Mersey Leven Catholic Parish
Resident Seminarian: Br Cris Mendoza Mob: 0408 389 216
chris_mendoza2080@yahoo.com
Postal Address: PO Box 362, Devonport
Parish Office:
(Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday 10am - 3pm)
Secretary: Annie Davies / Anne Fisher
Pastoral Council Chair: Jenny Garnsey
Pastoral Council Chair: Jenny Garnsey
Parish Mass Times: mlcpmasstimes.blogspot.com.au
Weekly Homily Podcast: mikedelaney.podomatic.com
Parish Magazine: mlcathparishnewsletter.blogspot.com.au
Year of Mercy Blogspot: mlcpyom.blogspot.com.au
Parish Prayer
Heavenly Father,
We thank you for gathering us together
and calling us to serve as your disciples.
and calling us to serve as your disciples.
You have charged us through Your Son, Jesus, with the great mission
of evangelising and witnessing your love to the world.
Send your Holy Spirit to guide us as we discern your will
for the spiritual renewal of our parish.
Give us strength, courage, and clear vision
as we use our gifts to serve you.
as we use our gifts to serve you.
We entrust our parish family to the care of Mary, our mother,
and ask for her intercession and guidance
as we strive to bear witness
as we strive to bear witness
to the Gospel and build an amazing parish.
Amen.
Our Parish Sacramental Life
Baptism: Parents are asked to contact the Parish Office to make arrangements for attending a Baptismal Preparation Session and booking a Baptism date.
Reconciliation, Confirmation and Eucharist: Are received following a Family–centred, Parish-based, School-supported Preparation Program.
Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults: prepares adults for reception into the Catholic community.
Marriage: arrangements are made by contacting one of our priests - couples attend a Pre-marriage Program
Anointing of the Sick: please contact one of our priests
Reconciliation: Ulverstone - Fridays (10am - 10:30am)
Devonport - Saturday (5:15pm – 5:45pm)
Penguin - Saturday (5:15pm - 5:45pm)
Care and Concern: If you are aware of anyone who is in need of assistance and has given permission to be contacted by Care and Concern, please phone the Parish Office.
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Weekday Masses 15th – 18th November, 2016
NO MASSES during this week as Fr Mike & Fr Alex are on Retreat
Mass Times Next Weekend 19th & 20th November
2016
Saturday Vigil: 6:00pm Penguin
Devonport
Sunday Mass: 11:00am Ulverstone
Only Mass on the Feast of Christ the King
Devonport:
Every
Friday 10am - 12noon, concluding with Stations of the Cross and Angelus
Devonport: Benediction with Adoration - first Friday of
each month.
Legion of Mary: Sacred Heart Church Community Room,
Ulverstone, Wednesdays, 11am
Christian Meditation:
Devonport, Emmaus House - Wednesdays 7pm.
Prayer Group:
Charismatic Renewal
Devonport, Emmaus House - Thursdays 7.00pm
Meetings, with Adoration and Benediction are held each
Second Thursday of the Month in OLOL Church, commencing at 7.00 pm
Ministry Rosters 19th
& 20th November, 2016
Devonport:
Ministers of Communion: Vigil T Muir, M
Davies, M Gerrand, M Kenny, D Peters, J Heatley
Cleaners 18th Nov: K.S.C. 25th Nov: M & L Tippett, A Berryman
Piety Shop 19th Nov: H Thompson 20th Nov:
Ulverstone:
Cleaners: G & M
Seen, C Roberts Flowers: C Mapley Hospitality:
Penguin:
Greeters: G & N Pearce Commentator: Y Downes Readers: Fifita Family
Ministers of Communion: A Guest, M Hiscutt
Liturgy: Sulphur Creek C Setting Up: F Aichberger
Care of Church: G Hills-Eade, T Clayton
Readings This Week: 33rd Sunday of Ordinary Time – Year C
First Reading: Malachi 3:19-20
Second Reading: 2 Thessalonians 3:7-12
Gospel: Luke 21:5-19
I come to my place of prayer and take time to become aware
of God’s loving presence; he holds all things in being.
After some time I read
this text slowly several times.
How do I feel now?
Anxious, fearful, perturbed,
deeply concerned about human suffering....
Or maybe trusting, accepting, hoping
for courage and strength....
I speak to the Lord about all this, asking to
understand.
