A CHURCH WHICH “JOURNEYS TOGETHER” — SYNODALITY IN THE ERA OF POPE FRANCIS

Abstract

The article lays out how Pope Francis looks at synodality, as a process of listening and discernment that implies the participation and involvement of the whole People of God. It seeks to highlight the essentially “relational” (rather than “instrumental”) nature of synodality, which should be understood, not as a tactic aimed at containing the excesses of clericalism, but as a return to the Church’s authentic origins and way of proceeding. In fact, as communion, the Church springs from the initiative of God the Father and, through Christ’s gift of the Holy Spirit, “brings the scattered children of God together and makes them one” (Jn 11:52). It thus responds to its founding, “constituted as an assembly” with the will to walk together as a People. Synodality expresses the very identity of the God of communion and misericordia whom the Church proclaims to the world. Synodality both brings about and shows the correspondence between what the Church is in herself and what she does in the world. KEYWORDS: Church. Vatican II. Synodality. People of God. Laity. Faithful.