I. Introduction: What is Synodality?
At a ceremony commemorating the 50th anniversary of the institution of the Synod of Bishops in 2015 Pope Francis spoke of a synodal Church as ‘a Church which listens, [and] which realises that listening “is more than simply hearing.” (Cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 171). It is a mutual listening in which everyone has something to learn. The faithful people, the college of bishops, the Bishop of Rome: all listening to each other, and all listening to the Holy Spirit, the “Spirit of truth” (Jn 14:17), in order to know what he “says to the Churches” (Rev 2:7)’.Footnote 1 This is Francis’ vision: ‘It is precisely this path of synodality which God expects of the Church of the third millennium’.Footnote 2
Synodality, however, is a contested topic. While, on the one hand, it is hard to be ‘against’ synodality given its roots in our tradition, on the other hand, there are voices within the Church who believe the term can be misinterpreted and presented as a kind of parallel authority, separate to the hierarchy, which leads to a ‘flattening’ of the Church. Instead of the diversity of charisms, where each person has his or her proper role, we end up with a majoritarian mass that undermines the proper functioning of the Church.Footnote 3
So, what is synodality? Between 2014 and 2017 the International Theological Commission undertook a study of synodality in the life and mission of the Church. The final text of the Commission was published in 2018 with the approval of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and received a favourable response from Pope Francis. It speaks of the ‘programmatic commitment’ of the pope to synodality as ‘an essential dimension of the Church’ in the sense that ‘what the Lord is asking of us is already in some sense present in the very word “synod”’.Footnote 4
‘Synod,’ the document says, ‘is an ancient and venerable word in the Tradition of the Church’. ‘Composed of a preposition συν (with) and the noun όδός (path), it indicates the path along which the People of God walk together… In ecclesiastical Greek it expresses how the disciples of Jesus were called together as an assembly and in some cases it is a synonym for the ecclesial community’. In the words of St. John Chrysostom, the Church is a ‘name standing for “walking together” (σύνοδος)’ (SLMC, 3).
Since the first centuries, the word ‘synod’ has been applied, with a specific meaning, to ecclesial assemblies convoked on various levels (diocesan, provincial, regional, patriarchal or universal). The distinction between ‘council’ and ‘synod’ is a recent one. In Vatican II the terms were synonymous – both referring to a Council session. The term ‘synodality’ is a neologism that has appeared since Vatican II and is something that has been maturing in the ecclesial consciousness ever since (SLMC, 5).
The ecclesiology of Vatican II stressed ‘the common dignity and mission of all the baptised’ in exercising the variety and richness of their charisms, vocations and ministries. It is an ecclesiology of communion. In this context, synodality is the specific modus vivendi et operandi of the Church, the People of God. Such communion is manifest ‘when all her members journey together, gather in assembly and take an active part in her evangelising mission’ (SLMC, 6).
The document presents the apostolic Council of Jerusalem (cf. Acts 15, and also Galatians 2,1-10) as the paradigm for Synods celebrated by the Church: ‘By all listening to the Holy Spirit through the witness given of God's action and by each giving his own judgment, initially divergent opinions move towards consensus and unanimity (όμοθυμαδόν: cf. 15.25)’ (SLMC 21). Such communal discernment bears fruit in the evangelising mission of the Church. The way the Council of Jerusalem operated is an excellent example of how the People of God moves forward – in an orderly and well thought out manner – and where each person has a specific position and role (SLMC 22).
When it comes to the witness of the Fathers and Tradition in the First Millennium, the document refers to Ignatius of Antioch and Cyprian of Carthage. The former spoke of how all members [of the various local Churches] are σύνοδοι or ‘companions on the journey’ by virtue of the dignity of their baptism and friendship with Christ, while the latter formulated the episcopal and synodal principle that should rule the life and mission of the Church locally and at a universal level: ‘while nothing should be done in the local Church without the Bishop - nihil sine episcopo - it is equally true that nothing should be done without your council (the Presbyters & Deacons) - nihil sine consilio vestro - or without the consensus of the people - et sine consensu plebis’ (SLMC 25).
