Brendan Hoban: Church is finally listening to its grassroots

Western People  3.10.23.

It was an evening in October 1988, at a gathering of Killala clergy in a Westport hotel. We were discussing whether, as a diocese, we should adopt the Parish Development and Renewal (PDR) programme then in use in Dublin diocese. Bishop Tommy Finnegan had just arrived as our new bishop and there was a general sense of new beginnings. What got the decision over the line was the proviso that, as in Dublin, Killala priests would have a veto on accepting (or rejecting) PDR for their parishes.

A hectic period of training ensued as 23 – men and women, lay and clerical – were trained to implement the programme. In the end, just seven parishes out of 22 expressed an interest, and five years later the initiative collapsed. The clerical veto was the main reason.

In February 2016, almost 30 years later, the Killala priests gathered in another Westport hotel, debating again what we might do to stem the further decline in the Catholic Church. That decline between 1988 and 2016 wasn’t just obvious but quantifiable. The graph in terms of every calculable measure – vocations, Mass attendance, etc – was going the wrong way.

The second Westport discussion followed a period of three years during which we had tossed the issue over and back, listened to the opinions of experts, worried about our resilience to sustain the project and the diocesan resources to fund it and yet found it difficult to arrive at a decision. Exasperated, someone suggested that, as we (priests) didn’t know what to do or (even if we did) on our own we wouldn’t be able to do it, that we should ask the people what they thought.

This ended with a decision (i) to ask the people of our parishes what they believed should be done (ii) to accept their advice and (iii) to work with them to implement it. This was agreed on two conditions that (i) the priests would give a commitment to support whatever emerged (no veto this time) and (ii) at the very least not do anything that might undermine it. The vote was carried by the nearest to unanimity possible –– unanimous minus one – and the process was called Placing Hope in Faith.

We started in February 2017.

Stage One (2017-2019) comprised: the formation of  a Steering Committee; deanery meetings of priests; meetings with Parish Councils; spot surveys carried out (on declining priest numbers and Mass attendance); a comprehensive survey of what people wanted; professional analysis of survey results to ensure credible, independent evaluation; processing of 129 proposals under 12 headings (Family, Youth, Women in the Church, etc); and a Diocesan Assembly of bishop, priests and 300 elected delegates from the parishes, during which decisions to prioritise the implementation of the top five proposals in each category were voted through using a system of electronic voting to ensure confidentiality.

Stage Two (2019-20) comprised: setting up Focus Groups to advise on how to implement the prioritised proposals; appointing an Implementation Group; election of three lay Leaders; and agreeing on a few general priorities (election and training of Parish Councils, encouraging Children’s Masses).  

Stage Three: (2022 – 2023) comprised: meeting Parish Councils to discuss implementation of four proposals; an initiative on training lay ministers at which, through the agency of the Newman Institute, a course with 65 lay participants is now completing its third module with a focus on pursuing two initiatives. From Advent 2023, the two initiatives – part of phase 1 of the pastoral placement are: (i) a liturgy on one evening a week, possibly Sunday, with various alternatives available (Scripture sharing/Meditation/Holy Hour/Evening Prayer), and (ii) a gradual introduction of funeral ministries.

Providentially, the Placing Hope in Faith process (as outlined above) was overtaken by and dovetailed with Pope Francis’ focus on synodality and preparation for the Synod of 2023/4.

This involved a number of stages of ‘synodal’ consultation – parish, diocesan, national and continental – intended to feed into the ‘real’ questions of the people. This comprehensive and unprecedented worldwide survey of the whole Church provoked in turn suspicion and doubt, nor least on my own part. Was this real? Was Pope Francis serious? Was it, as before on so many occasions, just public relations? Would the real questions surface? And, if they did, would they ever get as far as the synod in Rome in 2023?

In Killala diocese, the big questions had surfaced in our main survey so we knew what the people were saying. And in our diocesan report, we had included survey results that indicated clearly that the people (like Pope Francis) were way ahead of priests and bishops with their questions. For example, 86% voted that the Church’s teaching on LGBTIQ+ be changed to reflect the inclusion of all, irrespective of sexual orientation, marital or family status ; 69% voted that women be ordained to the priesthood; 85% voted that celibacy for priests be optional.

Two huge questions loomed: would the same issues surface in other dioceses and if they did would they be shuffled to one side by the Irish bishops in the national report? Clear answers were given at a national meeting in Athlone in June 2022, where the synthesis of diocesan reports was presented. Nothing was omitted!

Would the national reports presented for synthesis at continental level be watered down as happened so often in the past? Again, nothing was omitted!

Would the continental reports presented for synthesis at world (and Vatican) level be watered down as happened so often in the past? And again, nothing was omitted!

What was startlingly obvious and, for many, quite incredible was that the hard questions were asked at local level and had actually survived through a number of different stages to take their place on the synod agenda. It was, even for eternal optimists, somehow beyond belief.

Yet there it is in the working document, Instrumentum Laboris, the agenda for the synod. The first half of the document is, predictably, devoted to the synodal process. The second, extraordinarily, is a series of shared questions that emerged in the worldwide consultation from Killala to Rome!

They are all there: the place of women in the Church; reforming and sharing governance; reaching out to the alienated, the marginalised, the divorced and remarried, the LGBTIQ+; investigating priestly celibacy; addressing clericalism and hierarchicalism.

O ye of little faith, Jesus said to St Peter (and the rest of us) when our doubts undo us. So, not surprisingly, we find ourselves walking on water as the Roman Synod to discuss the heretofore unmentionables begins (October 4).

Who would have believed it?