Archbishop Anthony Fisher OP has accepted key proposals from the Sydney Synod, setting new pastoral priorities for the Sydney Archdiocese focused on more prayerful liturgies, Christ-centred communities and renewed missionary outreach. Source: The Catholic Weekly.
The decisions – aimed at strengthening sacramental life, evangelisation, and formation – came at the conclusion of the four-day Synod, which closed with Mass at St Mary’s Cathedral on May 3 after more than a decade of consultation and discernment.
Requested by the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia and the universal Synod on Synodality, the Synod was also the result of more than a decade of consultations, including three regional consultations held across Sydney in 2025 which drew almost 1000 participants.
These yielded 500 submissions, compiled into 18 ideas for synod members to discern, and grouped under three “longings” of Sydney Catholics: that liturgies be more prayerful; that parish and other Church communities be more Christ-centred; and that they be more mission-oriented.
“In these last four days, the Synod of Sydney has attempted to do what the disciples did in Jerusalem in the earliest days of the Church,” Archbishop Fisher said in his closing homily.
“To gather, pray, listen, and discern together what fidelity to the Gospel demands of the church in Sydney in our time. Against the temptation to trust in our own preferences, or to listen to the loudest voice, we have instead sought him who is the way, the truth and the life.”
The synod opened with 170 synod members and observers joining Archbishop Fisher at the cathedral for an evening Mass and informal reception on April 30.
Then followed two days of speeches, discussions and voting on which ideas should be implemented in the archdiocese, concluding with Mass and a BBQ for Synod members.
St Mary’s Cathedral College Hall was transformed into a carpeted room with a stage, large screens and round tables to allow for smaller “conversations in the Spirit” between members, input to the whole assembly from speakers and table facilitators, and a transparent voting process.
“This is a very grassroots synod,” Bishop Daniel Meagher, vice chair of the Synod working party, told the assembly. “Ultimately it’s all about mission – being truly, fully catholic – in drawing all people to Christ.”
FULL STORY
Sydney Synod sets new pastoral priorities (By Marilyn Rodrigues, The Catholic Weekly)