From the fourth century onwards, apart from major ecumenical Councils such as Nicea (325), there were also local and provincial Synods comprised normally of bishops but in some cases with the participation of the whole community (SLMC, 30). With the development of the synodal procedure two points would be stressed: i) the specific primacy of the Church of Rome and ii) the importance of communion between the Churches or, put differently, that ‘each local Church is an expression of the one Catholic Church’ (SLMC, 28).
The synodal procedure was kept alive in the Second Millennium through Cathedral Chapters, while the Council of Trent established the norm that diocesan or local Synods should take place annually, provincial Synods every three years, as a way of implementing the Council's reforms in the wider Church. Saint Charles Borromeo, for example, as Archbishop of Milan convoked five provincial and eleven diocesan Synods (SLMC, 35). However, such synods did not involve the participation of the whole People of God. Rather, in the polemical and apologetical Counter-Reformation culture of the time, the hierarchical nature of the Church was accentuated: the Pope and the Bishops represented the ecclesia docens; the rest of the People of God, the ecclesia discens (SLMC, 35). The First Vatican Council (1869-70) would endorse this position – emphasising the primacy and infallibility of the Pope (SLMC, 37).Footnote 5 Nevertheless, ‘there was a growing awareness that “the Church is not identical with her pastors; … and that lay people have an active role in the transmission of the apostolic faith”’ (SLMC, 39).Footnote 6
Vatican II would relaunch the notion of synodality in its dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium (1964) with its vision of the Church as communion and as the ‘People of God on pilgrimage through history towards the heavenly homeland, in which all members are by virtue of baptism honoured with the same dignity and appointed to the same mission’ (SLMC, 40). The decree Christus Dominus (1965) encouraged the establishment of a pastoral Council in every Diocese, the reinvigoration of Synods and Councils between Churches in a region, and the promotion of Episcopal Conferences. Pope Paul VI, for his part, helped to revitalise synodal practice through the institution of the Synod of Bishops as a ‘permanent Council of Bishops for the universal Church’.Footnote 7
Towards a Theology of Synodality
In its second chapter, the document develops a theology of synodality. Its starting-point is synodality as ‘an essential dimension of the Church’ exemplified in the paradigmatic Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15: 4–29) and its ‘method of communitarian and apostolic discernment… Synodality is not simply a working procedure, but the particular form in which the Church lives and operates’ (SLMC, 42, italics mine). It denotes the particular style that qualifies the life and mission of the Church, expressing her nature as the People of God journeying together, gathering in assembly, and putting into practice ways of fulfilling its mission. In other words, synodality is lived out in the Church in the service of mission.
Synodality is also an expression of the ecclesiology of communion and the ‘pilgrim’ character of the Church. ‘The faithful are σύνοδοι, companions on the journey’, the People of God gathered from among the nations (Acts 2,1-9; 15,14) (SLMC, 49 and 55). Indeed, all the faithful have been gifted with an instinct of faith - sensus fidei - which helps them discern what is truly of God. The sensus fidei is the presence of the Spirit in the lives of Christians endowing them with ‘a certain connaturality with divine realities, and a wisdom which enables them to grasp those realities intuitively’ (Evangelii Gaudium, 119).
If synodality is an essential dimension of the Church, then it ought to be expressed in the Church's ordinary way of living and working. The three phases of synodal development are listening, deciding and acting. This happens ‘through the community listening to the Word and celebrating the Eucharist, the brotherhood of communion and the co-responsibility and participation of the whole People of God in its life and mission, on all levels and distinguishing between various ministries and roles’. Specifically, synodality ‘denotes those structures and ecclesial processes … involving the whole People of God in various ways on local, regional and universal levels, … to discern the way forward … and to take particular decisions and directions with the aim of fulfilling its evangelising mission’ (SLMC, 70).
