Sir, – Neil Bray raises some interesting issues in his critique (Letters, June 20th) of my Rite & Reason piece (“Catholic church struggling to have a conversation with itself”, June 13th).
Given that syondality traces its origins back to biblical times and the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15), given that in one form or another it was the predominant paradigm of ecclesial organization in the first millennium of Christianity, and given that it is now mandated by Pope Francis as the way of the church in the third millennium, it seems somewhat inaccurate to describe it in terms of an experiment, “lacking sufficient substantiation”.
Of course, since, unlike the Orthodox and the Anglicans, whom he also cites, we in the Catholic Church have largely lost the habit of synodality, it is true that we have much to re-learn, not least from the mistakes as well as the strong points in the practice of others.
Neil Bray is correct in suggesting that not all talking and listening is from the Holy Spirit: but the practice of communal discernment, at the heart of synodality, knows this and, again, this is a practice which we are having to relearn, requiring skill and patience.
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As to listening to minority voices, he is right to stress the value of this. The prophets were often lone voices. However, again, this has to be discerned: the “shifting sands of secular taste” may be difficult to negotiate but this is where a reading of the “signs of the times” and contemporary culture, which has been explicitly at the heart of Catholic teaching since the Church in the Modern World of Vatican II, is so essential.
Unless we engage with this culture we are in danger, as feared by the former Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin, of becoming “an irrelevant cultural minority”. Our desire not “to water down” the truth can sometimes be a recalcitrant laying on of burdens on the shoulders of those already overburdened.
This is where the notion of the “sense of the faith” comes in (which he states that I misrepresent but doesn’t say how).The Vatican document quoted in your editorial of June 20th (from the International Theological Commission) notes that we should be concerned when there is indifference to or rejection of church teaching (“non- reception”), and in such cases bishops should examine if such teaching needs clarification or reformulation.
This in some cases, with the help of theological expertise, will involve “a revision of previous positions”.
Cardinal Newman in his Consulting the Faithful and his Development of Doctrine had already, in the 19th century, laid the foundation for this understanding.
We are told that after the Council of Jerusalem, in which a burning controversy was resolved, involving learning from the pagan world and a revision of a prevision position, the news was received with peace and joy. Peace, joy and hope (all gifts of the Holy Spirit in the Christian understanding) were hallmarks of the recent pre-Synodal National Assembly in Athlone and Clonmacnoise (June 18th) when 160 participants spoke openly and listened respectfully, often disagreeing but always seeking a shared understanding, and united by their common faith in Jesus Christ. There is no need to be afraid of syondality.
Athlone was, rightly, conducted in the shadow of clerical and institutional abuse, and the “open wound” that this has inflicted on survivors and their families, as well as on the church itself.
For this reason and often for reasons around the non-reception of church teaching on sexuality and gender, many people today in Ireland, in particular young people, experience the severing of ties with the Catholic Church as emancipatory.
In this context, Catholics themselves often feel that they are viewed as not “normal people”.
It is interesting, then, that the latest novel from Sally Rooney, Beautiful World Where Are You? contains a sustained debate about ultimate questions, about God, about Jesus Christ and Christianity, as young adults now entering their thirties begin to ask if, behind the sexual freedom and the political options that affect those on the margins in particular, there is some more ultimate meaning.
A changed church, humbled and synodal, dialogical internally and externally, is in a better place to offer such people and wider Irish society the kind of contribution they may seek. – Yours, etc,
GERRY O’HANLON, SJ
Dublin 10.
Sir, – Patsy McGarry’s article “Catholics want change and they want it now” (Analysis, June 17th) and your editorial (“The Irish Times view on Catholic Church reform: in search of new ways”, June 20th) give a positive account of the synodal path being taken by the Catholic Church in Ireland.
On the face of it, this seems like good news for us in the church, but I fear many are being lead astray, believing a majority in favour of changing the practice or the teachings of the church is sufficient to effect change.
The often quoted “sensus fidelium”, taken to mean the belief of the faithful, does not refer solely to the members of the church alive in this world at present. The belief of the faithful refers to the practice and beliefs of all the members of the church at every time and place since the Apostles. The majority of the church is in the other world and how they practised and what they held as true shape our beliefs.
Their influence on us and their connectedness to us are what we call the communion of saints.
If a mere majority of present members of the church were sufficient to change the practice and beliefs of Catholics there would be no martyrs and no church at this point.
Catholicism continues to inspire the lives of millions of people because of its in-built protection against dominant cultures throughout its long history. – Yours, etc,
Fr GREGORY O’BRIEN,
Leixlip,
Co Kildare.