I may ask for the gift of faith, or for a deep level of peace,
trusting that the Lord will always support the world and the people he has
created.
Perhaps I can imagine the Lord coming again in glory.
How would I wish
to greet him?
What would I say to him?
I sit quietly pondering the mystery of
Christ’s victory over death and suffering.
I end my prayer with a slow sign of
the cross.
Readings Next Week: Our Lord JESUS CHRIST, KING of
the UNIVERSE – Year C
First Reading: 2 Samuel 5:1-3
Second Reading: Colossians 1:12-20
Gospel: Luke 23:35-43
Greg Mansfield, Dale
Jenkins, Marie Knight, Victor Slavin & ....
Let us pray for those who have died recently:
Aurora Barker, Nicole Fairbrother, Damian Matthews, Tom Knight, Maurice Evans, Heath Hendricks, Kathleen Kelly, Joanne
Long & Selina Shepherd.
Let us pray for those whose
anniversary occurs about this time: 9th
– 15th November
Jessie Hope, Shirley Winkler, Finbarr Kennedy, Ronald
Garnsey, Catherine Fraser, Olive Purton, Terrance Smith.
May they Rest in Peace
WEEKLY
RAMBLINGS:
Next week Fr Alex
and I (and many of the priests of the Archdiocese) will be on our Annual
Retreat so there are no Masses during the week. Please keep us all in your prayers as we will
keep you in ours.
On Wednesday evening
I was part of the ceremonies surrounding the re-internment of the remains of
Archbishops Tweedy, Young and D’Arcy into the crypt in St Mary’s Cathedral.
These men served the Archdiocese as our leader for well over 56 years and their
internment in the Cathedral is a fitting recognition of their service to the
Church.
Next weekend we
celebrate the Feast of Christ the King and, again, I invite all parishioners to
come to Sacred Heart Church at Ulverstone for the Parish Mass to be celebrated
at 11am – this will be the only Mass celebrated in the Parish on the Sunday. We
are a big (spread out) Parish with many smaller communities which celebrate
their uniqueness and gifts well in the various Mass Centres – the Feasts of
Pentecost and Christ the King are an opportunity for us all to gather as one to
celebrate our faith and the larger Parish Community. Looking forward to
celebrating with you all next weekend.
EDUCATION
OF PRIESTS COLLECTION – THIS WEEKEND:
The Education of
Priests collection enables the Archdiocese of Hobart to fund training for
seminarians, a process that normally takes 7 years of study. During that time the
Archdiocese is responsible for the cost of tuition for each seminarian at
Catholic Theological College, the training faculty in Melbourne. Also the
living costs for each seminarian at Corpus Christi College have to be met
during this time. Envelopes for your support for this important part of the life
of the Church are available this weekend at all Mass Centres.
ST VINCENT
DE PAUL COLLECTION:
This weekend in
Devonport, Ulverstone, Port Sorell, Latrobe and Penguin to assist the work of
the St Vincent de Paul Society.
CATHOLIC
CHARISMATIC RENEWAL: are sponsoring a
HEALING MASS at St Mary’s Church Penguin Thursday 24th November at 7.30pm.
All denominations are welcome to come and celebrate the liturgy. After
Mass, teams will be available for individual prayer. Please bring a friend and
a plate for supper and fellowship in the hall. If you wish to know more or
require transport, please contact Celestine Whiteley 6424:2043, Michael Gaffney 0447 018 068, Zoe Smith 6426:3073 or Tom Knaap 6425:2442.
Thursday Nights - OLOL Hall, Devonport. Eyes down 7.30pm!
Callers for Thursday 17th November – Rod Clarke & Alan Luxton
MT ST VINCENT AUXILIARY: Thank you to all parishioners for the wonderful support at our recent ‘Craft & Cake Stall.’ A Total of $700.00 was raised – Lyn Griffiths, Secretary.
Thursday Nights - OLOL Hall, Devonport. Eyes down 7.30pm!
Callers for Thursday 17th November – Rod Clarke & Alan Luxton
MT ST VINCENT AUXILIARY: Thank you to all parishioners for the wonderful support at our recent ‘Craft & Cake Stall.’ A Total of $700.00 was raised – Lyn Griffiths, Secretary.
