Extract from Pope Francis’ final greeting on receiving the Final Document of the Synod
“I do not intend to publish an Apostolic Exhortation. What we have approved is sufficient.
The document already contains very concrete indications
that can guide the mission of the Churches in their specific continents and contexts.
That is why I am making it immediately available to all
That is why I said that it should be published.
In this way, I wish to acknowledge the value of the Synodal journey which has been accomplished and which,
by means of this Document, I entrust to the holy and faithful People of God”
XVI ORDINARY GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE SYNOD OF BISHOPS
Second Session (2-27 October 2024) For a Synodal Church:
Communion, Participation, Mission
Final Document
WORKING TRANSLATION
26 October 20241
Table of Contents
Abbreviations .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3
Part I – The Heart of Synodality
Called by the Holy Spirit to Conversion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
The Church as the People of God, Sacrament of Unity .. . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
The Sacramental Roots of the People of God . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Meaning and Dimensions of Synodality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Unity as Harmony. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Synodal Spirituality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15
Synodality as Prophetic in Today’s World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16
Part II – On the Boat Together
The Conversion of Relationships 17
New Relationships . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
In a Plurality of Contexts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Charisms, Vocations and Ministries for Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .19
Ordained Ministers at the Service of Harmony . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Together for Mission .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Part III – Cast the Net
The Conversion of Processes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28
Ecclesial Discernment for Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
The Structure of the Decision-making Process .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Transparency, Accountability and Evaluation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32
Synodality and Participatory Bodies ... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34
Part IV – An Abundant Catch
The Conversion of Bonds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
Firmly Rooted yet Pilgrims . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
The Exchange of Gifts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
The Bonds of Unity: Episcopal Conferences and Ecclesial Assemblies . 40
The Service of the Bishop of Rome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Part V – “So I Send You”
Forming a People for Missionary Discipleship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46
Conclusion
A Feast for All Peoples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .150
Abbreviations
AA VATICAN COUNCIL II, Decr. Apostolicam Actuositatem (18 November 1965)AG VATICAN COUNCIL II, Decr. Ad Gentes (7 December 1965)CCEO Codex canonum Ecclesiarum Orientalium (18 October 1990)CD VATICAN COUNCIL II, Decr. Christus Dominus (28 October 1965)CIC Codex iuris canonici (25 January 1983)CV BENEDICT XVI, Enc. Lett. Caritas in Veritate (29 June 2009)DCS GENERAL SECRETARIAT OF THE SYNOD, Document for the Continental Stage (27.10.2022)DD FRANCIS, Ap. Lett. Desiderio Desideravi (29 June 2022)DN FRANCIS, Enc. Lett. Dilexit Nos (24 October 2024)DV VATICAN COUNCIL II, Const. Dogm. Dei Verbum (18 November 1965)FT FRANCIS, Enc. Lett. Fratelli Tutti (3 October 2020)EG FRANCIS, Ap. Exhort. Evangelii Gaudium (24 November 2013)GS VATICAN COUNCIL II, Past. Const. Gaudium et spes (7 December 1965)ITC INTERNATIONAL THEOLOGICAL COMMISSION, Synodality in the Life and
Mission of the Church (2 March 2018)
LG VATICAN COUNCIL II, Dogm. Const. Lumen Gentium (21 November 1964)
LS FRANCIS, Enc. Lett. Laudato Si’ (24 May 2015)
MC S. PAUL VI, Ap. Exhort. Marialis Cultus (2 February 1974)
NMI S. JOHN PAUL II, Ap. Lett. Novo Millennio Ineunte (6 January 2001)
PE FRANCIS, Ap. Const. Praedicate Evangelium (19 March 2022)
SC VATICAN COUNCIL II, Const. Sacrosanctum Concilium (4 December 1963)
SRS S. JOHN PAUL II, Enc. Lett Sollicitudo Rei Socialis (30 December 1987)
UR VATICAN COUNCIL II, Decr. Unitatis redintegratio (21 November 1964)
UUS S. JOHN PAUL II, Encyclical Letter Ut unum sint (25 May 1995)3
Introduction
Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.”After he said this,he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they sawthe Lord. (John 20: 19-20).
1. Every new step in the life of the Church is a return to the source.
It is a renewedexperience of the disciples’ encounter with the Risen One in the Upper Room on Easter evening.
Like them, during this synodal Assembly, we too felt enfolded in His mercy and drawn to His beauty.
We felt His presence in our midst as we lived conversation in the Spirit and listened toone another:
the presence of He, who, in bestowing the Holy Spirit, continues to build amonghis People a unity that establishes harmony amidst differences.
2. Contemplating the Risen One, we recall that “we have been baptized into his death”(Rom. 6: 3).
We have seen the mark of His wounds transfigured by a new life yet engravedforever in His humanity. These are wounds that continue to bleed in the bodies of many brothersand sisters, including through our own faults.
Looking upon the Lord does not distance us fromthe tragedies of history.
Instead, it opens our eyes to the suffering of those around us andpenetrates us: the faces of war-stricken terrorized children, weeping mothers, the shattereddreams of so many young people, refugees who face terrible journeys, the victims of climatechange and social injustice.
Their sufferings have resounded among us not only through themedia but also through the voices of many who have been personally involved with theirfamilies and their peoples in these tragic events.
In the days during which we have beengathered in this Assembly, wars have continued to cause death and destruction, a desire forrevenge and a loss of conscience.
We join Pope Francis in his repeated appeals for peace,condemning the logic of violence, hatred and revenge and committing ourselves to promotingthe logic of dialogue, fellowship and reconciliation. Genuine and lasting peace is possible andtogether we can build it.
“The joys and hopes and the sorrows and anxieties of people today,especially of those who are poor and afflicted” (GS 1) have been once again the joys andsorrows of all of us, Christ’s disciples.
3. Since the Holy Father embarked us upon this synodal journey in 2021, we have been discovering its richness and fruitfulness more and more.
We began by listening, careful to grasp in the many voices “what the Spirit is saying to the Churches” (Rev. 2: 7 – He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.).
The journey began with the vast consultation of the People of God in our dioceses and eparchies.
It continued with the national and continental stages, in a circularity of dialogue continually being reinvigorated by the General Secretariat for the Synod of Bishops through the Synthesis Reports and Working Documents.
The celebration of the XVI Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops and its two sessions has permitted us today to present to the Holy Father and to all the Churches the witness to all that we have experienced and the fruit of our discernment for a renewed missionary impulse.
During each stage, the journey was characterised by the knowledge of the “sense of faith” of the People of God.
Step by step, we came to understand that at the heart of the Synod 2021-2024. (For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, Mission) there is a call to joy and renewal of the Church in following the Lord, in committing to service of His mission, and in searching for ways to be faithful.
4. This call is based upon a shared baptismal identity.
It is rooted in the diversity of contexts in which the Church is present and finds unity in the one Father, one Lord, and one Spirit.
It challenges all the baptized , without exception: “The whole People of God is an agent of the proclamation of the Gospel.
Every baptized person is called to be a protagonist of mission since we are all missionary disciples” (ITC 53).
For this reason, the synodal journey directs us towards a full and visible unity of Christians, as was witnessed by the presence of delegates of other Christian traditions.
Unity ferments silently within the holy Church of God; prophetically so, for the entire world.
5. Rooted in the Tradition of the Church, the entire synodal journey took place in the light of the conciliar magisterium.
The Second Vatican Council was indeed like a seed thrown onto the field of the world and the Church.
The daily life of believers, the experience of the Churches in every people and culture, the many testimonies of holiness, and the reflection of theologians represented the soil upon which it has sprouted and grown.
The Synod 2021-2024 continues to draw upon the energy of that seed and develop its potential.
The synodal journey is indeed putting into practice what the Council taught about the Church as Mystery and Church as People of God, called to holiness through continual conversion that comes from listening to the Gospel.
In this sense, the synodal journey constitutes an authentic further act of reception of the Council, thus deepening its inspiration and reinvigorating its prophetic force for today’s world.
6. We cannot deny that we have faced fatigue, resistance to change and the temptation to let our own ideas prevail over listening to the Gospel and the practice of discernment.
Yet, the mercy of God, our most loving Father, purifies our hearts, thus enabling us to continue along this journey.
We acknowledged this and began the Second Session of the Assembly with a penitential vigil, through which, feeling ashamed, we asked forgiveness for our sins and we lifted up our prayers for the victims of the evils of the world.
We identified our sins: against peace; against Creation; against indigenous peoples, migrants, children, women, and those who are poor; against failures in listening and in building communion.
We were brought to a renewed understanding, namely, that synodality requires repentance and conversion.
In celebrating the sacrament of the mercy of God, we experience unconditional love: the hardness of heart is conquered and we open up to communion.
This is why we want to be a merciful Church, capable of sharing with everyone the forgiveness and reconciliation that come from God: pure grace of which we are not masters, but only witnesses.
7. We were able to witness to the first fruits of the synodal journey that began in 2021.
The simplest but most precious fruits mature in the life of families, parishes, movements, small Christian communities, schools and other movements.
This is where the practice of conversation in the Spirit, community discernment, sharing of vocational gifts and co-responsibility in the mission is growing.
The meeting of Parish Priests for the Synod (Sacrofano [Rome] 28 April – 2 May 2024) made it possible to listen closely to the rich experiences of priests and help them to renew their journey.
We are grateful and happy for the voices of many communities and of the faithful who ensure that the Church is experienced as a place of welcome, hope and joy.
8. The first Session of the Assembly has yielded further results.
The Synthesis Report drew attention to key themes of great importance for the life of the Church.
The Holy Father, at the end of an international consultation, entrusted these themes to Study Groups made up of pastors and experts from all continents, who were asked to work using a synodal methodology.
The areas of the life and mission of the Church that they have already begun to study in depth are the following:
1. Some aspects of the relationship between the Eastern Catholic Churches and the Latin Church.
2. Listening to the Cry of the Poor
3. The mission in the digital environment.
4. The revision of the Ratio Fundamentalis Institutionis Sacerdotalis in a missionary synodal perspective.
5. Some theological and canonical matters regarding specific ministerial forms.
6. The revision, in a synodal missionary perspective, of the documents touching on the relationship
between bishops, consecrated life, and ecclesial associations.
7. Some aspects of the person and ministry of the bishop (in particular: criteria for selecting candidates
to the episcopacy, the judicial function of the bishops, the nature and structure of ad limina Apostolorum
visits) from a missionary synodal perspective.
8. The role of Papal Representatives in a missionary synodal perspective.
9. Theological criteria and synodal methodologies for shared discernment of controversial doctrinal,
pastoral, and ethical issues.
10. The reception of the fruits of the ecumenical journey of the People of God.
Furthermore, in agreement with the Dicastery for Legislative Texts, a Canonical Commission has been established to work on innovations needed regarding ecclesial norms and on the discernment entrusted to the Symposium of the Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar concerning the pastoral accompaniment of people in polygamous marriages.
The work of these groups and commissions has marked the beginning of the implementation stage, enriching the work of the Second Session, and will assist the Holy Father in pastoral and governance decisions.
9. The synodal process does not conclude with the end of the current Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, but it also includes the implementation phase.
As members of the Assembly, we feel it is our responsibility to promote it as synodal missionaries within the communities from which we come.
The local Churches are asked to continue their daily journey with a synodal methodology of consultation and discernment, identifying concrete ways and formation pathways to bring about a tangible synodal conversion in the various ecclesial contexts (parishes, Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, movements of the faithful, dioceses, episcopal conferences, groupings of Churches, etc.). An evaluation of the progress made in terms of synodality and the participation of all the baptized in the life of the Church should also be envisaged.
We suggest to the episcopal conferences and synods of the churches sui iuris to allocate personnel and resources to accompany the pathway of growth as a synodal Church in mission and to maintain contact with the General Secretariat of the Synod (cf. CE 19 § 1 and 2).
We ask the Secretariat to continue to watch over the synodal quality of the working method of the Study Groups.
10. Offered to the Holy Father and to the Churches as the fruit of the XVI General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, this Final Document encapsulates all the steps taken so far.
It brings together some important convergences that emerged in the First Session,
the contributions coming from the Churches in the months between the First and Second Sessions,
and what has matured, especially through conversation in the Spirit, during the Second Session.
11. The Final Document expresses awareness that the call to mission is at the same time the call to conversion of each particular Church and of the whole Church, in line with the Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium (cf. EG 30).
There are five parts to the text.
The first, entitled The Heart of Synodality, outlines the theological and spiritual foundations that enlighten and nourish what is to come. It restates the shared understanding of synodality that emerged in the First Session and develops its spiritual and prophetic perspectives.
The conversion of the feelings, images and thoughts that inhabit our hearts proceeds together with the conversion of pastoral and missionary action.
The second part, entitled On the Boat, Together, is dedicated to the conversion of the relationships that build the Christian communityand shape the mission in the intertwining of vocations, charisms and ministries.
The third, Cast the Net, identifies three practices that are intimately connected: ecclesial discernment, decision-making processes, and a culture of transparency, accountability and evaluation.
With respect tothese, we are also asked to initiate pathways of ‘missionary transformation’, for which a renewalof participatory bodies is urgently needed.
The fourth part, under the title An Abundant Catch,outlines how it is possible to cultivate in new forms the exchange of gifts and the intertwiningof the bonds that unite us in the Church, at a time when the experience of being rooted in aplace is changing profoundly.
This is followed by a fifth part, So I Send You, which allows usto look at the first step to be taken: caring for the formation of all, of the People of God, allsynodal missionaries.
12. The development of the Final Document is guided by the Gospel Resurrection narratives.
The race to the tomb on Easter morning, the appearances of the Risen One in the Upper Room and on the lakeshore inspired our discernment and enriched our dialogue.
We invoked the Easter gift of the Holy Spirit, asking Him to teach us what we must do and show us the way forward together.
With this document, the Assembly recognizes and bears witness that synodality, a constitutive dimension of the Church, is already part of the experience of many of our communities.
At the same time, it suggests pathways to follow, practices to implement and horizons to explore.
The Holy Father, who convened the Church in Synod, will tell the Churches, entrusted to the pastoral care of the bishops, how to continue our journey supported by the hope ‘that does not disappoint’ (Rom 5:5 – hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us).
Part I – The Heart of Synodality – Called by the Holy Spirit to ConversionEarly on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomband saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb.
So she ran and went to Simon Peterand the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved (Jn 20: 1-2).
13. We encounter three disciples on Easter Morning: Mary Magdalene, Simon Peter, and the disciple whom Jesus loved.
Each of them is seeking the Lord in his or her own way; each has his or her own part to play in enabling the light of hope to dawn.
Mary Magdalene is so driven by love that she is the first at the tomb.
Alerted by her, Peter and the Beloved Disciple make their way to the tomb.
The Beloved Disciple races to the tomb with all the strength of youth.
He looks intently, he is the first to understand yet he lets Peter go first, he who is the elder, entrusted with the responsibility of leading.
Peter, weighed down by his renunciation of the Lord, has an appointment with mercy, the mercy which he will minister in the Church.
Mary remains in the garden. She hears herself called by name. She recognises the Lord.
He commissions her to proclaim his resurrection to the community of disciples.
For this reason, the Church recognizes her as Apostle of the Apostles.
Their dependence on each other embodies the heart of synodality.
14. The Church exists to bear witness in the world to the most decisive moment in history: the Resurrection of Jesus.
The Risen Christ brings peace to the world and gives us the gift of His Spirit.
The living Christ is the source of true freedom, the foundation for a hope that does not disappoint, the revelation of the true face of God and humanity’s ultimate destiny.
The Gospels tell us that in order to enter into Easter faith and become witnesses to it, it is necessary to acknowledge our own inner emptiness, the darkness of fear, doubt and sin.
Yet those who, in the midst of darkness, find the courage to set out as searchers, discover that they themselves are the ones being sought.
They are being called by name, offered forgiveness and, in turn, sent out to their brothers and sisters.
The Church as the People of God, Sacrament of Unity
15. The identity of the People of God flows from Baptism in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
This identity is lived out as a call to holiness and a sending out in mission, inviting all peoples to accept the gift of salvation (cf. Mt 28:18-19 – And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit).
The missionary synodal Church springs from Baptism, in which Christ clothes us with Himself
(cf. Gal 3:27 – For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.) and enables us to be reborn of the Spirit (cf. Jn3:5-6 – Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. 6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit) as children of God.
