VATICAN CITY — A highly anticipated working document for the upcoming synod on the family, published by the Vatican on June 23, pushes back on same-sex relationships and reaffirms much of the traditional Church’s teaching on the family, but it controversially offers an opening for divorced-and-civilly remarried Catholics to receive Communion.
The 23,000-word document will serve as the basis and reference point during discussions at the 14th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, to take place Oct. 4-25.
This document summarizes the proposals from last October’s synodal documents that will be used in preparation for the assembly in October. The synod will study the theme “The Vocation and Mission of the Family in the Church and in the Contemporary World.”
Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, secretary general of the Synod of Bishops, told reporters June 23 that the instrumentum laboris, which partly draws on feedback from questionnaires sent to dioceses worldwide, “reliably reflects the perception and expectations of the whole Church on the crucial issue of the family.”
Three Parts
The text is divided into three parts: “Considering the Challenges of the Family,” “The Discernment of the Family Vocation” and “The Mission of the Family Today.”
It will be sent to bishops and those participating in the synod to help them present their experiences and aspirations at the meeting.
Cardinal Baldisseri highlighted certain novelties in the first part, which refer to contexts “now happily enlightened by the new encyclical letter, Laudato Si.” The challenges, he explained, are “poverty and social exclusion, old age, widowhood, bereavement in the family, disability, migration, the role of women, emotional life and education in sexuality, and bioethics.”
In “The Discernment of the Family Vocation,” the report of the last synod is “enriched” with an extension of the themes regarding natural marriage and sacramental fullness, indissolubility as a gift and a duty, family life, union and fruitfulness, the missionary dimension, faith, prayer, catechesis, the intimate bond between Church and family, the young and fear of marriage, and mercy.
“The Mission of the Family Today” begins with a broad reflection on the family and evangelization and explores in depth a number of other issues, such as the family as a subject of pastoral ministry, nuptial liturgy, renewed language and missionary openness.
On the issue of homosexual relationships, the document firmly rejects same-sex unions, saying that “there are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God’s plan for marriage and family” — a quote taken from a 2003 document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF).
Church Teaching Affirmed
The working document reiterates Church teaching that “men and women with a homosexual tendency ought to be received with respect and sensitivity” and should not suffer any “unjust discrimination.” It also suggests that dioceses set up special structures for “the accompaniment of families” that have members with same-sex attraction.
On the issue of civilly-remarried divorcees, the document acknowledges the strength of opposition to allowing their reception of holy Communion because that would undermine the indissolubility of marriage and those who have “insisted on maintaining the present discipline.” As with the matter of homosexual unions, the issue failed to reach the required two-thirds majority at the last synod. With the Pope’s instruction, it was left in the lineamenta (guidelines) for the upcoming synod.
This has led to the instrumentum laboris resurrecting the issue for discussion, stating that other synod fathers “proposed a more individualized approach, permitting access in certain situations and with certain well-defined conditions, primarily in irreversible situations and those involving moral obligations towards children who would have to endure unjust suffering” (122).
It adds, “Access to the sacraments might take place if preceded by a penitential practice, determined by the diocesan bishop,” echoing the controversial proposal first floated by Cardinal Walter Kasper at a special consistory in February 2014.
The local bishop, it adds, can investigate the issue in greater depth, “bearing in mind the distinction between an objective sinful situation and extenuating circumstances” and that the responsibility for entering into a marriage can be “diminished or even nullified” by various “psychological or social factors.” It should be stressed that the instrumentum laboris is not endorsing such an approach, but stating that some synod fathers are promoting it.
Trojan Horse?
Opus Dei Father Robert Gahl, professor of moral philosophy at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome, told the Register he is concerned that the objective and subjective distinction used in Paragraph 122 “can both be interpreted soundly or used as a Trojan horse for all sorts of crazy moral theories.”
The following paragraph then claims that, to address this issue, among the synod fathers “a great number agree” with the idea of “a journey of reconciliation or penance, under the auspices of the local bishop,” for civilly remarried divorcees living in a situation of cohabitation.
Although the document refers to Pope St. John Paul II’s apostolic exhortation Familiaris Consortio (The Role of the Christian Family in the Modern World), which says Catholics in these circumstances must neither receive the sacrament of penance nor the Eucharist, but instead be committed to spiritual communion and “live in continence,” the working document says some synod fathers are proposing that a priest could accompany the couple along this penitential path, evaluating their progress in order “to be able to suitably apply the power of binding and loosing to the situation.”
Father Gahl explained that the implication of this is that, “in some cases, the synod could authorize priests to loosen some of the divorced from valid marital bonds so that they might receive the holy Eucharist, while continuing to live in a union that would otherwise be in contrast with the indissolubility of marriage.”
Father Gahl reminded that the so-called Kasper proposal had already been “roundly rejected” in the last synod (the issue was one of just three to fail to achieve the required two-thirds majority). Father Gahl said the fathers explained that it “pretends to square the circle by offering mercy to those who regret their sins but are not committed to living according to the challenging demands of the Gospel.”
He said “this odd proposal,” repeated in the instrumentum laboris, “countenances reconciliation with the Church and reception of holy Communion without the commitment to live a life in agreement with the radical call to holiness.”
Father Gahl said that, overall, the document “reflects, at once, fidelity to the Church’s traditional teaching, a renewed pastoral impulse attentive to inspirations of the Holy Spirit and the diversity of opinions within the Church today regarding hot-button issues, some of which seem difficult to reconcile with Tradition.”
He said that, in sum, the document “is a signal for all members of the Church to pray intensely for the upcoming ordinary synod, while working hard to promote the family as a subject of evangelization, through personal witness and eloquent teaching whenever possible.”