Archbishop Emeritus of Philadelphia Charles Chaput, OFMCap, has written some brief reflections addressed to the participants of the Synod on Synodality, noting that the most difficult problems for the Church today do not have to do with structures but with “what a human being really is.”
Writing for First Things in an article posted Oct. 6, the prelate responded to the question of what he would say to the synod delegates if he were there.
The former archbishop of Denver pointed out to the 450 participants that “the most difficult problems facing the Church today are not matters of ecclesial structure and process. They’re tied intimately to Psalm 8 and the question of who and what a human being really is. Do humans have a created nature? Are our bodies merely the disposable instruments of our appetites and will?”
The prelate warned that “a synodality that would ignore these issues, that might subordinate Christian faith to ambiguous social science and ‘paradigm shifts’ that focus away from the Church’s redemptive, supernatural mission, cannot serve her needs or her Lord.”
“At a minimum, synodality must never further divide her faithful at a time of internal confusion and grave external pressures,” he noted.
In his reflections, the American prelate also reminded the delegates that all their work must focus on “fidelity to Jesus Christ, to the Church, and to the Holy Father — in that order of priority.”
“Fidelity to Jesus Christ implies obedience to his witness and Word. Fidelity to the Church implies heartfelt support for her teaching. Fidelity to the Holy Father implies speaking the truth in love to each other and to him (Eph 4:11–16) in all of your synodal discussions,” wrote Chaput, who participated in three synods on previous occasions.
“For the Christian,” he said, “there can be no genuine love ungrounded in the truth of God’s word as recorded in the New Testament and preserved by the Church through time.”
After noting that every synod has “internal pressures toward sometimes unhelpful and predetermined ends,” Chaput told the delegates: “It’s the task of the delegate to remember that the Church belongs to Jesus Christ; she is his Church first” and that the faithful are children of the Church, “not her architects….”
From Catholic News Agency
God bless Abp. emeritus Chaput. He deserved his rightful Red Hat, as a Cardinal. We have far too many bad clerics today, wearing Red Hats, eligible to elect the next pope– or to be elected as one.
I think a discerning church should spend time listening to everyone in order to discern better what the Holy Spirit is trying to say to us. Spiritual and doctrinal and pastoral discernment are important qualities for the church’s ministers to have. When we properly discern a course of action that is God-inspired, we will give life and love to God’s people. But the key thing to realize is that discernment never ends because life never ends and things and times and people always change. So there is always something new and different to enter into discernment about. The church cannot pronounce once and for all — that would be contrary to discernment. No, the church must listen, discern, love and move forward. Always forward. Always love. Always listen. And always discern.
There is much that the Church is required to pronounce once and forever.
The Synod is trying to discern from the Holy Spirit how to spread the Gospel, the Faith, the Moral teachings, Prayer.
It is not making new teachings but about how to share God’s Life and Love with everyone.
“… that would be contrary to discernment. …” I guess what bothers me most about your post is that you never define the word “discernment,” even though it represents for you the great arbiter of truth.
always discern, yes, you should always be discerning but not about revealed truth. Truth needs to be accepted. Then what do you do with that truth?
Jesus asks us to spread it. This requires discernment. To whom and how should I approach them.
There are people on Tiktok who pay people $50 to answer Bible questions or tell him a quote from the Bible.
I wish we had tracts like some of the fundamentalists do.
There were people when I was growing up who would leave the Sinners Prayer everywhere they went-at tables in restaurants, benches at the Mall, in grocery carts.
All are welcome to become Catholic but how do we tell people that? But conversely, not everyone can become Catholic because they have to believe what we believe. And many people don’t or won’t.
Maybe the next Synod can be about the human person. This is one about the Mission of the Church, Communion in the Church and Participation in the Church.
It is kind of ridiculous to advise the Synod. They have a huge working document that they are going through. They have Mass and prayer. They have been asked to listen to the Holy Spirit.
A Communion that radiates
B 1.1 How does the service of charity and commitment to justice and
care for our common home nourish communion in a synodal Church?
B 1.2 How can a synodal Church make credible the promise that
“love and truth will meet” (Ps 85:11)?
B 1.3 How can a dynamic relationship of gift exchange
between the Churches grow?