II. Implementing Synodality
The third chapter reflects on ways of putting synodality into practice. This involves not only consultation of the faithful but their active participation. The previous chapter had described a synodal Church as ‘a Church of participation and co-responsibility. In exercising synodality she is called to give expression to the participation of all, according to each one's calling… Participation is based on the fact that all the faithful are qualified and called to serve each other through the gifts they have all received from the Holy Spirit’ (SLMC, 67). Thus any renewal of the Church's synodal life ‘demands that we initiate processes for consulting the entire People of God’ (SLMC, 65). Distinguishing between consultative and deliberative votes should not detract from the profound synodal dynamic of the whole community ‘called together to pray, listen, analyse, dialogue, discern and offer advice on taking pastoral decisions’ (SLMC, 68) for their particular situation. At the same time the document underlines the ‘function of governing proper to Pastors: The synodal process must take place at the heart of a hierarchically structured community’ (SLMC, 69), while the ‘authority of Pastors is a specific gift of the Spirit of Christ the Head for the upbuilding of the entire Body, not a delegated and representative function of the people’ (SLMC, 67).
An obstacle to the participation of the lay faithful is ‘a clerical mindset which runs the risk of keeping them on the edges of ecclesial life’ and away from decision making (SLMC, 73, Evangelii Gaudium, 102). The opposite of synodality is clericalism.Footnote 8 This manifests itself in a refusal to be open to the creation of synodal structures, inspired by Vatican II, where the lay faithful can express themselves. After all the first level in which synodality operates is at the local level – it begins in the parish (SLMC, 83–84).Footnote 9 The chapter speaks not only of synodal structures – diocesan, regional and universal – but of a ‘synodal style’ that facilitates discernment of pastoral challenges and seeks together new ways of mission (SLMC, 77). And this same synodal style applies on a national and universal level – from Episcopal Conferences to the College of Bishops to Ecumenical Councils. Such a style is reflected in processes of consultation that aim to reach ‘all the voices that are an expression of the People of God in the local Church’ (SLMC, 79).
Chapter Four speaks of the necessary pastoral conversion required for the implementation of synodality: ‘Some paradigms … still present in ecclesiastical culture need to be quashed, because they express an understanding of the Church that has not been renewed by the ecclesiology of communion. These include: the concentration of responsibility for mission in the ministry of Pastors; insufficient appreciation of the consecrated life and charismatic gifts; rarely making use of the specific and qualified contribution of the lay faithful, including women, in their areas of expertise’ (SLMC, 105). On the other hand, ‘an ecclesial mentality shaped by synodal thinking joyfully welcomes and promotes the grace in virtue of which all the baptised are qualified and called to be missionary disciples’ (SLMC, 104). This is the circular dynamic of synodality referred to a number of times in the document ‘between the ministry of Pastors, the participation and co-responsibility of lay people, [and] the stimulus coming from the charismatic gifts’ (SLMC, 106a).
The ‘synodal spirit’ or paradigm shift outlined above can only emerge from a profound conversion to what the document describes as a ‘spirituality of communion’, where there is a transition from an ‘“I” understood in a self-centred way to the ecclesial “we”’, where every Christian understands him/herself as living and journeying ‘with his or her brothers and sisters as a responsible and active agent of the one mission of the People of God’ (SLMC, 107). This synodal spirit requires certain dispositions: ‘a trust and openness’, a mature sense of faith (sensus fidei), and a thinking with the Church (sentire cum ecclesia) (SLMC, 107–108). Specific elements that nourish the affectus synodalis include: creating and fostering a Eucharistic communion which is a reflection of the Trinitarian communion; acknowledging our failures, and a desire for reconciliation (‘Synodal events presume that we recognise our frailties and request forgiveness from each other’); listening to the Word of God in order to illuminate our path (‘before listening to each other, disciples must listen to the Word’); and mission – synodality exists for the sake of mission: every synodal event prompts the Church to move outwards, ‘towards everyone in order to go together towards God’ (SLMC, 109).
The document concludes with an emphasis on dialogue and discernment. ‘Synodal dialogue depends on courage both in speaking and in listening. It is not about engaging in a debate where one speaker tries to get the better of the others or counters their positions with brusque arguments …’ (SLMC, 111). An attitude of humility and the principle that ‘unity prevails over conflict’ can help build communion amid tensions and disagreement. Finally, it insists that ‘exercising discernment is at the heart of synodal processes and events’ (SLMC, 113). While not spelling out the principle and methods of such discernment, it is clear these must go beyond the personal level to include communal discernment processes that help us ‘discover God's call in a particular historical situation’ (SLMC 113).
