Category Archives: Synod 2014

A Shepherd’s Voice: One Diocesan Bishop’s Pastoral Plan for Implementing “Amoris Laetitia”: First Look

 

Wuerl         Cardinal Donald Wuerl, the Cardinal-Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Washington, DC has just released Sharing in the Joy of Love in Marriage and Family: A Pastoral Plan to Implement Amoris Laetitia.  You may access the full document here.  This may be the first parish-centered pastoral plan on this subject in the United States, and I thank Deacon Greg Kandra for posting about this significant event.  This has personal implications for me,  since I am a deacon of the Archdiocese of Washington, DC so the new document has particular personal and ministerial relevance; Cardinal Wuerl is my bishop!

I think it is important to note from the outset that Cardinal Wuerl is a master teacher and a faithful, precise theologian.  Indeed, long before he became a bishop, he was well-known to be a skilled catechist, gifted teacher and respected author.  This catechetical perspective informs his entire approach to ministry, so it comes as no surprise that he would create a pastoral resource for the clergy, religious and laity of the Archdiocese, and that this resource would be grounded in a faithful presentation of the teaching of the Church on marriage and family life.  He provides clear guidance and direction for all Catholics of the Archdiocese, which should serve to prevent confusion while also serving wuerlsynodas an aid for everyone seeking to strengthen their own marriages and families, and the pastoral ministers who are supporting them.  These initial comments can only skim the surface of what is a much more substantive document, and I encourage everyone to take the time to read the Pastoral Plan in detail.  Let’s take a closer look.

More than fifty pages in length, the Pastoral Plan consists of a preface, some introductory reflections, five “parts”, a conclusion and an executive summary.  The five major sections are: Amoris Laetitia’s Teaching, the Way of Faith and Contemporary Culture, the Way of Accompaniment, the Importance of Parish Life, and finally, In Service of the Ministry of Accompaniment, which consists of an extensive list of resources available to pastoral ministers.

The contributions of the Pastoral Plan revolve around several key themes: context, accompaniment, conscience, and practical care.

CONTEXT

The document’s first significant contribution is context.  In the Preface, Cardinal Wuerl makes clear that the Plan incorporates not only the teaching of Amoris Laetitia itself, but also the two Synods which preceded and inspired it.  For me this is a most important reminder.  Far too frequently, observers have attempted to read and comprehend the pope’s Exhortation without this context, and that, in my opinion, is not only inadequate VaticanSynodofMarriageandFamilybut dangerous.  “Text” always requires “context”, and the Cardinal makes this clear: to understand and to implement Amoris Laetitia, one must situate it within that broader global synodal process.  Amoris Laetitia, precisely as a post-synodal apostolic exhortation, reflects not merely the personal teaching of the Holy Father himself; it is that, certainly, but so much more.  The work of the preceding synods involved representatives of the world’s episcopal conferences, extensive consultation and research over several years, and intense discussions during the synods themselves.  All of this reflected both the importance of the challenges facing contemporary families and the diversity of pastoral responses needed to help them.  As Cardinal Wuerl notes, “Many collaborators have worked to provide elements of a pastoral plan to implement this expression of the Papal Magisterium that follows on two gatherings of bishops, the 2014 Synod on the Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelization and the 2015 Synod on the Vocation and Mission of the Family in the Church and in the Contemporary World” (Preface, 3).

There is a sense in which the right understanding of the work of both the 2014 and 2015 synods and their fruit, Amoris Laetitia, depends upon the recognition of this interactive dynamic between teaching, experiencing the teaching, and the living out of the teaching in light of how it is understood and able to be received. This recognition is perhaps the most challenging aspect of Amoris Laetitia. It calls for a conversion of heart. The minister is called to recognize that beyond the assurance of doctrinal statements he has to encounter the people entrusted to his care in the concrete situations they live and to accompany them on a journey of growth in the faith.

