Brendan Hoban: Rite & Reason, Irish Times, Sunday April 6.
The Synodal Pathway – Vatican Two for slow learners
Gerry O’Hanlon S.J. (Letter to the Irish Times, 39.3.2025) gently reminded Diarmuid Ferriter that, in his column of March 21st assessing Pope Francis’s pontificate, there was no reference to the Pope’s signature project of reform and renewal under the rubric of synodality. Part of the reason, I suspect, is what the famous Jesuit priest, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, once called ‘the slow work of God’. Change in the Catholic Church is usually a dance of two steps forward and sometimes one (or two or even three) steps back.
Even the looming spectre of ‘the last priests in Ireland’, now a mathematical inevitability in a short number of years, has to date failed to move mountains of resistance. Yet, against all the odds, change is beginning to percolate out of sheer necessity as inviolable defences thought to be proofed against reform are coming under siege.
Bishops have received a curt letter from Rome telling them that they need to get their act together in responding to the synodal reforms – effectively Vatican Two for slow learners.
The clear message from Pope Francis is that bishops cannot choose not to be synodal. Priests are being reminded that Parish Pastoral Councils are now mandatory and no longer at the mercy of a PP’s veto. Dioceses, bishops’ conferences and parishes, hoping that the demand to receive and embed synodality would go away, are beginning to realise that there’s no opt out clause.
Suddenly, in terms of much needed reform a reluctance to name difficult truths is giving way to a more realistic assessment of need and a more determined response to critical issues. As with the comment of Bishop Kevin Doran, at his installation as bishop of Achonry last Sunday, that ‘Structures appropriate to the needs of the 21st century’ are now needed.
An example of sorting out one such anomaly is the robust effort now to reform the outdated borders of Irish dioceses. At present, a series of neighbouring dioceses are being unashamedly shoved together even if it upends over 900 years of immovable boundaries sacrosanct since the Synod of Rathbrazil in the noteworthy year of 1111.
As recently as 2022, when the dioceses of Galway and Clonfert were being united under one bishop, care was taken not to ruffle any feathers so everyone involved had to be reassured that, God forbid, nothing as outrageous as an amalgamation was taking place. However, just a year later, in 2023, when a new papal nuncio, Luis Mariano Montemayer, arrived at the bishop’s house in Killala to discuss the appointment of a bishop to succeed John Fleming who had retired, I was among a number of priests, grandly though inaccurately called the ‘Consultors’, who were informed gently but very persuasively that our diocese would be ‘merging’ (i.e. a synonym for ‘amalgamating’) with either Achonry or Tuam. Someone asked would either union be along the lines of Galway and Clonfert? The firm answer was ‘No’.
Now the clerical grapevine is buzzing with confident predictions that Raphoe and Derry, due to the expected retirement of the bishop of Derry, Donal McKeown, in a matter of weeks, are running favourites to become the next merger to be blessed, despite a visit to Rome of a high-powered episcopal delegation seeking special exemptions for northern dioceses. Other mergers are listed for Ferns and Ossory, Clogher and Kilmore, Armagh and Dromore, though a rumour that an effort was being made to merge Cork and Kerry is regarded unsurprisingly as a bridge too far.
What has happened is that, as Gerry O’Hanlon explained to Diarmuid Ferriter, the operative image of the Church as a pyramid with, in descending order of priority the pope, bishops, priests and lay faithful, has been flipped by Pope Francis with the people (the baptised) at the top of an inverted pyramid and below them pope, bishops and priests in the service of a People’s Church. This, as might be expected, is welcomed by the vast majority of Catholics and where ‘the laity’ are given a fair wind, almost everything becomes possible.
An example of this is the diocese of Killala where a week ago 64 women and men graduated after a two-year course in Theology, Culture and Ministry. In a few weeks, 62 of them will be commissioned in a number of lay ministries, one of which is Funeral Ministers. This will involve lay women and men co-leading with priests all of the standard funeral services with the exception of the Funeral Mass. Funeral Ministers will accompany the priest to the wake house or funeral home; they will co-lead the prayers for the reception of the remains at the church; they will co-lead the final prayers at the end of the funeral liturgy; and they will co-lead the prayers in the cemetery. In preparation, pastoral placements were undertaken in six host parishes over the two-year period. In the coming weeks, the lay leaders will commence their ministries in a voluntary capacity in their parishes.
It is a matter not just of regret but shame that it took 60 years after the close of the Second Vatican Council for the vision it proposed for the Church to get a fair wind and a following sea.
Brendan Hoban is a priest of Killala Diocese.
Thank you Brendan for a very thought provoking article.
I have no issue with what you say on the merging of Irish Dioceses. I recall that when Archbishop Charles Brown was Papal Nuncio here, he broached this issue with the Irish Hierarchy and was met with stony silence.
You state Brendan, that the Holy Father has inverted the pre-Synodal Hierarchical Model of the Church.
I of course believe in the Hierarchical model. At Pentecost, the Holy Ghost took everything of Christ’s, and revealed it to the Apostles. Fear left them, and they boldly proclaimed the Faith received via the outpouring of the Holy Ghost.
