US bishops’ head to focus on unity, integrity at synod

Thursday, March 19th, 2015

The president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has said he will take a message on integrity and unity to the synod on the family.

Archbishop Joseph Kurtz is one of four US prelates who will attend the synod in October.

In an interview with the National Catholic Register, he was asked what message he would carry to Rome.

Archbishop Kurtz replied: “The dimension that I would bring is the unity and integrity of how we worship, how we believe and how we provide pastoral care.”

“It will be very important that there is not a gap between the way we worship, believe and provide pastoral care,” he said.

Asked about pastoral care, Archbishop Kurtz mentioned a principle he was taught in the seminary: “Sacraments are for people.”

“So we do have a responsibility as bishops to first ensure the integrity of the sacrament, but also to ensure that we are looking at ways to reach out to others.”

Archbishop Kurtz cited the Holy Father’s “effort to form a committee to explore how the process of granting annulments might be streamlined and how unnecessary roadblocks might be removed, without doing violence to Church teaching”.

Archbishop Kurtz also said the synod will have to look at how the Church accompanies people in what he called “irregular situations”.

“In those cases, it will be the task of the synod to look at many opportunities to provide pastoral care,” he said.

“The delegates to the synod will have to evaluate each one of the proposals based on theological guidance [regarding its] effect on the theology of the Eucharist and on our need to be in grace as we approach the sacrament.”

The archbishop acknowledged that the Church does allow for adaptations to local culture by local churches.

But these mainly come in the area of liturgy and require special permission, he said.

“These adaptations, however, are not in the area of doctrine,” he added.

Sources