CALLING ALL CHORISTERS: The
next rehearsal for our whole Mersey Leven Parish Mass (Sunday 20th November)
will be held Saturday 19th
November 2 pm at Sacred Heart Church Ulverstone. We need singers from
all Centres of the Parish. Please email John john.leearcher@gmail.com if you need copies of the
music.
NEWS FROM ACROSS THE ARCHDIOCESE:
Archdiocesan Website: www.hobart.catholic.org.au for
news, information and details of other Parishes.
ST MARY’S COLLEGE OSA: will be holding their Christmas luncheon at Hellyers
Road Distillery Saturday 19th November at 12noon. All welcome! RSVP
by 11th November to Felicity Sly 6424:1933 or Lillian Hay 6428:2773
CLOSE OF THE YEAR OF MERCY – To
mark the conclusion of the Year of Mercy, all are warmly invited to join the
Carmelite Nuns for an afternoon of prayer on Sunday 20th November 2016 at the Carmelite Monastery, 7 Cambridge St.,
Launceston. Discalced Carmelite friar Fr Greg Chee OCD will be available for
confessions and will lead the Holy Hour. The programme for the afternoon will
be:
1.30 –
2pm Sacrament of
Reconciliation
2.00pm
Office of None
2.15pm
HOLY HOUR
3.00pm
Benediction
The Sacrament of Reconciliation will be available again
after the Holy Hour.
CHURCH OF
THE APOSTLES, LAUNCESTON SESQUICENTENARY: 25th
– 27th November 2016 the Launceston
Parish will be celebrating the 150th Anniversary of the Opening and Blessing of
the Church of the Apostles. Sesquicentenary Dinner at the Tailrace Centre,
Riverside on Friday 25th November at 7.00pm. Tickets are $40 and must be pre-purchased
through the Parish Office. Open Day Saturday 26th November 11.00am –
5.00pm. An Historical Display (which
includes a Commemoration of the Archbishop Guilford Young Centenary) will be
held in the Pastoral Centre with refreshments available. In the Church a Promenade of Music will be
presented with performances each half hour commencing at 2.00pm. Between the items four treasures of the
Church of the Apostles will be highlighted for those present. On Sunday 27th
November at 10.30am Archbishop Julian Porteous will be the celebrant of the
Mass of Solemn Dedication of the Church.
This will be followed by a shared lunch in Presentation Hall at Sacred
Heart School. All parishioners, friends and families associated in any way with
this magnificent Church are warmly invited to join in any or all of these
celebrations. Please contact the
Launceston Parish Office (phone: 6331:4377 or email: apostles@bigpond.com)
for more information and to register your interest in these events.
FIRE RETREAT: Set a FIRE down in my soul! For all young adults aged between 14-30 years old, you are invited to FIRE, a weekend retreat, at Saint Francis of Assisi, Riverside. Speakers include: Archbishop Julian Porteous and the Immaculata Mission Team 2016 When? Friday, 25 November (6.30pm Gathering for a 7pm start) to Sunday, 27 November. Cost? $20 (includes Friday night, light supper; Saturday, main meals; and Sunday, morning tea).
For more information or to register: Phone 0406372608 or
email fireretreattas@gmail.com
THE
IMMACULATA MISSION SCHOOL: is an opportunity to go deeper in faith and to
encounter the love of God through prayer and the sacraments, to live in
community and make new friends, to learn about the faith from fantastic
speakers - and to start your year in the best way possible.
When: 1-10th January, 2017 Where: Launceston Church Grammar
School, Launceston Tasmania
Who is it for: 16-35 year olds How much: $360 early-bird,
or $410 after 16th November
"The IMS gave me an insight into how being a Christian
gives life to people. Everyone at the school was kind, friendly and
compassionate and were filled with a sense of purpose, especially the Sisters.
Their actions have inspired me to pray more and to look into my faith
more." Max (Tasmania)
THE REAL PRESENCE
An article by Fr Ron Rolheiser OMI. The original article can be found here
When I was a graduate student in Belgium, I was privileged one day to sit in on a conference given by Cardinal Godfried Danneels of Brussels. He was commenting on the Eucharist and our lack of understanding of it full richness when he highlighted this contrast: If you stood outside of a Roman Catholic church today as people were coming out of the church and asked them: “Was that a good Eucharist?”, most everyone would answer on the basis of the homily and the music. If the homily was interesting and the music lively, most people would answer that it had been a good Eucharist. Now, he continued, if you had stood outside a Roman Catholic church sixty or seventy years ago and asked: “Was that a good mass today?” nobody would have even understood the question. They would have answered something to the effect of: “Aren’t they all the same!”
