Fr. Paul T. Nguyen,
He was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, in 1979.
He attended the Cursillo de Cristiandad in 1970. He is currently retired from ministry and returned to Vietnam while continuing to live his Fourth Day with the Cursillistas there.
Synodality and the Cursillo Movement.
In the recent history of the Roman Catholic Church, in addition to the Second Vatican Council, the Church periodically holds Synods that bring together many bishops from all over the world and some experts on various topics. The Synod is also referred to as a General Assembly.
For this current Synod, the first General Assembly was already scheduled for October 4-29, 2023, which the Holy See called a Synod on the Future of the Church, and entitled “For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation and Mission”. However, this Synod is clearly special because the Holy See broadly invites all the faithful of the Universal Church to participate and extends it for two years instead of just a few months. A second General Assembly will take place in October 2024.
Before each Synod, the Holy See usually sends to all the local churches an “instrumentum laboris”, that is, “the working document”, for their preparation. Once again, this Synod has invited the faithful from all walks of life to participate, rather than primarily in the “circle” of the clergy.
“A basic question animates and guides us: how does this “walking together”, which takes place today at different levels (from the local to the universal), enable the Church to proclaim the Gospel in accordance with the mission entrusted to her; and what steps does the Spirit invite us to take to grow as a synodal Church?
Here we will indicate the main objectives, which define synodality as a form, style and structure of the Church:
- To remember how the Spirit has guided the Church’s journey throughout history and, today, calls us to be, together, witnesses of God’s love;
- To live a participatory and inclusive ecclesial process that offers everyone, especially those who, for various reasons, are on the margins, the opportunity to express themselves and to be heard in order to contribute to the building up of the People of God;
- To recognize and appreciate the richness and variety of the gifts and charisms that the Spirit generously bestows for the good of the community and the benefit of the whole human family;
- Explore participatory ways of exercising responsibility in the proclamation of the Gospel and in the effort to build a more beautiful and livable world;
- Examine how responsibility and power are lived in the Church, as well as the structures by which they are managed, bringing to light and seeking to convert prejudices and distorted practices that are not rooted in the Gospel;
- Accrediting the Christian community as a credible subject and reliable partner in the paths of social dialogue, healing, reconciliation, inclusion and participation, the reconstruction of democracy, the promotion of fraternity and social friendship;
- Regenerating relationships among the members of Christian communities, as well as between them and other social groups, e.g., communities of believers of other confessions and religions, civil society organizations, popular movements, etc;
- Fostering the appreciation and appropriation of the fruits of recent synodal experiences at the universal, regional, national and local levels”.
There is no doubt that many of the Cursillistas of the Cursillo Movement throughout the world had participated in the initiative process at the local levels of the Synod. All we have to do at the present time is to listen to what the General Assemblies, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, will have to say in the final document, which is expected to come out after the Second General Assembly in October 2024. In this spirit of “walking together”, the Holy See and the Church Fathers would certainly discern all the “opinions” of the faithful and assimilate them into this Final Document for the future of our beloved Universal and Synodal Church.