III. Appraisal and Reflection: The Challenge of Synodality
There is much to commend in the document: a helpful overview of the development of the term ‘synodality’ – its historical development East and West and how synodality is not restricted to the modus operandi of the Synods of Bishops or Episcopal conferences but applies to all the baptised exercising differing vocations within the Christian community. It correctly identifies a synodal dynamic on three levels: the local, national and universal. Clearly, the Commission is drawing inspiration from Pope Francis, who has revived the term and is committed to building a more synodal Church. The document is trying to capture this idea, namely, that synodality represents a new way of being Church, more participatory and dialogical, more merciful and listening, more decentralised and with greater involvement of people at the local level and the periphery,Footnote 10 and more aware of the diversity of charisms at the service of mission and evangelisation.Footnote 11 Synodality, for Francis, implies not only fraternity, listening, and collaboration, but is part of a wider agenda of reform – including reform of the Roman Curia, of Bishops’ Synods, and of the papacy itself.
As with many Vatican documents, this one, too, remains at the more general and aspirational level. The practical implications for the various national Churches will need to be teased out at the local level. In other words, the document will have to be ‘translated’ into different ecclesial contexts. Synodality begins at home. An analogy might be made with the recent document on priestly formation, The Gift of Priestly Vocation. On the basis of this charter each country or jurisdiction is to devise its own national plan or Ratio taking into account its particular situation and challenges. With regard to implementing synodality there are a number of efforts currently in train. The Australian Church, for example, is holding a Plenary CouncilFootnote 12 in 2020 against a backdrop of clerical sexual abuse and the jailing of Cardinal Pell. Both synodality and the scandal of abuse entail a commitment to transformation ‘of all members, processes and structures of the Church’.Footnote 13 A commitment to synodal transformation requires journeying, creativity and responsibility. On this journey, Francis reminds us, the ‘organs of communion’ in the local Church (e.g., the presbyteral council, the college of consultors, chapters of canons, and the pastoral council) must ‘keep connected to the “base” and start from people and their daily problems’.Footnote 14 Only then can a synodal Church begin to take place. This reflects Francis’ ecclesiology of the ‘inverted pyramid’, where ‘the top is located beneath the base’, and where the ‘only authority is the authority of service’.Footnote 15 It is in line too with the fundamental reorientation of ecclesiology at Vatican II (Lumen Gentium, Chapter Two) that put an end to the pyramidal vision of the Church, stressing instead the fundamental equality of all believers by virtue of their baptism. In short, synodal transformation is a commitment of dioceses to co-responsibility and action. As one US bishop put it:
This future will ask much of us, … We will need to collaborate and work together in new ways, come to a much deeper level of co-responsibility for the life of the whole diocese, surrender any parochialism, competition or isolation that keeps us divided, break out of the torpor that often says, “We've always done it this way,” shatter the complacency that can keep us in a spiritual rut, and be more proactive and inviting in our evangelization efforts. If we do not embrace such a vision, our local Church will simply continue a slow and steady slide towards a painful diminishment of the faith in our people.Footnote 16
In promoting the synodal calling of the whole people of God, the document speaks much of the consultation and participation of the laity, who ‘are the immense majority of the People of God’ (SLMC, 73). Drawing on Vatican II's Lumen Gentium, 12, it encourages synodal assemblies ‘to listen more broadly and more attentively’ to the sensus fidei or instinct of faith of the People of God (SLMC, 100). This instinct of faith is a gift of the Spirit helping Christians discern what is truly of God. It ‘gives Christians a certain connaturality with divine realities, and a wisdom which enables them to grasp those realities intuitively’ (SLMC, 56 citing Evangelii Gaudium, 119). This ‘connaturality’ or interior affinity with the object of faith shows itself in a ‘sentire cum ecclesia’: a capacity to feel, sense and perceive in harmony with the Church.