VATICAN-POPE-AUDIENCEACCOMPANIMENT

The Cardinal outlines the approach of his Pastoral Plan in terms of accompaniment, which is of course, a major theme of Amoris Laetitia itself.  The theme of pastoral accompaniment is, indeed, the foundation and the goal of the entire Plan.  The Cardinal writes,

Not every marriage, however, goes forward with “they lived happily ever after.”  In fact, for many, in our heavily secular culture today, there is little understanding of the true nature of love, marriage, commitment, and self-giving which are all part of the Catholic vision of love. Yet, while their lives and experiences may have drawn many far away from the Church’s message, we are all the more called to reach out to them, to invite and accompany them on the journey that should help bring them to the joy of love that is also the joy of the Church.

He reminds us that we must approach everyone “with humility and compassion,” remembering that all the baptized are members of Christ’s body, and that we are all brothers and sisters to one another, regardless of circumstance.  He recalls the invitation of Pope Francis “to value the gifts of marriage and family. . .  (and) to encourage everyone to be a sign of mercy and closeness wherever family life remains imperfect or lacks peace and joy” (AL, 5).

The Cardinal directs that the implementation of Amoris Laetitia  in the Archdiocese of Washington, DC be based on the following points.

  • First, it must begin with the Church’s teaching on love, marriage, family, faith and mercy. In particular, he points out that a key insight of the pope’s teaching was a proper understanding of the family “as the site of God’s revelation lived out in practice.”  To this end, the Cardinal joins with Pope Francis in exhorting all ministers of the Archdiocese to a deeper knowledge and formation on marriage and family life.  The richness of the Church’s teaching on marriage and family is a gift to be treasured and shared, especially in light of the many challenges faced by people in today’s world which can distract or even alienate people from each other and from loving commitments.  However, the Cardinal points out, “our task is not complete if we only limit ourselves to faith statements. The goal is the salvation of souls and it is a far more complex effort than simply restating Church doctrine.”
  • Therefore, “it is essential to recognize that our teaching is received by individuals according to their own situation, experience and life. Whatever is received is received according to the ability of the receiver, to paraphrase Aristotle and Saint Thomas Aquinas. This is our starting point for pastoral ministry.” The Cardinal points out that this “interation” between the proclamation of the church’s teaching and the lived experience of those who hear that teaching was a critical insight from both of the synods.

There is a sense in which the right understanding of the work of both the 2014 and 2015 synods and their fruit, Amoris Laetitia, depends upon the recognition of this interactive dynamic between teaching, experiencing the teaching, and the living out of the teaching in light of how it is understood and able to be received.  This recognition is perhaps the most challenging aspect of Amoris Laetitia. It calls for a conversion of heart. The minister is called to recognize that beyond the assurance of doctrinal statements he has to encounter the people entrusted to his care in the concrete situations they live and to accompany them on a journey of growth in the faith.

Here we see the master catechist at work.  The Cardinal expresses the Church’s constant tradition that at the heart of our faith lies a relationship with Christ, and that one does not establish or nourish such a relationship without the conversion of the human heart.  Teaching alone, as central as it is, will be heard and received within very different life situations, and he challenges all of us who minister “to encounter and to accompany” the people we serve where they are in their journey.

CONSCIENCE7889200

Central to Amoris Laetitia and to this pastoral plan is the role of conscience.  St. John Paul II referred to the conscience as “the ultimate concrete judgment” in Veritatis Splendor 63, while the Catechism of the Catholic Church (both of which are cited by Cardinal Wuerl) describes conscience as “a judgment of reason by which the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act” (CCC, 1796).  Therefore, stressing always fidelity to the Church’s teaching on marriage and family along with the pastoral awareness of how that teaching “is being received or even able to be perceived,” there is something more.  “An equally important part of our Catholic faith is the recognition that personal culpability rests with the individual. We have always made the distinction between objective wrong and personal or subjective culpability.”  The Cardinal continues:

          Our personal culpability of any of us does not depend solely on exposure to the teaching. It is not enough simply to hear the teaching. Each of us has to be helped to grasp it and appropriate it.  We have to have “experiential” and not just “objective” moral knowledge, to use the language of Saint John Paul II. . . .  Our consideration of our standing before God recognizes all these elements. We cannot enter the soul of another and make that judgment for someone else. As Pope Francis teaches, “We have been called to form consciences, not to replace them” (AL, 37).