Today our understanding of the Eucharist, in Roman Catholic circles and indeed in most Protestant and Anglican circles, is very much concentrated on three things: the liturgy of the Word, the music, and communion. Moreover, in Roman Catholic churches, we speak of the real presence only in reference to the last element, the presence of Christ in the bread and wine.
While none of this is wrong, the liturgy of the word, the music, and communion are important, something is missing in this understanding. It misses the fact that the real presence is not just in the bread and wine, it is also in the liturgy of the Word and in the salvific event that is recalled in the Eucharistic prayer, namely, the death and resurrection of Jesus.
Most churchgoers already recognize that when the scriptures are celebrated in a liturgical service God’s presence is made special, more physically tangible, than God’s normal presence everywhere or God’s presence inside our private prayer. The Word of God, when celebrated in a church is, like Christ’s presence in the consecrated bread and wine, also the real presence.
But there’s a further element that’s less understood: The Eucharist doesn’t just make a person present; it also makes an event present. We participate in the Eucharist not just to receive Christ in communion, but also to participate in the major salvific event of his life, his death and resurrection.
What’s at issue here?
At the Last Supper, Jesus invited his followers to continue to meet and celebrate the Eucharist “in memory of me”. But his use of the word “memory” and our use of that word are very different. For us “memory” is a weaker word. It simply means calling something to mind, remembering an event like the birth of your child, your wedding day, or the game when your favorite sports team finally won the championship. That’s a simple remembering, a passing recollection. It can stir deep feelings but it does nothing more. Whereas in the Hebrew concept out of which Jesus was speaking, memory, making ritual remembrance of something, implied much more than simply recalling something. To remember something was not simply to nostalgically recall it. Rather it meant to recall and ritually re-enact it so as to make it present again in a real way.
For example, that’s how the Passover Supper is understood within Judaism. The Passover meal recalls the Exodus from Egypt and the miraculous passing through the Red Sea into freedom. The idea is that one generation, led by Moses, did this historically, but that by re-enacting that event ritually, in the Passover Meal, the event is made present again, in a real way, for those at table to experience.
The Eucharist is the same, except that the saving event we re-enact so as to remake it present through ritual is the death and resurrection of Jesus, the new Exodus. Our Christian belief here is exactly the same as that of our Jewish brothers and sisters, namely, that we are not just remembering an event, we are actually making it present to participate in. The Eucharist, parallel to a Jewish Passover meal, remakes present the central saving event in Christian history, namely, Jesus’ Passover from death to life in the Paschal mystery. And just as the consecrated bread and wine give us the real presence of Christ, the Eucharist also gives us the real presence of the central saving event in our history, Jesus’ passage from death to life.
Thus at a Eucharist, there are, in effect, three real presences: Christ is really present in the Word, namely, the scriptures, the preaching, and the music. Christ is really present in the consecrated bread and wine; they are his body and blood. And Christ is really present in a saving event: Jesus’ sacrificial passing from death to life.
And so we go to Eucharist not just to be brought into community by Jesus’ word and to receive Jesus in communion, we go there too to enter into the saving event of his death and resurrection. The real presence is in both a person and in an event.
The Welcoming Prayer
Taken from the daily email by Fr Richard Rohr OFM. You can subscribe to receive these emails here
I’d like to offer you a form of
contemplation—a practice of accepting paradox and holding the tension of
contradictions—called The Welcoming Prayer.
First, identify a hurt or an
offense in your life. Remember the feelings you first experienced with this
hurt and feel them the way you first felt them. Notice how this shows up in
your body. Paying attention to your body’s sensations keeps you from jumping
into the mind and its dualistic games of good-guy/bad-guy, win/lose, either/or.
After you can identify the hurt
and feel it in your body, welcome it. Stop fighting it. Stop splitting and
blaming. Welcome the grief. Welcome the anger. It’s hard to do, but for some
reason, when we name it, feel it, and welcome it, transformation can begin.
Don’t lose presence to the
moment. Any kind of analysis will lead you back into attachment to your ego
self. The reason a bird sitting on a hot wire is not electrocuted is quite
simply because it does not touch the ground to give the electricity a pathway.