The whole of Christian existence has its source and horizon in the mystery of the Trinity, which brings forth in us the dynamism of faith, hope and love.
16. “It has pleased God, however, to sanctify and save men and women not individually and without regard for what binds them together, but to set them up as a people who would acknowledge Him in truth and serve Him in holiness” (LG 9).
The Eucharist, the source of communion and unity, continually nourishes the People of God on their journey towards the Kingdom: “Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.” (1 Cor 10: 17).
The Church, nourished by the sacrament of the Body of the Lord, is constituted as His Body (cf. LG 7): “you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.” (1 Cor 12: 27).
Enlivened by grace, the Church is a temple of the Holy Spirit (cf. LG 17); the Spirit animates and builds it, making us all living stones of a spiritual edifice (cf. 1 Pet 2: 5 – like living stones be yourselves built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ; LG 6).
17. Gathered from every tribe, language, people and nation and living in different contexts and cultures, the synodal process gave us “the spiritual taste” (EG 268) of what it means to be the People of God.
The People of God is never the simple sum of the baptized but the communitarian and historical subject of synodality and mission still on pilgrimage through time and already in communion with the Church in heaven.
Within the plurality of contexts where the local Churches are rooted, the People of God proclaim and bear witness to the Good News of salvation.
Being in the world and for the world, they walk together with all the peoples of the earth, in dialogue with their religions and their cultures, recognising in them the seeds of the Word, journeying towards the Kingdom.
Incorporated into the People of God by faith and Baptism, we are sustained and accompanied by the Virgin Mary, “a sign of sure hope and comfort” (LG 68), by the Apostles, by those who bore witness to their faith to the point of giving their lives, and by the saints of every time and place.
18. In the holy People of God, which is the Church, the communion of the faithful (communio Fidelium) is at the same time the communion of the Churches (communio Ecclesiarum), which is manifested in the communion of Bishops (communio Episcoporum)by reason of the very ancient principle that “the Church is in the Bishop and the Bishop is in the Church” (St. Cyprian, Epistle 66, 8).
The Lord placed the Apostle Peter (cf. Mt 16: 18) and his successors at the service of this manifold communion. By virtue of the Petrine ministry, the Bishop of Rome is “the perpetual and visible principle and foundation” (LG 23) of the Church’s unity.
19. “God’s heart has a special place for the poor” (EG 197), the marginalized and the excluded.
Therefore, they are at the heart of the Church.
The whole Christian community is called to recognize in those made poor the face and flesh of Christ, who, though He was rich, became poor for us, so that we might become rich through His poverty (cf. 2 Cor 8: 9 – For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich).
The preferential option for the poor is implicit in Christological faith.
The direct knowledge of the suffering Christ (cf. EG 198) possessed by the poor makes them heralds of a salvation received as a gift, and witnesses to the joy of the Gospel.
The Church is called to be poor with those who are poor, who often constitute the majority of the faithful, to listen to them, learning together how to recognise the charisms they receive from the Spirit. The Church also needs to learn to recognise them as agents of evangelisation.
20. “Christ is the Light of nations” (LG 1), and this light shines on the face of the Church, even when marked by the fragility of the human condition obscured by sin.
The Church receives from Christ the gift and responsibility of being the effective leaven in bonds, relationships and the kinship of the human family (cf. AG 2-4), witnessing to the meaning and goal of her journey in the world (GS 3.2 and 42.3).
The Church assumes this responsibility today at a time dominated by a crisis of participation, that is, of people feeling that they are not participants or actors with a common destiny, as well as by an individualistic understanding of happiness and salvation.
The Church’s vocation and its prophetic service (LG 12) consist in witnessing to God’s plan to unite all humanity to Himself in freedom and communion.
The Church is “the Kingdom of Christ already present in mystery” (LG 3) and “the seed and the beginning of the Kingdom on earth” (LG 5).
It, therefore, walks together with all humanity, strongly committed to justice and peace, human dignity and the common good.
All this, while it “aspires after the completion of the kingdom” (LG 5) when God will be “all in all” (1 Cor 15: 28 – When all things are subjected to him, then the Son himself will also be subjected to him who put all things under him, that God may be everything to everyone.).
The Sacramental Roots of the People of God
21. The synodal journey of the Church led us to rediscover the root of the varieties ofcharisms, vocations and ministries: “we were all baptized into one body and we were all madeto drink of one Spirit.” (1 Cor 12: 13). Baptism is the foundation of Christian life.
This isbecause it introduces everyone to the greatest gift.
This is to be children of God, that is, to sharein Jesus’ relationship to the Father in the Spirit.
There is nothing higher than this baptismaldignity, equally bestowed upon each person, through which we are invited to clothe ourselveswith Christ and be grafted onto Him like branches of the one vine.
The name “Christian”, whichwe have the honor of being called, contains the grace that is the basis of our life and enablesus to walk together as brothers and sisters.
22. Through Baptism “the holy People of God has a share, too, in the prophetic role of Christ, when it renders Him a living witness, especially through a life of faith and charity” (LG 12).
The anointing by the Holy Spirit received at Baptism (cf. 1 Jn 2.20 – you have been anointed by the Holy One, and you all know. 27 – but the anointing which you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that any one should teach you; as his anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie, just as it has taught you, abide in him.) enables all believers to possess an instinct for the truth of the Gospel.
We refer to this as the sensus fidei.
This consists in a certain connaturality with divine realities, based on the fact that, in the Holy Spirit, the baptized become “sharers in the divine nature” (DV 2).
This participation enables the capacity for the faithful to grasp intuitively that which is in conformity with the truth of Revelation in the communion of the whole Church.
This is the reason why the Church is certain that the holy People of God cannot err in matters of belief. They manifest this special property when they show universal agreement in matters of faith and morals (cf. LG 12).
The exercise of the sensus fidei must not be confused with public opinion.
It is always in conjunction with the discernment of pastors at the different levels of Church life, as the various interconnected phases of the synodal process demonstrated.
The sensus fidei aims at reaching a consensus of the faithful (consensus fidelium), which constitutes “a sure criterion for determining whether a particular doctrine or practice belongs to the apostolic faith” (ITC, Sensus fidei in the life of the Church, 2014, 3).
23. All Christians participate in the sensus fidei through baptism.
Therefore, as well as constituting the basis of synodality baptism is also the foundation of ecumenism. “The path of synodality, which the Catholic Church is travelling, is and must be ecumenical, just as the ecumenical path is synodal” (Pope Francis, Address to His Holiness Mar Awa III, 19 November 2022). Ecumenism is first and foremost a matter of spiritual renewal.
It demands processes of repentance and the healing of memories of past wounds, and, where necessary, finding the courage to offer fraternal correction in a spirit of evangelical charity.
The Assembly resounded with eye-opening testimonies by Christians of different ecclesial traditions who share friendship, prayer, live together in community, are committed to serving those living in various forms of poverty and who care for our common home.
In many regions of the world, there is, above all, the ecumenism of blood: Christians of different backgrounds who together give their10 lives for faith in Jesus Christ.
The witness of their martyrdom is more eloquent than any word: unity comes from the Cross of the Lord.
24. Baptism is understood more fully when placed in the context of Christian Initiation, that is, the journey through which the Lord, through the ministry of the Church, introduces us to the Paschal faith and draws us into Trinitarian and ecclesial communion.
This journey takes various significant forms depending on the age at which it is undertaken, the different emphases proper to the Eastern and Western traditions, and the specificities of each local Church.
Initiation brings each person into contact with a great variety of vocations and ecclesial ministries. These embody the merciful face of the Church who like a mother teaches her children to walk by walking alongside them.
The Church listens to those in initiation, addressing their doubts and questions.
We are enriched by the newness each person brings by means of his or her own history and culture.
In the practice of this pastoral action, the Christian community experiences, often without being fully aware of it, the first form of synodality.
25. Within the journey of Christian initiation, the Sacrament of Confirmation enriches the lives of believers with a special outpouring of the Spirit so that they become witnesses to faith.
The Spirit with whom Jesus was filled (cf. Lk 4: 1 – Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit), who anointed Him and sent Him to proclaim the Gospel (cf. Lk 4: 18 – “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed,), is the same Spirit poured out on believers.
This sanctifying anointment seals their belonging to God.
For this reason, Confirmation, which renders the grace of Pentecost present in the lives of the baptized person and the community, is a valuable gift.
It renews in us the miracle of a Church stirred up by the fire of mission, with the courage to go out onto the streets of the world with the ability to be understood by all peoples and cultures.
All believers are called to contribute to this impetus, accepting the charisms that the Spirit distributes abundantly to each one and committing themselves to place these at the service of their brothers and sisters with humility and creative resourcefulness.
26. The celebration of the Eucharist, especially on Sundays, is the first and fundamental way the holy People of God gather and meet.
“The unity of the Church is both signified and made a reality” (UR 2) by the celebration of the Eucharist.
In the “full, conscious and active” (SC 14) participation of all the faithful, in the presence of different ministries and in the presidency of the Bishop or Priest, the Christian community is made visible, whereby a differentiated co-responsibility of all for mission is fulfilled.
For this reason, the Church, the Body of Christ, learns from the Eucharist how to join together unity and plurality: the unity of the Church and the multiplicity of Eucharistic assemblies; unity of the sacramental mystery and variety of liturgical traditions; unity of celebration and plurality of vocations, charisms and ministries.
The Eucharist, above all else, demonstrates that the harmony created by the Spirit is not uniformity, and that every ecclesial gift is destined for the common good of all.
Every celebration of the Eucharist is also an expression of the desire and call to a unity of all the baptized not yet fully visible. Should celebrating the Sunday Eucharist not be possible despite the desire to do so, the community gathers around the celebration of the Word, where Christ is, in any case, present.
27. There is a close link between synaxis and synodos, between the Eucharistic assembly and the synodal assembly.
In both cases, albeit in different forms, Jesus’ promise to be present where two or three are gathered in His name is fulfilled (cf. Mt 18: 20 – where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”).
Synodal assemblies are events that celebrate the union of Christ with His Church through the action of the Spirit.
It is the Spirit who ensures the unity of the ecclesial body of Christ in the Eucharistic assembly as well as in the synodal assembly.
The liturgy is a listening to the Word of God and a response to His covenantal initiative.
Similarly, the synodal assembly is a listening to this same Word, which resounds as much in the signs of the times as in the hearts of the faithful.
The liturgy is also a response of the assembly that is discerning God’s will in order to put it into practice.
Deepening the link between liturgy and synodality will help all Christian communities, in the diversity of their cultures and traditions, to adopt celebratory styles that make visible the face of a synodal Church.
To this end, we call for the establishment of a specific Study Group to which would be entrusted reflection on how to make liturgical celebrations more an expression of synodality.
It could also consider the topic of preaching within liturgical celebrations as well as the development of catechetical resources on synodality from a mystagogical perspective.
Meaning and Dimensions of Synodality
28. The terms ‘synodality’ and ‘synodal’ derive from the ancient and constant ecclesialpractice of meeting in synods. According to the traditions of the Eastern and Western Churches,the word ‘synod’ refers to institutions and events that assumed different forms over time,involving a plurality of agents and participants.
This variety notwithstanding, what unites themis gathering together to dialogue, discern and decide. Owing to the experience of recent years,the meaning of these terms has come to be better understood and what they represent morevibrantly lived.
They have become ever more deeply associated with the desire for a Churchthat is closer to people and more relational – a Church that is God’s home and family.
Duringthe synodal journey, we have witnessed a fruitful convergence regarding the meaning ofsynodality that forms the basis of this Document.
Synodality is the walking together ofChristians with Christ and towards God’s Kingdom, in union with all humanity.
Orientated towards mission, synodality involves gathering at all levels of the Church for mutual listening, dialogue, and community discernment.
It also involves reaching consensus as an expression of Christ rendering Himself present, He who is alive in the Spirit.
Furthermore, it consists in reaching decisions according to a differentiated understanding of co-responsibility.
Along these lines we can understand better what it means to say that synodality is a constitutive dimension of the Church (ITC 1).
In simple and concise terms, synodality is a path of spiritual renewal and structural reform that enables the Church to be more participatory and missionary, so that it can walk with every man and woman, radiating the light of Christ.
29. We see the features of a synodal, missionary and merciful Church shining in full light in the Virgin Mary, Mother of Christ, of the Church and of humanity.
She is the form of the Church who listens, prays, meditates, dialogues, accompanies, discerns, decides and acts.
From her we learn the art of listening, attentiveness to God’s will, obedience to God’s Word and a readiness to hear the needs of the poor and to set out along the path.
We also learn the love that comes to our aid and the song of praise that exults in the Spirit.
For this reason, as Saint Paul VI said, “the action of the Church in the world can be likened to an extension of Mary’s concern” (Marialis Cultus, 28).
30. Specifically, synodality designates three distinct aspects of the life of the Church:
a) in the first instance, it refers to “the particular style that qualifies the life and mission of the Church, expressing her nature as the People of God journeying together and gathering in assembly, summoned by the Lord Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit to proclaim the Gospel.
Synodality ought to be expressed in the Church’s ordinary way of living and working.
This modus vivendi et operandi works 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” (ITC 70.a);
b) secondly, “(i )n a more specific sense, which is determined from a theological and canonical point of view, synodality denotes those structures and ecclesial processes in which the synodal nature of the Church is expressed at an institutional level, but analogously on various levels: local, regional and universal.
These structures and processes are officially at the service of the Church, which must discover the way to move forward by listening to the Holy Spirit” (ITC 70.b);
c) thirdly, synodality designates “the program of those synodal events in which the Church is called together by the competent authority in accordance with the specific procedures laid down by ecclesiastical discipline, involving the whole People of God in various ways on local, regional and universal levels, presided over by the Bishops in collegial communion with the Bishop of Rome, to discern the way forward and other particular questions, and to take particular decisions and directions with the aim of fulfilling its evangelizing mission” (ITC 70.c).
31. In the context of the ecclesiology of the Council, with reference to the People of God, the concept of communionexpresses the profound substance of the mystery and mission of the Church.
This mystery has its source and summit in the celebration of the Eucharist, that is, in union with God the Trinity and in the unity among human persons realized in Christ through the Holy Spirit.
Against this background, synodality “is the specific modus vivendi et operandi of the Church, the People of God, which reveals and gives substance to her being as communion when all her members journey together, gather in assembly and take an active part in her evangelizing mission” (ITC 6).
32. Synodality is not an end in itself.
Rather, it serves the mission that Christ entrusted to the Church in the Spirit.
To evangelize is “the essential mission of the Church […] it is the grace and vocation proper to the Church, her deepest identity” (EN 14).
By being close to all without distinction of persons, preaching and teaching, baptizing, celebrating the Eucharist and the Sacrament of Reconciliation, all the local Churches and the entire Church respond concretely to the Lord’s command to proclaim the Gospel to all nations (cf. Mt 28:19-20 – Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age.”; Mk 16:15-16 – he said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation.
He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned).
By appreciating all charisms and ministries, synodality enables the People of God to proclaim to women and men and witness to the Gospel of every place and time, making itself a “visible sacrament” (LG 9) of the fellowship and unity in Christ willed by God. Synodality and mission are intimately linked: mission illuminates synodality and synodality spurs to mission.
33. The authority of pastors “is a specific gift of the Spirit of Christ the Head for the upbuilding of the entire Body” (ITC 67).
This gift is bound to the sacrament of orders which configures pastors to Christ, Head, Shepherd and Servant, and places them at the service of the holy People of God in order to safeguard the apostolicity of the proclamation and to promote ecclesial communion at all levels.
Synodality offers “the most appropriate interpretative framework for understanding the hierarchical ministry itself” (Francis, Address in Commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of the Institution of the Synod of Bishops, 17 October 2015) and provides the correct context for understanding the mandate that Christ entrusts, in the Holy Spirit, to pastors.
Synodality therefore invites the whole Church, including those who exercise authority, to conversion and reform.
Unity as Harmony
34. “As a spiritual being, the human creature is defined through interpersonal relations.
The more authentically he or she lives these relations, the more his or her own personal identity matures.
It is not by isolation that humans establish their worth, but by placing themselves in relation with others and with God. Hence, these relations take on fundamental importance.” (Caritas in Veritate 53).
