The Church does not have a listening crisis. The Church has a truth crisis.
Like many of you, I came across today’s article by Diane Montagna concerning a study conducted by the Synod on Synodality’s (my spell check flags this word because it is fake and made up) study group on “controversial doctrinal, pastoral and ethical questions.” You can read it here. I was disgusted and furious at the same time. This was a VATICAN REPORT! If you wanted a concise, methodological proof text as to why a large percentage of Catholic clergy should be shown the door, this is it. And yet, it will be celebrated and heralded. Jimmy Martin and his ilk are prancing these disordered couples and their “relationships” straight to hell.
“The dogmas of the Fathers are despised; apostolic traditions are set at naught; the devices of innovators are in vogue in the churches.” AD 375
St. Basil the Great:
This sounds like it could have been written yesterday.
Faithful Catholics are exhausted, and pretending otherwise is dishonest. Ordinary Catholics are watching the world collapse into confusion, degeneracy, broken families, doctrinal illiteracy, hostility toward Christianity, and moral chaos, while enormous portions of the Church hierarchy respond with another symposium on “listening.” Who exactly is being shepherded here?
It increasingly feels like many bishops have abandoned the role of apostles and recast themselves as facilitators, moderators, consultants, and therapists. It’s like “Office Space” for Rome. Every issue becomes a “dialogue.” Every doctrinal conflict becomes a “journey.” Every crisis becomes a “process of discernment.” The language is perpetually soft, endlessly unfinished, and almost allergic to clarity. And that is precisely the problem. They’ve traded Scripture for TPS Reports.
“Synodality” has become one of the most elastic terms in modern Catholicism. It seems to mean everything and therefore means nothing. Ask ten Catholics to define it and you will get ten different answers wrapped in phrases like “walking together,” “encounter,” “accompaniment,” and “shared listening.” None of those words are evil in themselves. But together they form a kind of ecclesiastical fog machine that obscures rather than clarifies. It’s all done on purpose!
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