I was blessed recently to attend the International Meeting of Parish Priests for the Synod in Rome April 28-May 2.
The event was planned in response to last October’s first session of the Synod of Bishops on Synodality, which recommended that the voice of pastors be heard in preparation for the second session to take place this coming October. Thus, the general secretariat for the Synod, along with the Dicasteries for the Clergy, for Evangelization and for the Oriental Churches, organized the gathering of 200 parish pastors from around the world. I was one of eight pastors chosen by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to represent the church and the priests in our country.
The first part of the meeting took place at a retreat center north of Rome, and comprised three days of prayer, fellowship, formation, and conversations on the theme of synodality; that is, how all the members of the church walk together, sharing co-responsibility for the Gospel mission. In working groups of priests assisted by a facilitator, we shared synodal experiences and ideas from our respective parishes and dioceses.
My group included priests from Syria, Italy, Slovakia, Mozambique, Belarus, Romania, Poland and Portugal. It was inspiring to hear how we all shared in common our love for our parishioners and our zeal for parish ministry. At the same time, it was instructive to learn about the different cultural and pastoral circumstances that affect our apostolates. For example, while I noted that our American democratic experience fosters a culture of open communication and collaboration in our parishes, the priests from the former Eastern Bloc countries dominated by the Soviet Union and decades of extensive spying explained that their people were therefore not used to sharing their opinions and collaborating in parish meetings.
I was honored to be chosen to deliver a presentation to the entire gathering on our diocese’s and my parish’s best practices for synodality, as well as to be asked to be the celebrant and homilist for the concelebrated Mass on the final day of the meeting. The summaries of our group conversations will provide material to be used for the drafting of the “Instrumentum laboris,” the foundational document for discussion at this October’s second session of the Synod, together with the syntheses of this year’s diocesan consultations coordinated by the world’s bishops’ conferences, and the Synthesis Report of last October’s first session.
The second part of the meeting took place at the Vatican and included an audience with Pope Francis followed by a concelebrated Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica. Pope Francis answered questions from several priests in a very warm, fraternal, and jovial spirit, and signed a letter to all the pastors in the world urging them to be “builders of a synodal and missionary Church.” He also greeted each of us individually, and it was a joy for me to receive his personal blessing. The Mass at the Altar of the Chair in the apse of St. Peter’s, under Bernini’s Baroque Chair of St. Peter, was a fittingly glorious send-off for all the participants. I returned to my parish inspired by the global fraternal experience of priestly synodality and energized to continue fostering synodal co-responsibility for our mission by everyone at my parish.
Fr. Planty is pastor of St. Charles Borromeo Church in Arlington