We recognize a synodal Church by flourishing interpersonal relationships flowing from the mutual love that constitutes the “new commandment” left by Jesus to His disciples (cf. Jn 13: 34-35 – A new commandment[a] I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. 35 By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”).
The Church as “a people made one by the unity of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit” (LG 4),
can witness to the power of relationships founded in the Trinity especially where individualism
pervades cultures and societies.
Differences that are found in every Christian community with respect to age, vocation, sex, profession and social belonging provide an opportunity for an encounter with otherness that is indispensable to personal growth and maturity.
35. Families, which the Council refers to as the “domestic Church” (LG11), are the pre-eminent context in which we learn to live out the richness of relationships between persons, united in their diversity of character, age and role. In families, we learn to experience the basic practices needed for a synodal Church.
The reality of brokenness and suffering experienced by families notwithstanding, they remain places where we learn to exchange the gifts of love, trust, reconciliation, forgiveness and understanding. Here we learn that we are equal in dignity and created for reciprocity; that we need to be listened to, and we are able to listen.
Here we first learn how to discern and decide together, accept and exercise authority that is loving and life-giving, and to be co-responsible and accountable.
Families “humanize people through the relationship of ‘we’ and at the same time promote each person’s legitimate differences” (Francis, Address to the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, 29 April 2022).
36. The synodal process has shown that the Holy Spirit constantly calls forth from the People of God a great variety of charisms and ministries.
“In the structure of the body of Christ, too, there is a diversity of members and functions.
There is one Spirit who distributes his various gifts for the good of the church according to his own riches and the needs of the ministries (cf. 1 Cor 12: 11 – All these are inspired by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.) (LG 7).
Equally, a desire emerged to expand possibilities for participation and for the exercise of differentiated co-responsibility by all the baptized, men and women.
In this regard, however, the lack of participation by so many members of the People of God in this journey of ecclesial renewal was a source of sadness.
There was also a sense of sadness expressed at the widespread difficulty within the Church in living flourishing relationships fully between men and women, between different generations and between individuals and groups with diverse cultural identities and social conditions.
Of particular concern in this regard must be the people made poor and those who are excluded.
37. In addition, the synodal process highlighted the spiritual heritage of the local Churches, in which and from which the Catholic Church exists and the need to combine their14 experiences.
By virtue of catholicity, “the individual parts bring their gifts to the other parts and to the whole church … through the mutual communication of all and their united efforts towards fullness in unity” (LG 13). The ministry of the successor of Peter “safeguards legitimate differences while taking care that what is particular not only does no harm to unity but rather is conducive to it” (LG 13, cf. AG 22).
38. The whole Church has always been comprised of a plurality of peoples and languages as well as of local Churches. In turn, these local Churches have always possessed their own rites and disciplines as well as their own distinctive theological and spiritual heritage; so too, their own vocations, charisms and ministries at the service of the common good.
Unity in diversity is realized by Christ, the cornerstone, and the Holy Spirit, the source of all harmony.
This unity in diversity is precisely what is meant by the catholicity of the Church.
The plurality of the Churches sui iuris, of which the synodal process highlighted the richness, is a sign of this very catholicity.
The Assembly asks that we continue along the path of the encounter, mutual understanding and exchange of gifts that nourish the communion of a Church of Churches.
39. Synodal renewal fosters appreciation of local contexts as the place where the universal call from God manifests and fulfils itself. It is a call to be part of God’s people, to participate in that Reign of God, which is “righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom 14:17 – the kingdom of God does not mean food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit;).
In this way, different cultures are enabled to grasp the unity that underlies their plurality and become open to the prospect of an exchange of gifts.
“The unity of the Church is not uniformity, but the organic blending of legitimate diversities” (NMI46). There is a variety of ways in which the message of salvation is expressed.
This helps avoid reducing this message to a single understanding of the life of the Church and of the theological, liturgical, pastoral and disciplinary forms it takes.
40. The appreciation of contexts, cultures and diversities, and of the relationships between them, is key to growing as a missionary synodal Church and to journeying, prompted by the Holy Spirit, towards the visible unity of Christians.
We reaffirm the commitment of the Catholic Church to continue and intensify the ecumenical journey with other Christians, by virtue of our common Baptism and in response to the call to live together the communion and unity among disciples for whom Christ prayed at the Last Supper (cf. Jn 17:20-26 – “I do not pray for these only, but also for those who believe in me through their word, 21 that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. 22 The glory which thou hast given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and thou in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them even as thou hast loved me. 24 Father, I desire that they also, whom thou hast given me, may be with me where I am, to behold my glory which thou hast given me in thy love for me before the foundation of the world. 25 O righteous Father, the world has not known thee, but I have known thee; and these know that thou hast sent me. 26 I made known to them thy name, and I will make it known, that the love with which thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.”).
The Assembly welcomes with joy and gratitude the progress in ecumenical relations of the past sixty years as well as the dialogue documents and declarations expressing the common faith.
The participation of the Fraternal Delegates enriched the proceedings of the Assembly, and we look forward to the next steps on the path towards full communion through the incorporation of the fruits of the ecumenical journey into ecclesial practices.
41. In every place on earth, Christians live side by side with people who are not baptized yet serve God by practizing a different religion.
We pray solemnly for them in the liturgy of Good Friday, and we strive together with them to build a better world, imploring the one God to free the world from the evils that afflict it.
Dialogue, encounter and exchange of gifts, typical of a synodal Church, are calls to open out to relations with other religious traditions, with the aim of “establishing friendship, peace, harmony and sharing moral and spiritual values and experiences in a spirit of truth and love” (Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India, Response of the Church in India to the present day challenges, 9 March 2016, cited in FT 271).
In some regions, Christians who engage in building close relationships with those of other religions are15 subjected to persecution.
The Assembly encourages them to persevere in their efforts and with a sense of hope.
42. The plurality of religions and cultures, the diversity of spiritual and theological traditions, the variety of the gifts of the Spirit and of the tasks of the community, as well as the diversity of age, sex and social affiliation within the Church, are an invitation to each person to confront his or her own unconscious bias, resist the temptation of being at the center, and open oneself to the acceptance of other perspectives.
Everyone can make a particular and indispensable contribution to completing our common task.
The synodal Church can be described using the image of the orchestra: the variety of instruments is necessary to give life to the beauty and harmony of music, within which the voice of each one retains its own distinctive features at the service of the common mission.
Thus, is manifested the harmony that the Spirit brings about in the Church, the One who is harmony in person (cf. St. Basil, On Psalm 29:1; On the Holy Spirit, XVI: 38)
Synodal Spirituality
43. Synodality is primarily a spiritual disposition.
It permeates the daily life of the baptized as well as every aspect of the Church’s mission.
A synodal spirituality flows from the action of the Holy Spirit and requires listening to the Word of God, contemplation, silence and conversion of heart.
As the Pope stated in his opening address of the Second Session, “the Holy Spirit is a sure guide and our first task is to learn how to discern his voice, since he speaks through everyone and in all things.”
A spirituality of synodality also requires asceticism, humility, patience and a willingness to forgive and be forgiven.
It welcomes with gratitude and humility the variety of gifts and tasks distributed by the Holy Spirit for the service of the one Lord (cf 1 Cor 12: 4-5 – Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5 and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord;).
It does so without ambition, envy or desire for domination or control, cultivating the same attitude as Christ who “emptied himself, taking the form of a slave” (Phil.2:7 6though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself,[ taking the form of a servant,[c]being born in the likeness of men.).
We recognize the fruits of a spirituality of synodality when the daily life of the Church is marked by unity and harmony in pluriformity.
No one can progress along the path of authentic spirituality alone; we need accompaniment and support, including formation and spiritual direction, both as individuals and as a community.
44. The renewal of the Christian community is possible only by recognizing the primacy of grace.
If spiritual depth at both personal and communitarian levels is lacking, synodality is reduced to organizational expediency.
We are called not only to translate the fruits of a personal spiritual experience into community processes.
We are also called, more profoundly, to experience how practicing the new commandment of reciprocal love is the place and form of “encounter with God.
In this sense, while drawing on the rich spiritual heritage of the Tradition, the synodal perspective contributes to renewing its forms: of a prayer open to participation, a discernment lived together, and a missionary energy that arises from sharing and that radiates as service.
45. Conversation in the Spirit is a tool that, even with its limitations, enables listening in order to discern “what the Spirit is saying to the Churches” (Rev. 2:7 – He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.’).
Its practice has elicited joy, awe and gratitude and has been experienced as a path of renewal that transforms individuals, groups, and the Church.
The word “conversation” expresses more than mere dialogue: it interweaves thought and feeling, creating a shared vital space.
That is why we can say that conversion is at play in conversation.
This is an anthropological reality found in different peoples and cultures, who gather together in solidarity to deal with and decide matters vital to the community.
Grace brings this human experience to fruition. Conversing “in the Spirit” means living the experience of sharing in the light of faith and seeking God’s will in an evangelical atmosphere within which the Holy Spirit’s unmistakable voice can be heard.
46. The need within the Church for healing, reconciliation and the rebuilding of trust has resounded at every stage of the synodal process, particularly in light of so many scandals related to different types of abuse.
It also resounded in the face of similar abuses in society.
The Church is called to put at the centre of its life and action the fact that in Christ, through Baptism, we are entrusted to each other.
Recognition of this profound reality becomes a sacred duty that enables us to recognize mistakes and rebuild trust.
There is a missionary obligation upon the People of God to walk this path in our world and we need to invoke the gift to do so from above.
Walking this path is also an act of justice.
The desire to do so is the fruit of synodal renewal.
Synodality as Prophetic in Today’s World
47. Practiced with humility, the synodal style enables the Church to be a prophetic voicein today’s world. “A synodal Church is like a standard lifted up among the nations (cf. Is 11:12 – He will raise an ensign for the nations, and will assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.)” (Francis, Address for the Commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of the Institution of theSynod of Bishops, 17 October 2015).
We live in an age marked by ever increasing inequalities;growing disillusionment with traditional models of governance; disenchantment with thefunctioning of democracy; increasing autocratic and dictatorial tendencies; and thepredominance of the market model without regard for the vulnerability of people and ofcreation.
The temptation can be to resolve conflicts by force rather than by dialogue.
Authenticpractices of synodality enable Christians to be a critical and prophetic voice over against theprevailing culture.
In this way, we can offer a distinctive contribution to the search for answersto many challenges faced by our contemporary societies in building the common good.
48. The synodal way of living relationships can witness to the human need to be welcomed and recognized within a particular, concrete community.
The practice of synodality is a challenge to the growing isolation of people and to cultural individualism, which the Church has also often absorbed, and it calls us to mutual care, interdependence and co-responsibility for the common good.
Likewise, it challenges exaggerated forms of social communitarianism that suffocate people and prevent them from being agents of their own development.
The willingness to listen to all, especially those who are poor, stands in stark contrast to a world in which the concentration of power tends to disregard those who are poor, the marginalized, minorities and the earth, our common home.
Synodality and integral ecology both take on the character of relationality and insist upon us nurturing that which binds us together; this is why they correspond to and complement each other in regard to how the mission of the Church is lived out in today’s world.
Part II – On the Boat, Together
The Conversion of Relationships
Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. Simon Peter said to them, ‘I am going fishing.’ They said to him, ‘We will go with you.’ (Jn 21: 2-3).
49. Lake Tiberias is where it all began. Peter, Andrew, James and John had left the boat and the nets to follow Jesus. After Easter, they set out again from that same lake. In the night, a dialogue is heard on the shore: “I am going fishing.”
“We will go with you.” The synodal journey also began like this: we heard the invitation of Peter’s successor, and we accepted it; we set out with him and followed his lead. We prayed, reflected, struggled and dialogued together.
But above all we have experienced that it is relationships that sustain the Church’s vitality, animating its structures. A missionary synodal Church needs to renew the one and the other.
New Relationships
50. What emerged throughout the entire synodal journey, and in every place and context,was the call for a Church with a greater capacity to nurture relationships: with the Lord, betweenmen and women, in the family, in the local community, among social groups and religions, withthe earth itself.
Many participants were delighted and surprised to be asked to join this journeyand to be given the opportunity to have their voice heard in the community.
Unfortunately,others continued to experience the pain of feeling excluded or judged because of their maritalsituation, identity or sexuality.
The desire for more real and meaningful relationships is not onlyan authentic longing to belong to a close-knit group but may also reflect a deep sense of faith.The evangelical quality of relationships in a community is decisive for the witness that thePeople of God are called to make in history.
“By this everyone will know that you are mydisciples, if you have love for one another.” (Jn 13: 35).
The most eloquent sign of the HolySpirit’s action in the community of disciples is the invitation to relationship extended to thosemost in need, which flows from a renewal of grace and accords with the teaching of Jesus.
Tobe a synodal Church, we are required to open ourselves to a genuine relational conversion thatredirects each person’s priorities and we must once again learn from the Gospel that attendingto relationships is not merely a strategy or a tool for greater organizational effectiveness.Relationships and bonds are the means by which God the Father has revealed Himself in Jesusand the Spirit.
When our relationships, even in their fragility, allow the grace of Christ, the loveof the Father, the communion of the Spirit to shine through, we confess with our lives, our faithin God the Trinity.51. We should, therefore, look to the Gospels to outline for us the journey of conversionwe are required to undertake, learning little by little to make Jesus’ practices our own.
TheGospels present to us a Lord who is often “in the act of listening to the people who come toHim along the roads of the Holy Land” (DTC 11).
Jesus never sent anyone away withoutstopping to listen and to speak to them, whether men or women, Jews or pagans, doctors of the18law or publicans, righteous men and women or sinners, beggars, the blind, lepers or the sick.By meeting people wherever their history and personal freedom had led them, He revealed tothem the face of the Father.
By listening to the needs and to the faith of those He met, and byresponding through words and gestures,
He renewed their lives, opening the path to healedrelationships. Jesus is the Messiah who “even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak”(Mk 7: 37).
He asks us, His disciples, to do the same and, through the grace of the Holy Spirit,the capacity to do it conforming our hearts to His: only “the heart makes all authentic bondingpossible, since a relationship not shaped by the heart is incapable of overcoming thefragmentation caused by individualism” (DN 17). When we listen to our sisters and brothers,we are participants in the way that God in Jesus Christ comes to meet each of us.
52. The need for conversion definitely concerns the relations between men and women.
The dynamics of relationships is inscribed upon our condition as creatures.
The difference between the sexes constitutes the basis of human relationships.
“So God created humankind in his image […] male and female he created them” (Gen 1: 27).
Inequality between men and women is not part of God’s design. In the new creation, this difference is reconsidered in the light of the dignity of Baptism: “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3: 27-28).
Our vocation as Christians is to welcome and respect, in every place and context, this difference, which is a gift from God and a source of life.
We bear witness to the Gospel when we seek to live in relationships that respect the equal dignity and reciprocity between men and women.
The widely expressed pain and suffering on the part of many women from every region and continent, both lay and consecrated, during the synodal process, reveal how often we fail to live up to this vision.
In a Plurality of Contexts
53. The call to renewed relationships in the Lord Jesus flourishes in the different contextsin which His disciples live and carry out the Church’s mission.
The plurality of cultures requiresthat the uniqueness of each cultural context is taken into account. However, interaction bypeople from diverse cultural contexts can also lead to distorted relationships that are not inkeeping with the Gospel.
Throughout history, relational failures have turned into structures ofsin (cf. SRS 36), which in turn shape the way people think and act.
In particular structures ofsin create obstacles and generate fear. We need to face these in order to set out on the road tothe conversion of relationships in the light of the Gospel.
54. The evils that plague our world, including wars and armed conflicts and the illusionthat just peace can be achieved by force, are rooted in these dynamics.
Just as destructive is the belief that all of creation, and this includes humans themselves, can be exploited at will for profit.
A consequence of this reality is the creation of barriers that divide, even Christian communities, resulting in inequalities whereby some have possibilities that are denied to others.
These are inequalities such as between men and women, racial prejudices, caste divisions, discrimination against people with disabilities, violation of the rights of minorities of all kinds and the reluctance to accept migrants.
Even our relationship with our mother and sister Earth (cf. LS 1), bears the mark of a fracture that endangers the lives of countless communities, particularly among those most poor, if not entire peoples and perhaps all of humanity.
The most19 radical and dramatic rejection is that of human life itself; this leads to the rejection of the unborn, as well as of the elderly.
