Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus

U.S. Synod Report: Common Hopes, Lingering Pain

September 28, 2022

~ by Dennis Sadowski, Catholic News Service

WASHINGTON (CNS) – Catholics across the country continue to feel wounded by the clergy abuse crisis, seek a more welcoming church in which their “lived reality” is prioritized over rules and regulations, and desire lifelong spiritual, pastoral and catechetical formation as disciples according to a report synthesizing the 10-month synodal process in diocese.

Participants in the process also expressed concern that the U.S. Catholic Church is deeply divided and that a lack of unity exists among the bishops; spoke of a desire to “accompany with authenticity” LGBTQ+ individuals and their families, and voiced hope that lay people’s gifts would be more widely utilized in a spirit of collaboration throughout the church, the report said.

Released September 19 by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the report summarized the concerns, hopes, pains and desires voiced by an estimated 700,000 participants who joined thousands of listening sessions and other events during the diocesan phase in the lead-up to the Synod of Bishops on synodality in October 2023.

There are roughly 66.8 million Catholics in the U.S. according to the report, meaning more than 1% of Catholics participated in the listening sessions.

The Synod’s theme is “For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, and Mission.”

The report is the synthesis of 290 documents received by the USCCB from various contributors. The report said the documents “represent over 22,000 reports from individual parishes and other groups.

The report is divided into four themes: “Enduring Wounds,” “Enhancing Communion and Participation,” “Ongoing Formation for Mission” and “Engaging Discernment.” Each section summarized common observations raised in the listening sessions.

The synthesis report included the observation that “nearly all synodal consultations shared a deep appreciation for the powerful impact of women religious who have consistently led the way in carrying out the mission of the church.”

Participants in listening sessions expressed a “desire for stronger leadership, discernment, and decision-making roles for women – both lay and religious in their parishes and communities.” To read the entire article, please click here
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Pope Francis: The Synod Must Hear Excluded Voices

March 31, 2022

~ by Brian Fraga, National Catholic Reporter (NCR)

“If we believe in the imago Dei, that the image of God is in everyone, then if we do not hear from those voices, we are not hearing from the entire body of Christ. And that’s our loss,” said Mary O’Meara, the executive director of the Deaf and Disabilities Ministry for the Archdiocese of Washington.

Diocesan officials, chaplains, social workers, lay ministers, parish leaders and others are listening to people with intellectual and physical disabilities. They are reaching out to those in prisons, homeless shelters, soup kitchens, and mobile home communities. Pastors have organized parish listening sessions for LGBTQ parishioners and seasonal farmworkers near the U.S. southern border.

Pope Francis and other church leaders have framed synodality as a decisive step in the church’s renewal that the Second Vatican Council proposed more than a half century ago. As the Pope has explained it, a synodal church journeys together with all the baptized, including those whose voices are usually not heard.

“Pope Francis’ main question is critical,” said Sr. Donna Ciangio, the chancellor for the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, told NCR. “What does the Holy Spirit expect of the church in the 21st century? We can sit around and look inward, but if we’re not hearing from everyone, we won’t know how we can get the Gospel out today.”

Archdiocese of Chicago
“You can’t be any more marginalized than an inmate in jail,” said Msgr. John Pollard, the synod coordinator for the Archdiocese of Chicago.

Pollard told NCR that the Archdiocese is relying on its Kolbe House Jail Ministry to hear from the estimated 700 Catholic pre-trial detainees at the Cook County Jail, one of the largest single-site pre-detention county facilities in the United States.

“It’s important to hear from them because they are human beings,” said Emily Cortina, the coordinator of outreach and formation at Kolbe House. “We’re following the model Jesus gave us to listen to the voices of those who have stumbled and fallen and are still reaching out for grace and mercy, because that’s really where we find God.”

Diocese of El Paso, Texas
In the colonias, or unincorporated communities, surrounding El Paso, Texas, volunteers are knocking on doors, asking residents how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted them, and how the church can help them regroup and get back on their feet.

“If you are doing a consultation with the people who are already in the pews, who are already coming to church, that’s great, and helpful,” said Surya Kalra, a lead organizer. “The difficult part is figuring out how to reach out to people we don’t see [in church], who used to be here, or would be here if we were different. That requires much more persistence and creativity. They are reaching out to those voices on the margins in house meetings, which are small informal group meetings in private homes.”