The theme of ‘sensus fidei’ has been a disputed topic since Vatican II. The phrase used in Vatican II's Lumen Gentium,12 was ‘sensus fidei totius populi’. If synodal processes desire to consult as widely as possible, then the sense of faith not only of committed believers but also of those who are on the periphery, the ecclesially liminal, needs to be heard.Footnote 17 These include: the poor, those who are ambivalent towards, or dissent from, aspects of Church teaching, the separated and divorced, and LGBT persons. Like Yves Congar, Francis is aware that many reforms come from the periphery.Footnote 18 The qualifier totius is now being taken with greater seriousness from theologians and pastors alike, acknowledging that the sensus fidei pertains to all the faithful, and that the Church has much to learn from the experience of its sceptical and alienated members. In short, the sensus fidei is present in every Christian who struggles to make sense of, and practice, her faith. To this extent, the document could have done with more of a cutting edge, but like most such documents it reflects a theological compromise. Its authors would have been aware that the sensus fidelium, not unlike synodality, can be used as a kind of lobbying or pressure tactic pitting the laity against the hierarchy. But bishops also share in the sensus fidelium. Nevertheless, the process of discerning and determining the sensus or consensus fidei involves a degree of tension, disagreement and conflict – even among bishops themselves, as recent Synods have shown. Francis is unfazed by this. He encouraged and approved of the open discussions and debates at the 2014 and 2015 synods.Footnote 19 He believes in the synodal process as a collective search for the truth, not one where majority rules, but where the aim is to allow a common will to emerge in the Church.
Ecclesial conflicts are not new. The ITC document referred to the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15:7) as an example of an early hermeneutical conflict, where, after much debate, a consensus fidelium was reached. In the words of Australian theologian, Ormond Rush, ‘dialogue is the means through which the Spirit communicates’.Footnote 20 Helpful too is the distinction made by Cardinal Luis Tagle between ‘problems’ and ‘dilemmas’: Problems can be solved but dilemmas don't have clear and universal solutions.Footnote 21 Part of the journey towards a more synodal modus operandi in the Church will involve bishops and theologians listening to how the faithful have faced dilemmas, namely, listening to them ‘tell their stories’, how they are trying to make sense of the Gospel, their sensus fidei, as it were. In such situations people are not looking for solutions but for meaning, encouragement and hope.
In discussing the implementation of synodality it is regrettable the ITC document did not give more explicit attention to the issue of women's participation and leadership in the Church. In Francis’s battle to overcome clericalism and the culture of abuse to which it gave rise – abuse of power, abuse of conscience and sexual abuse – women and young people have a key role to play. Developing synodal and collegial practices in the Church implies the active participation of laity in its decision-making processes.Footnote 22 Specifically, there have been growing calls for the ordination of women to the diaconate and to leadership positions in dioceses and curial congregations.
The importance of listening to new and different voices, of trying to understand rather than rejecting and censoring them, will be crucial if synodal processes are to have a reforming impact on Church teaching and practice. Engaging with a multitude of perspectives and voices is to acknowledge that ‘the sensus fidelium can be an important factor in the development of doctrine’ and that ‘the magisterium as a whole does not have responsibility for [the faith]’.Footnote 23 It is to see in the sensus fidelium a true locus theologicus or ‘conscience of the Church’, as Greek theology puts it, that not only has pastoral value but a formal authority that can lead to shifts in magisterial discourse and teaching. For example, this would mean listening to the experience and testimony of committed gay and lesbian believers, to their sensus fidei.Footnote 24 While Francis has moved away from the policy of anathematizing the dissenter, and has acknowledged how leadership has erred, the official Church teaching on the gay issue still borders on a ‘theology of contempt’.Footnote 25 In an earlier document on the Sensus fidei in the Life of the Church (2014), cited above, the International Theological Commission recognised that the majority of the faithful can be indifferent to or reject particular doctrinal or moral teachings but they might not always be to blame: ‘… In some cases it may indicate that certain decisions have been taken by those in authority without due consideration of the experience and the sensus fidei of the faithful, or without sufficient consultation of the faithful by the magisterium’ (n.123).
The neuralgic issue is how to determine the sensus fidei. Whose sensus? Which fidelium? Synodality tells us that this is a process that takes time and demands patience. It cannot be forced or rushed. While the sensus fidei is not a synonym for public opinion – it must be the truth rather than majority opinion that prevails – synodality commits the Church to real engagement with all members of the Church.Footnote 26 We do this ‘by discerning with our people and never for our people or without our people’.Footnote 27 It entails a processive, participative, and dialogical search for truth acknowledging there is not one uniform sensus fidelium but many – the sensus fidelium can exist in the plural.Footnote 28 The Spirit, Francis believes, conducts and unifies this symphony of different sounds and harmonies.
