Synod Edition
 

At our last meeting we decided to send out an interim enews on the subject of Synod. Details about National ACTA's conference and Root and Branch Synod - shining a healing light on fear in the Catholic Church - are also included

Our next meeting will be Thursday 21 October at 2pm via zoom. Make a note of the date and more details will follow

THE DIOCESAN LISTENING PROJECT – LENT 2022
 
THE DIOCESAN ‘LISTENING PROJECT’ – PART OF A SYNODAL PROCESS?
 
We learnt of this initiative through a short entry in the Diocesan Review for 2020:
‘The Bishop has asked Fr Martin Kelly, assisted by Deacon John Walsh, to co-ordinate a ‘listening project’ involving all clergy, laity and schools across the many parishes which together comprise our ONE Diocese. Provisionally entitled ‘From Parish to Mission’, ALL constructive views will actively be sought, so watch the diocesan and parish websites for details of how to contribute to the exercise’. 
 
There has been nothing further officially from the diocese, but we have learnt piecemeal that:

• Due to the pandemic, the process, originally scheduled for this autumn, has been delayed to Lent 2022, In the hope that parishioners will be ‘embedded’ back in parishes; the Bishop has spoken about it lately at a meeting of the Deans;the project aims to be well planned and prepared; inclusive, extensive, positive and realistic; we are asked to be patient.

• What can priests tell us about the project; the stage it has reached, the timetable etc?
• How, if it starts in Lent next year, can it realistically fit into the Vatican synodal process timetable?
• Have any members of the laity been involved in the project’s design or aims? Is it too late for that?
• Have there been any involvement of any women in designing the project?
• Can we presume that the diocesan ‘listening Project’ is part of the Pope’s ‘synodal process’? 
• If so: how can parishioners be prepared to be able to play their part; any plans for adult formation about synodality?
• You may wish to air your feelings as a lay person, constituting the vast majority of Church membership, about the apparent lack of consultation and involvement so far; the inevitable necessity in the absence of any lay pastoral diocesan council, of a ‘top down’ approach to the exercise; your desire to ensure that the voices of the laity be heard on this issue as on all others.
• Perhaps let your PP have a copy of these extracts from the ACTA Mission and Theology statement: ‘
• ACTA believes that the reforms of the Second Vatican Council are the only way forward for mission to modern society. It is not a small chapel of selected followers; it believes in the Church as a “big tent”, with open doors. As a free and representative association of believers, it seeks to liberate the expertise in the ranks, so as to bring added energy and witness to the Church in the world.

It must be clear that, whilst we regret the lack of any consultation or involvement of the laity in framing the Listening Project, we welcome the chance to engage with an exercise which has the potential to mirror and embody in our local Church, the mission and theology of the ACTA movement and our love of and dreams for the Church.
 
For further reference and for sharing with others, you may wish to look at Fr Eamonn Mulcahy’s  talk to the Liverpool Conference on Synods & the Church under Pope Francis