Continuing to watch and follow the synod I must admit that the synod meeting unfolding in its second week brings some interesting insides: Cardinal Dolan forgets that he has signed a letter, Cardinal Sarah brings the Gender theory and ISIS together on the same level, talking about two “apocalyptic beasts” and what stroke me most is that seemingly the highest rank in our church does not understand the continuation of a synod as an institution rather than a single event. Vatican II and its consequences seems far away judging from the published content of the mysterious letter signed by Cardinals Dolan, Mueller, Pell and some more.
I also notice that the word “mercy” could become a bit of a trap, if used to cover up for a change of realities. To elaborate: In this moment in time the Synod is considering not the doctrine but the pastoral care. To have an appropriate answer of care towards people living in today’s situation one has to acknowledge this situation, but also realize the advances in academic reflection. Otherwise the trap is to remain unchanged but just use different language – which seems to be on top of the list for most synod fathers. So I am just merciful if you can’t live up to my expectations but all the expectations are exactly as they have been 100 years ago as well as the general situation and nothing has changed.
I admit, this is not an easy task:
We have to see that the teaching of the church and the pastoral care in terms of marriage has been developed over centuries and it was not fixed from the beginning and the times of Jesus. We also have to acknowledge that the orthodox sister church developed an alternative way of dealing with failure which was never condemned or even really questioned by the Western church. We have the fact of longer lives, a complete different understanding of sexuality and gender. And we have certainly a different and more developed understanding of God’s commitment and unconditional love than e.g. those people living in the middle ages. The earth is not flat anymore and our planet is not the center of the universe. Human development is accelerated and when previously it took a hundred years for changes to be noticed or even implemented, it takes now only a couple of years.
We are the people of God on pilgrimage through times and we have to ask ourselves what all this means in relationship to God and each other now in this point in time. Human life, human situations, human knowledge changes, the factor not being changed in all this is the mystery of God’s love speaking of marriage as a grace, a blessing, and a lifelong covenant of love.
So lets talk about mercy within the acknowledgement of a changed framework of people’s living and if we do so, we will be close to God in whose image we are made and who’s unconditional love keeps us going day after day. Doing so, we will life a dynamic faith as it is indeed needed to keep a relationship between God and human mankind going. Relationships are always dynamic, otherwise they are dead. At least the lively debates of the synod fathers we can only imagine when listening to the daily briefing via the Vatican Press Office show that all is not lost in our church and that alone gives hope. And for those who are so anxious about doctrine: Nobody wants to rock the boat and sink the ship, we just trying to come closer to the mystery of God’s plan with human mankind.
Filed under: Catholic Church, Networking, Reflection, Religion and Ethics, Society and living environment, Cardinal Dolan, Cardinal Mueller, Cardinal Pell, God, ISIS, mercy, Orthodox Church, people of god, synod, Synod on family, unconditional love, vatican, Vatican II, Vatican Press Office
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