Synod Workshop

Speech

Most Rev Timothy Costelloe SDB
Archbishop of Perth

Saturday 25 October, 2025
Paul IV Hall, Vatican City, Rome

Download the full text in PDF

Good morning, everyone and welcome to this seminar which invites us to reflect on the theme of Organisms of Participation for a Synodal Church. 

During our time together today, rather than simply going through a list of all the Organisms of Participation for a Synodal Church: those already functioning; those already envisaged by Canon Law but perhaps either not operative everywhere or in desperate need of revitalisation; and all the possibilities which could be imagined and which might correspond to the particular circumstances of each local Church, I thought it might be more useful to ask ourselves about the fundamental principles which can and should animate both those organisms already existing and any that we might establish in the future.

In doing so, I would like to use paragraph 94 of the final document as my launching pad:

The correct and resolute implementation of authentic synodal decision-making processes will further the progress of God's people in a participatory way, especially by utilising the institutional means provided for in Canon Law, in particular participatory bodies. Without concrete changes in the short term, the vision of a Synodal Church will not be credible, and this will alienate those members of the People of God who have drawn strength and hope from the synodal journey. Local Churches need to find ways to implement these changes (FD94).

With this in mind I want to begin with some of Pope Leo’s insights into synodality which he has shared with us since his election. Addressing the members of the Ordinary Council of the General Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops just a few weeks after his inauguration, Pope Leo made the following comment: The legacy Pope Francis has left us, in my view, is above all this: that synodality is a style, an attitude that helps us to be Church by promoting authentic experiences of participation and communion.

More recently, in his first major interview, he expanded on this theme with these words:

Synodality is an attitude, and openness, a willingness to understand. Speaking of the Church now, this means each and every member of the Church has a voice and a role to play through prayer, reflection … through a process. There are many ways that that could happen, but (always through) dialogue and respect for one another. To bring people together and to understand that relationship, that interaction, that creating of opportunities of encounter, is an important dimension of how we live our life as Church.

A style, an attitude, an openness, a willingness to understand, a recognition that each and every member of the Church has a voice and a role to play: these are essential elements of a truly Synodal Church, at least as Pope Leo understands it. They are principles, or ideals, which we are called to bring alive in any participatory body which seeks to be at the service of a truly synodal Church.  Such a Church cannot, or at least should not, be divided into active members and passive members; into those who give and those who receive; into those who act and those who are acted upon. Rather, every member of the Church is meant to be an “actor” in the lives of others and equally someone who is willingly acted upon by others.

Another way of saying this, perhaps, is that in the Church there is a mutuality and a mutual inter-dependence which is at the heart of our identity. One important, but by no means the only, way to be an actor in the Church is to be involved in some of the organisations of participation. Not everyone can be, of course, for a variety of good reasons, and we must be careful to ensure that those who are not are not regarded as, or made to feel as if they are, mere spectators in the life of the Church, or those who only receive but who do not give. To fail to be alert to this possibility is to run the risk of creating a new elite class in the Church – the very opposite of what synodality is seeking to advance.

There is in all this a profound harmony between the vision of Pope Leo and that of Pope Francis. And what it points to is something that has emerged with greater clarity as the journey towards a more Synodal Church continues: that at the heart of this pilgrimage of the holy pilgrim people of God is what the final document of the Second Assembly of the Synod called the Spirituality of Synodality.  

This dimension of Synodality is found in paragraphs 43-46 of the Final Document of the Second Assembly although in reality the whole of part one of the document, under the heading of The Heart of Synodality, is really a sustained reflection on the theological, spiritual and pastoral principles which underpin the Church’s commitment to this synodal transformation.

It is not the purpose of this particular seminar to explore this theme in depth, but it is important to acknowledge because the renewal and reform of the Church for which we are all looking is precisely that: the renewal of the Church, the Holy People of God, the Body of Christ, the Universal Sacrament of Salvation - and not the restructuring of a profit-driven corporation or even a charitable NGO. While the Church may have much to learn from the business world or from some of the philosophies which underpin various social and political movements and organisations around the world, in the end it must be the logic of the gospel which guides us, and which ultimately becomes the one sure criterion against which we measure all that we are seeking to do and to be.

In speaking of the logic - what I prefer to call the culture - of the gospel, my mind goes back to something one of the archbishops in Australia said in his appearance before the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse in Australia. The Royal Commission, the highest level of inquiry possible in the Australian political system, in dealing with the tragedy and scandal of the sexual abuse of the young, including in the Catholic Church, focused primarily on institutional questions.  In that context, without denying the need for an exploration of the structural causes of the Church’s dreadful failures, the archbishop made a telling remark which has stayed with me ever since: culture, he said, eats structures for breakfast.