Hold the creative tension, but don’t ground it by thinking about it, critiquing
it, or analyzing it.
When you’re able to welcome
your own pain, you will in some way feel the pain of the whole world. This is
what it means to be human—and also what it means to be divine. You can hold
this immense pain because you too are being held by the very One who went
through this process on the Cross. Jesus was holding all the pain of the world,
at least symbolically or archetypally; though the world had come to hate him,
he refused to hate it back.
Now hand all of this pain—yours
and the world’s—over to God. Let it go. Ask for the grace of forgiveness for
the person who hurt you, for the event that offended you, for the reality of
suffering in each life.
I can’t promise the pain will
leave easily or quickly. To forgive is not to forget. But letting go frees up a
great amount of soul-energy that liberates a level of life you didn’t know
existed. It leads you to your True Self.
Earthly Mission: The Catholic Church and World Development
The review is taken from the Thinking Faith Website. The Original article by Susy Brouard can be found here
Robert Calderisi’s Earthly Mission: The Catholic Church and World Development, could not have been published at a more apt time. Since the election of Pope Francis, people of all faiths and none are showing renewed interested in the Church, and Calderisi’s book will give a helpful overview to anyone who seeks an understanding of the Church’s role in global development over the last sixty years.
Calderisi states that his book is for the general reader; it is not aimed particularly at a Catholic or academic audience. The author draws on anecdotes and stories from his interviews with people around the globe, as well as some statistics, to show how the Church, as a vast network, is able to go where others cannot and to reach where others will not. Catholicism accounts for 17 percent of the world’s population; and the Church’s 140,000 schools, 18,000 clinics and hospitals, and 37,000 centres for informal education allow it to touch those in need. The subject matter is so vast that Calderisi has had to make choices about what to include and what to omit, and as such he claims that the book can only be an introduction to the Church’s role in the developing world.
The book starts with the stories and witness of Dom Hélder Cámara and Denis Hurley, two church leaders who felt called to speak out against injustice in their respective countries of Brazil and South Africa. The next chapters look at some of the Catholic Church’s history and teaching from the late 1800s and explore the Church’s relationship with development, both the way it has hindered and helped the alleviation of poverty. The main body of the book looks in more detail at the Catholic Church in Africa, Asia and Latin America, focusing on its role in education, services and advocacy respectively. Included in the book is a critical reflection on how the Church in Rwanda responded to the genocide, while another chapter explores the impact on population of church teaching on contraception and the Church’s dealings with the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Calderisi also examines the Church as a network, both the Caritas agencies and other new movements within the Church. The concluding chapters assess the impact of the Catholic Church on development and stress the challenges that lie ahead.
The large picture that Calderisi paints is one which, by his own admission, ‘has as many angles as a Cubist painting’. He writes very much from his own viewpoint, as a liberal Catholic and an economist who has worked in international development for over thirty years, including at the World Bank. One of the riches of the book is the variety of people to whom the author has spoken – from Archbishops in the Vatican to rebellious religious in Bangladesh, from development officials to Caritas workers. The impression is of a well-connected author who knows his subject-matter. This strength, though, is occasionally a weakness in that sometimes the author jumps from one story to another and you have the sense that he wants to include everybody’s story in the book.
When I give workshops to CAFOD staff on ‘An introduction to Catholicism’, I remind them that the Catholic Church includes as many Borgias as it does Romeros, as many sinners as saints. Earthly Mission has more saints in it than sinners, and some of the stories told are truly inspiring. Calderisi gives many examples, including the example of Dick Timm, a member of the Congregation of the Holy Cross who helped set up 17,000 social awareness groups in Bangladesh and later went on to head up the Justice and Peace commission in that country, insisting on a living wage for the Church’s own employees.
The author is clearly ‘in love’ with his subject and wants to share the good the Church has done, but he is also unafraid to critique the institutions and the individuals who have failed to live up to the challenge of the gospel. Calderisi raises some important questions near the end of his book which might well be of more interest to Catholics than to others. In particular, he asks what constitutes Catholic identity, particularly in the context of development agencies. His view would be that becoming more Catholic does not mean an entrenchment in doctrine, but an openness to working with all those concerned to eradicate poverty.