55. Many of the evils that afflict our world are also visible in the Church.
The abuse crisis, in its various and tragic manifestations, has brought untold and often ongoing suffering to victims and survivors, and to their communities.
The Church must listen with particular attention and sensitivity to the voice of victims and survivors of abuse.
This includes sexual, spiritual, economic and institutional abuse, as well as the abuse of power and conscience by members of the clergy or those holding ecclesial roles.
Listening is a fundamental aspect of the journey towards healing, repentance, justice and reconciliation. At a time characterised by a global crisis of trust, which encourages people to live in distrust and suspicion, the Church must acknowledge its own shortcomings. It must humbly ask for forgiveness, must care for victims, provide for preventative measures, and strive in the Lord to rebuild mutual trust.
56. Listening to those who suffer exclusion and marginalisation strengthens the Church’s awareness that taking on the burden of wounded relationships is part of its mission.
The Church does this in order that the Lord, the Living One, can heal them.
This is the only way that the Church can be “as a sacrament or instrumental sign of intimate union with God and of the unity of all humanity” (LG 1).
At the same time, being open to the world allows one to discover that the Spirit has sown the seeds of the Gospel in every corner of the planet, in every culture and in every human group.
These seeds bear fruit in the ability to live healthy relationships, cultivate mutual trust and forgiveness and overcome fear of diversity.
They also give life to welcoming communities, promote an economy respectful of people and the planet and bring about reconciliation after conflict.
History leaves us with a legacy of conflicts motivated at times in the name of religion, undermining the credibility of religions themselves.
Much suffering has been caused by the scandal of division between Christian communions and the hostility between sisters and brothers who have received the same Baptism.
The renewed experience of ecumenical momentum that marks the synod’s journey opens the way towards hope.
Charisms, Vocations and Ministries for Mission
57. Christians, individually and as part of a community, are called to bear fruit by sharingthe gifts they have been given and to be witnesses to the Gospel.
“Now there are varieties ofgifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there arevarieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone.
To each isgiven the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good” (1Cor 12: 4-7).
In the Christiancommunity, all the baptized are enriched with gifts to share, each according to his or hervocation.
The various ecclesial vocations are many yet express the one baptismal call to holiness and mission.
The variety of charisms, which originates in the freedom of the Holy Spirit, aims at unifying the ecclesial body of Christ (cf. LG 32) and promoting mission in different places and cultures (cf. LG 12).
These gifts are not the exclusive property of those who receive and use them, nor are they intended solely for their personal benefit or for that of a group.
They are intended for the flourishing of the life of the Christian community, including caring pastorally for vocations, and the development of society as a whole.
58. Each baptized person, man or woman, responds to missionary needs in the contexts in which they live and work, according to their dispositions and abilities.
This demonstrates the20 freedom of the Spirit in bestowing God’s gifts.
Owing to this dynamism in the Spirit, the People of God, listening to the reality in which they live, discover new forms of commitment and new ways to fulfil their mission.
Christians, each according to their diverse roles – within the family and other states of life; in the workplace and in their professions; engaged civilly, politically, socially or ecologically; in the development of a culture inspired by the Gospel, including the evangelization of the digital environment – walk the paths of the world according to their life situations and proclaim the Gospel, sustained by the gifts of the Spirit.
59. In doing so, they ask the Church not to abandon them but rather to enable them to understand that they are sent and sustained in mission.
They ask to be nourished by the bread of the Word and the Eucharist, as well as by the familial bonds of the community.
They ask that their commitment be recognized for what it is: Church action in light of the Gospel, and not merely a personal choice.
Lastly, they ask the community to accompany those who, through their witness, have been drawn to the Gospel. In a missionary synodal Church, under the leadership of their pastors, communities will be able to send people out in mission and support those they have sent.
Communities will, therefore, see themselves as primarily devoted to the service of a mission that the faithful carry out within society, in family and working life.
They will, therefore, not remain focused exclusively on the activities that take place within their own communities and upon their own organizational needs.
60. By virtue of Baptism, women and men have equal dignity as members of the People of God. However, women continue to encounter obstacles in obtaining a fuller recognition of their charisms, vocation and roles in all the various areas of the Church’s life.
This is to the detriment of serving the Church’s shared mission. Scripture attests to the prominent role of many women in the history of salvation.
One woman, Mary Magdalene, was given the first proclamation of the Resurrection.
On the day of Pentecost, Mary, the Mother of God, was present, accompanied by many other women who had followed the Lord.
It is important that the Scripture passages that relate these stories find adequate space inside liturgical lectionaries. Crucial turning points in Church history confirm the essential contribution of women moved by the Spirit.
Women make up the majority of churchgoers and are often the first witnesses to the faith in families. They are active in the life of small Christian communities and parishes.
They run schools, hospitals and shelters. They lead initiatives for reconciliation and promoting human dignity and social justice.
Women contribute to theological research and are present in positions of responsibility in Church institutions, in diocesan curias and the Roman Curia.
There are women who hold positions of authority and are leaders of their communities.
This Assembly asks for full implementation of all the opportunities already provided for in Canon Law with regard to the role of women, particularly in those places where they remain under-explored.
There is no reason or impediment that should prevent women from carrying out leadership roles in the Church: what comes from the Holy Spirit cannot be stopped.
Additionally, the question of women’s access to diaconal ministry remains open.
This discernment needs to continue.
The Assembly also asks that more attention be given to the language and images used in preaching, teaching, catechesis, and the drafting of official Church documents, giving more space to the contributions of female saints, theologians and mystics.
61. Within the Christian community, special attention should be given to children.
Not only do children need accompaniment in their growth, but they have much to give to the community of believers.
When the apostles argue among themselves about who is the greatest,
Jesus puts a child at the center, presenting the child as a criterion for entering the Kingdom (cf.Mk 9:33-37).
The Church cannot be synodal without the contribution of children, who are bearers of missionary potential, to be valued. The voice of the child is needed by the community.
We must listen to children and make efforts to ensure that everyone in society listens to them, especially those who have political and educational responsibilities.
A society that is not able to welcome and care for children is a sickly society.
The suffering experienced by many children due to war, poverty and abandonment, abuse and trafficking, is a scandal that calls both for the courage to denounce their suffering and for a serious commitment to solidarity.
62. Young people also make a contribution to the synodal renewal of the Church.
They are acutely aware of the values of fellowship and sharing, while rejecting paternalism or authoritarian attitudes.
At times, their attitude toward the Church can come across as critical, yet often it manifests positively as a personal commitment to the creation of a welcoming community dedicated to fighting against social injustice and for care of our common home.
The request that they made at the 2018 Synod on Young People to “walk together in daily life” corresponds exactly to the vision of a synodal Church.
For this reason, it is fundamental that we assure them thoughtful and patient accompaniment; in particular, the proposal of “an experience of accompaniment in view of discernment”, which arose thanks to their contribution, deserves to be revisited and taken up again.
It foresees companionship shared with educators, an apostolic commitment lived at the service of the neediest, and the offer of a spirituality rooted in prayer and the sacramental life (cf. Final Document of the XV Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, “Young People, the Faith and Vocational Discernment”, 161).
63. In promoting co-responsibility for the mission of all the baptized, we recognize the apostolic capacities of people with disabilities who feel called and sent out as active agents of evangelization.
We appreciate the contribution that comes from the immense wealth of humanity they bring with them. We acknowledge their experiences of suffering, marginalization, and discrimination, sometimes suffered even within the Christian community itself due to attempts at showing compassion that can be paternalistic.
In order to encourage their participation in the life and mission of the Church, we propose the establishment of a Church-based research centeron disability.
64. Among the vocations that enrich the Church, that of married persons stands out.
The Second Vatican Council taught that “in their state and way of life, they have their own particular gift within the People of God” (LG 11).
The sacrament of marriage assigns a distinctive mission that concerns at the same time the life of the family, the building up of the Church and a commitment within society.
In particular, in recent years there has been a growing awareness that when it comes to the pastoral care of families, families themselves are active participants and not just passive recipients.
For this reason, and with the help of the Church institutions, they need to meet and network together in regard to the education of children and young adults.
The Assembly once again expressed its closeness to and support for all those who accept being alone as a choice made in fidelity to the Church’s Tradition and Magisterium on marriage and sexual ethics, which they recognise as a source of life.22
65. Over the centuries, the Church has also been enriched spiritually by the many different forms of consecrated life.
From the very beginning, the Church has recognized the action of the Spirit in men and women who have followed Christ along the path of the evangelical counsels, consecrating themselves to the service of God whether through contemplation or other forms of service.
They are called to interrogate Church and society with their prophetic voice.
In their experience of living in the world, the various forms of consecrated life matured into what we
now recognize as practices of synodal living.
These include how to practize discernment in common and to harmonize together individual gifts as well as pursue mission in common.
Orders and congregations, societies of apostolic life, secular institutes, as well as associations,
movements and new communities, all have a special contribution to make to the growth of synodality in the Church. Today, many communities of consecrated life are like laboratories for inter-cultural living in a way that is prophetic for both the Church and the world.
At the same time, synodality invites – and sometimes challenges – pastors of local Churches, as well as those responsible for leadership in consecrated life and in the movements, to strengthen relationships in order to bring to life an exchange of gifts at the service of the common mission.
66. Mission involves all the baptized. The first task of lay women and men is to permeate and transform earthly realities with the spirit of the Gospel (cf. LG 31.33; AA 5-7).
At the behest of Pope Francis (cf. Apostolic Letter in the form of Motu Proprio Spiritus Domini, 10 January 2021), the synodal process urged local Churches to respond with creativity and courage to the needs of the mission. This response should involve a form of discernment among the various charisms in order to identify which of these should take a ministerial form and thus be equipped with adequate criteria, tools and procedures. Not all charisms need to be configured as ministries, nor do all the baptized need to become ministers, nor do all ministries need to be instituted.
For a charism to be configured as a ministry, the community must identify a genuine pastoral need.
This should be accompanied by a discernment carried out by the pastor who, together with the community, will make a decision on whether there is a need to create a new ministry.
As a result of this process, the competent authority reaches a decision.
A missionary synodal Church would encourage more forms of lay ministries, that is, ministries that do not require the sacrament of Holy Orders, and this not only within the liturgical sphere.
They can be instituted or not instituted. Further reflection should be given to the most effective way of bestowing lay ministries at a time when people move from one place to another with increasing ease, specifying the times and areas of their exercise.
67. Among the many ecclesial services recognised by the Assembly was the contribution to the understanding of the faith and discernment offered by theology in the variety of its expressions. Theologians help the People of God to develop an understanding of reality enlightened by Revelation and to develop suitable responses and the appropriate language for mission.
In the synodal and missionary Church, “the charism of theology is called to carry out a specific service […].
Together with the experience of faith and the contemplation of the truth of the faithful people and with the preaching of the Pastors, it contributes to the ever deeper penetration of the Gospel.
Moreover, ‘as with any other Christian vocation, the ministry of the theologian, in addition to being personal, is also communitarian and collegial’” (ITC 75).
This ministry is particularly communitarian and collegial when carried out as teaching entrusted with a canonical mission in ecclesiastical academic institutions.
“Ecclesial synodality therefore commits theologians to do theology in a synodal form, promoting among themselves the ability to listen, dialogue, discern and integrate the multiplicity and variety of requests and contributions.”
In this view, it is urgent to foster dialogue between Pastors and those engaged in theological research according to appropriate institutional forms.
The Assembly invites theological institutions to continue research aimed at clarifying and deepening the meaning of synodality and accompanying formation in the local Churches.
Ordained Ministers at the Service of Harmony
68. As with all ministries in the Church, the episcopate, priesthood and diaconate are atthe service of proclaiming the Gospel and building up the ecclesial community.
The Second Vatican Council recalled that the divinely established ordained ministry “is exercised in different orders by those who right from ancient times are called bishops, priests and deacons” (LG 28). In this context, the Second Vatican Council affirmed the sacramentality of the episcopate (cf. LG 21), recovered the communion reality of the presbyterate (cf. LG 28) and paved the way for the restoration of the permanent exercise of the diaconate in the Latin Church (cf. LG 29).
The bishop’s ministry: integrating the gifts of the Spirit in unity
69. A bishop’s task is to preside over a local Church as a visible principle of unity within it and a bond of communion with all the Churches.
The Council’s affirmation that “the fullness of the sacrament of order is conferred by episcopal consecration” (LG 21) allows us to understand the identity of the bishop in the framework of sacramental relations with Christ and with the “section of the people of God” (CD 11).
The bishop is called to serve this section of the people entrusted to him in the name of Christ the Good Shepherd.
He who is ordained bishop is not charged with prerogatives and tasks that he must perform alone. Rather, he receives the grace and the task of recognizing, discerning and bringing together in unity the gifts that the Spirit pours out on individuals and communities, working with priests and deacons in a way that reflects their common sacramental bond; they are co-responsible with him for ministerial service in the local Church.
In doing this the bishop realizes what is most proper and specific to his mission in the context of his solicitude for the communion of Churches.
70. A bishop’s service is a service in, with and for the community (LG 20). It is carried out through the proclamation of the Word and by presiding over the celebration of the Eucharist and the other sacraments.
This is why the Synodal Assembly desires that the People of God have a greater voice in choosing bishops.
It also recommends that the ordination of a bishop should take place in the diocese to which he is destined as pastor, and not in his home diocese, as is often the case.
It also recommends that the principal consecrator be chosen from among the bishops of the ecclesiastical province, including, as far as possible, the metropolitan.
It will thus become clearer that he who becomes a bishop establishes a bond with the Church to which he is destined, publicly assuming before it the commitments of his ministry.
It is equally important that, especially during pastoral visits, the bishop can spend time with the faithful to listen to them as part of his own ongoing discernment of needs.
This will also assist them in experiencing the Church as God’s family.
In the case of titular bishops today, the constitutive relationship between the bishop and the local Church does not appear with sufficient clarity, for example, in the case of papal representatives and those who serve in the Roman Curia. It would be opportune to continue to reflect upon this matter.24
71. Bishops also need to be accompanied and supported in their ministry.
The Metropolitan Bishop can play a role in promoting fraternity among bishops of neighbouring dioceses.
During the course of the synod, the need emerged to offer bishops ongoing formation paths including in local contexts.
The need also surfaced to clarify the role of auxiliary bishops and to expand the tasks that bishops can delegate.
The experience of bishops emeriti in their new way of being at the service of the People of Godshould also be taken into consideration.
It is important to help the faithful to avoid excessive and unrealistic expectations of the bishop, remembering that he too is a fragile brother, exposed to temptation, in need of help like everyone else. An idealized image of the ministry of the bishop can be a hindrance to the sometimes fragile nature of his ministry.
On the other hand, his ministry is greatly enhanced when, in a truly synodal Church, it is supported by the active participation of all the People of God.
With the Bishop: Priests and Deacons
72. In a synodal Church, priests are called to live their service in a spirit of proximity to their people, to be welcoming and prepared to listen to all, opening themselves up to a synodal style.
Priests “constitute along with their bishop one presbyterium” (LG 28) and collaborate with him in discerning charisms and in accompanying and guiding the local Church with particular regard to the matter of safeguarding unity.
They are called to live in solidarity with their brother priests and to collaborate in providing pastorally for their people.
Priests who belong to religious orders and congregations enrich the priesthood with the uniqueness of their charism.
These, along with priests who come from Eastern Churches sui iuris, be they celibate or married, the fidei donum priests, and those who come from other countries, assist the local clergy in opening themselves to an entire Church perspective.
In turn, local priests help clergy from elsewhere to become part of the history of a concrete diocese with its distinctive spiritual richness and traditions.
In this way, the priesthood experiences a genuine exchange of gifts in the service of the Church’s mission. Priests also need to be accompanied and supported, especially in the early stages of their ministry as well as at times of weakness and fragility.
73. Servants of the mystery of God and the Church (cf. LG 41), deacons are ordained “not. unto the priesthood but unto a ministry of service” (LG 29).
They exercise their service of charity in proclamation and in the liturgy.
In doing so they make real the relation between the Gospel and a life lived in love in every social and church context.
They also promote within the whole Church both a consciousness of service and a particular style of service towards all, especially the poorest.
As the tradition demonstrates, the functions of deacons are many, above all the liturgy and pastoral practice.