B 1.4 How can a synodal Church fulfil its mission
through a renewed ecumenical commitment?
B 1.5 How can we recognize and gather the richness of cultures and develop
dialogue amongst religions in the light of the Gospel?
You left out what Jimmy Martin is discussing at his table about gay welcoming, aka blessing gay unions.
Oh my gosh. His X account today has a picture of him with Cardinal Muller talking about how he admires him for being a friend with the ‘father of liberation theology”, Gustavo Gutierrez who Muller co-authored a book with.
How can we waste time and money in a useless and dangerous synod?
What a ridiculous Synod. There is no listening at all. And no one is honestly open to the Holy Spirit. What a big laugh. It is all pre-arranged, set up, with pre-determined agendas and results. Basically, the liberal crackpots want a big LGBTQ Mass and changes in the Catechism to accept and bless gay couples. And to forever dump the old, traditional Catechism, and dump the ancient traditional Latin Tridentine Mass. And no Church discipline. Do as you please. That right there, is against the Holy Spirit. The liberal crackpots probably won’t get what they want, though. They will just waste time, complain about the true teachings of the Church, complain about the Church not welcoming unchaste LGBTQs, as well as not “welcoming” irresponsible, sinful Catholic communicants who are divorced/remarried without Church annulments, and other dumb things– and waste more time, and try to discourage everyone from the practice of the True Faith. This is a fake Church Synod. Everyone knows, that a real Church Synod includes only the Bishops of the Church– and perhaps a few laymen who are esteemed experts in certain fields, who may be invited to offer some perspectives on certain things. An Orthodox Church Patriarch spoke about that recently, on the news. It just once again reminds everyone what a real Synod is supposed to be. An American high school girl from a youth group is certainly not capable of being considered as an equal, falsely, to her Bishop, at a Synod.
That is absolutely not what is happening at the Synod.
This so-called “Synod” is a big waste of time.
I have been watching, on EWTN, the life story of the great Jesuit missionary to Russia, Fr. Walter Ciszek, S.J., and his courageous labors as a priest, and great sufferings in Russia. Captured and imprisoned by the Russian Communists, he was finally released from his imprisonment and sufferings in the Russian Siberian labor camps in 1963, in an American-Russian prisoner exchange, and came back to America. His release was negotiated by JFK, one month prior to his assassination. I remember Fr. Ciszek’s famous book, “With God in Russia,” published in 1964. His Cause for Canonization was recently opened. As he said, the Russian people, though brainwashed by the atheist Communists, never really became atheists, and never truly lost their Faith. Many did what they could, to keep their religious Faith alive, during the atheist Communists’ persecutions, and secretly passed on the Faith to their children, as best they could. And Fr. Ciszek did much to help Russian Catholics! Today, the beautiful, holy Catholic Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Moscow has been re-opened and renovated back to its original state, before the brutal Communist takeover. And the Russian Catholic seminary has been re-opened in St. Petersburg! Immediately, it was filled with 80 seminarians, many from Russian families who secretly held onto their Catholic Faith, and passed it on to their children, during the severe, atheist Communist persecutions. It just made me cry! Faithless, Godless, immoral post-Conciliar Jesuits of today– like Fr. James Martin, Jesuits in the Vatican, Jesuits like Cardinal Hollerich at the Synod on Synodality, Jesuit university presidents and professors, the Jesuits who run “America” magazine– and many more– ought to all give up their Roman collars and their fake priesthood– and let the REAL Jesuits come back, and be our saintly Church leaders! Maybe some true Jesuits would have their own Causes for Canonization someday opened– and some may even become real Saints! Would just love to see that! No more persecution and suppression of Christs’s True Jesuits and His True Church.
B 2. Co-responsibility in Mission
B 2.1 How can we walk together towards a shared awareness of the meaning
and content of mission?
B 2.2 What should be done so a synodal Church is also an ‘all ministerial’
missionary Church?
B 2.3 How can the Church of our time better fulfil its mission through greater
recognition and promotion of the baptismal dignity of women?
B 2.4 How can we properly value ordained Ministry in its relationship with
baptismal Ministries in a missionary perspective?
B 2.5 How can we renew and promote the Bishop’s ministry from a missionary
synodal perspective?