The Cardinal’s treatment of “conscience” is, for me, a highlight of the pastoral plan, since it is at the level of conscience that our pastoral activity will be centered, and I hope that everyone will study this section reflectively and carefully.

Many will be curious about the question of the possibility of divorced-and-remarried persons receiving Communion, so let me address this in more detail.   This question itself is not specifically addressed in the Plan.  However, much as the treatment of the subject in Amoris Laetitia, I do not find this particularly troubling, for the following reasons.  Traditional Catholic teaching has always stressed a balanced approach between objective moral principles and subjective moral culpability.  There is nothing new in this, and the current Catechism of the Catholic Church repeats it clearly (see, for example, paragraphs 1857-1859).  What prevents us from receiving communion ccc-photois being in a state of mortal sin.  The tradition holds that for a sin to mortal, “three conditions must together be met: grave matter which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.” The Catechism continues, “Grave matter is specified by the Ten Commandments, corresponding to the answer of Jesus to the rich young man: ‘Do not kill, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not defraud, honor your father and your mother. . . .”  But mortal sin is more than an objectively grave act.  “Mortal sin [also] requires full knowledge and complete consent. It presupposes knowledge of the sinful character of the act, of its opposition to God’s law. It also implies a consent sufficiently deliberate to be a personal choice” (CCC, 1857-1859).

What Cardinal Wuerl has done is to echo this traditional teaching.  How one forms spiritual directionone’s conscience is a complex matrix involving experience, formation, and discernment guided by one’s pastor.  Objective moral principles are one thing, but a person’s moral culpability for those acts or omissions is another, since “full knowledge” and “complete consent” are subjective issues.  The state of one’s soul before God, then, is deeply personal between the person and God, which again is the traditional teaching of the Church.  The decisions a person makes under the guidance of a pastor are matters of a deeply internal spiritual nature and can vary from person to person.  The responsibilities of a pastor in these matters are most crucial and weighty, and the Cardinal stresses all of this in the document.  No one answer will suffice in every case.  He writes, “Here Amoris Laetitia confirms the longstanding teaching of the Church and encourages pastors to see through the lens of Christ’s mercy and compassion rather than through a rigorous legalism.”  He continues:

Pastoral dialogue and accompaniment involve the development of conscience and also the expression of a level of support or confirmation for the judgment the individual is making about the state of his soul or her soul.  That judgment is the act of the individual and is the basis for their accountability before God.

In practice, this means that while some may be secure in their understanding and appropriation of the faith and the call of the Christian way of life, not all of our spiritual family can say the same thing. Even how we receive and understand the faith and its impact on our lives varies according to our situation, circumstances and life experiences.

While some people might prefer that both Amoris Laetitia and this Pastoral Plan might more directly “answer the question” about the reception of communion, such a response would not respect the primacy of the individual conscience under the guidance of the Church’s pastors, and the traditional understanding of moral decision-making in the Catholic Church.

PRACTICAL CAREwuerl3

Finally, as suggested by all that has gone before, the Plan offers very concrete resources for all those in pastoral ministry.  A primary “resource” is, of course, the parish itself.  The Plan suggests myriad ways in which various people within the parish might catechize, encourage, and accompany each other.  The parish is “the home of pastoral accompaniment, where we can all experience the love and healing mercy of Jesus Christ.”  The Cardinal directs that “Our parishes, as the place where people most experience the life of the Church, must be places of welcome, where everyone is invited, particularly anyone who might be disillusioned or disaffected by contemporary society or even by our faith community. The Church assures all that there is a place for everyone here in our spiritual home.”

7-Church-Walk           The section on the parish is extremely practical, with suggestions on how the various members of the parish and pastoral team might create this “culture of accompaniment” for others.  There are paragraphs for pastors and other priests, parish leaders and staffs, youth and young adults, engaged couples, newly married couples, young families, older couples and adults, and families in special circumstances.  It is only here that I would have wished for just one addition to the text.  Deacons are not mentioned in any context, and yet deacons, who are generally married with families of their own, are frequently engaged in ministries to couples preparing for marriage as well as other forms of family-related ministry.  In one sense, of course, the words of encouragement offered by the Plan to pastors, priests and parish staffs can – and do! – apply to the deacons.  Still, it does seem a missed opportunity to develop specific ways in which the diaconate, given its unique features within marriage and family life, might contribute to these ministries.