I am not sure how well this phrase translates into other languages or cultures, but what it is really trying to say is that if you put all your energy and time into the reform of structures without also, and even more insistently, putting energy and time into the question of culture, then in fact very little will change. And certainly, especially though not only in relation to the horrors of sexual abuse, something needs to change.

This is why, as we turn our minds to consider the various organisms of participation already in existence in the Church and reflect on how they might be reimagined or expanded upon to enable the Church to operate in a more Synodal way, we must, I believe, keep a number of fundamental things in mind, and first among them is the question of fidelity to the gospel and to our fundamental identity as disciples of Christ. Our task is not to remake the Church but to play our part in ensuring that the Church is faithful to its Lord: that we are faithful to the Lord. One of the essential dimensions of that fidelity is our recognition that the Church is fundamentally missionary in nature.

Pope Francis expressed this very powerfully in paragraph 27 of Evangelii Gaudium

I dream of a “missionary option”, that is, a missionary impulse capable of transforming everything, so that the Church’s customs, ways of doing things, times and schedules, language and structures can be suitably channelled for the evangelisation of today’s world rather than for self-preservation. The renewal of structures demanded by pastoral conversion can only be understood in this light: as part of an effort to make them more mission-oriented, to make ordinary pastoral activity on every level more inclusive and open, to inspire in pastoral workers a constant desire to go forth and in this way to elicit a positive response from all those who Jesus summons to friendship with himself (EG27).

To speak of a Synodal spirituality is to speak of a missionary spirituality, a spirituality which is grounded in the recognition that by virtue of their baptism, every Christian not simply as an individual but as a member of the body of Christ is commissioned by the Lord to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last (John 15:16), to be the salt of the earth and a light for the world (cf. Matthew 5:13-14); to be, in other words, in and through communion with all the members of the Church, a sacrament - that is, both a sign and an instrument - of communion with God and unity among all people (LG1). As Pope Saint John Paul II reminded the bishops of Oceania 25 years ago, we must avoid the danger of ecclesial introspection (cf. Ecclesia in Oceania 27).

The implication of this is very clear. Whether we are considering the suitability and effectiveness of the various organisms of participation already operative in our local Church, or exploring the possibility of establishing new organisms of participation at the level of parish, deanery, diocese, or various groupings of dioceses at the national or continental level, the fundamental question we must ask ourselves is this: how does or will this particular ecclesial institution or consultative body, whether of governance or administration, assist those involved in it and those whom it seeks to serve, be a credible witnesses to the saving love of God made manifest in Jesus Christ?

Does, for example, the Parish or Diocesan Pastoral Council, in the way that it is presently operates, faithfully reflect the synodal, missionary impulse of the Church at the local level? Is it characterised by deep, open-hearted listening and focussed on enabling the local community to look beyond its own needs to the opportunities which exist to bring the Good News of the Gospel to the local situation in which it lives?

This is the kind of fundamental question which every organ of consultation and decision-making in the Church must ask itself.

There are, of course, many already existing organs of consultation within the Church’s structures. Many of these are listed in paragraph 103 of the FD, which references both the Eastern and Western traditions of the Church. In both traditions many of these bodies are consultative and some are deliberative, in whole or in part. They include Parish Councils, Presbyteral Councils, Diocesan and Eparchial Councils, and Diocesan, Eparchial and Parish Finance Councils, as well as Plenary Councils and Diocesan and Eparchial Synods. Many of these bodies, in both the Eastern and Latin Churches, include both laity and clergy. 

The fact that many of these bodies are consultative reflects the Church’s understanding of the role of the ordained ministry, particularly in relation to the bishops, and its historical and theological link to the apostles and ultimately to the will of Christ. Paragraph 92 of the FD makes this clear. But paragraph 92 also speaks of what it calls the “limits” of this authority. This has already been hinted at in paragraph 91 which, with reference to current Church law, speaks of the obligation of the bishop to consult with certain bodies such as the College of Consultors or the Council of Priests before taking a decision: 

 “Those with pastoral authority,” we read, “are obliged to listen to those who participate in the consultation and may not act as if the consultation had not taken place. Therefore, those in authority will not depart from the fruits of consultation that produce an agreement without a compelling reason which must be appropriately explained.  

This procedure is accepted as a general principle by the FD in paragraph 93 where we are reminded that “those who are consulted … assume the responsibility of offering their input honestly, sincerely, with an informed conscience and acting in good conscience …. This will enable the pastoral authority to explain how they have taken the consultation into account, if the decision ultimately taken differs from the opinions offered”. It seems to me that what is offered in the whole of paragraph 93 of the FD is of central importance if, as the document itself puts it, “the processes of decision-making envisaged here are to bear fruit”.

