Under the golden dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica, the absolute center of the Catholic world, between the cyclopean marble columns of the transept and under the gaze of immense statues of saints draped in stone, the Church does penance. On the eve of the resumption, Wednesday October 2, of the work of the synod on the future of the Church which could determine the place of its heritage in history, Pope Francis chairs an assembly gathered to ask forgiveness for sins of the institution.
“How can we be credible in our mission if we do not recognize our mistakes and bend down to heal the wounds we have caused with our sins? “, asks the pontiff gently, whose words resonate between the enormous walls of a building whose every corner overflows with treasures and evokes a power once unheard of.
Shortly before, seven cardinals followed one another on the platform, reading requests for forgiveness written by Francis, all punctuated with the words of ” shame “. It is a question of wars, destruction of the environment, but also of evils in which the responsibility of the institution is directly involved. Among other sins we cite complicity in the acts of colonialism and slavery, oppression of women and of course sexual abuse, structural aspect of the crisis in the Church to which the synod must respond.
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Following the testimonies on the war, delivered by the Syrian sister Deema Fayad and by Sara Vatteroni, a migrant reception volunteer, the victim of a pedophile priest also spoke. Facing the pope and under the gaze of an assembly of cardinals and bishops, Laurence Gien, a South African baritone, said in the middle of his speech: “The faces of the abused are too often hidden behind a veil of secrecy maintained with the complicity of the Church. »
“Walk together”
The day after this singular preamble, the second session of the XVIe ordinary synod of bishops, consultative instrument desired by Francis and dedicated to the future of the Church or to “synodality”, this virtue supposed to bring about a more inclusive, less vertical, less centralized institution, going beyond to a certain extent the border, a source of abuse of power, which separates the clerics from the laity. In Rome, some see in the outcome of the synod a possible return to the original Church. Others are skeptical about the decisions that could be expected, or even fear the opening of a “Pandora’s box” with the risk of seeing already clear internal fractures burst.
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