the first importance in the liturgical life of God's people . . . they come to hear, and too often are left straining their ears. But I'm afraid that as often as not, while this is regarded as unfortunate, and something of a flaw in the celebration, it's not really seen as serious — not as serious say, as omit­ting part of the eucharistic prayer, or forgetting to put water in the wine — or even leaving the candles unlit. Opus operatum may not still rule OK, but its influence lingers on.

I would suggest that something of the same mentality accounts, at least partly, for the failure to communicate on other levels — and the failure to see that such failure touches the very core of what the Church is for and should be about. We recognise the fundamental, indeed the primal, importance of mission as a sine qua non in the life of God's people. But what is mission without communication?

And if we have begun to recognise that mission, like charity, it must begin at home, and that everything we say and do within the Church and outside it has, for good or ill, a missionary connotation, how can we be so insensitive to the effect of the Church's pro­ceedings and statements, so careless of the image they project? I am far from proposing that we should engage in 'creating' a new image, or in polishing and sanitising the old ones. I am not using the word image in its customary PR sense, which has too often little to do with the reality it's meant to 'sell'.

Our concern is with telling the truth in love, not selling anything. The Synod of bishops is an expression of church life, of recent origin and, one might say, experimental structure. What it does and says may be of no great interest to the world, but it is of some interest, and could be of some value, to some people all over the world, not all of them Catholics. And to this end, they must be seen and heard as they are, warts and all. Above all, let no well-meaning in­termediary try to rub off the corners, remove the rough edges and convey an impression not only of unity but of uniformity.

One of the factors that seriously reduces the credibility of the pre­sent Synod is the absence of conflict or, at least, of any serious dif­ferences of opinion as published. To admit that such exist would no doubt be deemed 'imprudent', and bordering on scandal, by some of those in a position to influence such matters. In fact, the real scandal consists in presenting a bland and unremittingly uniform face to the world - a face that surely must be a facade, if, that is, the Synod is actually a living thing. For where there is life there is conflict: not necessarily involving violence or hostility, but honest and open.

It is, indeed, sometimes alleged (and this year's assembly was no ex­ception) that the very nature and status of the Synod tends to discourage the expression of strongly opposed views — especially where these are regarded as of a 'minority', with implications of ec­centricity, 'unsoundness', or perhaps near-heresy. I have even heard it suggested — though this can hardly be true — that ideas (even on 'doubtful' or 'open' questions) which the Pope is known not to favour are regarded as unsuitable for discussion.

But rumours like these, as I have said so often, are the predictable spawn of the kind of darkness which the secrecy sickness engenders. And, indeed, of the whole failure of the institutional church to come to terms with a world where people want to know, and expect to be told even when they don't. This is not an aspect of secularisation, or of middle-class trendiness, or intellectual hedonism or any of the other maladies to which we are allegedly subject. The Church's duty to communicate is rooted, as I've tried to say, in her founder's com­mand and charge.

Eppur si muowe. The people of God, men and women, old and young, ordained and married and celibate, are still in pilgrimage. Our journey is, among other things, one of self-discovery, and, however slowly, we are learning all the time — about ministry and sexuality and community and mission and culture and the whole story of the earth, of this world we live in. Some of us are learning more quickly than others, but the slow learners may stay the course better.

The gain from this bit of the pilgrimage may seem hardly worth the labour. I must say that's how I've been feeling myself. But maybe I'll still be surprised — after the event. Maybe we all will. There's always hope.

Feile Naomh Uile Eireann 1987.