Finally, the last section of the plan offers a kind of “bibliography” of sources available from a variety of places, including the offices of the archdiocese itself, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, and various national and regional groups.  The resources identified cover the waterfront and there is something for everyone, in every kind of need.

          In short, this Pastoral Plan, while prepared for the Archdiocese of Washington, DC, is an excellent resource for Catholics everywhere, and I hope that other bishops will follow suit with similar initiatives in their own dioceses.  This Plan reflects significant collaboration on the part of the archdiocesan staff as the Cardinal prepared this multi-layered pastoral response to Amoris Laetitia.  I encourage everyone to read it, study it, and use it!

ADW Seal

The Synod on the Family: Curtain Up on Act II

Beatification Paul VIToday we experienced the ringing down of the curtain on Act I of the synodal process on the Family.  Pope Francis closed the Extraordinary Synod today with Mass in St. Peter’s Square and the beatification of Blessed Paul VI.

But the process has only just begun!  Perhaps the best road map to the future is found in the Pope’s speech on Francis at SynodSaturday closing the final work session of the Extraordinary Synod.  In fact, I believe that this beautiful speech deserves to be read in its entirety; you may find it in English translation here, and if you read Italian you can read it as the Pope delivered it, here.  It is spiritually rich, and it also gives us wonderful insights into the Holy Father’s dreams for the next steps in the process.

Act II, which has now begun, takes place over the next twelve months.  Act III will be Ordinary Synod on the Family to be held in October 2015.  Here’s how the Pope explained it in his speech:

Dear brothers and sisters, now we still have one year to mature, with true spiritual discernment, the proposed ideas and to find concrete solutions to so many difficulties and innumerable challenges that families must confront; to give answers to the many discouragements that surround and suffocate families.

One year to work on the “Synodal Relatio” which is the faithful and clear summary of everything that has been said and discussed in this hall and in the small groups. It is presented to the Episcopal Conferences as “lineamenta” [guidelines].

US BishopsUsing the Synod’s Relatio, the various bishops’ conferences around the world will be discussing its contents and mapping out their specific courses of action for their dioceses.  For example, here in the United States, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) will have it on their agenda next month at the Fall Meeting in Baltimore.  We can expect that individual diocesan bishops will then develop ways and means of encouraging further conversations within their own dioceses over the coming year.  Keep in mind, as the Pope says above, that the current Relatio is merely a starting point, a kind of rough draft, for the work that lies ahead.

Then, next October, Act III will begin as the Pope opens an Ordinary Synod (not an Extraordinary one such as just ended) on the Family.  At that time, more discussions will be held by the Synod Fathers, many of whom will be different bishops than the ones who attended this one, and a final document will be prepared for the Holy Father.  It can then be anticipated that the Pope will take all of these results and draft his own Apostolic Exhortation in which he charts the course ahead.

I think there are several important things to keep in mind.

1) To speak of the current Relatio as anything other than a working document is a mistake.  It does not constitute in any way “official teaching.”  Rather, it simply recounts, as the Pope says, the various elements which were discussed during this first stage of the process.  So, for people to be upset over what the document currently says, or doesn’t say, is very inappropriate and unnecessary.  The various topics for FUTURE work are all there; what final forms may come in the year remain to be seen.

2) This is why the Pope directed that even those three paragraphs which did not gain a 2/3 majority vote would still be printed in the text.  He also directed that the voting results be included so that everyone (and not just bishops!) could see how the voting went.

francis at synod 23) I would strongly recommend that people spend more time on the Pope’s speech at this point, because it gives the clearest indication of how HE is seeing things.  Consider just two tantalizing tidbits.

