Over a hundred delegates at the first general meeting of the diocesan synod in Johannisthal approved the so-called final document, which summarizes and describes how local believers perceive the current situation in the diocese regarding organization, missions, and management.
“This year’s final document should serve as a map that describes where we stand as a diocese. Now, the synod delegates are informing their parishes, communities, and assemblies about its outcomes,” explains synod team member Růžena Ambrožová and adds: “The diocesan synod will continue to build upon the diocesan final synod document, as well as on the document that emerged from the October general assembly of the worldwide synod in Rome.”
The diocesan document states that over the last ten years, the number of participants in Sunday Masses has decreased by a quarter, and the average age of priests has increased. It also discusses how poorly the church community communicates and their uncertainty about how to conduct missions, how pastoral workers are undervalued, and how parishes are opaque in their finances.
The document notes that people often consider the Plzeň diocese in connection with the term “mission territory,” which was partially evident in synodal diocesan listening. Here, delegates observe a certain contradiction: “On one hand, we say we are a mission territory, while on the other hand, our practices suggest that we do not want missionaries but priests.” “While there are voices that organizational structures do not correspond to the local missionary situation, we are not always willing to seek ways to adapt these structures to the situation and we want the priest to be with us, in our community, in our church,” the document states. Many voices in the diocese indicate that “missions,” as understood in the diocese, do not only limit to preaching the gospel verbally but permeate all other basic expressions of pastoral work in the diocese and parishes: celebrating worship services, serving people in need, and meeting in community.
Working Together
During diocesan listening, there were also strong voices emphasizing the importance of synodally-based attitudes, processes, and structures of shared decision-making in the pastoral and economic councils of parishes and the diocese, which can be considered inherently missionary simply by being collaborative, respectful, and discerning.
A mission as a style of life and service based on dialogue and respect for all is something that is already present in the practice of some parishes or communities, but it simultaneously calls for further reflection, deepening, and accompaniment, and this in communication with the worldwide church. During diocesan listening, delegates often perceived a tension between the importance of “local” rooting and “global” mission. However, the locally rooted form of “mission through simple presence” is often hindered today by the decrease in the number of priests, the mobile lifestyle, and the fragmentation of various “worlds” of today’s people (living elsewhere, working elsewhere, going to offices elsewhere, etc.). In the final document, delegates reflect on how to respond to the need to support local continuity and rootedness while sensitively accompanying today’s people in their rootlessness and extreme mobility.
Based on diocesan listening, delegates also intensively perceive the need for a specific approach to individual locations.
The entire final document along with the attachments is available on the website synoda.bip.cz. Now in November, the second phase of the diocesan synod will begin (correction: it will begin in January), during which answers will be sought to the question: “Where do we need to go?” The result of the second phase is to formulate long-term goals for the diocese.
Kateřina Odvodyová
The article was published in Catholic Weekly no. 47.
