Synod of Bishops on the Family now underway in Rome

The Synod of Bishops on the Family began in Rome on Sunday October 4.  This marks the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the Synod of Bishops, which was first held after the close of the Second Vatican Council in 1965.  It comprises an Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops with the theme of “vocation and mission of the family in the Church and in the contemporary world.”

According to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) website, a synod is “an assembly of bishops from around the world who assist the Holy Father by providing counsel on important questions facing the Church in a manner that preserves the Church’s teaching and strengthens her internal discipline.”  The Synod of Bishops can meet in a Special Assembly or in a General Assembly, the latter dealing with topics that are either Ordinary or Extraordinary.  An Ordinary General Assembly concerns “‘the good of the universal Church’ … [and] requires the ‘learning, prudence and counsel’ of all the world’s bishops.”

Last October, Pope Francis called for an Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, one that deals with matters that “‘require a speedy solution’ and which demand ‘immediate attention for the good of the entire Church.’”  The Extraordinary General Assembly worked to define the current situation in the world with regards to the family and to hear the experiences and proposals of the bishops on how best to spread the Gospel of the Family.

The Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops now comes together to “‘formulate appropriate pastoral guidelines for the pastoral care of the person and the family.”

Monsignor Michael Heintz, the director of the Masters of Divinity Program at Notre Dame and Professional Specialist in the History of Christianity, shared his own expectations and challenges facing the synod with the Rover.

“The Synod on the Family is an opportunity for representative bishops from around the world to reflect on the family in light of revealed truth,” Heintz said.  “The family has often been referred to as the ‘domestic church’ in that it is the most basic social unit in a community, and it is in the home (if one reads carefully the Marriage and Baptismal liturgies) that formation in faith begins and is sustained.

The challenges facing marriage and family today across various cultures are at times staggering,” he continued.  “But it is important to remember that this is precisely a synod from around the world, and we tend in the U.S. to presume that the challenges or issues facing us are those that Catholics around the world are facing; to some degree this is quite true, but it is also true that our perspective is also at times narrow and limited.  It will be both interesting and refreshing to hear the perspectives of bishops who are from the second- and third- world countries.”

David Fagerberg, Professor of Liturgical Studies, offered a few insights to the Rover as well.  He emphasized that the “Church takes the long view and has seen the family unit survive amongst a number of movements and governments and ideologies always standing up for it.”

In many of his public appearances, especially in Philadelphia and his Wednesday audiences in Saint Peter’s Square over the past few months, Pope Francis has offered his thoughts and meditations as a preparation for the Synod on the Family.

At the conclusion of his historic trip to Philadelphia for the World Meeting of Families, the pope delivered an impromptu speech to the crowds on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.  He spoke of the creation of the family: “God made this marvelous world in which we live. … But the most beautiful thing that God did, says the Bible, was the family.”
He went on to describe how the family must reciprocate God’s love: “Families have a citizenship which is divine.  The identity card that they have is given to them by God.  So that within the heart of the family, truth, goodness, and beauty can truly grow.”

As he has done in other places, Pope Francis then talked about the importance of caring for children and grandparents in the context of the family.  “Children, whether young or older … are the future, the strength that moves us forward.  We place our hope in them. … Grandparents are the living memory of the family.  They passed on the faith, they transmitted the faith to us.  To look after grandparents, to look after children, is the expression of love,” he said.

The pope’s words resound with what the bishops emphasized in Instrumentum Laboris, the working document for Ordinary Synod, that “the family is truly the ‘school of humanity’ … an expert in humanity and faithful to her mission to proclaim untiringly and with profound conviction the ‘Gospel of the Family’ … the essential agent in the work of evangelization.”

In one of his September general audiences, the Holy Father talked of how a covenant upholds the family because “it protects them, frees them from selfishness, protects them from degradation, rescues them for life which knows no death.”  This covenant is not exclusively between God and the family; it is intimately contained in the gift of self between one man and one woman in the marriage covenant.

“The communion of charisms—those bestowed in the Sacrament of Marriage and those granted at consecration through the Kingdom of God—is intended to transform the Church into a fully familial place through the encounter with God,”  Pope Francis said.  Marriage is not just a man-made institution but is also a divine sacrament instituted by God.

The staggering number of divorces has hurt the unit of the family.  In an August general audience, the pope talked of how “the Church is fully aware that such a situation is contrary to the Christian Sacrament.  However, her gaze as a teacher always draws from a mother’s heart; a heart which, enlivened by the Holy Spirit, always seeks the good and the salvation of the people.  This is why she feels obliged, ‘for the sake of truth,’ to ‘exercise careful discernment of situations.’”

He continued, “Here the repeated call to Pastors to openly and consistently demonstrate the community’s willingness to welcome them and encourage them, so they may increasingly live and develop their membership in Christ and in the Church through prayer, by listening to the Word of God, by attending the liturgy, through the Christian education of their children, through charity and service to the poor, through the commitment to justice and peace.”

Pope Francis has also touched upon a number of other issues that affect the family, including poverty, sickness, and death.  In particular, he has emphasized the importance of viewing the family from a child’s perspective.

“In the family,” the pope said during one of his general audience addresses, “everything is connected: when her soul is wounded in some way, the infection spreads to everyone.  And when a man and a woman, who have committed to being ‘one flesh’ and forming a family, think obsessively of their own need for freedom and gratification, this bias affects the hearts and lives of their children in a profound way.  Frequently these children hide to cry alone.”

Pope Francis reminds us, “Husband and wife are one flesh.  Their own little children are flesh of their flesh.  If we think of the harshness with which Jesus admonishes adults not to scandalize the little ones … we can also better understand his words on the serious responsibility to guard the marital bond that gives rise to the human family.”

The family, amidst all the struggles, is liturgically and sacramentally united.  Pope Francis’ homily for the opening Mass of the Synod compared the image of the Lord’s vineyard—“his ‘dream,’ the plan which he nurtures with all his love, like a farmer who cares for his vineyard”—to his people.  These people are united together as a body of Christ, a family of God, “who are his own and produce the fruits of the kingdom of God.”

The Synod on the Family will continue through October 25, exploring the theme of the vocation and mission of the family in the Church and in the contemporary world.

 
Alex Slavsky is a junior studying philosophy and theology.  He has never been home for fall break before and needs advice on how to spend his time with the anticipation of traveling somewhere new.  Please let him know at aslavsky@nd.edu.