Br Mark O’Connor FMS – Soundings from Rome: Seekers not Dwellers – Towards a Spirituality of Synodality
The last of four reports from the Vatican by Brother Mark O’Connor FMS, Vicar for Communications, Diocese of Parramatta and Pope Francis Fellow, Newman College, University of Melbourne.
“PEOPLE…ARE SEEKING, AND NOT WITHOUT SUFFERING, SOMETHING OR SOMEONE WHOM THEY SENSE BUT CANNOT NAME.” – PAUL VI, EVANGELII NUNTIANDI (PAR.21)
Diagnosis comes before a cure. In this final Sounding from Rome 2022, I suggest that if we are to continue to develop a Synodal spirituality in the years ahead, we need to get the diagnosis right! For after all, as Pope Francis famously said – the Church is a ‘field hospital’.
“I see clearly that the thing the church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity. I see the church as a field hospital after battle. It is useless to ask a seriously injured person if he has high cholesterol and about the level of his blood sugars! You have to heal his wounds. Then we can talk about everything else. Heal the wounds, heal the wounds…. And you have to start from the ground up.” – Pope Francis
Link to full article: https://catholicoutlook.org/soundings-from-rome-seekers-not-dwellers-towards-a-spirituality-of-synodality/