Deacons respond to the specific needs of each local Church, particularly reawakening and sustaining everyone’s attention to the poorest in a Church which is synodal, missionary and merciful.
Many Christians continue to be uninformed of the ministry of deacon, in part because, although it was restored by Vatican II in the Latin Church as a distinct and permanent order (cf. LG 29), it has not been welcomed in every part of the world.
The teaching of the Council needs to be more deeply explored, particularly in the light of the lived experience of the diaconate.
This teaching and experience already offer good reasons to local churches to not delay in promoting the permanent diaconate more generously, recognising in this ministry a valuable resource in the growth of a servant Church, following the example of the Lord Jesus, who made Himself the servant of all.
This deeper understanding could also help to better comprehend the meaning of the diaconal ordination of those who will become priests.
Collaboration between ordained ministers within a Synodal Church
74. Frequently during the synodal process, the bishops, priests and deacons were thanked for the joy, commitment and dedication with which they carry out their service.
Often mentioned, in addition, were the very real difficulties encountered by pastors in their ministry. These mainly concerned a sense of isolation and loneliness, as well as the feeling of being overwhelmed by the expectation that they were required to fulfil every need.
The experience of the Synod can be a response to this reality, helping bishops, priests and deacons to rediscover co-responsibility in the exercise of ministry, which includes collaboration with other members of the People of God.
A more active distribution of tasks and responsibilities and a more courageous discernment of what properly belongs to the ordained ministry and what can and must be delegated to others will enable each ministry to be exercised in a more spiritually sound and pastorally dynamic manner.
This perspective will surely have an impact on decision-making processes, enabling them to have a more clearly synodal character.
It will also help to overcome clericalism, understood as use of power to one’s own advantage and the distortion of the authority of the Church which is at the service of the People of God.
This expresses itself above all in forms of abuse, be they sexual or economic, the abuse of conscience and of power, by ministers of the Church.
“Clericalism, whether fostered by priests themselves or by lay persons, leads to an excision in the ecclesial body that supports and helps to perpetuate many of the evils that we are condemning today” (Francis, Letter to the People of God, 20 August 2018).
Together for Mission
75. Throughout its history, the Church has adopted other ministries apart from those ofthe ordained in response to the needs of the community and the mission.
Charisms take theform of ministries when they are publicly recognised by the community and by thoseresponsible for leading the community.
In this way, they are placed at the service of themission in a stable and consistent way. Some tend, more specifically, towards service of theChristian community.
Of particular importance are instituted ministries.
These are conferred by a bishop once in a lifetime through a specific rite and after appropriate discernment and formation of the candidates.
These ministries cannot be reduced to a simple mandate or assignment of tasks. The conferral of ministry is a sacramental that shapes the person and redefines his or her way of participating in the life and mission of the Church.
In the Latin Church these are the ministries of lector and acolyte (cf. The Apostolic Letter issued Motu Proprio Spiritus Domini, 10 January 2021) and that of the catechist (cf. The Apostolic Letter issued Motu Proprio Antiquum Ministerium, 10 May 2021).
A legitimate authority establishes the terms and conditions of their practice by mandate. Episcopal Conferences establish the personal conditions that candidates for these ministries must fulfil and draw up the formation pathways that must be taken to access these ministries.
76. Instituted ministries are complemented by those not instituted by ritual but are exercised with stability as mandated by the competent authority.
Some examples of such ministries include the ministry of coordinating a small church community, leading community prayer, organizing charitable activities, and so forth.
These ministries have a great variety of expressions depending on the characteristics of the local community.
An example is the catechists who, in many regions of Africa, have always been responsible for communities without priests.
Although there is no prescribed rite, in order to promote its effective recognition, a public entrustment should be made through a mandate before the community.
There are also extraordinary ministries, including the extraordinary ministry of the Eucharist, leading Sunday liturgies in the absence of a priest, administering certain sacramentals, and other instances.
The Latin and Eastern Rite canonical order already provides that, in certain cases, the lay faithful, men or women, may also be extraordinary ministers of Baptism.
In the Latin canonical order, the bishop (with the Holy See’s authorization) may delegate assistance at marriages to lay faithful, men or women.
Responsive to the needs of local contexts, consideration should be given to extending and stabilizing these opportunities for the exercise of lay ministries.
Finally, there are spontaneous services, which need no further conditions or explicit recognition.
They reveal the ways that all the faithful, in various ways, participate in the mission through their gifts and charisms.
77. The lay faithful, both men and women, should be given greater opportunities for participation, also exploring new forms of service and ministry in response to the pastoral needs of our time in a spirit of collaboration and differentiated co-responsibility.
In particular, some concrete needs have emerged from the synodal process. These need to be responded to according to the various contexts:
a) increased participation of laymen and laywomen in Church discernment processes and all phases of decision-making processes (drafting, making and confirming decisions);
b) greater access of laymen and laywomen to positions of responsibility in dioceses and ecclesiastical institutions, including seminaries, institutes and theological faculties; more fully enacting existing provisions;
c) greater recognition and support for the lives and charisms of consecrated men and women and their employment in positions of ecclesial responsibility;
d) a greater number of qualified lay people serving as judges in all canonical processes;
e) effective recognition of the dignity and respect for the rights of those who are employed in the Church and its institutions.
78. The synodal process has renewed the awareness that listening is an essential component of every aspect of the Church’s life: administering sacraments, in particular that of Reconciliation, catechesis, formation and pastoral accompaniment.
In this light, the Assembly also focused on the proposal to establish a ministry of listening and accompaniment, showing a variety of perspectives.
Some were in favour of this proposal, because this ministry would represent a prophetic way of emphasising the importance of listening and accompaniment in the community.
Others said that listening and accompaniment are the task of all the baptised, without there being the need for a specific ministry.
Others still underlined the need for further study, for example, of the relationship between this ministry of listening and accompaniment and spiritual accompaniment, pastoral counselling, and the celebration of the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
It was also proposed that a possible ‘ministry of listening and accompaniment’ should be particularly aimed at welcoming those who are on the margins of the Church community, those who return after having drifted away and those who are searching for the truth and wish to be helped to meet the Lord. Therefore, in this regard, discernment should continue.
The local contexts where this need is more strongly felt can try to explore possible approaches upon which to base a discernment.28
Part III – Cast the Net
The Conversion of ProcessesJesus said to them, “Children, you have no fish, have you?” They answered him, “No.” Hesaid to them, “Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they castit, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish. (Jn 21:5-6).
79. The fishing has not borne any fruit and it is now time to return to shore.
Yet a voice rings out, in an authoritative tone, inviting the disciples to do something that they alone would not have done, pointing to a possibility that their eyes and minds could not grasp: “Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.”
During this synodal journey, we have sought to hear this Voice and to welcome it.
In prayer and dialogue, we have recognized that ecclesial discernment, the care for decision-making processes, the commitment to accountability and the evaluation of our decisions are practices through which we respond to the Word that shows us the paths of mission.
80. These three practices are closely intertwined.
Decision-making processes need ecclesial discernment, which requires listening in a climate of trust that is supported by transparency and accountability.
Trust must be mutual: decision-makers need to be able to trust and listen to the People of God.
The latter, in turn, needs to be able to trust those in authority.
This integral vision highlights that each of these practices depends on and supports the others, thus serving the Church’s ability to fulfil its mission.
Formation is needed in order in order to engage in decision-making processes grounded in ecclesial discernment and which reflect a culture of transparency, accountability, and evaluation.
The formation required is not only technical; it also needs to explore theological, biblical and spiritual foundations. All the baptized need this formation in witness, mission, holiness and service, which emphasizes co-responsibility.
It takes on particular forms for those in positions of responsibility or at the service of ecclesial discernment.
Ecclesial Discernment for Mission
81. In order to promote relationships capable of sustaining and orienting the mission of the Church, a priority must be made to exercise the evangelical wisdom that allowed the apostolic community of Jerusalem to seal the result of the first synodal event using the following words: “For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us” (Acts 15:28).
This is discernment that, since the People of God undertake it in view of mission, can be qualified as “ecclesial”.
The Spirit whom the Father sends in Jesus’ name and who teaches everything (cf. Jn 14:26), guides believers in every age “to all truth” (Jn 16:13).
Through the Spirit’s presence and enduring action, the “tradition which comes from the apostles progresses in the church” (DV 8).
Calling on the Spirit’s light, the People of God, who participate in the prophetic function of Christ (cf. LG 12), “works to discern the true signs of God’s presence and purpose in the events, needs and desires which it shares with the rest of modern humanity” (GS 11).
This discernment draws on all the gifts of wisdom that the Lord bestows upon the Church and on the sensus fidei bestowed upon all the baptized by the Spirit.
In this Spirit, the life of a missionary and synodal Church must be re-envisioned and re-orientated.
82. Ecclesial discernment is not an organizational technique but rather a spiritual practice grounded in a living faith.
It calls for interior freedom, humility, prayer, mutual trust, an openness to the new and a surrender to the will of God. It is never just a setting out of one’s own personal or group point of view or a summing up of differing individual opinions.
Each person, speaking according to their conscience, is called to open themselves to the other who shares according to their conscience.
In this sharing, they seek to recognize together “what the Spirit is saying to the churches” (Rev 2:7).
As this discernment entails the contribution of everyone, ecclesial discernment is both the condition and a privileged expression of synodality, in which communion, mission and participation are lived.
The more everyone is heard, the greater the discernment.
Therefore, it is essential that we promote the broadest participation possible in the discernment process, particularly involving those who are at the margins of the Christian community and society.
83. Listening to the Word of God is the starting point and criterion for all ecclesial discernment.
The Scriptures testify that God has spoken to his People to the point of giving us in Jesus the fullness of all Revelation (DV 2).
They indicate the places where we can hear his voice.
God communicates with us, first of all, in the liturgy because it is Christ himself who speaks “when Sacred Scripture is read in the Church” (SC 7).
God speaks through the living Tradition of the Church, the Magisterium, personal and communal meditation on the Scriptures, and the practices of popular piety. God continues to manifest Himself through the cry of those who are made poor and in the events of human history.
God also communicates with His people through the elements of the cosmos, whose very existence points to the Creator’s action and which is filled with the presence of the life-giving Spirit.
Finally, God also speaks through the personal conscience of each person, which is “the most intimate center and sanctuary of a person, in which he or she is alone with God and whose voice echoes within them.” (GS 16).
Ecclesial discernment demands the continuous care for and formation of consciences and the maturing of the sensus fidei, so as not to neglect any of the places where God speaks and comes to meet His people.
84. The steps of ecclesial discernment will differ depending on the various places and their traditions. Based on the synodal experience, we have identified the elements of discernment which should be included:
a) clearly setting out the object of discernment and disseminating information and the means for adequately understanding it;
b) giving sufficient time for prayerful preparation, for listening to the Word of God and for reflection on the question;
c) an inner disposition of freedom regarding one’s own interests, both personal and as a group, and a commitment to the pursuit of the common good;
d) allowing time to listen attentively and respectfully to each person’s voice;
e) searching for the widest possible consensus which will emerge when “our hearts burn within us” (cf. Lk 24.32), without hiding conflicts or searching for the lowest common denominator;
f) the facilitators of the process formulating the consensus in such a way that allows the participants to say whether they recognize themselves in it or not.
Even if individual opinions are not accepted, the discernment process should lead to a mature acceptance by all of the decision.
The process should also provide for a period for reception by the community that will lead to further review and assessment.
85. Discernment always unfolds within a particular context, the complexities and specificities of which must be grasped as completely as possible. For discernment to be truly ‘ecclesial’, it should make use of the appropriate means.
These include an adequate biblical exegesis to help interpret and understand biblical texts while avoiding partial or fundamentalist interpretations; a knowledge of the Fathers of the Church, of Tradition and the teachings of the Magisterium, according to their varying degrees of authority; the contributions of the various theological disciplines; and the contributions of the human, historical, social and administrative sciences.
Without these latter, it is not possible to grasp the context in which and with a view to which discernment takes place.
86. The Church enjoys a wide variety of approaches to and well-established methods of discernment. This variety is a gift as it allows adaptation to different contexts and shows itself to be fruitful.
Keeping our common mission in view, we should bring these different approaches into dialogue, ensuring that neither loses its specific character nor becomes fixed in its way of proceeding. It is essential to offer formation opportunities that spread and nourish a culture of ecclesial discernment focused on mission in local Churches, as well as in small ecclesial communities and parishes.
This is particularly necessary amongst those who hold leadership roles.
It is equally important to encourage the formation of facilitators, whose contribution is often crucial to the process of discernment.
The Structure of the Decision-making Process
87. In the synodal Church “the whole community, in the free and rich diversity of itsmembers, is called together to pray, listen, analyze, dialogue, discern and offer advice on takingpastoral decisions” (ITC n. 68) for mission.
The way to promote a synodal Church is to fostergreater participation of all the People of God in decision-making processes.
If it is indeed truethat the Church’s very way of living and operating is synodal, then this practice is essential tothe Church’s mission, requiring discernment, the reaching of consensus, and decision-makingthrough the use of the various structures and institutions of synodality.
88. The community of disciples called into being and sent by the Lord is neither uniform nor shapeless. It is his Body composed of diverse members, a community with a history within which the Reign of God is present as a “seed and beginning”, at the service of his coming amongst the whole human family.
The Fathers of the Church reflect on the communal nature of the mission of the People of God with a triple “nothing without”: “nothing without the bishop” (St. Ignatius of Antioch, Letter to the Trallians 2,2) “nothing without the council of presbyters, nothing without the consent of the people” (St. Cyprian of Carthage, Letters 14,4)
When this logic of “nothing without” is disregarded, the identity of the Church is obscured, and its mission is hindered.
89. An ecclesiological framework shapes the commitment to promote participation based on differentiated co-responsibility. Each member of the community must be respected, with value placed upon their gifts and abilities in light of the goal of shared decision-making.
More or less sophisticated institutional arrangements are required to facilitate this process depending on the size of the community.The current law already provides for such participatory bodies at various levels.
These will be dealt with later in the document.
90. It is appropriate to reflect on decision-making processes to ensure their effective functionality. These processes typically involve a period of elaboration and preparation “through a joint exercise of discernment, consultation and co-operation” (ITC n. 69), which informs and underpins the subsequent taking of a decision by the competent authority.
There is no competition or conflict between the two elements of the process; rather, they both contribute to ensuring that the decisions taken are the fruit of the obedience of all to what God wants for His Church.
For this reason, it is necessary to encourage procedures that make reciprocity between the assembly and the person presiding effective in an atmosphere of openness to the Spirit and mutual trust in search of a consensus that could, possibly, be unanimous.
Once the decision has been reached, it requires a process of implementation and evaluation in which the various participants are once again involved, yet in new ways.
91. Those in authority are, in several instances, obligated by current law to conduct a consultation before taking a decision. Those with pastoral authority are obliged to listen to those who participate in the consultation and may not act as if the consultation had not taken place.
Therefore, those in authority will not depart from the fruits of consultation that produce an agreement without a compelling reason which must be appropriately explained (cf. CIC, can.127, § 2, 2°; CCEO can. 934, § 2, 3°).
As in any community that lives according to justice, the exercise of authority in the Church does not consist in an arbitrary imposition of will. Rather, authority should always be exercised in service of communion and the reception of Christ, who is the truth towards whom the Holy Spirit guides us in different moments and contexts (cf. Jn 14:16).
92. In a synodal Church, the authority of the Bishop of the Episcopal College and of the Bishop of Rome in regard to decision-taking is inviolable as it is grounded in the hierarchical structure of the Church established by Christ; it both serves unity and legitimate diversity (cf. 13).
Such an exercise of authority, however, is not without limits: it may not ignore a direction which emerges through proper discernment within a consultative process, especially if this is done by participatory bodies.
It is not appropriate to set the consultative and deliberative elements involved in reaching a decision in opposition to each other: in the Church, the deliberative element is undertaken with the help of all, and never without those whose pastoral governance allows them to take a decision by virtue of their office. For this reason, the recurring formula in the Code of Canon Law, “merely consultative vote” (tantum consultivum) should be reviewed to eliminate the possibility of ambiguity.
It, therefore, seems appropriate to carry out a revision of Canon Law from a synodal perspective, clarifying the distinction and relation between consultation and deliberation and shedding light on the responsibilities of those who play different roles in the decision-making process.
