Participants in the diocesan phase of the synod on synodality in Luxembourg have called for a change in Church teaching on homosexuality and the abolition of mandatory priestly celibacy.
Newsroom (1/08/2022 4:15 PM Gaudium Press) The Archdiocese of Luxembourg, led by Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich, published a 16-page report following a consultation process involving 4,590 Catholics in the Archdiocese. Luxembourg archdiocese’s synod document, released in French on July 5, 2022, said: “The Church needs a change of view on homosexuality, to open up to marriage for all, and to abolish the obligation of celibacy for priests.”
The report describes the 4,590 people who took part as “a considerable number.” There are an estimated 439,000 Catholics in Luxembourg, which covers the whole of the small country bordering Belgium, Germany, and France. This suggests that roughly 1% of Luxembourg’s baptized Catholics participated in the process.
The synod report, “On the way to a living Church of the people of God in Luxembourg,” collates the responses of individuals and groups to a questionnaire on the themes of the synodal process.
It considers them under the headings “Communion,” “Participation,” and “Mission.” Under each heading is a reflection on what can change at a diocesan level and what needs to be discussed further by the universal Church.
Under the title “Communion,” the text says that the Archdiocese needs a “clear vision” for the future and to “develop a real pastoral project built in a synodal way.” It calls for an “independent office” at the universal level to analyze the Church’s problems.
“It is necessary to modernize the rules and viewpoints of the Church,” it says. “To be credible, the Church must acknowledge its errors and question itself.”
After citing the appeal for change on homosexuality and priestly celibacy, the report says that “on the one hand, women take ‘a central place in the life of the Church,’ they participate in large numbers, but on the other hand, they are ‘sidelined at the level of institutions.’”
“The service of preaching should be opened to the laity (women/men),” it concludes.
Under the heading “Participation,” the report calls for the principle of subsidiarity to be applied at the local level, with greater opportunities for “joint decision-making.” It says that lay people should be able to express their wishes “concerning the appointments of priests and lay professionals, and of the bishop.” It adds that parishes want the universal Church to “reform structures in order to integrate women by giving them responsibilities, abolish mandatory celibacy, [and] reform sexual morality to open ways of participation.”
Under “Mission,” the text says that the local Church “must be a welcoming Church, capable of empathy, first of all towards the weakest and most fragile,” and value the diverse cultures and languages “which are specific riches in Luxembourg.” At the universal level, it appeals for greater efforts to combat abuse. The document also calls on the Church “to review its teaching, its internal law, its rituals, and even the sacraments: to aim at building a bridge between the Gospel message that it must proclaim and the concrete life of people.”
Cardinal Hollerich will have a significant role in gathering the world’s bishops in Rome at the end of the two-year synodal process in October 2023. Hollerich will serve as relator general of the bishops’ assembly on the theme “For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, Mission.” Cardinal Hollerich said earlier this year that he believed the “sociological-scientific foundation” of the Church’s teaching on homosexuality was “no longer correct.”
– Raju Hasmukh
(with files from The Pillar)
