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The intense and pervasive onslaught of the sexual revolution through the western world, now threatening to affect the non-western world, has caused traditional Christians from a variety of Christian traditions to draw together in cooperation and even sympathy.
For Christians in America, strongholds in the culture war have been conservative denominations such as the Southern Baptist Convention, non-denominational churches, the world of parachurch organizations, including educational and charitable organizations, the Catholic Church, and, politically, the Republican Party. Commitment to traditional faith and morals is now challenged in many of these strongholds; a new challenge could come in the Catholic Church in the fall of 2014 with the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelization.
Based on the Pope Francis’ statements in the first year of his pontificate, church doctrine with respect to marriage and sexual morality will not change, but the tone of the church as it approaches the contemporary world may change. Also, and most importantly, it is possible that the actual practice of the church toward those who do not conform their lives to church teaching may change.
Advocates of fundamental change in the church’s faith and morals have advocated for some time that moderating teaching and/or practice concerning divorce and remarriage is the place to start (as noted by Cardinal Dulles at the end of the linked article). Unlike the world of the old, established Protestant churches, which over the twentieth century accepted, both practically and formally, the reality of divorce and remarriage as something the church must accommodate to, the Catholic Church continues to hold, at least in its teaching, to the doctrine of Christ, which forbids divorce and remarriage. Although the process of annulment may function in many cases as a kind of ecclesiastical divorce, church doctrine continues to be the indissolubility of marriage until the death of a spouse.
Predictably, this is challenged, especially in the more liberal jurisdictions of the church, such as in Germany, and centers at the present time on the issue of worthiness to receive communion. It is advocated that Catholics who have been divorced and remarried, without valid annulment of a previous marriage be permitted to receive communion, which is in turn tied to a more general position that Catholics actively opposing church teaching (such as, especially, Catholic politicians who actively support legal abortion) should be able to receive communion, as indeed they often are in some dioceses.
The new synod on the family comes only 34 years after an earlier synod, at the beginning of John Paul II’s pontificate in 1980, on the role of marriage and the family in modern life. It was followed by that Pope’s apostolic exhortation, Familiaris Consortio in 1981, which restated church teaching against divorce, abortion, contraception, and generally reiterated the traditional Christian doctrine of chastity. In calling for a new synod to address the same topic, Pope Francis recognized the substantial change in practice regarding sexuality in the last thirty years, and in particular initiated a survey of Catholic laity to learn current lay opinion regarding Church teaching and sexual issues. While, as noted in the link provided to LifeSiteNews.com, the call for the survey seemed to express concern about widespread ignorance or rejection of church teaching, it has also been interpreted by dissidents in the church as a willingness to change church doctrine.
At a papal consistory in February, German Cardinal Walter Kasper addressed a range of issues related to marriage and the family in preparation for the Synod, but drew sharp criticism for his suggestion that divorced and civilly remarried Catholics be given communion after a period of penance, without changing their behavior in the civil marriage (historically the Church required abstinence from sexual relations if a non-sacramental, civil marriage was entered into). Cardinal Carlo Caffarra of Bolonga in particular condemned the practical acceptance of civil remarriage as a practical change in the doctrine given by Christ’s explicit statements. But Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops, said in respect to teaching on marriage and the family that “the Church is not timeless” and needs to update its teaching.
The Synod is to focus on “pastoral concern,” and reputedly will be in the vein of Pope John XXIII, who condemned those who condemn the modern world, see the true Christian era in the past, and counsel severity rather than mercy. The official title of the synod is “the Pastoral Challenges of the Family in the Context of Evangelisation.” The Synod’s “working document” takes account of responses to the survey of laity requested by Rome and received from the bishops. The Synod will run two weeks in October 2014, and will consider both bishops’ contributions and the results of “group discussions.”
The actual working document (“instrumentum laboris”) for the Synod on the Family, written after receipt of responses to the survey of the laity, seems to show notable prudence in striving to minister to persons in life situations which are contrary to church teaching without compromising the church’s teaching. A papal “letter to families” in February, Pope Francis asked families in the church to pray for the success of the Synod in adequately addressing the “pastoral challenges” of ministering to families in the contemporary world. Focusing as it does on “evangelization,” the Synod will proceed from the position that families are the “natural home” of evangelization, according to the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.
What will actually come of the Synod is unclear. A Philippine cardinal expressed the hope that the Synod will find “new ways” to share church teaching on the family. Cardinal Philipe Barbarin of Lyons, France said that Synod had been entrusted by the Pope to the intercession of two new “pope saints,” John XXIII and John Paul II, “in obedience to the Holy Spirit.” He indicated that there should be prayer for the Synod and that “the stakes are very high.”
While church “pastors” will provide summaries of their parishioner’s responses to the survey, and individual Catholics can communicate their views directly to offices concerned with the Synod at the Vatican, an encouraging note is that the Synod will be based on “Catholic doctrine” and not public opinion. The Synod will have a “broad focus,” according to Pope Francis. The Pope noted that currently the family in crisis, cohabitation is common, but didn’t clearly endorse Kasper’s position on receiving communion. However, he did think that Kasper’s other proposals were “positive.” The Synod will make recommendations, but ultimate decisions rest with the Pope.
In referring to the two intercessor popes, Pope Francis says John Paul II was “pope of the family” and John XXIII was “pope of docility.” As perhaps an indication that the church’s position on sexual morality will not change, Pope Paul VI, who issued the decisive encyclical Humane Vitae, condemning contraception, will be beatified at the end of the Synod, on October 19.
It is clear from the statements of those responsible for guiding the Synod that there will be no change, radical or otherwise, from the past doctrine of the church. The great danger for believers convinced of the clear statements of Christ and the apostles on marriage, the family, and sexuality is that the Synod will recommend that formal sanction be given to the practical acceptance of people not conforming to Christ’s teaching, without any change in their lives. This will not have the effect of drawing the wayward into conformity with Biblical teaching, as might be expected to be the goal of a strategy to engage the world on difficult questions, but will begin an erosion of the church’s actual position on Biblical teaching. If such accommodation is indeed the result of the Synod, then faithful Christians will be at pains to point out, and yet must continually insist on, in practice as well as in doctrine, the words of Christ in the Gospels that marriage is a “one flesh” union of man and wife, which in its nature cannot be ended in this life.
To believe the Biblical revelation is indeed to believe that it conveys objective, timeless content, to which we conform our lives at whatever great difficulty. Objectivity means the revelation and duty to obey do not change even when it is compromised by institutions. Social conservatives have had the Catholic Church as a bastion for the entire time of the sexual revolution of the late twentieth, and now, the twenty-first centuries. If it does not appear that they will suddenly lose it wholesale, the logic of our belief in the objective truth of Biblical revelation, and more than that, our personal commitment as disciples of Christ, means that we must hold to Christ’s commands in our own lives from the pages of Scripture, and clearly confess that to the world.
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