93. It is of fundamental importance, if the processes of decision-making envisaged here are to bear fruit, that they be conducted in an orderly manner and that the people involved assume their own responsibilities:
a) in particular, it is up to the relevant authority to: clearly define the object of the consultative and deliberative elements, as well as clarify with whom ultimate responsibility for taking the decision resides.
They need to identify those who ought to32 be consulted, including those who have a specific competency or are affected by the matter under consideration.
They also need to ensure that everyone involved has access to relevant data so that they may make an informed contribution to the process;
b) those who are consulted, whether individually or as members of a collegial body, assume the responsibility of: offering their input honestly, sincerely, with an informed conscience and acting in good conscience, respecting the confidentiality of the information received, offering clearly formulated thoughts that identify their main points.
This will enable the pastoral authority to explain how they have taken the consultation into account if the decision was ultimately taken should it differ from the opinions offered;
c) finally, when the competent authority has formulated the decision, having respected the consultation process and clearly expressed the reasons for it, by reason of the bond of communion that unites them, all the baptized should respect and implement the decision.
They should do this even if it differs from their own opinion, but they should also be free to participate honestly in the evaluative phase.
There is always a possibility of making an appeal to the higher authority according to the provision of the law.
94. Implementing the processes of decision-making correctly and resolutely, and in a synodal style, will further the progress of God’s People in a participatory way, especially by utilizing the institutional means provided for in Canon Law, in particular participatory bodies.
Without concrete changes in the short term, the vision of a synodal Church will not be credible, and this will alienate those members of the People of God who have drawn strength and hope from the synodal journey. Local Churches need to find ways to implement these changes.
Transparency, Accountability and Evaluation
95. Decision-making does not conclude the discernment process.
It must be accompaniedand followed by practices of accountability and evaluation undertaken in a spirit of transparencyinspired by evangelical criteria.
Accountability to the community for one’s ministry belongs toour oldest tradition: to the Apostolic Church itself.
Chapter Eleven of the Acts of the Apostlesoffers us the example of Peter’s being held to account upon his return to Jerusalem for baptizingCornelius, a Gentile, “Why did you go to uncircumcised men and eat with them?” (Acts 11: 2-3).
Peter responded by setting out the reasons for his decision.
96. In particular, it has been requested that greater light be shed on the meaning of transparency.
The synodal process has connected it to words such as: truth, loyalty, clarity, honesty, integrity, consistency; rejection of obscurity, hypocrisy and ambiguity; and absence of ulterior motives.
The Gospel blessing of those who are “pure in heart” (Matt 5:8) and the command to be “innocent as doves” (Matt 10:16) resonated in this regard as well the words of the Apostle Paul: “We have renounced the shameful things that one hides; we refuse to practice cunning or to falsify God’s word; but by the open statement of the truth we commend ourselves to the conscience of everyone in the sight of God” (2Cor 4:2).
Thus, when we speak of transparency we are referring to a fundamental attitude grounded in the Sacred Scriptures and not to a series of administrative or procedural requirements.
Transparency, in its correct evangelical sense, does not compromise respect for privacy and confidentiality, the protection of persons, their dignity and rights, even in the face of unreasonable demands of civil authorities.
However, this privacy can never legitimate practices contrary to the Gospel or become a pretext to circumvent or cover up actions to combat evil.
With regard to the seal of the confessional, “The sacramental seal is indispensable and no human power has jurisdiction over it, nor can lay any claim to it.” (Address of Pope Francis to Participants At the Course organized by the Apostolic Penitentiary, 29 March 2019)
97. The attitude to transparency we have just outlined safeguards the trust and credibility needed by a synodal Church that is attentive to relationships.
When this trust is violated, the weakest and the most vulnerable suffer the most.
Wherever the Church enjoys trust, the practice of transparency, accountability and evaluation help to strengthen its credibility.
These practices are even more critical where the Church’s credibility needs rebuilding.
They are particularly important in regard to the safeguarding of minors and vulnerable adults.
98. In every situation, these practices contribute to keeping the Church faithful to her mission.
The absence of these practices is one of the consequences of clericalism, which is thus fueled. Clericalism is based on the implicit assumption that those who have authority in the Church are not to be held to account for their actions and decisions as if they were isolated from or above the rest of the People of God.
Transparency and accountability should not only be invoked when it comes to sexual, financial and other forms of abuse.
These practices also concern the lifestyle of pastors, pastoral planning, methods of evangelization, and the way in which the Church respects human dignity, for example, in regard to the working conditions within its institutions.
99. If the synodal Church wants to be welcoming, then the culture and praxis of accountability must shape its actions at all levels. However, those in positions of authority have greater responsibility in this regard and are called to account for it to God and to His People.
While accountability to one’s superiors has been practiced over the centuries, the dimension of authority’s being accountable to the community is in need of restoration.
The structures and procedures established through the experience of consecrated life (such as chapters, canonical visitations, etc.) can serve as an inspiration in this regard.
100. Similarly, it is necessary to have structures and methods for regularly evaluating the exercise of ministry. Such evaluation is not a judgement upon an individual.
Rather, it allows a way of assisting the minister by highlighting positive aspects of their ministry and bringing to light areas for improvement.
The evaluation also assists the local Church in learning from experience, adjusting plans of action, determining the outcomes of its decisions in relation to its mission, and remaining attentive to the voice of the Holy Spirit.
101. Local churches and their groupings are responsible for developing effective forms and processes of accountability and evaluation in a synodal way in addition to adhering to the criteria and oversight of structures already established by canonical norms.
These should be appropriate to the context, including the requirements of civil law, the legitimate expectations of society and the availability of experts in the field.
It is also necessary to draw on the skills of those, especially laypeople, who have greater expertise regarding accountability and evaluation.
Best practices within civil society should be discerned and adapted for use within Church contexts.
The way in which reporting and evaluation processes are implemented at the local level should be included in the report presented during the x ad limina visits.
102. It seems necessary to ensure, at the very least, the establishment everywhere of the following in forms appropriate to different contexts:
a) effective functioning of finance councils;
b) effective involvement of the People of God, in particular of the more competent members, in pastoral and financial planning;
c) preparation and publication (appropriate to the local context and in an accessible form) of an annual financial report, insofar as possible externally audited, demonstrating the transparency of how the temporal goods and financial resources of the Church and its institutions are being managed;
d) the preparation and publication of an annual report on the carrying out of the local Church’s mission, including also safeguarding initiatives (the protection of minors and vulnerable adults), and progress made in promoting the laity’s access to positions of authority and to decision-making processes, specifying the proportion of men and women;
e) periodic evaluations of all the ministries and roles within the Church.
We need to realize that this is not a bureaucratic task for its own sake. It is rather a communication effort that proves to be a powerful educational tool for bringing about a change in culture. It also enables us to give greater visibility to many valuable initiatives of the Church and its institutions, which too often remain hidden.
Synodality and Participatory Bodies
103. The baptized participate in decision-making, accountability and evaluation processesthrough institutional structures, primarily through those already provided for the local Churchset out in the existing Code of Canon Law.
In the Latin Church these are: Diocesan Synod (cf.CIC, can. 466), Presbyteral Council (cf. CIC, can. 500, § 2), Diocesan Pastoral Council (cf.CIC, can. 514, § 1), Parish pastoral council (cf. CIC, can. 536), Diocesan and Parish Councilfor Economic Affairs (cf. CIC, cann. 493 e 537). In the Eastern Catholic Churches these are:Eparchial Assembly (cf. CCEO, can. 235 ss.), Eparchial Assembly for Economic Affairs (cf.CCEO, can. 262 ss.), Presbyteral Council (cf. CCEO can. 264), Eparchial Pastoral Council (cf.CCEO can. 272. ss.), Parish Councils (cf. CCEO can. 295).
Members participate on the basisof their ecclesial role and their differentiated responsibilities and capacities (charisms,ministries, experiences, competencies, etc).
Each of these bodies plays a role in the discernmentneeded for the inculturated proclamation of the Gospel, for the community’s mission in itsmilieu, and for the witness of the baptized.
They also contribute to the decision-makingprocesses through established means.
These bodies themselves become the subject ofaccountability and evaluation, as they will need to give an account of their work.
Participatorybodies represent one of the most promising areas in which to act for rapid implementation ofthe synodal guidelines, bringing about perceptible changes speedily.
104. A synodal Church is based upon the existence, efficiency and effective vitality of these participatory bodies, not on the merely nominal existence of them.
This requires that they function in accordance with canonical provisions or legitimate customs and with respect to the statutes and regulations that govern them.
For this reason, we insist that they be made35 mandatory, as was requested at all stages of the synodal process, and that they can fully play their role, and not just in a purely formal way, in ways appropriate to their diverse local contexts.
105. Furthermore, the structure and operations of these bodies need to be addressed.
It is necessary to start by adopting a synodal working method. The suitability of conversation in the Spirit for adaptation may constitute a reference point.
Particular attention should be given to the way members are selected.
When no election is envisaged, a synodal consultation should be carried out that expresses as much as possible the reality of the community or the local Church, and the relevant authority should proceed to the appointment on the basis of its results, respecting the relation between consultation and deliberation described above.
It is also necessary to ensure that members of diocesan and parish pastoral councils are able to propose agenda items in an analogous way to that allowed for in the presbyteral council.
106. Equal attention needs to be given to the membership of the participatory bodies so as to encourage greater involvement by women, young people, and those living in poverty or on the margins. Furthermore, it is essential that these bodies include the baptized who are committed to living their faith in the ordinary realities of life, who are recognizably committed to an apostolic and missionary life, not only those engaged with organizing ecclesial life and services internally.
In this way, the ecclesial discernment will benefit from a greater openness, an ability to analyze the reality in which it finds itself and a plurality of perspectives.
It may be appropriate to provide for the participation of delegates from other Churches and Christian Communions, as happened during this synodal assembly, or representatives of the religions present in a territory.
Local Churches and their groupings can more appropriately indicate criteria for the composition of participatory bodies suitable to each context.
107. The Assembly paid special attention to good practices and positive experiences of reform.
These include creating networks of pastoral councils within communities, parishes, pastoral areas, and among diocesan pastoral councils.
The regular hosting of ecclesial assemblies at all levels is also encouraged.
Without limiting consultation to members of the Catholic Church, these gatherings should be open to listening to the contributions from other Churches and Christian Communions.
Attention should also be paid to the religions in the territory.
108. The Assembly proposes that the diocesan Synod and eparchial Assembly be more highly valued as bodies for regular consultation between the bishop and the portion of the People of God entrusted to him.
This should be the place for listening, prayer and discernment, particularly when it comes to choices pertaining to the life and mission of a local Church.
Moreover, the diocesan Synod may provide scope for the exercise of accountability and evaluation whereby the bishop gives an account of pastoral activity in various areas: the implementation of a diocesan pastoral plan, reception of the synodal processes of the entire Church, initiatives in safeguarding and the administration of finances and temporal goods.
It is, therefore, necessary to strengthen the existing canonical provisions in order to better reflect the missionary synodal character of each local Church, making provision that these bodies meet on a regular, and not rare or infrequent, basis.
Part IV – An Abundant Catch
The Conversion of BondsThe other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish…. Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three of them; and thoughthere were so many, the net was not torn. (Jn 21:8,11)
109. The nets cast upon the Word of the Risen one yielded a bountiful catch.
All the disciples work together, hauling in the net; Peter plays a particular role.
In the Gospel, fishing is an action undertaken together: everybody has their own particular task, different but coordinated with the others.
This is the synodal Church in action – it is founded on bonds of communion that unite us and with space for all peoples and all cultures.
In a time when there is great change occurring in the places where the Church is rooted and on pilgrimage, we need to cultivate new forms of the exchange of gifts and the network of bonds that unite us. In this we are sustained by the ministry of the bishops in communion amongst themselves and with the Bishop of Rome.
Firmly Rooted yet Pilgrims
110. The proclamation of the Gospel awakens faith in the hearts of men and women andleads to the foundation of the Church in a particular place.
The Church cannot be understoodapart from its roots in a specific territory, in that space and time where a shared experience ofencounter with the saving God occurs.
This local dimension to our Church preserves the rich diversity of expressions of faith that are grounded in a specific cultural and historical milieu.
The communion of local Churches is the expression of the unity of the faithful within the one Church. Thus, synodal conversion calls each person to enlarge the space of their heart, the heart being the first place where all our relationships resonate, grounded in each person’s personal relationship with Jesus Christ and His Church.
This is the starting point and the condition of any synodal reform of the bonds of our communion and the spaces where we are Church.
Pastoral action cannot be limited to tending to relationships between people who already feel attuned to one another but rather encourage the encounter between all men and women.
111. The experience of rootedness means grappling with profound socio-cultural changes that are transforming the understanding of place.
‘Place’ can no longer be conceived in purely geographical and spatial terms but evokes, in our time, one’s belonging to a network of relationships and to a culture whose territorial roots are more dynamic and flexible than ever before.
Urbanisation is one of the main factors driving this change.
Today, for the first time in human history, most of the global population lives in cities.
Large cities are often urban masses without a history and identity in which people live an isolated existence.
Traditional territorial bonds are being redefined, blurring the borders of many dioceses and parishes. Living in these places, the Church is called to rebuild community life, to put a face to faceless entities and to rebuild relationships in this milieu.
To this end, we must not only continue to value still-useful structures; we also need “missionary creativity” to explore new forms of pastoral care and identify concrete processes of care.
It remains the case that rural contexts, some of which constitute genuine existential peripheries, must not be neglected and require specific pastoral attention, as do places of marginalization and exclusion.
112. For a variety of reasons, our times are marked by a growth in population mobility.
Refugees and migrants often form dynamic communities, including of religious practice, rendering multicultural the places in which they settle.
Some maintain strong bonds with their country of origin, especially with the help of digital media, and thus can find it difficult to form connections in their new country; others find themselves living without roots.
The inhabitants of destination countries, too, find the welcoming of newcomers challenging.
All experience the impact resulting from encountering diverse geographical, cultural and linguistic origins and are called to build intercultural communities.
The impact of the phenomenon of migration on the life of the Church should not be overlooked. In this sense, the situation of some Eastern Catholic Churches is emblematic of this reality, with a growing number of faithful living in the diaspora.
Maintaining links between those dispersed and their own Church of origin whilst creating new ones that respect diverse spiritual and cultural roots requires that new approaches be taken.
113. The spread of digital culture, particularly evident among young people, is profoundly changing their experience of space and time; it influences their daily activities, communication and interpersonal relationships, including faith.
The opportunities that the internet provides are reshaping relationships, bonds and boundaries. Nowadays, we often experience loneliness and marginalization, even though we are more connected than ever.
Moreover, those with their own economic and political interests can exploit social media to spread ideologies and generate aggressive and manipulative forms of polarization.
We are not well prepared for this and ought to dedicate resources to ensure that the digital environment becomes a prophetic space for mission and proclamation.
Local Churches should encourage, sustain and accompany those who are engaged in mission in the digital environment.
Christian digital communities and groups, particularly young people, are also called to reflect on how they create bonds of belonging, promoting encounter and dialogue.
They need to offer formation among their peers, developing a synodal way of being Church.
The internet, constituted as a web of connections, offers new opportunities to better live the synodal dimension of the Church.
114. These social and cultural developments challenge the Church to reconsider the meaning of ‘local’ in its life and to review its organizational structures so that they can better serve its mission.
It is essential to understand ‘place’ as the real and actual setting in which humanity was formed, without denying that there is a geographical and cultural dimension to this as well.
Here, where the web of relationships is established, the Church is called to express its sacramentality (cf. LG1) and to carry out its mission.
115. The relation between place and space leads us also to reflect on the Church as “home”.
When it is not thought of as a closed space, inaccessible, to be defended at all costs, the image of home evokes the possibility of welcome, hospitality, and inclusion.
Creation itself is our common home, where men and women, members of the one human family, live with all other creatures.
Our commitment, supported by the Spirit, is to ensure that the Church is perceived as a welcoming home, a sacrament of encounter and salvation, a school of communion for all the sons and daughters of God.
The Church is also the People of God walking with Christ, in it everyone is called to be a pilgrim of hope. The traditional practice of pilgrimage is a sign of this. Popular piety is one of the places of a missionary synodal Church.
116. It is the local Church, understood as a diocese or eparchy, which is the fundamental sphere in which the communion in Christ of the baptized is most fully manifested.
