Pray For The Bishops At The Synod

The Catholic bishops have gathered in Rome to kick off the Synod of Bishops XIV Ordinary General Assembly. The topic is the family.

In the 2014 Synod was plagued by controversy. First, Cardinal Kaspar floated a proposal that would have allowed Catholics who have been divorced and remarried to receive communion. A contingent of bishops prevented this heretical proposal from moving forward.

Second, there were some irregularities in the content of the interim and final reports. Somehow, statements on homosexual relationships found their way into the reports even though they did not have the requisite number of votes.

Rorate Caeli indicates that there are already some irregularities with the 2015 Synod. Even if you don’t pay much attention to the daily news on the Catholic Church, you are probably aware that there are powerful factions within the Church that would be pleased to jettison or ignore portions of the teaching of Christ that they don’t like. While I believe that the Church will always be prevented from teaching heresy, that doesn’t stop from bishops from making terrible mistakes in how they present the doctrine of the Church.

In the coming days, pray for the bishops at the Synod, that they may have the courage to be faithful to our Lord.

By the way, the Gospel reading for today, the start of the Synod, was from Mark. Let’s hope the bishops were paying attention at Mass.

The Pharisees approached Jesus and asked,
“Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?”
They were testing him.
He said to them in reply, “What did Moses command you?”
They replied,
“Moses permitted a husband to write a bill of divorce
and dismiss her.”
But Jesus told them,
“Because of the hardness of your hearts
he wrote you this commandment.
But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.
For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother
and be joined to his wife,
and the two shall become one flesh.
So they are no longer two but one flesh.’ 
Therefore what God has joined together,
no human being must separate.”
In the house the disciples again questioned Jesus about this.
He said to them,
“Whoever divorces his wife and marries another
commits adultery against her;
and if she divorces her husband and marries another,
she commits adultery.”