In time, they appointed Successors who in turn passed the Faith on under the Tradidi Quod et Accepi principle.
And so on in the pre-Synodal Hierarchical Church.
The Holy Ghost doesn’t contradict himself. Therefore he was right up until the election of Pope Francis. Therefore he is STILL right. In other words, the Holy Ghost still teaches what the pre-Synodal Church taught in all things.
Men and Women are of course free to reject the teaching and inspiration of the Holy Ghost.
The Synodal Model of Church may now be in vogue. As it is not of the Holy Ghost, it will be overturned by a successor (not necessarily the immediate one) to Pope Francis.
After all, Remember Matthew 16:18.
Also, according to the Perennial Binding Public Revelation of the Church, our Church has four Marks as stated in the Sunday Credo:
“Et unam, Sanctam, Catholicam et Apostolicam Ecclesiam”.
The word Synodal doesn’t occur here.
Thank you, Brendan, excellent as always.
While, as you explain, parish priests cannot veto the formation of parish councils in our new model of synodal church, can they still overturn decisions and initiatives of the council?
Also, will parish financial committees have new autonomy?
Thanks, Brendan
A further Clarification: the following is a De Fide Dogma as per “Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma ” by the late Professor Ludwig Ott. (See the Section on “The Purpose of the Church”) CHRIST GAVE HIS CHURCH A HIERARCHICAL CONSTITUTION [DE FIDE]
I am reading a Vatican document which shows no understanding of the people it claims to want to dialogue with it. https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/ccatheduc/documents/rc_con_ccatheduc_doc_20190202_maschio-e-femmina_en.pdf
If no one understands what “synodality” means it is because real human beings and their needs have been progressively wiped off the agenda.
The tones of condemnation that laced the documents identifying Jews as deicides who were rightly condemned to perpetual servitude, or telling us that buying and selling slaves was in perfect accord with divine and natural law, or that gays were intrinically disordered in their sexual orientation, have now yielded to a kind of love-bombing whose tone is “trust us, we are experts in humanity, you poor confused things have become alienated from your true identity by wicked ideologues; we are here to save you.”
US bishops praise Trump for holding the line against trans folk, and he responds by producing on day one of his presidency a very nasty screed which is a charter for persecution. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/defending-women-from-gender-ideology-extremism-and-restoring-biological-truth-to-the-federal-government/
Trans folk are betrayed and scapegoated on all sides, and unfortunately the church is once again making a terrible mistake.
I heard this plucky woman speak out in Beijing about how the Vatican, in cahoots with Evangelicals, has destroyed her life work. The people who are massively branding the vulnerable with a crude and brutal “gender ideology” are the churches — Trump is just following their lead.
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v47/n06/judith-butler/this-is-wrong?fbclid=IwY2xjawJj2w9leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHjWzm8UF9X3mw0ycSU0B9EfwXghgwymFSJ7DZfwWPfQJcJgUa_1O1rWVk7b0_aem_63W9NgN2nL2dpvnLymmt0Q
Thank you Joe for the link to this article.
Very apt reading as we enter into Holy Week:
Scapegoating then and now.
“It is better that one man (or one vulnerable group) should die for the nation”…
Religious and political forces working together.
Paddy @ 2: ‘Therefore those in authority will not depart from the fruits of consultation that produce an agreement without a compelling reason which must be appropriately explained…it is not appropriate to set the consultative and deliberative elements involved in reaching a decision in opposition to one another…for this reason, the recurring formula in the Code of Canon Law, “merely consultative vote” should be reviewed to eliminate the possibility of ambiguity’ (Final Document of Synod, nn 91-93) and, in cases when the competent authority goes against the opinion of some…’There is always the possibility of making an appeal to a higher authority according to the provision of law’ (n 93). How I read all this Paddy is: the Synod has made recommendations, accepted formally by Pope Francis. We are now in the implementation phase when the canonists need to propose the appropriate revision of Canon Law. So, the direction of travel is clear – and exactly as Brendan outlined- but the definitive legal grounding is still pending.
Father Brendan has reminded us that “PPCs are now mandatory and no longer at the mercy of a PP’s veto”. When PPCs were first formed, the laity interested in serving put their names forward. The members were then selected by secret ballot of all the parish laity. Subsequently, PPC members were chosen and appointed by the PP. Hopefully, the selection of PPC members by secret ballot will be restored and made mandatory for the future.
Again thanks to Father Brendan for an inspiring article.
Thanks, Gerry@6.
Today, here in Strasbourg, I heard Bishop Etienne Vetö (whose father Miklós was a friend) hold forth magnificently on the Nicene Creed. It turns out that he is the principal author of the original (French) text of the International Theological Commission’s document on Nicaea: https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_cti_doc_20250403_comunicato-1700-nicea_en.html
“Gerry O’Hanlon explained to Diarmuid Ferriter, the operative image of the Church as a pyramid with, in descending order of priority the pope, bishops, priests and lay faithful, has been flipped by Pope Francis.”
Gerry or Brendan, can you please cite the Ordinary and Universal Magisterial Document and paragraph(s) therein, where Pope Francis abrogated the Hierarchical model of the Church?