Here the local Church is gathered in the celebration of the Eucharist presided over by its Bishop.
Each local Church has its own internal organization, whilst also maintaining relationships with other local Churches.
117. One of the main places of coming together in the local Church given to us throughout history is the parish.
The parish community that gathers in the celebration of the Eucharist is a privileged place of relationships, welcome, discernment and mission.
Changes in how we experience and live our relationship with locality require us to reconsider how parishes are configured.
What characterizes the parish is that it is a community that is not self-selecting.
People gather there from different generations, professions, geographical origins and social classes and status. Responding to the new needs of mission requires opening up to new forms of pastoral action that take into account the mobility of people and the “existential territory” in which their life unfolds.
By placing a special emphasis on Christian initiation and offering accompaniment and formation, the parish community will be able to support people in the different stages of life in fulfilling their mission in the world. In this way, it will become more evident that the parish is not centered on itself but oriented towards mission.
The parish is then called to sustain the commitment of so many people who in so many ways live and bear witness to their faith in through their profession, in social, cultural and political activities.
In many regions of the world, small Christian communities or basic ecclesial communities are the terrain where meaningful relationships of closeness and reciprocity can flourish, offering the opportunity to experience synodality concretely.
118. We recognize that institutes of consecrated life, societies of apostolic life, as well as associations, movements and new communities, have the ability to take root locally and, at the same time, connect different places and environments, often at a national or international level.
Their action, together with that of many individuals and informal groups, often brings the Gospel to highly diverse contexts: hospitals, prisons, homes for the elderly, reception centers for migrants, minors, those marginalized and victims of violence; to centers of education and training, schools and universities where young people and families meet; the arenas of culture and politics and of integral human development, where new forms of living together are imagined and constructed.
We look with gratitude also to monasteries, which are places of gathering and discernment and speak of a “beyond” that concerns the whole Church and directs its path.
It is the particular responsibility of the bishop or eparch to animate these diverse bodies and to nurture the bonds of unity.
Institutes and associations are called to act in synergy with the local Church, participating in the dynamism of synodality.
119. Placing greater value on the ‘intermediate’ spaces between the local Church and the universal Church – such as ecclesiastical provinces and national and continental groupings of Churches – can foster a more meaningful presence of the Church in the world of today.
Increased mobility and interconnectedness make the boundaries between Churches fluid, requiring ministry across a “vast socio-cultural territory.”
Such ministry needs to ensure that the Christian life “be adapted to the character and disposition of each culture” while avoiding all “false particularism” (AG 22).
The Exchange of Gifts
120. Our walking together as disciples of Jesus, with our diverse charisms and ministries,while at the same time engaging in the exchange of gifts among the Churches, is an effectivesign of the love and mercy of God in Christ breathed out in the Spirit who accompanies, sustainsand directs humanity’s journey towards the Reign of God.
This exchange of gifts involves everyaspect of Church life.
The Church fulfils its mission by taking up and encouraging “the riches, resources and customs of peoples insofar as they are good; and in taking them up it purifies, strengthens and raises them up” (LG 13).
It does so because it is both established in Christ as the People of God from all the peoples of the earth and is structured dynamically in a communion of local Churches, of the Churches sui iuris within the one Catholic Church, and of their groupings.
The exhortation of the apostle Peter: “Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received” (1Pet 4:10) can undoubtedly be applied to each local Church.
The relationship between the Latin and the Eastern Catholic Churches is a paradigmatic and inspiring example of such an exchange of gifts.
This relationship needs to be revivified and reconsidered with particular care due to changed and pressing historical circumstances.
The exchange of gifts and search for the common good within large transnational and intercultural geographical areas such as the Amazon, the Congo River basin, and the Mediterranean Sea is emerging as an example of newness and hope.
This exchange includes a commitment to social issues of great global relevance.
121. The Church, both at the local level and by virtue of its Catholic unity, aspires to be a network of relationships which prophetically, propagates and promotes a culture of encounter, social justice, inclusion of the marginalized, communion among peoples and care for the earth, our common home. The concrete realization of this requires each Church to share its own resources in a spirit of solidarity, without paternalism or subordination, with respect for diversity and promoting healthy reciprocity. This includes, where necessary, a commitment to healing the wounds of memory and to walking the path of reconciliation.
The exchange of gifts and the sharing of resources among local Churches belonging to different regions fosters the unity of the Church, creating bonds between the Christian communities involved.
It is necessary to define the conditions that ensure that priests who help Churches experiencing shortages of clergy not only be a functional remedy but a resource for the growth of the Church that sends them and that which receives them.
Similarly, it is important to ensure that economic aid does not degenerate into welfarism but promotes evangelical solidarity and is managed in a transparent and reliable way.
122. The exchange of gifts is of crucial significance in the journey towards full and visible unity among all Churches and Christian communions.
Moreover, it represents an effective sign of the unity in the faith and love of Christ that promotes both the credibility and the impact of the Christian mission (cf. Jn 17:21).
Saint John Paul II applied the following expression to ecumenical dialogue: “Dialogue is not simply an exchange of ideas. In some way it is always an ‘exchange of gifts’”. (UUS 28).
Previous and ongoing efforts to incarnate the one Gospel by various Christian traditions within a diversity of cultural contexts, historical circumstances and social challenges – attending to the Word of God and the voice of the Holy Spirit – have generated abundant fruit in holiness, charity, spirituality, theology, social and cultural solidarity.
The time has come to treasure these precious riches: with generosity, sincerity, without prejudice, with gratitude to the Lord, and with mutual openness, gifting them to one another without assuming they are our exclusive property.
The example of the saints and witnesses to the faith from other Christian Churches and Communions is also a gift that we can receive, including by inserting their memorial – especially that of the martyrs – into our liturgical calendar.
123. Pope Francis and the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, Ahmed Al-Tayyeb, declared a commitment to adopt “a culture of dialogue as the path; mutual cooperation as the code of conduct; reciprocal understanding as the method and standard” in the Document on Human Fraternity for World Peace and Living Together, signed in Abu Dhabi on 4 February 2019.
This is not an idle aspiration or something optional along the journey of the People of God in today’s world.
A synodal church commits itself to walk this path alongside the believers of other religions and people of other beliefs wherever it lives.
It freely shares the joy of the Gospel and gratefully receives their respective gifts.
Through this collaboration, we aim to build together, as sisters and brothers, in a spirit of “mutual activity and aid” (cf. GS 40), justice, solidarity, peace and interreligious dialogue. In some regions, people meet in small neighborhood communities irrespective of their religious belonging. These communities offer a favorable environment for a threefold dialogue: of life, of action and of prayer.
The Bonds of Unity: Episcopal Conferences and Ecclesial Assemblies
124. The guiding principle of the relationship among churches is the perspective ofcommunion through the sharing of gifts.
This combines attention to the bonds that form theunity of the whole Church with the recognition and appreciation of the particularity of thecontext of each local Church, along with its history and tradition. A synodal style allows localChurches to move at different paces.
Differences in pace can be valued as an expression of legitimate diversity and as an opportunity for sharing gifts and mutual enrichment.
This common horizon requires discerning, identifying and promoting concrete practices which allow us to be a synodal Church on mission.
125. Episcopal Conferences express and implement the collegiality of the bishops in order to foster communion between Churches and respond more effectively to the needs of pastoral life.
They are a fundamental tool for creating bonds, sharing experiences and good practice among the Churches, and for adapting Christian life and the expression of faith to different cultures.
With the involvement of the entire People of God, they also play an important role in the development of synodality. Based on the outcomes of the synodal process, we propose the following:
a) to gather the fruits of deliberations on the theological and juridical statute of Episcopal Conferences.
b) to specify precisely the domain of the doctrinal and disciplinary competence of Episcopal Conferences.
Without compromising the authority of the Bishop within the Church entrusted to him or putting at risk either the unity or the catholicity of the Church,the collegial exercise of such competence can further the authentic teaching of the one faith in an appropriate and enculturated way within different contexts in addition to identifying fitting liturgical, catechetical, disciplinary, pastoral theology and spiritual expression (cf. AG 22).41
c) a process of assessment of the experience of the concrete functioning of Episcopal Conferences, of the relations among the bishops and with the Holy See so as to identify the particular reforms needed.
The visits ad limina Apostolorum can provide appropriate occasions for this;
d) ensuring that all dioceses are part of an ecclesiastical province and to an Episcopal Conference;
e) specifying that decisions made by an Episcopal Conference impose an ecclesial obligation on each Bishop who participated in the decision in relation to his own diocese.
126. In the synodal process, the seven continental ecclesial assemblies that took place at the beginning of 2023 are both a relevant innovation and a legacy that we must treasure.
They are an effective way of implementing conciliar teaching on the value of “each great socio- cultural region” in pursuit of “a more profound adaptation in the entire area of Christian life” (AG 22).
In order to enable them to more fully contribute to the development of a synodal Church, it will be necessary to clarify the theological and canonical status of ecclesial assemblies, as well as that of the continental groupings of Episcopal Conferences.
In particular, it is the responsibility of the Presidents of these groupings to encourage and sustain the continued development of this process.
127. In Ecclesial assemblies (regional, national, continental) members who express and represent the diversity of the People of God (including bishops) take part in the discernment that will enable bishops, collegially, to reach decisions which it is proper for them to make by reason of their ministry.
This experience demonstrates how synodality enables concretely the involvement of all (the holy People of God) and the ministry of some (the College of Bishops) in the decision-making process concerning the mission of the Church.
We propose that discernment may include, in a manner appropriate to the diversity of contexts, spaces for listening and dialogue with other Christians and representatives of other religions, public institutions, civil society organizations and society at large.
128. In specific social and political circumstances, certain Episcopal Conferences face difficulties in participating in continental assemblies or supranational ecclesial bodies.
The Holy See has the responsibility to assist these Episcopal Conferences by promoting dialogue and mutual trust among states or nations, so that they may have the opportunity to engage with other Episcopal Conferences so that there may be the sharing of gifts.
129. To realize a “sound decentralization” (EG 16) and an effective inculturation of faith, it is necessary not only to recognize the role of Episcopal Conferences, but also to reevaluate the institution of particular councils, both provincial and plenary.
The periodic celebration of these councils has been an obligation for much of the Church’s history and is currently provided for in the canon law of the Latin Church (cf. CIC can. 439-446). They should be convened periodically.
The procedure for the recognition of the conclusions of particular councils by the Holy See (recognitio) should be reformed to encourage their timely publication by specifying precise deadlines or, in cases of purely pastoral or disciplinary matters (not directly concerning issues of faith, morals, or sacramental discipline), by introducing a legal presumption equivalent to tacit consent.42
The Service of the Bishop of Rome
130. The synodal process has also revisited the question of the ways in which the Bishopof Rome exercises his ministry.
Synodality enables the communitarian (“all”), collegial (“some”) and personal (“one”) aspects of local Churches and of the entire Church, aligning and unifying them with one another. In light of this, the Petrine ministry of the Pope plays a fundamental part in the synodal dynamic, as does the communitarian aspect that includes the whole People of God and the collegial dimension of the episcopal ministry (cf. ITC 64).
131. We can, therefore, understand the extent of the Council’s affirmation that “within the ecclesiastical communion, there are lawfully particular churches which enjoy their own proper traditions, while the primacy of the see of Peter remains intact, which presides over the universal communion of charity and safeguards legitimate differences while taking care that what is particular not only does not harm to unity but rather is conducive to it” (LG 13).
The Bishop of Rome, who is the foundation of the Church’s unity (LG 23), is the guarantor of synodality: he is the one who convokes the Church in synodality and presides over it, confirming its results. As the Successor of Peter, he has a unique role in safeguarding the deposit of faith and of morals, ensuring that synodal processes are geared towards unity and witness.
Together with the Bishop of Rome, the College of Bishops has an irreplaceable role in shepherding the whole Church (cf. LG 22-23) and in promoting synodality in all the local Churches.
132. As guarantor of unity in diversity, the Bishop of Rome ensures that the identity of the Eastern Catholic Churches is safeguarded and that their centuries-old theological, canonical, liturgical, spiritual and pastoral traditions are respected.
These Churches are equipped with their own deliberative synodal structures: Synod of Bishops of the Patriarchal Church, the Synod of the Major Archepiscopal Church (CCEO c. 102. ss., 152), Provincial Council (CCEO can. 137), Council of Hierarchs (CCEO cc. 155, § 1, 164 ss.), and, lastly, Assemblies of Hierarchs of the various Churches sui iuris (CCEO can. 322) As Churches sui iuris that are in full communion with the Bishop of Rome, they hold fast to their Eastern identity and their autonomy.
In the name of synodality, it is appropriate to revisit history together in order to heal the wounds of the past and to deepen how we live communion.
This means giving consideration to adjusting relationships among Eastern Catholic Churches and the Roman Curia.
These relations must be characterized by the exchange of gifts, collaboration and mutual enrichment.
133. In order to further these relations, the Synodal Assembly proposes to establish a Council of Patriarchs, Major Archbishops and Metropolitans of the Eastern Catholic Churches presided over by the Pope, which would be an expression of synodality and an instrument for promoting communion.
The Council would also serve as a means of sharing liturgical, theological, canonical and spiritual patrimony.
The migration of many of the Eastern faithful into regions of the Latin Rite risks compromising their identity. Instruments and norms need to be evolved to strengthen as much as possible collaboration between the Latin Church and the Eastern Catholic Churches to address this situation. The Synodal Assembly recommends sincere dialogue and fraternal collaboration between Latin and Eastern Bishops, to ensure better pastoral care for the Eastern Faithful who lack priests of their own rite and to guarantee, with the appropriate autonomy, the involvement of Eastern Bishops in Episcopal Conferences.
Finally, the Assembly proposes that the Holy Father convene a Special Synod to promote the consolidation and re-flourishing of the Eastern Catholic Churches.
134. A synodal reflection on the exercise of the Petrine ministry must be undertaken from the perspective of the “sound decentralization” (EG 16) wanted by Pope Francis and many Episcopal Conferences.
According to the Apostolic Constitution Praedicate Evangelium, this decentralization means “to leave to the competence of Bishops the authority to resolve, in the exercise of ‘their proper task as teachers’ and pastors, those issues with which they are familiar and that do not affect the Church’s unity of doctrine, discipline and communion, always acting with that spirit of co-responsibility which is the fruit and expression of the specific mysterium communionis that is the Church (PE II, 2).
To keep progressing in this direction, one could initiate a theological and canonical study whose task would be to identify those matters that should be addressed to the Pope (reservatio papalis) and those that could be addressed to the bishops in their Churches or groupings of Churches.
This should be done in line with the recent Motu Proprio Competentias quasdam decernere (February 15, 2022).
The document assigns “certain areas of competence with regard to the provisions of the Codes intended to safeguard unity of discipline in the universal Church, and executive power in the local Churches and ecclesial institutions” on the basis of “the dynamic of ecclesiastical communion” (preamble).
Even canonical norms should be developed in a synodal style by those who have the relevant responsibility and authority in the Church and should be allowed to ripen as the fruit of ecclesial discernment.
135. The Apostolic Constitution Praedicate Evangelium has configured the service of the Roman Curia in a synodal and missionary sense.
It insists that it “is not set between the Pope and the Bishops, but is at the service of both, according to the modalities proper to the nature of each” (PE I. 8).
Its implementation ought to promote greater collaboration among the dicasteries and encourage their listening to local Churches.
Before publishing important normative documents, the dicasteries are exhorted to initiate a consultation with Episcopal Conferences and with the corresponding structures of the Eastern Churches sui iuris.
In accordance with the rationale of transparency and accountability outlined above, forms of evaluating the work of the Curia might possibly be envisaged. Such an evaluation, in a synodal and missionary perspective, could also be extended to the Pontifical Representatives.
The visits ad limina Apostolorum are the apex of the relation between the bishops of local Churches and the Bishop of Rome and his closest collaborators in the Roman Curia.
Many Bishops desire that the way these visits are conducted will be reviewed to make them more and more an opportunity for open exchange and mutual listening.
Considering their diverse cultures and backgrounds, it is important, for the good of the Church, that members of the College of Cardinals become better acquainted with one another and that the bonds of communion among them be fostered.
Synodality should inspire their collaboration with the Petrine Ministry and their collegial discernment in ordinary and extraordinary consistories.