Calderisi writes well and fluently, and will give any reader a ‘flavour’ of the global Church. For a more in-depth historical, political and theological reading of the Church over the same period, I would also recommend Ian Linden’s Global Catholicism: towards a networked Church (revised in 2012). Both books cover the meeting of religion and development and the sometimes tense, sometimes fruitful, relationship which ensues. For Calderisi, this is depicted most clearly through the stories of men and women ‘who have struggled to do good in forbidding circumstances.’
Susy Brouard is the Theology Programme advisor at CAFOD and is currently undertaking doctoral studies in the area of pedagogy and Catholic social teaching.
Theologians praise San Diego's
pioneering synod
Theologians who helped guide and advise the five working groups that were the engine of the San Diego diocese's Oct. 29-30 synod on marriage and family universally praised the pioneering effort and agree that its basic structure and thrust would work well to confront other challenging issues in church life.
Some said they even saw clues for addressing the often-strident differences between progressive and traditionalist wings of the Catholic church.
"Looking broadly, I think the seriousness with which Catholics took this task offers a promising model for healing and bridge-building ... and the American church needs this desperately," said Maureen Day, assistant professor of pastoral theology at the Franciscan School of Theology, Oceanside, Calif.
"I have no doubt that these same people, who waded through muddy waters, would have been able to do this on many 'hot-button' issues that are especially prominent, given the [presidential] election," emailed Day, who worked with the synod discussion group addressing "the challenge to welcome, nurture and form children."
"There is a core that American Catholics share, including concern for the poor and the understanding of Christ's presence in the Eucharist," she explained. "These and others can be important starting points to bring real partnerships and common understanding to our daily lives. Not to sugarcoat any of these, an important lesson from the synod is that this isn't easy. It requires us to be courageous and a willingness to fully hear positions we may staunchly disagree with. But these help us move from abstractions to realities, from seeing stark division to important commonalities."
Holy Child Sr. Tobie Tondi, one of two theologians assigned to the working group on the topic of creating "a culture of invitation and hospitality to unmarried couples," praised San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy for initiating the synod.
"I think it's the only one happening in the country" seeking to concretely address the pastoral challenges set forth in Pope Francis' apostolic exhortation on marriage and family, Amoris Laetitia, she said.
"For the bishop to call together representatives from every parish, and other people who play certain roles in the diocese, and to really use a synodal process to try to move the diocese even further in understanding its role as church, I think it's been a fabulous idea, and it's come to be," said Tondi, who teaches theology at the Catholic University of San Diego.
One or two theologians were invited to work with each of five grassroots groups of parishioners and priests formed after extensive listening sessions in parishes throughout the diocese had taken place. Each unit had a different "challenge" to evaluate and for which to devise achievable, realistic diocesan objectives. Those topics were:
The challenge to witness to both the beauty and realism of the Catholic vision of marriage and family life;
The challenge to form a culture of invitation and hospitality to unmarried couples;
The challenge to welcome, nurture and form children;
The challenge to provide authentic pastoral support for those who are divorced;
The challenge to bring spiritual depth to family life.
What is 'untouchable'
The theologians interviewed by NCR underlined a number of points emphasized in a foundational white paper written in advance of the synod by Msgr. John Strynkowski to "set the tone" for the gathering and flush out the grassroots consultation's mission.
For example, Fr. Michael Murphy and Emily Reimer-Barry echoed Strynkowski's white paper observation that "the teaching of the church on marriage is untouchable" but "what is also untouchable is the long-standing tradition of the church that the most effective way to lead people to full discipleship is by a patient accompaniment that gently leads to ever greater conversion."
"Our doctrine is sound. It is truth," said Murphy, San Diego's director of the diocesan Office for Priests and pastor of Sacred Heart Parish in Coronado. "What I hope comes out of this is that we begin to find some ways around the barriers. ... Using the pope's understanding, how do we lead people along who can't embrace it all the way?"
During the synod process, Murphy served as the theological consultant for the working group on "the challenge to bring spiritual depth to family life."
Chair of the University of San Diego's Department of Theology and Religious Studies, Reimer-Barry worked with colleague Tondi on advising the group on outreach to the unmarried. Reimer-Barry also said that church teaching on the highest ideals of marriage and family was not at issue.
"So many people in our world perceive those teachings as limiting, judgmental, and they feel excluded from being able to experience the fullness of grace," she said. "Divorce, married civilly, a member of family being deported. So many instances of families hurting."
"Just reiterating" church doctrine "is not enough," she stressed.