But is this picture too idealistic? Yes, and No. Yes, in that the document on synodality does not refer to the current reality of polarisation within the Church, to what has been described as ‘the newly fractured Catholicism, at least in the Euro-Western hemisphere’.Footnote 29 This intra-Catholic polarisation often mirrors a political polarisation and tends to revolve around issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage. How is the sensus fidelium determined against a backdrop of opposing understandings of Catholicism? No, in that the synodal process offers a way forward beyond polarisation – a journey that, as Francis described at the conclusion of the 2014 synod, has ‘moments of consolation and grace’ but ‘also moments of desolation, of tensions and temptations’.Footnote 30 For him, the synodal process is the concrete form of a decentralised ecclesiology of communion marked by a participatory style and real debate. It is not about finding ‘exhaustive solutions for all the difficulties’ facing the Church; nor is it about demonizing those with whom we disagree, for ‘even people who can be considered dubious on account of their errors have something to offer which must not be overlooked’.Footnote 31 This means living with the tensions and conflicts and allowing mature solutions to emerge over time rather than yielding to the temptation of the quick-fix. In the final document of the Amazon synod Francis laid the groundwork for reform. If he disappointed some by side-stepping (for now) the hot-button issues of women deacons and the ordination of married men, neither did he silence the discussion. He puts greater faith in the local Church and does not insist the magisterium must intervene to settle every doctrinal, moral and pastoral dispute. At the same time, in his recent letter to the German bishops, who are also engaged in a synodal process, he underlined two points: i) the synodal path of personal and ecclesial renewal must be linked to the Church's central task of evangelisation and be guided by the Holy Spirit; and ii) any process of synodal renewal must guard against the twin dangers of polarisation and fragmentation by means of a strong sensus ecclesiae and connectedness to the universal Church.Footnote 32
‘Realities are greater than ideas’ is an oft-quoted line of Pope Francis. Archbishop Blaise Cupich of Chicago, sees in this statement an invitation to ‘a new epistemology, a new way of learning, of knowing – another way in which we are informed. … It's important not to have just a 30,000 feet perspective on life but to really be there in the reality of the situation and pay attention to the observables right now around you’.Footnote 33 This is an appeal to link the doctrinal with the pastoral, a hermeneutical circle or spiral, whereby ‘we get a sense of the whole (in theological terms, the doctrinal perspective) by getting down into the detail (the pastoral perspective); and from the perspective of the detail, we have to form a revised and more “real” sense of the whole’.Footnote 34 This dynamic is well known in the Church: from earliest times it has had to creatively interpret the Gospel for new times and contexts.
More than once Francis has said that Catholics can turn to ‘other Christians’ to find in them ‘something of which we are in need’.Footnote 35 He mentions, for example, how Catholics can learn from ‘our Orthodox brothers and sisters’ about ‘the meaning of episcopal collegiality and their experience of synodality’.Footnote 36 While recent Orthodox-Catholic discussions on synodality and primacy would take us beyond the scope of this article, we can point to some learnings from the Anglican experience of synodality as highlighted in the recent agreed statement of the Third Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC III) – ‘Walking Together on the Way. Learning to Be the Church – Local, Regional, Universal’ (2017).Footnote 37
The document draws on the synodal metaphor of ‘walking together’ as pilgrim companions and the method of ‘receptive ecumenism’, whereby the emphasis is placed on what one's own tradition can learn from the partner in dialogue (rather than the other way around). The learning from the Catholic side is similar to many of the emphases we have seen with Francis: promoting decentralisation, open debate, and the need to give a greater hearing to a range of lay opinion. The document also develops and concretises the ITC document on synodality.
