In a recent meeting with the president of the Polish Episcopal Conference, Pope Francis stated that he has distanced himself from the German Synodal Way.
Newsroom (3/03/2022 11:25, Gaudium Press) Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki had an audience of 45 minutes with Pope Francis, during which time the prelate thanked the Pope for making the consecration of Russia and Ukraine to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
The meeting agenda could not have been more interesting, largely due to the Polish archbishop’s latest actions: Archbishop Gadecki told the Pope about the assessment that the bishops had made at a recent Assembly, concerning the events in Ukraine. He spoke also of the letter he had sent to the Orthodox Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, asking for peace, and about his upcoming meeting with Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople, scheduled to take place next Tuesday in Warsaw.
Bishop Gadecki gave the Pontiff a detailed account of the many activities the Church in Poland has carried out for the victims of the invasion of Ukraine, highlighting especially the great work carried out at the parish level.
He took the opportunity to discuss the difficulties facing the Universal Church raised by the “so-called German synodal path”. According to a note published by the Polish Episcopal Conference, the Pope has expressed his distance from this ‘path’.
The Pontiff praised and thanked the initiatives undertaken by the Church in Poland to help the Ukrainians, the work of this church in general, and assured his spiritual support.
Gadecki to Msgr. Batzing
As already reported by Gaudium Press, Archbishop Gadecki sent a kind letter to his German counterpart, Archbishop Batzing, regarding the problematic direction of the “German Synodal Way”.
In that letter, the Archbishop of Poznan expressed his “deep concern and uneasiness about the information that has been received recently from some spheres of the Catholic Church in Germany.” In particular, Archbishop Gadecki spoke to Bishop Batzing of his “concern about the validity of the statements made by some circles of the Church in Germany, especially in the context of the ‘synodal path‘.
Compiled by Sandra Chisholm
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