Via rkkerk.nl, a short note from Cardinal Eijk, who is the sole Dutch participant in the assembly of the Synod of Bishops which was opened yesterday with a Holy Mass.
“The opening celebration, in which we prayed for the support of the Holy Spirit, was impressive, and we are ready to begin this intense period of listening to and deliberating and discussing with each other. I hope that faithful across the world and in especially in the Netherlands pray with us for God’s blessing over this Synod.”
Cardinal Baldisseri addresses the Synod, flanked by the Pope and, at his right, Archbishop Bruno Forte, the special secretary, and Cardinal André Vingt-Trois, president delegate. Seated in the third row from the bottom, second from the right, seems to be Cardinal Eijk, flanked by Cardinals Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal and Christopher Collins.
Today was the first full day of deliberations, although for the majority of Synod father, much of it was taken up by listening. Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, secretary general of the Synod, once again explained the processes of the coming three weeks. Cardinal Péter Erdö, relator general, held a long exposition outlining the context and topics of the Synod. John Allen has a good analysis of the cardinal’s talk. His clear words about the impossibility of allowing divorced and remarried Catholics to receive Communion, ruffled a number of feathers outside the Synod hall, but it should be clear by now that the Synod is not about to change doctrine. Rather, its focus is pastoral care and how it may best be developed and practiced. As Cardinal Vingt-Trois put it at this afternoon’s press conference, “If you think you will find a radical change in Church doctrine, you’ll be disappointed”. The archbishop of Paris, who serves the Synod as one of four President Delegates, stated that the Synod has two goals: to propose the Gospel of the family and the pastoral accompaniment of families in their realities.
Photo credit: L’Osservatore Romano
Yesterday the Holy See published the list of participants in the upcoming Synod of Bishops on the family. Of course, there are the usual suspects: the heads of the Roman Curia departments, the standing members of the Synod and the presidents of the world’s bishops’ conferences, with the latter being default participants in an Extraordinary General Synod, which this one is. Pope Francis has had a personal touch in the selection of several participants; noteable among those are Cardinal Kasper, to all appearances a theologian much appreciated by the Holy Father, but also the vast majority of cardinals he created in his first consistory of last February.
From a local point of view it is interesting to see that no less than four participants come from Belgium, while there is only a single one from the Netherlands and a mere two from Germany. Belgium sends Archbishop André-Joseph Léonard,which was expected as he is the president of the Belgian bishops’ conference, but also his predecessor, Cardinal Godfried Danneels (pictured), as well as Father George Henri Ruyssen of the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome. Additionaly, Metropolitan Athenagoras, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church in Belgium, attends as a “fraternal delegate”.
It seems that the Synod of Bishops has become the first curial body to undergo Pope Francis’ expected and announced reforms. Following the appointment of its new General Secretary, Archbishop Lorenzo Baldisseri in September, Pope Francis fairly soon afterwards announced the first major assembly of the Synod: an Extraordinary General Assembly titled “The Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelization”.
Today, Pope Francis selected the Relator General and the Special Secretary for the Extraordinary Assembly, which is only the third such gathering since the Synod of Bishops was created in 1965. The Relator General opens the assembly and gathers the conclusions and results for the final message and ultimately the Post-Synodal Exhortation that Pope Francis will write. This task will be performed by Péter Cardinal Erdö, the archbishop of Esztergom-Budapest and president of the Council of European Bishops’ Conferences. The Special Secretary, who records the proceedings of the Synod, is Italian Archbishop Bruno Forte (pictured) of Chieti-Vasto. He is also a member of the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelisation.
In the afternoon, the Synod continued with the interventions of 16 fathers. The first speaker, Cardinal Tauran (pictured at right), said some interesting things about interreligious dialogue, which is, of course, his area of expertise. In that dialogue, he said,
The most noted contribution, at least in social media, to this day’s session came from the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. Rowan Williams, pictured at left during his intervention. His theological address focussed on contemplation, and how that needs to be a first step before we present our faithful face to the world:
In Caelo et in Terra 