Scottish Catholic Observer

Greater emphasis on small-group discussions is helping increase trust in the synod process, one of the four synod presidents has said.

“I think this time we are aware of and I think the secretary of the synod [Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri] is aware that there are these suspicions and, therefore, I think there’s going to be a much more perhaps open-handed approach to the synod,” Cardinal Wilfrid Napier of Durban, South Africa, said.

As a member of the synod’s ordinary council, Cardinal Napier (above) was part of the group that planned this year’s general Synod on the Family as well as last year’s extraordinary synod.

Last year Cardinal Napier openly criticised the publication of a midterm report during the extraordinary synod and the decision not to release summaries of the speeches participants gave in the synod hall. He and several other synod fathers at the time suggested that the midterm report did not accurately reflect the assembly’s views and that the press had no way of assessing the report’s accuracy.

Although the Vatican is not distributing summaries of speakers’ presentations during the current synod, Cardinal Baldisseri has  insisted bishops were free to give their texts to whomever they wanted.

In addition, Pope Francis created a 10-person committee to oversee the drafting of the final synod document and ensure it incorporates the general discussions, small groups’ reports and written comments from synod participants.

Cardinal Napier said he had been pleased with the increased emphasis on and time given to the small group discussions, saying the bishops ‘have been given what we have always said is the best part’ of a synod.

After just two days of meeting in the language-based groups, the cardinal said the discussions ‘have actually fulfilled my expectations. Really free and open exchanges, a real getting a good measure of what’s happening in the Church in the various parts of the world,’ and how the Church and families help and support each other.

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