  • When the mid-point version of the Relatio was released last week, much attention was given to the language of “welcome” that used with regard to homosexuals, as well as the gifts that they bring to the Church.  In fact, some in the blogosphere complained about that translation of “welcome”.  The Italian verb used was “accogliere”.  According to Italians I’ve asked, the best English translation for that verb is “to welcome.”  Still, the English translation was later changed to “provide for” — clearly not an accurate translation.  Now look at the Pope’s speech from Saturday.  He’s not talking specifically about homosexual persons, but more generally, and he uses “accogliere” again.  He reminds the bishops that there first duty is to “feed your sheep, feed your sheep.”  He then tells them that they are to:

Seek to welcome [“accogliere”] – with fatherly care and mercy, and without false fears – the lost sheep. I made a mistake here. I said welcome [“accogliere”]: [rather] go out and find them! [“Ho sbagliato, qui. Ho detto accogliere: andare a trovarle.”]

I find it interesting that he takes the time here to use the very verb so many were fussing about earlier in the week: and then he plainly says that even as “welcoming” it doesn’t go far enough!  We’re not merely to welcome those who come to us who are lost: we are to go out and find them.

  • The Pope also reminds us that, as a Church, we are already to be open to all who seek.  In a particularly beautiful passage, he teaches:

And this is the Church, the vineyard of the Lord, the fertile Mother and the caring Teacher, who is not afraid to roll up her sleeves to pour oil and wine on people’s wound; who doesn’t see humanity as a house of glass to judge or categorize people. This is the Church, One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and composed of sinners, needful of God’s mercy. This is the Church, the true bride of Christ, who seeks to be faithful to her spouse and to her doctrine. It is the Church that is not afraid to eat and drink with prostitutes and publicans. The Church that has the doors wide open to receive the needy, the penitent, and not only the just or those who believe they are perfect! The Church that is not ashamed of the fallen brother and pretends not to see him, but on the contrary feels involved and almost obliged to lift him up and to encourage him to take up the journey again and accompany him toward a definitive encounter with her Spouse, in the heavenly Jerusalem.

So, however Act II and Act III develop over the next year, the vision of our Holy Father Francis is quite clear: the Church as “field hospital” for all in need is open to receive patients; in fact, we’re supposed to be out in the streets and the fields and the back alleys finding those in need.  Brother deacons, this message is particularly apt for us!  If the whole Church is a field hospital, we deacons should be the EMTs.

Stay tuned.  This is going to be quite a year ahead!  And, as the Pope requested, pray for him.  He has set us on a challenging course, but one that will, with God’s grace, bear much fruit.

Moon Over St. Peter's

Synod 2014: Lessons on the Process from Vatican II

Pope at SynodSo much hyperventilation!  Bishops fighting bishops!  “The press is out of control!”  “Translations are all messed up!”  “Release the information!”  “Don’t release the information!”  “This is bringing scandal to the world!”

After more than a week of living in the breathless world of exclamation points, it’s past time for everyone to just calm down.  In terms of the process, there is absolutely nothing new here.  This is how these things work, and we just need to take a deep breath (as I suggested yesterday) and exhale slowly.

During Vatican II, we saw analogous happenings.

  • The Roman Curia had announced that the working language for the Council would be Latin.  Therefore, the CardinalArchbishop of Los Angeles at the time, James McIntyre, offered to provide a simultaneous translation system for the Council. (Some sources maintain that the offer was made by Cardinal Cushing, but several bishop-participants later reported that it was McIntyre, with his Hollywood connections, who offered first.) Regardless, the offer was refused by the curia because the General Sessions of the Council were to be secret and there was concern that word would leak out. Did the sessions remain “secret”?  Of course not!
  • Vatican II Presser

    Vatican II Presser

    Many countries held daily press briefings, in addition to the official Vatican briefings.  For the United States, these were often held at the Pontifical North American College.  Other countries held frequent press briefings, just not on a daily basis.  Frequently these “pressers” contained information that was at odds with the official press offering, or they provided additional details.

