VATICAN CITY — Clear statements upholding Church teaching during the Pope’s opening messages, coupled with a strong introductory speech reasserting Church teaching from Cardinal Peter Erdö, were the most noticeable highlights of the earliest days of the 14th Ordinary Synod of Bishops on the Family that runs through Oct. 25.

But the synod took on a different hue as the first week progressed, after the Holy Father and various synod fathers downplayed Cardinal Erdö’s speech and questions were raised about a new methodology for the synod and the instrumentum laboris (working document), which is the official text to guide the synod fathers’ discussions during the three-week meeting.

The synod, which is being attended by 279 bishops and priests from around the world, is discussing the theme “The Vocation and Mission of the Family in the Church and the Contemporary World.”

In his homily at the opening Mass of the synod on Oct. 4, Pope Francis underlined the indissolubility of marriage and told participants that the union between a man and a woman is the foundation of God’s plan for the family and a solution to the many forms of loneliness in today’s world.

The first full day of the gathering was dominated by the introductory address of the synod’s general relator, Hungarian Cardinal Peter Erdö, who reasserted much of the Church’s traditional teaching and effectively rejected German Cardinal Walter Kasper’s controversial proposal to readmit civilly remarried divorcees to Communion.

Cardinal Erdö stressed that although civilly remarried Catholics “must be given merciful pastoral guidance,” this “does not call into question the indissolubility of marriage as taught by Jesus Christ himself.”

Critics of the Cardinal Kasper proposal, which was raised at the very beginning of the synodal process in February 2014, believe that Cardinal Kasper’s pastoral guidance does threaten Church doctrine. Cardinal Erdö’s comments were given added weight by the fact that his assertion was reflective of wishes and concerns received by the synod secretariat in the time between the two synods. As the synod’s general relator, Cardinal Erdö was responsible for underlining the goals of the synod at the beginning of the three-week meeting.

He further pointed out that the Gospel reading for that day was from the Gospel of Mark, when Jesus says, “From the beginning of creation, God made them male and female,” and what “God has joined together, let no man put asunder.”

The cardinal’s speech, which many bishops praised for its orthodox content, did not completely put an end to Cardinal Kasper’s proposal (Cardinal Erdö himself said it needed “further reflection”). But one synod father told the Register, on condition of anonymity, that he felt his speech “probably change[d] the direction of the synod,” and Cardinal Kasper sat “stony-faced and didn’t applaud when it was read out.”

It later emerged that some synod fathers had valued Cardinal Erdö’s speech so much that they sought to include it as a guide for the assembly’s deliberations, along with the instrumentum laboris. This was called into question in an unscheduled intervention the next day from Pope Francis, who appeared to downplay the speech by stressing that only three official documents of the synod should be taken as guidance for the synod fathers: his two speeches from the last synod and the final report. Other texts, including Cardinal Erdö’s introductory report, were pointedly excluded.

Various synod fathers at a Holy See briefing on Oct. 6 with reporters also pushed back on the speech, saying it was “just one piece” in a number of documents relevant to the synod and that Cardinal Kasper’s proposal was still “pastorally open.”

Problems with the new methodology of the synod also became apparent. Archbishop Joseph Kurtz, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, told the Register there were “a lot of questions on the modalities,” particularly about exactly how the discussions of the small groups were “going to lead up to votes” on the final report.

The questions led to attempts by both the Pope and Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, secretary general of the Synod of Bishops, to try to allay fears, although it wasn’t clear in the first days if the concerns had been addressed. The Pope stressed the importance of the small groups and praised the instrumentum laboris as a basis for discussion.

And yet there were questions about the instrumentum laboris, too. Although critics have said the document was flawed from the beginning, and some synod fathers criticized it for being too heavily weighted specifically towards Western problems, the text is expected to be more instrumental to the final report than in past synods, since no midterm report is being produced — a novelty some view as manipulation.

The Holy See’s first official briefing on the opening discussions appeared to lay special emphasis on finding a new, more inclusive language on issues relating to the Church’s teaching on marriage and the family. Homosexuality also appeared to figure highly. It later became clear that many other issues were discussed but were left out of the briefing by the press office.

 

Key Interventions

Among the key interventions (talks) omitted from the briefing was that of Cardinal Robert Sarah of Guinea, prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, who warned against gender ideology and Islamic fundamentalism. They are both tyrannies, he said, akin to communism and fascism.

Other interventions left out upheld Church doctrine, Scripture and Tradition, the need for justice along with mercy, and the necessity of conversion. Also ignored was an intervention from Panama’s synod father, Bishop Aníbal Saldana Santamaria, who controversially proposed the law of Christ be overturned and the Church adapt a position on divorce, in order to be “merciful like Moses.” He was openly criticized by Greek-Melkite Patriarch Gregory III Laham.

An additional contention revolved around the makeup of the 10-member papal commission that is charged with monitoring the synod and drafting the final speech. Critics have pointed out that the commission is heavily weighted toward those not considered to be robust enough in defending the Church’s doctrine on marriage and family. Cardinal George Pell, a member of the Curia, sought to change the composition of the commission, but the Pope put a stop to such efforts by stressing on the first day that he was involved in setting up the commission and chose its members.

Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia told reporters that the Holy Father urged the synod fathers not to think of each other as “conspiring against one another, but to work for unity among the bishops.”

The Pope made the comment after it emerged that 13 cardinals and bishops had written to the Holy Father warning against “steering” the synod to achieve a certain result.

Archbishop Chaput said he had never been to a Church meeting “where groups don’t get together and lobby for a particular direction, and that’s what’s going on.”

“We shouldn’t be scandalized or surprised by that,” he said, “as long as it’s done up front and honestly, and not in a way that tries to win rather than arrive at the truth. We’re not here to win anything; we’re here to arrive at the truth.”

On Oct. 7, Archbishop Chaput and Archbishop Kurtz were named relators of the circuli minori (small groups). The groups will have greater prominence than in previous synods, in order to foster a more “intense” discussion, Pope Francis said.

Cardinal Wilfrid Napier of Durban, South Africa, co-president of the synod, told Catholic News Service on Oct. 8 that the emphasis on small-group discussions and incorporating that work into the synod’s final draft document is helping alleviate any suspicion of the synod being manipulated.

Those discussions “have actually fulfilled my expectations,” he said, adding that they are “really free and open exchanges … getting a good measure of what’s happening in the Church in the various parts of the world.”

“If the family is weak, the Church is going to be weak; it’s not the other way around,” the cardinal said. “The strength of the Church comes from the families, so let’s give the families every support we can.”

Edward Pentin is the author of

The Rigging of a Vatican Synod? (Ignatius Press, 2015).