Italian synodal document gets new vote after standoff in April
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The Italian synodal assembly is set to vote Saturday on a summary document of the country’s three-year synodal process, after the last attempt to bring the document to a vote in April ended in a standoff.
The previous attempt at a vote was halted after progressive members of the assembly reportedly threatened to oppose the text, saying it did not adequately discuss the topics of LGBT people and the possibility of ordaining women.
The new document includes proposals calling for parishes to support LGBT people and Catholics in irregular unions.
The summary document is composed of three sections: one about missionary renewal, one about synodal and missionary formation, and one about co-responsibility in the mission of the Church. Each of the 75 proposals of the document will be voted on Saturday.
The synodal assembly, convened by the Italian bishops’ conference, is composed of more than 1,000 participants — lay, clerical, and religious.
The Italian “synodal path” – as the bishops’ conference has called it – began in 2021, following a call from Pope Francis for consultative synodality processes across the Church.
The final phase of the Italian synod started in May 2024 with the annual bishops’ conference assembly. The organizers drafted a working document — called an Instrumentum laboris — in November and received contributions between January and February from all Italian dioceses and other Catholic institutions in the country.
A summary document was birthed from the Instrumentum laboris and is now being put up to a vote.
The document’s wide-ranging proposals touch on many subjects, including care for the poor, the pursuit of peace, and pastoral care for those with disabilities.
While the April document addressed similar topics, critics said it was too vague, especially with regards to pastoral care for LGBT people, female participation in the Church, and the abuse crisis.
The new document calls for “local Churches, to overcome the discriminatory attitudes sometimes widespread in ecclesial circles and society, and commit to promoting the recognition and support of homosexual and transgender people, as well as their parents, who already belong to the Christian community.”
The document stops short of explicitly calling for Communion for the divorced and remarried. But it urges local churches and regional bishops’ conferences to promote “paths of accompaniment, discernment, and integration into ordinary pastoral care for those who wish to pursue greater ecclesial integration but are marginalized from ecclesial and sacramental life due to stable emotional and family situations other than the sacrament of marriage (second unions, de facto cohabitation, marriages and civil unions, etc).”
The summary document also calls for lay people to be supported by parish priests in leading parishes through “ministerial groups or teams,” composed by deacons, laypeople, and religious, and also calls for a seminary formation reform.
While the document does not explicitly support the institution of the female diaconate, it asks the Italian bishops to “support and promote research projects by theological faculties and theological associations in order to contribute to the in-depth study of issues relating to the diaconate of women initiated by the Holy See.”
The document also calls for the Church to “refresh” the language used in the liturgy to make it more “understandable in light of current usage and culture.”
Archbishop Erio Castellucci, president of the national committee of the synodal assembly, said the document “is steeped in experiences of peace and hope.”
“Despite many challenges, it captures the reality of more than 200 local churches, with all their articulations, committed to living and transmitting hope and peace: often unnoticed, without ‘making the news,’ but always with tenacity and evangelical care,” he said in a statement.
“Our Christian communities are not in disarray: although tested by so many challenging situations and sometimes tempted by discouragement, they live as a ‘little leaven’ of fraternity, attentive above all to those left behind or left on the margins.”
After the vote, the presidency of the bishops’ conference will appoint a group of bishops who will develop a series of resolutions based on the document, which will then be discussed at the Italian bishops’ assembly in November.
The Italian synodal process began in 2021 at the behest of Pope Francis, and unfolded in three phases with the participation of over 400 diocesan representatives and 50,000 listening groups.
The assembly had been expected to vote on a final document on April 3, but progressive members of the body argued that the text failed to properly address issues like pastoral care of LGBT persons, or to advocate for a female diaconate, and was not representative of the four-year synodal process.
After receiving too many amendment proposals to be considered before the scheduled vote, organizers decided instead to postpone consideration until October, giving them time to prepare a new document with the proposed amendments.
Castellucci said in a speech to the assembly in April that problems began after the organizers received the diocesan contributions.
“In the first days of [March] the presidency of the Synodal Path read all the contributions and some of the members drafted a first summary text, of 74,000 characters, read in full and discussed on March 11 in the Permanent Episcopal Council: In that meeting a drastic reduction of the document was requested, so that the form of synthetic and targeted propositions could be reached.”
But the reduction of the length and number of proposals made the document’s language too vague for some participants, and local media reported that a sizable number of the more progressive assembly members threatened to vote against it.
One participant told local newspaper La Repubblica that the final document did not address many of the proposals discussed during the four year process, saying that the assembly “met for four years, discussed, studied, exchanged ideas, made proposals, and none of this was found in the text” — including the possibility of ordaining women to the diaconate.
Castelluci conceded that the text “appeared inadequate, in fact. Therefore… the many amendment proposals put forward by the twenty-eight groups require a global rethinking of the text and not just the adjustment of some of its parts.”
He added that the first document was “too synthetic” and that “the desire to listen to creativity prevails, going beyond the schemes that we have set ourselves.”
Castellucci also said that the document was drafted to an overly tight schedule since organizers originally expected a smaller number of amendment proposals.
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