University of Canberra chaplain Fr Paul McGavin explained his criteria in a 2000-word article in L'Espresso.

He started by stating that ordination does not change a man.

"He has access to the authority and grace of Holy Orders. Whether or not these are enacted in important measure depends upon the human qualities that are present in the one who is ordained," he wrote.

Therefore selection criteria need to focus on human qualities and the way that grace is manifested in those human qualities.

Fr McGavin wrote that it is from this perspective that his 12 criteria are put forward.

In summary, firstly, a candidate must be a manly man, confident in his own masculinity.

Second, he must be a man of integrity who can be trusted.

Third, he must be a man of principle, insisting on due process and natural justice, proceeding canonically rather than arbitrarily.

Fourth, fear of God is important.

Fifth, he must be inclusive. "Has he as a priest pastor worked to build a community where diverse people find a place and a welcome. . . . Has he shown himself as a man of acute listening skills so that he hears deeply what is being said to him?"

Sixth, he must be a man of prayer, so that people encounter a man who "practises the presence of God".

Seventh, is he humble in a robust way? If he is not, "the Church will have a man who is wilful and who abuses his position, is threatened by others, who puts down others and who thinks himself to be what he is not".

Eighth, he must love beauty, and be a man who "communicates the beauty of God from small and lowly things through to exalted things".

Ninth, he must have a history of proven intellectual accomplishment.

Tenth, practical implementation capacities are important.

Eleventh, he must be able to decide what not to do.

Twelfth, the Church needs men of deep love who try to imitate Christ, and don't just do their own thing.

Sources

• L'Espresso
• Image: Goulburn Post

In a wide-ranging open letter to the Pope, Fr Paul McGavin said such interventions lead to "bald and combative declarations".

Rather, Fr McGavin proposed a process oriented to "dialogue and learning".

He suggested the bishops first meet in groups and listen to each other, in an attempt to find "meeting points between different perceptions and different ways of fidelity to what the Church has received and the challenges of the world . . ."

Fr McGavin, who is Catholic chaplain at the University of Canberra, suggested the Pope move around the various groups, "not only listening but contributing to the dialogue".

An elected bishop from each group would present the consensus or lack thereof back to a plenary session, speaking maybe for half an hour.

The Pope should continue to foster dialogue at this stage, and bring the discourses together in his post-synodal exhortation.

"This does not guarantee that everyone will agree with that exhortation," Fr McGavin wrote.

"But it does substantially increase the likelihood that what the Pope writes will find resonance with more bishops and faithful and provide a means whereby the Church may remain faithful to the entrustment received from the Lord and better communicate her mission to a disparate and confused world."

Fr McGavin said he did not "see this happening while bishops speak in 10-minute sound bites and decide on numerical voting".

"To me this seems unecclesial," he wrote.

The theologian stated he dislikes "vote by numbers" on matters of doctrine.

"I believe in the Church it should be ‘it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us' (Acts 15:28)."

Touching on the issue of Communion for the divorced and civilly remarried, Fr McGavin wrote that it makes sense to him to say it is not enough to consider the problem only from the perspective of the Church as a sacramental institution.

"As I see it, we need comprehensive thinking and reasoning within the complete inheritance and authority of the Church."

Sources

• L'Espresso
• Image: Goulburn Post