Archdiocese of Washington
At Holy Trinity Church in Georgetown, a couple dozen LGBTQ parishioners and their families earlier this year attended a special listening session. Jesuit Fr. Kevin Gillespie, the pastor, said there were tears and some anger directed at the Catholic Church.

“They expressed pain that their relationships aren’t recognized by the church,” Gillespie said. “They expressed their desires for sacramental marriage. In that group session, they expressed how important faith is for them, and how important a welcoming community is for them.”

Archdiocese of Seattle
Catholic Community Services of Western Washington (CCSWW) is planning bilingual in-person listening sessions at food banks, homeless shelters and rural mobile home communities in and around Seattle, Tacoma and Olympia, Washington.

We know the people who are served in those programs, and we feel they’d be comfortable with us,” said Erin Maguire, a regional network builder with CCSWW.

Diocese of San Diego
Marioly Galvan, chancellor for the Diocese of San Diego, told NRC that Catholic Charities of San Diego is helping the diocese to connect with migrant seasonal farmworkers. “We want to remain mindful of those communities. We’re all brothers and sisters, so to hear from their reality and lived experience, I think will be very enlightening for everyone to hear,” said Galvin.

“This moment is an opportunity for renewal and reawakening,” she said. “It is a moment that will lead us to become a more conscious church, to perfect and improve our ways in which we minister to others, and the ways that we listen to one another and journey with others.
To read the entire account, please click here

Collecting Religious’ Feedback for the Synod

March 22, 2022

~ by Dan Stockman, Global Sisters Report (GSR)

Sacred Heart Sr. Maria Cimperman is a true believer in the Synod of Bishops on synodality.

Cimperman, Director of the Center for the Study of Consecrated Life at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, is part of a four-member panel put together by the International Union of Superiors General (UISG) for women religious and the Union of Superiors General (USG) for men religious.
Religious congregations have until March 27 to submit their responses for the synod. Cimperman and her fellow commission members will meet in April in Rome to begin synthesizing those responses for the General Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops and the Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life. The response must be filed by August.

GSR: Your passion for the synod is undeniable.

Sr. Cimperman: It goes against polarization. Normally, we are in our own little worlds, and this – the synod – is flying in the face of that, and you don’t know where it’s going to go, which means it’s probably the Spirit guiding it.

The whole synodal process is really communal discernment. How do we walk and talk with each other and hear each other? And if we do it right, it may not be that dominant voice that stands out, it may be that quiet voice you hear and say, “There is truth in this.” How do we invite and engage religious everywhere in this so it’s not only the leaders, it’s everyone in the church and even people not in the church.

GSR: You have talked about how vowed religious have a particular role to play, by helping the process for laypeople.

Sr. Cimperman: Religious are being called to offer something – really, two things. Yes, fill out your response as religious, but also participate in the parishes, our schools, wherever the conversations are happening, to listen and hear – because we’re always trying to meet the unmet needs – and to offer some of our ways, to show how we seek to listen through our own discernment processes.

We have some experience in communal discernment. It’s the experience of listening, engaging, ways of being silent and listening, modes of prayer. Plus, we’ll learn from other people. It’s a space where we can offer what we are deeply about.
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GSR: Will it matter? Is it really worth the bother when so many people say the church won’t listen and nothing will change?

Sr. Cimperman: People are asking that question. It is an act of hope. It’s an action – and it’s hope. That’s important.

I also see this as a call of the Spirit. This is a cure for that polarization and all this division. Synodality is asking us to sit with one another and have a conversation and listen and do some sharing. If we don’t do this, if we keep doing the same thing, what will happen? This is not doing the same thing. This is doing something different.

Also, I have confidence in the Spirit’s movement among us. This is not top-down. It’s not bottom-up. It’s coming from everywhere. Everyone is asking and being asked to be involved in this. We don’t know where it’s going to lead, and that’s exciting.

GSR: Do you get the sense that people are responding, that they really are participating in this process?

Sr. Cimperman: I think they’re getting so many people responding that they are trying to refigure how to do this. To me, that’s a great sign. There’s a hunger, and we’re going to lose people if we don’t engage them, the possibilities here are immense. And we, too, as religious can offer spaces for these conversations, space for people of the margins whose voices don’t get heard.

GSR: Is there some fear that what is said and heard may not be positive? There’s no shortage of people with criticisms of the church.

Sr. Cimperman: I think we are going to hear both pain and grace, but we don’t know where the conversations will lead.

To read the complete account, please click here