On the Synod...Cardinal Nichols’s view

Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster and President of the Bishops’ Conference, held a press conference at the Bishops’ Conference office in London on Oct 21, to offer his reflections on the Extraordinary Synod on the Family that took place in Rome Oct 5-19.

Oct 30, 2014

LONDON: Cardinal Vincent Nichols, Archbishop of Westminster and President of the Bishops’ Conference, held a press conference at the Bishops’ Conference office in London on Oct 21, to offer his reflections on the Extraordinary Synod on the Family that took place in Rome Oct 5-19. Fr Manuel Dorantes, who works for the Vatican Press Office, also took part in the conference.

Using a musical analogy, the Cardinal compared the Synod to a symphony. At this point in time, we’ve got to the end of the first movement, he explained. There will now be a slow movement over the next year, before the finale.

The tone of the Synod was set by Pope Francis, who wanted to ensure that every voice was heard, the Cardinal said. The first week was a reflection on the situation, added to by 280 individual speeches, bringing the voices of the local church. There were different opinions, disagreements, honest speaking. Listening attentively, humbly, with charity and the tone never wavered, he said. Many issues were raised — the impact of war, immigration, domestic violence, polygamy, adoption, sexual exploitation, inter religious marriage, divorce and remarriage.

Cardinal Vincent said that one of the strongest voices was the anger expressed by a group of eleven bishops over the way aid funding was tied to their accepting abortion and contraception. One bishop described this as ‘blackmail’ and said ‘keep the money. We would rather keep our values than this.’ The interim report had a strongly pastoral tone, the Cardinal said but added that many people thought it “wasn’t balanced and was careless in its use of language in some points.”

The Synod then broke up into ten discussion groups which focused on four key themes. Firstly, a powerful trumpet call in support of marriage. Secondly they wanted to see in the next document, more systematic presentation of Church teaching. Thirdly there were calls to intensify pastoral ‘art of accompanying people’ and finally there were calls to address explicitly, some of the difficult situations.

Cardinal Vincent said the SynoCommenting on the “spirit of trust and openness” at the Synod, was “of a tone and language being developed but more importantly than that, a profound sense of common purpose” under the leadership of Pope Francis. -- ICN

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