The General Secretariat of the Synod prepared 10 questions with answers concerning the Instrumentum Laboris [working document] for the second session of the XVI Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops to be held from October 2 to 27. The Sunday Examiner will publish two each week through September.
What is the Instrumentum laboris?
As its Latin expression indicates, the Instrumentum Laboris [IL] is first and foremost a working instrument for the members of the Second Session of the XVI Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops. This also justifies its language and the use of theological notions and categories in some of its parts. A theological aid, soon to be published, will facilitate its reading and will allow for a deeper study of the theological notions and categories used.
It is born from the reflections that the Episcopal Conferences, the Eastern Catholic Churches and other international ecclesial realities, as well as the reports presented by the pastors during the three-day working meeting of the Pastors for the Synod, have made around the Synthesis Report of the First Session [4-29 October 2023] in light of the indications given by the General Secretariat of the Synod through the document Towards October 2024.
The IL thus articulates the syntheses received in order to encourage the Assembly’s reflection on the central issue of the October assembly How to be a synodal Church in mission.
As a working instrument of the XVI Assembly, the IL is not a magisterial document, nor a catechism. Neither is it a text that offers prefabricated answers, nor a document that pretends to address all the questions related to the need to be more and more “synodal in mission”.
It is a document, fruit of listening, discernment and reflection on the synodality that has matured in the course of the synodal process. It is a basic text, articulated but essential, conceived above all as a support for the method with which the assembly will be called to work and to encourage prayer, dialogue, discernment, the maturation of a consensus starting from some convergences matured along the way in view of the delivery to the Holy Father of a Final Document of the XVI Assembly.
Despite the short time available, by 30 June 2024, no less than 108 reports had been received from the Episcopal Conferences [out of 114], nine from the Eastern Catholic Churches [out of 14], in addition to the contribution of the USG-UISG [respectively, the International Union of Major Superiors and the International Union of Superiors General]
The Instrumentum laboris has its origin in the reports received by the General Secretariat of the Synod. Who sent these reports?
In December 2023, the General Secretariat, through the document ‘Towards October 2024’, invited the entire Christian community to reflect on the guiding question indicated for the Second Session of the XVI Assembly: How to be a Synodal Church in Mission, proposing a series of differentiated paths and activities based on the Synthesis Report, approved by the members of the XVI Assembly at the end of the work of the First Session, in October 2023.
The aim was to keep the synodal dynamism alive by promoting at the local level a reflection on how to strengthen the differentiated co-responsibility in the mission on the part of all the faithful and, at the same time, to ask the Episcopal Conferences, the Eastern Catholic Churches and the groupings of Churches to reflect on how to articulate the dimension of the Church as a whole and its rootedness at the local level, thus gathering the fruits of the reflection around the Synthesis Report.
Despite the short time available, by 30 June 2024, no less than 108 reports had been received from the Episcopal Conferences [out of 114], nine from the Eastern Catholic Churches [out of 14], in addition to the contribution of the USG-UISG [respectively, the International Union of Major Superiors and the International Union of Superiors General]. In addition to the contribution of some dicasteries of the Roman Curia, the General Secretariat also received more than 200 comments from international entities, university faculties, associations of the faithful or communities and individuals.
This broad consultation was carried out in order to maintain consistency with the principle of circularity [what comes from the base, goes back to the base] that animated the entire synodal process
Obviously, in drafting the Instrumentum Laboris, the General Secretariat also took into account the reports presented by the pastors during the three-day working session of the International Meeting of Pastors for the Synod, as well as those of some working groups: the five groups created by the General Secretariat of the Synod to deepen the theological study of five areas of reflection, in the wake of what was repeatedly requested by the Assembly [the face of the missionary synodal Church; the missionary synodal face of the groupings of Churches; the face of the universal Church; the synodal method; the “place” of the synodal Church in the mission], and a specific commission of canonical experts created to support the work of the theologians.
In this sense, the Instrumentum Laboris can truly be considered a Church document that has been able to dialogue with diverse sensibilities and different pastoral fields.
Who drafted the ‘Instrumentum laboris’?
Like any other document of the General Secretariat of the Synod concerning the synodal process, the Instrumentum Laboris [IL] is the fruit of a work in which a large number of people from various parts of the world and with different competencies have participated.
First of all, a group of theologians [men and women, bishops, priests, consecrated men and women and lay people] from different continents, but also the members of the XV Ordinary Council of the General Secretariat of the Synod accompanied by some Consultors of the same Secretariat.
A first version of the document was then sent to some seventy people, representatives of all the People of God [priests, consecrated men and women, lay people, representatives of ecclesial realities, theologians, pastoral agents and a significant number of pastors] from all over the world, from different ecclesial sensibilities and from different theological “schools”.
This broad consultation was carried out in order to maintain consistency with the principle of circularity [what comes from the base, goes back to the base] that animated the entire synodal process. This verification of the material prepared in the light of the reports received was also an exercise, on the part of the General Secretariat, of that accountability that characterizes the synodal Church.
Finally, after due modifications, the IL returned to the hands of the Ordinary Council which, after a series of amendments, approved it and transmitted it to the Holy Father for final approval.
