Cardinal Mario Grech, the Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops, has invited the Church to “make every effort to ensure that the third phase of the synodal process constitutes a further step forward in the experience and understanding of synodality”. Source: Vatican News.
The encouragement comes in a note published for the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the Vatican body.
In the letter, Cardinal Grech says that Pope Francis defined synodality as “the privileged way to achieve communion in the Church.”
These sentiments have also been echoed by Leo XIV, who at last Sunday’s Angelus underlined St Paul VI’s “prophetic intuition” in creating the Synod of Bishops in 1965, as the Second Vatican Council was drawing to a close.
The Pope said that he hoped that the 60th anniversary of this body “will inspire a renewed commitment to the unity and mission of the Church”.
Cardinal Grech reiterates this hope in his note, which comes during the third stage of a synodal process that Pope Francis launched at the grassroots level in 2021.
Starting from the dioceses and local churches, the process included three stages that resulted in the two assembly sessions at the Vatican in 2023 and 2024. These meetings produced a final document, which Cardinal Grech urges the local Churches and their regional bodies to now look to, in order to try out its proposals.
Cardinal Grech begins his note by looking at the roots of the Synod, starting from Paul VI’s creation of the Synod of Bishops through the motu proprio Apostolica Sollicitudo.
He instituted this body, Cardinal Grech writes, in order to “respond to the requests of the Council Fathers” to involve the College of Bishops “in the Petrine prerogative of solicitude for the whole Church”.
The cardinal explains that Paul VI endowed the Church with “a central institution representing the entire episcopate, capable of fostering unity and collaboration between the bishops of the whole world and the Bishop of Rome” and of “assisting him with advice” on issues and questions of decisive importance for the People of God.
Since then, 16 Ordinary General Assemblies, three Extraordinary General Assemblies, and 11 Special Assemblies have been held.
FULL STORY
Cardinal Grech: Third phase of synodal process is ‘step forward’ for Church (By Salvatore Cernuzio, Vatican News)