An underlying issue is how to understand ‘the interconnection between the local and the universal dimension of the Church today’ (WTW, 22). Although the document does not resolve the issue, it articulates a Catholic appreciation of ‘the Anglican practice of provincial diversity’ (WTW, 148), and ‘the significance of provinces’ (WTW, 123),Footnote 38 its ‘culture of open and frank debate’ (WTW, 157), and its ‘according a deliberative role to laity and clergy’ in synodal bodies (WTW, 122). It is not a question of idealising the ‘other’ tradition. The ‘parliamentary inheritance’ of synods in some Anglican provinces, for example, can lead to ‘an oppositional style of debate when that is not suited to the discernment of teaching, especially in relation to ethics’ (WTW, 100). While, on the Catholic side, the ‘instinct for unity can … result in the suppression of difference, the inhibiting of candid conversation, and the avoidance of contentious issues in open fora’ (WTW, 96). Moreover, decentralisation can lead to parochialism: Anglicans have noted how excessive provincial and juridical autonomy can undermine doctrinal cohesion and ‘the call to interdependence in communion’ (WTW, 137).
The situation in Ireland is one where the Irish bishops are currently discerning how best to move further along the synodal path outlined by Francis. Some dioceses have initiated synodal-type processes (e.g. Diocesan Assemblies), while the Diocese of Limerick held a synod in 2016, the first synod in Ireland in fifty years and involving over two years’s preparatory work. Some of the learning that has emerged is that ‘in a truly synodal experience the process is more important than the programme, the journey is greater than the destination, the lead-in more critical than the event’.Footnote 39 Francis’ cryptic principle: ‘Time is greater than space’
enables us to work slowly but surely, without being obsessed with immediate results. It helps us patiently to endure difficult and adverse situations, or inevitable changes in our plans. It invites us to accept the tension between fullness and limitation, and to give a priority to time.Footnote 40
And in Limerick the process itself was transformative – a process comprising listening, discerning and identifying key themes that would be discussed at the three-day Synod.Footnote 41 The outcome was a ten-year synodal plan for the diocese (2016-2026) designed to bring about change over a negotiable time period, and with progress reports available online. In the context of fewer priests, new models of leadership are being explored. The Limerick Synod was effectively a call to ‘a more mission-shaped Church’ and a rediscovery of ‘the vocation and responsibility of all the baptised’. It means not limiting the Church ‘to a parish made up of a small number of committed lay people in “churchy” roles’.Footnote 42 Rather, the vision of Church is that of a ‘Community of Communities’, including schools, hospitals, prisons, and nursing homes, as well as other, often new, religious associations, institutes and movements. The conviction is that the Church is only Church if it is there for others, going out, and creating, what Francis calls, a ‘culture of encounter’. The mission of the Church is not restricted to tasks within the Church but is ultimately about the transformation of society (Evangelii Gaudium, n. 102). Synodality, therefore, is not simply about reforming the inner life of the Church (ad intra) but about reinvigorating its outward thrust (ad extra).
So, while there are some reasons for hope, the challenge remains how to put the synodal ‘theory’ into practice. The laity's enthusiasm for synodal processes is not always matched by clerics. In Ireland we still retain a clerical model of Church and a service model of parish. Some bishops realise that this model is no longer appropriate nor in line with Pope Francis’s synodal vision. One bishop put it starkly: ‘The Catholic Church in Ireland is in the maelstrom of its gravest crisis in centuries’, and it is a crisis from within.Footnote 43 Yet Francis does not believe the solution to the Church's problems lies exclusively with structural, organisational, and administrative reform. He sees in this a concession to the current Zeitgeist – a ‘technocratic mentality’ or contemporary form of Pelagianism, whereas his stress is on spiritual renewal and evangelisation.Footnote 44 On the one hand, he aims to ‘promote a sound “decentralisation”’ (Evangelii Gaudium, 16) and bolster the governing and teaching authority of regional conferences of bishops (often citing these in his writings); on the other, he reminds local Churches that they are part of a bigger body – the Church universal. Church reform does not come overnight, he continues, but takes time to mature; it is a question of holding the tensions and imbalances together.Footnote 45 But should the spiritual and the structural be played off against each other?Footnote 46 Irish theologian, Gerry O'Hanlon, has suggested ‘a broadening and deepening of the synodal process in the Church’ and the introduction of ‘a deliberative and not just consultative model of synodality’.Footnote 47 That is still some way off.Footnote 48 Still there is a ‘quiet revolution’ taking place under Francis – one that gives due weight to the sense of all the faithful and is convinced that ‘a synodal Church is the Church of the future’.Footnote 49
