New Ways Ministry’s Synod Report Finds “Persistent LGBTQ+ Hope,” Offers Recommendations

Tomorrow, the Vatican will release a working document to guide this October’s final General Assembly for the Synod on Synodality. Ahead of the release, today’s post includes news about New Ways Ministry’s own report for the Synod, as well as an analysis from the Global Network of Rainbow Catholics.

Report Identifies “Persistent Hope” of LGBTQ+ Catholics for Synod

New Ways Ministry released its latest report for the synodal process, a four-page document titled, “Persistent LGBTQ+ Hope for the Synod.” The report opens by naming the “new and renewed ways” that LGBTQ+ people and allies “have once again answered Pope Francis’ invitation to journey together on the synodal path.” The report offers five recommendations (see below).

The report is based on virtual “Conversations in the Spirit” that New Ways Ministry hosted earlier this spring for LGBTQ+ advocates, conversations held, as the report notes, to answer “the Synod General Assembly’s call last October for broader listening, especially at the margins.”

Similar to the format of last October’s global General Assembly’s synthesis report, Persistent LGBTQ+ Hope for the Synod focuses on the points of convergence and summarizes recommendations—all of which are offered while recognizing both Catholic LGBTQ+ advocates’ “great disappointment” after last October’s assembly and “persistent hope for a synodal ecclesial future.”

Among the convergences that surfaced during the spiritual conversations were the following:

• Distress about the “hurt, exclusion, and pastoral malpractice” many queer people and their loved ones have experienced by an “institutional church that has done so much damage.”
• A major affirmation by most participants that they “felt listened to through the synodal process, and expressed a desire for further opportunities, especially with Church leaders involved.”
• Criticism of the Synod General Assembly’s 2023 synthesis report, particularly “the language that some ‘feel marginalized’ by the Church” which was “wounding to LGBTQ+ people, as though this marginalization was a matter of feelings rather than harmful reality of their lives as Catholics,” and dismisses the discrimination the community has experienced.
• An overwhelming desire for LGBTQ+ people to have “full participation in the sacramental, spiritual, and social life of the Church,” with concrete efforts to “eliminate barriers” to this participation and expand welcoming spaces.
• Recognition that LGBTQ+ inclusion is often shakily reliant on whether individual priests are affirming or harmful, “rather than a more universal approach that uplifts the humanity of LGBTQ+ people. . .calling for consistency among the hierarchy.”

Promoting social justice was a common thread throughout the conversation on these convergences and other topics. The report explains:

“LGBTQ+ Catholic participants felt the Church ought to focus more on its rich social justice teachings rather than dated and scientifically-flawed theology of sexuality and gender. Many believed approaching LGBTQ+ issues through the primary lens of social justice would be lifegiving and counter dehumanization.”

Participants’ emphasis on approaching LGBTQ+ issues through the lenses of social justice and pastoral care brought about the report’s five recommendations for the final General Assembly this October in Rome, as well as for the ongoing synodal study groups the Vatican created earlier this year:

1. The Synod’s 2024 General Assembly should include openly LGBTQ+ delegates; the same is needed for the Study Groups, especially Group 9.
2. Study Group 2 must take seriously the near-unanimous sentiment among LGBTQ+ Catholics, their allies, affirming theologians, psychologists, and social scientists, as well as the growing number of bishops, that the Catechism’s language of “objectively disordered” must be revised.
3. Study Group 4 should consider how LGBTQ+ Catholics can be effectively involved in the formation of clergy.
4. The concerns of LGBTQ+ Catholics and allies should be a point of conversation at the October assembly, seeking to find concrete ways to implement greater inclusion, particularly in parish life.
5. Structures in a synodal spirit should be established beyond October 2024 so that the institutional Church can more carefully and attentively listen to the prayerful contributions of LGBTQ+ Catholics and their loved ones.

In a final section, “Towards October 2024,” the report concludes:

“In this phase of the Synod on Synodality, LGBTQ+ Catholic participants again demonstrated that they are prayerful, devout, thoughtful members of the Church. This ‘Conversation in the Spirit’ gathering, coupled with those New Ways Ministry held during 2022 in which more than 1,000 people participated (see From the Margins to the Center: A Report on Spiritual Conversations Held LGBTQ People and Allies as Part of the Synod on Synodality) prove that LGBTQ+ Catholics are already engaged in exercising their baptismal priesthood, sharing in Christ’s prophetic and royal mission (Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 1628). The Church must now finally and fully honor the baptismal ministry of LGBTQ+ Catholics and their allies.”

Persistent LGBTQ+ Hope for the Synod can be found by clicking here. For all of New Ways Ministry’s resources about the Synod on Synodality and LGBTQ+ issues are available here.

Rainbow Catholics Seek Church Teaching Reform, Openly LGBTQ+ Delegates

The Global Network of Rainbow Catholics (GNRC) submitted a white paper to the Synod secretariat in May based on its 2023 report and listening sessions the network held this spring.

GNRC had surveyed its member organizations with a series of questions about how they perceived the Synod on Synodality, how church leaders could improve inclusion efforts and reform structures for greater synodality, and in what ways LGBTQ+ Catholics and allies already participate in church life co-responsibly. The responses highlighted that LGBTQ+ Catholics’ views are on the synodal process are very diverse, due to their experiences of having been embraced in some contexts while facing exclusion in others. Respondents questioned what the Vatican’s documents Fiducia Supplicans (on blesssings for people in same-gender couples) and Dignitas Infinita (on human dignity, but which included negative statements on gender identity) ultimately mean for LGBTQ+ people.

GNRC submitted three recommendations based on their survey and listening sessions: reform of “harmful teachings,” prompted by a collaborative study by queer folks, allies, theologians, and bishops; adding openly LGBTQ+ delegates to future Synod assemblies; and mandating the documents of Vatican II be taught in seminaries. The full white paper can be found here.

Tomorrow, Bondings 2.0 will begin its coverage of the next Instrumentum Laboris, expected to be released then, and what it means for LGBTQ+ issues in the church.

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—Robert Shine (he/him), New Ways Ministry, July 8, 2024