Strynkowski had been slated to address the synod's general assembly, but was ill. A now-retired priest of the Brooklyn, N.Y., diocese, he served as the U.S. bishops' executive director of the Secretariat for Doctrine and Pastoral Practices (2001-2005) and attended the 2015 Synod of Bishops on the family as the peritus for Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich.
That global gathering of church hierarchy led to Francis' exhortation. McElroy released his own follow-up pastoral letter, "Embracing the Joy of Love," which expanded on Francis' themes and announced that a diocesan synod would be held this fall.
"Bishop McElroy has expanded the notion of synodality to the diocese, and I think that this is very much in line with what Pope Francis asked for," Strynkowski told NCR by phone. "I think Bishop McElroy's document was geared precisely to this type of a process, which was very well-planned, very well-structured, very well-implemented."
Bernadeane Carr, director of the San Diego Diocesan Institute, concurs: "The synod process was quite effective for inviting the expression of the sensus fidei of Catholics from many levels of engagement in the life of the church, from the average person in the pew to pastors."
Carr advised the discussion team responding to the "challenge to witness to both the beauty and realism of the Catholic vision of marriage and family life."
Her group "invited wide-ranging input to begin and then narrowed the focus gradually through identifying elements which had wide agreement, and which expressed a major level of consensus. By the end, we arrived at a manageable number of concrete goals that made sense to nearly all, which the bishop can use to develop ministry in parishes, in deaneries and at the diocesan level," Carr said.
"The only surprise was how well a group of just 25 diverse persons could hit on so many of the main areas where marriages need strengthening in our local setting," she said, adding that "the synod process as we experienced it was mainly about discovering the essential consensus in a wide group, not creating consensus where it did not exist. The process itself led us to pay attention to and respond to what was important to others, but extreme positions of whatever stripe ended up outside the final priorities of the group as a whole."
Day had similar observations. "Everyone there was truly invested in the synod and wanted to dig deep, ask hard questions, add their part and — and I think this last part is key — really listen to the contributions of others. The result was truly extraordinary and the final proposals reflect the tremendous diversity of experiences of the diocese. By the end of the process, which I liken to childbirth in its efforts and fruits, we had a real beginning that will serve families and the church."
Synod provides 'solid direction'
Carr described the synod as "just the first step" and said it provided "us solid direction as a local church."
"The real work will be its implementation," she added. "Much prayer accompanied the synod; even more prayer will be needed to carry it forward."
At the synod's conclusion, 15 action-item resolutions — three from each of the five working groups — were summarized on scrolls and presented to McElroy.
McElroy told NCR he hopes to release a pastoral letter on the synod and its recommendations in January after further consultation with diocesan deans, the Presbyteral Council and a synod implementation committee made up of at least three members of each of the five synod working groups.
In his preparatory theological narrative on the synod and Amoris Laetitia, Strynkowski stressed "the centrality of the parish" and cautioned against a rush to "development of new programs."
"To bear witness is more than programs," he wrote. "It is a matter of words and deeds."
"In a society that today is characterized by hectic and fragmented patterns of life, we must rely more on what we already have in terms of bearing witness," he explained and placed emphasis on the Eucharist and "more specifically the homily."
The theologian also: Writes that Amoris Laetitia's passages on divorce and civil remarriage "by no means imply a kind of general amnesty or permission," but pastorally recognize "for various reasons ... it may not always be possible for a couple to obtain an annulment";
Spotlights the centrality of conscience and prudent use of "the internal forum" in church tradition highlighted by the Second Vatican Council (1962-62) and in the pope's pastoral exhortation; he quotes Francis saying that the church "is called to form consciences, not to replace them";
Suggests that Amoris Laetitia could easily be the basis for high school and college courses as well as "the focus of prayer and study groups in parishes" and a key source for marriage preparation programs;
Cautions that "the focus on marriage and family in a parish community should never neglect the roles and vocation of single people";
Commends the recommendation from the deliberation group on bringing spiritual depth to family for giving "its highest priority ... the creation of an Office for Family Spirituality that would foster marriage preparation, 'develop resources for parishes to minister to fragmented families — divorced, single-parent, widowed, deployed, deported, multi-generational households — as well as outreach to LGBT Catholics and their families.' "
[Dan Morris-Young is NCR West Coast correspondent. Amy Morris-Young contributed to this report.]
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