We are all aware that at the end of the Second Assembly, after the final vote on the document and its official consigning to the Pope for his consideration, Pope Francis took the unusual, but perfectly valid, decision to accept the document itself and incorporate it into his formal magisterium. The pope had been present for much of the work of the synod, he had followed the discussion closely, he had made a number of interventions himself, and he had had an opportunity to consider the final draft of the document before it was voted on by the Assembly. In then accepting the final document as his own and giving it the weight of his own authority, the Pope gave us a clear example of how important it is for those in pastoral authority to firstly ensure that the consultation process is well prepared, well conducted, open and honest, and clear in terms of its outcomes (which of course must not be predetermined), and secondly, to treat those outcomes with great seriousness and deliberation, recognising the action of the Holy Spirit, and committing the Church to the implementation of its recommendations.

Whether we are speaking of the Synod of Bishops, a Plenary Council, a Diocesan Synod or Assembly or indeed a decision by the bishop in his local Church, another step in the process of discernment must take place. Paragraph 93 puts it this way:

When the competent authority has formulated the decision, having respected the consultation process and clearly expressed the reasons for it, by reason of the bond of communion that unites them all the baptised should respect and implement the decision … even if it differs from their own opinion, but they should also be free to participate honestly in the evaluative phase. There is always a possibility of making an appeal to the higher authority according to the provision of the law.

While it is natural, and correct, to recognise the importance and relevance of all this to the role of the Pope at the universal level, of the bishops at the diocesan level, and of the clergy at the local parish level, it is also important to recall that in a Synodal Church, authority, both pastoral and organisational, will be exercised at different levels and in different ways by people other than the ordained. This is both inevitable and necessary in a synodal Church which respects also the principle of subsidiarity.  Because we are speaking here of a spirituality of synodality, which is to say a spirituality of discipleship grounded in the culture of the gospel, all that is said above applies equally to a lay principal in a Catholic school, to the chair of the local Parish Finance Committee, to the director of a Catholic social service outreach agency, and so forth. The variety of ways in which, by virtue of baptism, many people exercise authority and leadership within the Christian community is vast and will certainly increase as synodality continues to develop in the life of the Church, but the principles of leadership and governance in the Church apply to everyone.

A little earlier I spoke of the some of the characteristics of a spirituality of synodality, and in particular of deep, open-hearted listening and a missionary vision. In every synodal team, and every participatory body at every level of the Church from the very local to the universal, the question of to whom and to what we listen is vital – for this deep listening is the key to discernment. The synodal journey of the last few years has deepened in us all the realisation of our need to listen to each other: to acknowledge that we have all, through baptism, received the Spirit of God and that the Spirit can and does speak through the body of believers. This implies that in our listening, and in the discernment to which that listening is meant to lead us, we must ensure that what we hear, within ourselves and among ourselves, and from the wider world of which we are a part is, as Gaudium et Spes would put it in terms of the “signs of the times”, discerned in the light of the Gospel (G&S4). 

This takes me back to the beginning of our time together. In the end it must be the logic – the culture - of the gospel which guides us, and which ultimately becomes the one sure criterion against which we measure all that we are seeking to do and to be. Any synodal body in the Church must be grounded in, shaped by and measured against the Word of God. And, of course, that Word of God is made flesh and lives among us in Jesus Christ who is, as Saint Paul reminds us, the head of his body, the Church (Col 1:18).

The Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, abides in the Church and animates the Church – and for this reason we must also listen to the wisdom of the Church accumulated over the centuries and expressed in the Church’s living tradition –  for "the Church, in her teaching, life and worship, perpetuates and transmits to every generation all that she herself is, all that she believes" (Dei Verbum 8). The challenge and privilege of discernment, which is the challenge and privilege of all participatory bodies in the life of the Church, is found here: to listen deeply, respectfully and prayerfully to all the voices – of the Holy People of God, of the cries of the people of our time,  of the living tradition of the Church, and especially and fundamentally to the Word of God in the inspired scriptures, in order to “catch” the voice of the Spirit calling us forward. We cannot hope for a renewed and deeply faithful Church if we do not commit ourselves to a profound spiritual renewal based on the conviction that, again to quote Saint Paul, Christ is the image of the unseen God, he is the beginning, the first-born from the dead, and he is the Head of his body the Church. We are nothing if we are not his faithful disciples: this must always be our first and final desire for the Church, our first and final ambition for the Church, our first and final reason for all that we look for, in and from the Church.