136. The Synod of Bishops emerges as one of the most evident places where synodality and collegiality are to be practiced.
The Synod was established by Saint Paul VI as an assembly of Bishops convoked to support the Roman Pontiff in his concern for the whole Church.
Today, transformed into a phased process by the Apostolic Constitution Episcopalis Communio, it fosters essential relationships between the People of God, the College of Bishops and the Pope.
The entire holy People of God, the Bishops to whom portions of the People of God are entrusted,44 and the Bishop of Rome participate fully in the synodal process, each according to their proper function. This participation is made manifest in the varied composition of the Synodal Assembly gathered around the Pope, which reflects the catholicity of the Church.
In particular, as Pope Francis explained, the composition of this XVI Ordinary General Assembly is “more than a contingent fact. It expresses a way of exercising the episcopal ministry that is consistent with the living Tradition of the Churches and with the teaching of Vatican II” (Intervention at the First General Congregation of the Second Session of the XVI General Ordinary Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, October 2, 2024).
The Synod of Bishops, preserving its episcopal nature, has seen and will be able to see in the future in the participation of other members of the People of God “the shape that episcopal authority is called to take in a Church that is aware of being constitutively relational and, because of this, synodal” (ibid) for mission.
In deepening the identity of the Synod of Bishop, what is essential is that the relationship between the involvement of all, (the holy People of God), the ministry of some (the College of Bishops) and the presidency of one (the successor of Peter) appears and is concretely realised throughout the synodal process and in the Assemblies.
137. One of the most significant fruits of the Synod 2021-2024 has been the intensity of ecumenical zeal. The need to find “a form of exercise of the Primacy that […] opens itself up to a new situation” (UUS 95) is a fundamental challenge both for a missionary synodal Church and for Christian unity.
The Synod welcomes the recent publication of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity The Bishop of Rome: Primacy and Synodality in Ecumenical Dialogues and in the Responses to the Encyclical Ut Unum Sint, which opens avenues for further study.
The document shows that the promotion of Christian unity is an essential aspect of the ministry of the Bishop of Rome and that the ecumenical journey has fostered a deeper understanding of it.
The concrete proposals it contains regarding a rereading or an official commentary on the dogmatic definitions of the First Vatican Council on primacy, a clearer distinction between the different responsibilities of the Pope, the promotion of synodality within the Church and in its relationship with the world and the search for a model of unity based on an ecclesiology of communion offer promising prospects for the ecumenical journey.
The Synodal Assembly hopes that this document will serve as a basis for further reflection with other Christians, “together, of course”, on the exercise of the Ministry of Unity of the Bishop of Rome as a “service of love recognized by all concerned” (UUS 95).
138. The richness of the participation of Fraternal Delegates from other Churches and Christian Communions at the synodal Assembly invites us to pay more attention to the synodal practices of our ecumenical partners, both in the East and in the West.
Ecumenical dialogue is fundamental to developing an understanding of synodality and the unity of the Church.
It urges us to develop ecumenical synodal practices, including forms of consultation and discernment on questions of shared and urgent interest, as the celebration of an ecumenical Synod on evangelization could be.
It also invites us to mutual accountability for who we are, what we do, and what we teach.
What makes this possible is our unity under the one Baptism that offers us the dynamism of communion, participation and mission and which gives life to our identity as the People of God.
139. In 2025, the Year of Jubilee, we will also celebrate the anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, the First Ecumenical Council at which the symbol of the faith that unites all Christians was formulated.
The preparation and joint commemoration of the 1700th anniversary of this45 event should be an opportunity to deepen and confess together our faith in Christ and to put into practice forms of synodality among Christians of all traditions.
It will also be an opportunity to launch bold initiatives for a common date for Easter so that we can celebrate the Resurrection of the Lord on the same day, as will happen, providentially, in 2025. This will give greater missionary strength to the proclamation of Him, who is the life and salvation of the whole world.46
Part V – “So I Send You”
Forming a People for Missionary DiscipleshipJesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” (Jn20, 21-22).
140. On the evening of the Resurrection, Jesus gave the disciples the salvific gift of his peace and made them sharers in His mission. His peace represents the fullness of life, harmony with God, with sisters and brothers, and with creation.
His mission is to proclaim the Reign of God, offering to every person, without exception, the mercy and love of the Father.
The subtle gesture that accompanies the words of the Risen One recalls what God did in the beginning.
Now, in the Upper Room, with the breath of the Spirit, the new creation begins: a people of missionary disciples is born.
141. The Holy People of God require proper formation so that they can witness to the joy of the Gospel and grow in the practice of synodality: first of all, in the freedom of sons and daughters of God in following Jesus Christ, contemplated in prayer and recognized in those who are poor.
Synodality implies a profound vocational and missionary awareness, the source of a renewed way of living ecclesial relations and new dynamics regarding participation.
It also means adopting the practice of ecclesial discernment and a culture of ongoing evaluation.
These cannot come about unless accompanied by focused formation processes.
Formation in synodality and the Church’s synodal style will make people aware that the gifts received in Baptism should be put to use for the good of all: they cannot be hidden or remain unused.
142. The formation of missionary disciples begins with and is rooted in Christian Initiation.
In each person’s journey of faith, there is an encounter with many people, groups and small communities that have helped foster their relationship with the Lord and in the communion of the Church: parents and family members, godparents, catechists and educators, liturgical leaders and those providing charitable services, deacons, priests and that of the bishop himself.
Many of these people have made an impression on us.
Sometimes, unfortunately, once the journey of Initiation is over, the bond with the community weakens, and formation becomes neglected.
Becoming missionary disciples of the Lord is not, however, something achieved once and for all.
It demands continuous conversion, growing in love “to the measure of the fullness of Christ” (Eph 4:13) and being open to the gifts of the Spirit for a living and joyful witness of faith.
This is why it is important to rediscover how the Sunday Eucharist is formative for Christians: “The fullness of our formation is conformation to Christ […]: it is not a mental, abstract process, but rather one enabling us to become Him” (Francis, Desiderio desideravi, 41).
For many of the faithful, the Sunday Eucharist is their only contact with the Church: ensuring it is celebrated in the best possible manner, with particular regard to the homily and to the “active participation” (SC 14) of everyone is decisive for synodality.
In the Mass, we experience synodality coming to life in the Church as a grace received from above.
This precedes the synodality that comes about as the result of our own efforts.
Under the presidency of one and thanks to the ministry of a few, all can participate at the twofold table of the Word and the Bread.
The gift of communion, mission and participation – the three cornerstones of synodality – is realized and renewed in every Eucharist.
143. One of the requests that emerged most strongly and from all contexts during the synodal process is that the formation provided by the Christian community be integral and continuing.
Such formation must aim not only at acquiring theoretical knowledge but also at promoting the capacity for openness and encounter, sharing and collaboration, reflection and discernment in common. Formation must consequently engage all the dimensions of the human person (intellectual, affective, relational and spiritual) and include concrete experiences that are appropriately accompanied.
There was also a marked insistence throughout the synodal process upon the need for a common and shared formation, in which men and women, laity, consecrated persons, ordained ministers and candidates for ordained ministry participate together, thus enabling them to grow together in knowledge and mutual esteem and in the ability to collaborate.
This requires the presence of suitable and competent educators, capable of demonstrating with their lives what they transmit with their words.
Only in this way will formation be truly generative and transformative.
Nor should we overlook the contribution that the pedagogical disciplines can make to providing well-focused formation, adult learning and teaching methods and the accompaniment of individuals and communities.
We, therefore, need to invest in the formation of formators.
144. The Church already has many places and resources for the formation of missionary disciples: families, small communities, parishes, ecclesial associations, seminaries and religious communities, academic institutions, and also places for serving and working with the marginalized as well as missionary and volunteer initiatives. In each of these areas, the community expresses its capacity to educate in discipleship and to accompany through witness.
This encounter often brings together people of different generations.
Popular piety, too, is a precious treasure of the Church, which teaches the entire People of God on the journey (cf. Aparecida 259. 261).
In the Church, no one simply receives formation: everyone is an active subject and has something to give to others.
145. Among the formative practices that can benefit from the new impetus of synodality, special attention should be given to catechesis so that, in addition to being part of the journey of initiation, catechesis is continuously drawing people outwards in mission.
Communities of missionary disciples will know how to implement catechesis under the sign of mercy and bring it closer to each person’s lived experience, taking it to the existential peripheries without losing the Catechism of the Catholic Church as a reference point.
It can thus become a ‘laboratory of dialogue’ with the men and women of our time (cf. Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, General Directory for Catechesis, 54) and illuminate their search for meaning.
In many Churches, catechists are the fundamental resource for accompaniment and formation; in others, their service must be better appreciated and supported by the community, breaking away from a logic of delegation, which contradicts synodality.
Taking into account the scale of the phenomena of human migration, it is important that catechesis promotes deeper relationships of mutual acquaintance amongst different Churches.
146. In addition to specifically pastoral settings and resources, the Christian community is present in many other places of formation, such as in schools, vocational training colleges, and universities, as well as where people are formed for social and political commitment and in the worlds of sport, music and art.
Despite the diversity of cultural contexts, which determine very different practices and traditions, Catholic-inspired formation centers are increasingly finding themselves on the frontline of a Church that is always moving outwards in mission.
Inspired by the practices of synodality, they can become fertile contexts for friendly and participative relationships.
They become contexts that give witness to life; in them, the skills and organization are, above all, lay-led, and the contribution of families is prioritised.
In particular, Catholic schools and universities play an important role in the dialogue between faith and culture and in providing moral education on values, offering a formation oriented towards Christ, the icon of life in its fullness.
Thus, they become capable of promoting an alternative to the dominant models that are often driven by individualism and competition, thereby also playing a prophetic role.
In some contexts, they are the only settings where children and young people come into contact with the Church.
When inspired by intercultural and interreligious dialogue, their educational engagement is also valued by those of other religious traditions as a form of human development.
147. Shared synodal formation for all the baptized constitutes the horizon within which to understand and practice the specific formation required for individual ministries and vocations.
For this to happen, it must be implemented as an exchange of gifts between different vocations (communion), in the perspective of a service to be performed (mission) and in a style of involvement and education in differentiated co-responsibility (participation).
This request, which emerged strongly from the synodal process, often requires a demanding change of mentality and a renewed approach to both formation contexts and processes.
Above all, it implies an inner readiness to be enriched by the encounter with brothers and sisters in the faith, overcoming prejudices and partisan views.
The ecumenical dimension of formation cannot but facilitate this change in mentality.
148. Throughout the synodal process, a widely expressed request was that discernment and formation of candidates for ordained ministry be undertaken in a synodal way.
There should be a significant presence of women, an immersion in the daily life of communities, and formation to enable collaboration with everyone in the Church and in how to practice ecclesial discernment.
This implies a courageous investment of energy in the preparation of formators. The Assembly calls for a revision of the Ratio Fundamentalis Institutionis Sacerdotalis in order to incorporate the requests made by the Synod. They should be translated in precise guidelines for a formation to synodality.
Formation pathways should awaken in candidates their passion for the mission to all peoples (ad gentes). Formation of Bishops is just as necessary so that they may better assume their mission of bringing together in unity the gifts of the Spirit and exercise in a synodal manner the authority conferred on them.
The synodal way of formation implies that the ecumenical dimension is present in all aspects of the paths towards ordained ministries.
149. The synodal process has insistently drawn attention to some specific areas of formation of the People of God for synodality.
The first of these concerns the impact of the digital environment on learning processes, concentration, the perception of self and the world, and the building of interpersonal relationships.
Digital culture constitutes a crucial dimension of the Church’s witness in contemporary culture and an emerging missionary field.
This requires ensuring that the Christian message is present online in reliable ways that do not ideologically distort its content. Although digital media has great potential to improve our lives, it can also cause harm and injury through bullying, misinformation, sexual exploitation and addiction.49 Church educational institutions must help children and adults develop critical skills to safely navigate the web.
150. Another area of great importance is the promotion in all ecclesial contexts of a culture of safeguarding, making communities ever safer places for minors and vulnerable persons.
The work to equip Church structures with regulations and legal procedures that enable the prevention of abuse and timely responses to inappropriate behavior has already begun.
It is necessary to continue this commitment, offering specific and adequate formation to those who work in contact with minors and vulnerable adults so that they can act competently and recognize the signals, often silent, of those experiencing difficulties and needing help.
It is essential that victims are welcomed and supported, and this needs to be done sensitively.
This requires great humanity and must be carried out with the help of qualified people.
We must all allow ourselves to be moved by their suffering and practice that proximity, which, through concrete choices, will uplift them, help them and prepare a different future for all.
It is imperative that throughout the world, the Church activates and promotes a culture of prevention and safeguarding, making communities ever safer places for minors and vulnerable persons.
Although steps have been taken to prevent abuse, it is necessary to strengthen this commitment by offering specific and ongoing formation and training for those working with minors and vulnerable adults.
Safeguarding processes must be constantly monitored and evaluated.
Victims and survivors must be welcomed and supported with great sensitivity.
151. The themes of the Church’s social doctrine, such as commitment to peace and justice, care for our common home and intercultural and interreligious dialogue, must also be more widely shared among the People of God so that the action of missionary disciples can influence the construction of a more just and compassionate world.
The commitment to defending life and human rights, for the proper ordering of society, for the dignity of work, for a fair and supportive economy, and an integral ecology is part of the evangelizing mission that the Church is called to live and incarnate in history.50
Conclusion
A Feast for All Peoples
When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. […] Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast”.
Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” because they knew it was the Lord.
Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them and did the same with the fish. (Jn 21, 9.12.13)
152. The miraculous catch of fish concludes with a feast.
The Risen One asked the disciples to obey His Word, to cast their nets and pull them ashore.
It is He, however, who prepares the banquet and invites them to eat.
There are loaves and fish for all, just as when He multiplied them for the hungry crowd.
Most of all, there is the wonder and enchantment of His presence, so clear and bright that no one needs to ask questions.
Eating with them once again, following their abandonment and denial of Him, He invites them anew into communion with Him, imprinting upon them the sign of His eternal mercy that opens onto the future.
Those who participated in this Easter would thus identify themselves as: “those who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.” (Acts 10,41).
153. By these banquets, the Risen Lord fulfils the image of the prophet Isaiah, whose words have inspired the work of the Synod Assembly: a superabundant and sumptuous banquet prepared by the Lord on the mountaintop, a symbol of conviviality and communion intended for all peoples (Is 25:6-8).
The banquet that the Lord prepared for His disciples after Easter is a sign that the eschatological banquet had already begun. Even if it finds its fullness only in Heaven, the banquet of grace and mercy is already prepared for all. The Church has the mission of bringing this splendid announcement to a changing world.
While nourished in the Eucharist by the Lord’s Body and Blood, She knows She cannot forget the poorest, the last, the excluded, those who do not know love and are without hope, nor those who do not believe in God or do not recognise themselves in any established religion.
She brings them to the Lord in His prayer and then goes out to meet them with the creativity and boldness that the Spirit inspires.
The Church’s synodality, thus, becomes a social prophecy, inspiring new paths in the political and economic spheres, as well as collaborating with all those who believe in fellowship and peace in an exchange of gifts with the world.
154. Living through the synodal process again, we have become aware that the salvation to be received and proclaimed is inherently relational.
We live it and witness to it together.
History reveals itself to us tragically marked by war, rivalry for power, and thousands of injustices and abuses.
We know, however, that the Spirit has placed the desire for authentic relationships and true bonds in the heart of every human being. Creation itself speaks of unity and sharing, of diversity and of variously interconnected forms of life.
Everything stems from and tends towards harmony, even while being devastated by evil.
The ultimate meaning of synodality is the witness that the Church is called to give to God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the harmony of love that pours Himself out, to give Himself to the world.
We can live the communion that saves by walking in a synodal way, in the intertwining of our vocations, charisms and ministries.
By going forth to meet everyone in order to bring the joy of the Gospel we can live the communion that saves; with God, with the entire humanity and all of creation.
It is then that we will begin to experience, through sharing, the banquet of life that God offers to all peoples.
155. We entrust the results of this Synod to the Virgin Mary, who bears the splendid title of Odigitria, she who shows and guides the way.
May she, Mother of the Church, who in the Upper Room helped the newly formed community of disciples to open themselves to the novelty of Pentecost, teach us to be a people of disciples and missionaries walking together, to be a synodal Church.