  • Early on, the US bishops’ conference (then known as the National Catholic Welfare Conference), began assembling daily summaries of key events, interviews and interventions (speeches) from the day’s activities.  These were eventually put together as “Council Daybooks” and were published by the NCWC.  The Foreword gives some insight into the process.  I apologize in advance for the length of the quote, but read this in light of current events at the Synod,  I’ve highlighted certain interesting passages:

Council DaybookFrom various sources requests have come to the NCWC to gather as soon as possible into one volume whatever information is available covering the day-to-day proceedings of the Second Vatican Council.  One of the distinctive features of the present council in contrast to all preceding ones was the prompt reporting of each day’s activities, including a summary statement of each speech delivered in the aula of St. Peter’s.  The correspondents of the NCWC News Service had access to the official press releases each day by early afternoon, and were able to supplement the record by the discussions which took place at the meeting of the daily press panel.  The representatives of the various international news media, especially those from the United States, queried the “periti” or experts who had been present at the morning congregations of the council, and were in consequence able to fill in any lacunae which might have occurred and also to clear up any obscurities in the official releases.

The bishops of the United States had the benefit of receiving each evening or early the next morning a mimeographed copy of these reports.  It was the general, one might say even the unanimous judgment of the United States hierarchy that this was an invaluable service.  It enabled the bishops to review in substance the speeches or the interventions made each day, with more leisure to evaluate the various contributions made to the subject under debate. . . .

I would also point out that in interviews I conducted with several bishops who attended the sessions of the Council, they remarked that almost no Council Father from any country knew Latin sufficiently to follow the actual Latin interventions as they were being given.  The bishops noted that they knew Latin well enough to celebrate Mass and the sacraments, but not well enough to follow particular speeches in real time, especially when the Latin was spoken in such a variety of different accents from around the world!  Therefore, these daily working translations and summaries were invaluable.

  • Bishops disagreed frequently and in public on the matters under discussion.  This was helpful in sorting out the nuances of every position being taken.  It was unusual to see such things, but I don’t recall anyone being scandalized by it.  As I’ve blogged before, the almost violent disagreements that most of the world’s bishops had with the way Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani was running the Holy Office (the precursor to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) were quite open and frank.  They were not unlike the public disagreements now seen between Cardinals Burke and Kasper.
  • John in TimeLong debates were held, often in public, over the meaning of specific words and passages in the the draft documents, and sometimes parts of those drafts were available to the public.  Robert Blair Kaiser, the Rome bureau chief for Time Magazine during the Council, recounts the many cocktail and dinner parties he and his wife hosted in their apartment for the Council Fathers and the periti.  He loves to tell of the conversations groups of bishops would have, debating and arguing over the text they were considering, and sometimes even going into a room and finding a group of them drafting a revised text.
  • The speeches at the Council were only the tip of the information iceberg.  For more bishop submitted their own interventions and emendations to the draft documents in written form, and so just listening to the speeches alone would never give the full story.  That would only be known sometimes days later, when all of the written interventions had been studied.
  • Just as now, people around the world could not get enough news about the Council.  The fact that the Council had been called specifically to “update” the Church (St. John XXIII’s aggiornamento) was exciting in itself!  How would they do this?  What would they do?  Writing from Rome, an American professor of Moral Theology shared his behind-the-scenes experiences with family and friends back home.  They encouraged him to submit similar accounts to the The New Yorker, and they became regular columns known as “Letters from Vatican City.”  To protect himself and his family, he wrote under the nom-de-plume “Xavier Rynne”.  For years the real identity of Xavier Rynne was as much an exciting mystery as the identity of “Deep Throat” would be years later during the Watergate scandal (Many people who knew him, however, had little trouble figuring it out: Fr. Francis X. Murphy used his middle name Xavier and his mother’s maiden name Rynne.) Many figures at the Council, particularly among the curia, were not amused by his writing, since he pulled no punches about the inner workings of what was going on.

There are countless other examples, but these make my point: RELAX, people!  This is all part of the process, warts and all.  We have the “benefit” today of instantaneous communication via electronic media to a level unknown during the Council, and we have the “benefit” of so many “experts” who really are not, except in their own minds.  Everyone has opinions; few have the facts.  And what is most important: this is only the beginning of the end of Act One of the overall synodal process initiated by Pope Francis.

“Pace, pace”: Peace, my sisters and brothers, peace!