Amid an increasingly leftwards turn by the Synodal Path in Germany, and calls for upending Catholic tradition in Ireland, is it time to ignore the Pope’s Synod on Synodality? The consultation process – which has been a rather hit-and-miss affair, with huge variance by diocese in terms of engagement – will culminate in a major meeting next year and recommendations for the Pope. Yet, the numbers, in fact, seem to underrepresent the conservative faithful while giving full voice to liberal groups. Take England and Wales, for instance: the 30,000 estimated participants represent under 10 per cent of all Mass-going Catholics and under 1 per cent of all Catholics. These figures are no outlier. In fact, compared to France they are generous.

Meanwhile, the progressive language we have heard is coming from countries where the secular progressive train has already very much left the station. In other words, many Catholics in much of western Europe are being forced to compromise with, or are being swept along with the tide of, liberal values. What the Pew Research Center discovered with regards to a divide on social values across Europe is, for instance, mirrored among Europe’s Catholics, with US Catholics trending along with western European Catholics. According to Pew: “In Western Europe, large majorities of Catholics said in 2017 that they support legal same-sex marriage. That was the case in the Netherlands (92%), the United Kingdom (78%), France (74%) and Germany (70%).” 

Pew found, however, that “in almost all of the Central and Eastern European countries surveyed by the Center in 2015 and 2016, most Catholics oppose same-sex marriage”. In Ireland meanwhile, where less than half of people see religion as core to national identity, about two-thirds of people also support same-sex marriage. Predictably, 65 per cent of Irish Catholics feel the same. Of course, a majority of Irish people nominally remain Catholics, so perhaps the numbers should come as little surprise. Still, could it be that Catholics in western Europe and much of the US are following trends in the wider culture? Why are we not hearing progressive noises coming out of the likes of Poland, for instance?

Could this mean that Catholics – what few remain of us – increasingly follow the herd in western European countries, while Catholics in central and eastern Europe, and the Global South, hold firm to traditional values? This could mean the Synod on Synodality merely reflects national trends, while the tiny samples involved – and sense of overrepresentation of liberals anyway among western European, and many US, Catholics surveyed – mean the Synod on Synodality may not be of much value at all. The consultation, which has no legislative power as it is, has also seemed to seek out those who are not active participants in the Church.

Of course, this is not to say that reforms should not be considered – and the Church must tolerate dissent – but the recommendations look set to not only underrepresent mainstream Catholics but overestimate progressive values, while there is a sense that Catholics in western Europe are being forced to compromise with a secular progressive culture. More worrying is that the Church could be splitting in two, although the Pope should not ignore the fact Catholicism is alive and kicking where it has remained faithful to tradition (eastern Europe, Nigeria, the Philippines, etc.), while the evidence of Protestantism suggests a progressive turn cannot get people back into pews (one need only look at the Church of England). Instead, other traditionalist forms of Christianity – Evangelicalism and Eastern Orthodoxy – have thrived.

The Synod on Synodality is likely to be a costly exercise which perhaps leads to little, whose findings, frankly, will have failed to take a genuine and representative pulse of the world’s engaged and practising Catholics. It may be too soon to write the entire process off. But it seems hard to take its findings entirely seriously given the numbers and samples involved.

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