Featured on Where Peter Is on January 13, 2025

(This article is the first in a four-part series on Mental Health written by Ariane Sroubek, PsyD. Ariane holds a doctorate in School and Child Clinical Psychology as well as a bachelor’s degree in biblical and theological studies. Her undergraduate work in psychology took place at a Christian college where the integration of faith and learning was prioritized.)

Throughout history, deep thinkers have wrestled with the integration of faith and science. Within the Church, this struggle has at times resulted in epic mistakes, such as rejecting the idea that the earth revolves around the sun. At other times, the Church has embraced science in surprising ways. Pope Pius XII’s eagerness to accept the Big Bang theory is a good example of this.

The desire to integrate science with our understanding of creation as it relates to Scripture and Church teaching has been addressed by Where Peter Is contributors before. Rather than reinvent the wheel, I refer you to these past articles for a better understanding of the intersection of faith and science in general (see Fr. Alex Roche’s 2022 article, Pete Vere’s 2018 article, Pedro Gabriel’s 2023 article). The importance of developing a solid comprehension of the Catholic approach to science cannot be overstated, particularly as it relates to specific fields of science like psychology; I encourage you to build your own understanding of how faith and science intersect. This is especially important in an age when the acceptance of reality is often questioned and even ideas that are supported with irrefutable evidence are revised to suit political agendas.

Nonetheless, the field of psychology poses several unique issues for the Church which makes the integration of psychology and faith particularly challenging. It is to these issues that I now turn.

“Soft” v “real” science

Even within the secular world, psychology is often pejoratively considered to be a “soft science.” In some ways this is a fair analysis. Most – though not all – psychologists spend their lives engaged in research that takes place far from a lab bench or imaging machine that could provide the kind of hard data that we have come to associate with “real science.”

In reality, however, the same is true for all applied sciences. For example, consider the field of medicine, which is rarely – if ever – derided as a “soft science.” Yet most practicing physicians who engage in research do so clinically, using largely the same methods and approaches that psychologists use to test treatments in real time: hypothesis testing, data collection, statistical analysis, and peer review of findings. While medical science as a whole is backed by armies of lab researchers, clinical research in medicine is based on the same scientific principles that govern psychological research.

The scientific method that directs both medical and psychological research ensures that, while some theories can be challenging to accept, they are continuously tested and revised in precise ways. This means that erroneous assumptions are challenged and knowledge builds on and modifies itself over time. This means that our understanding of the truth – as much as we can comprehend it at any particular point in time – is ultimately the goal of psychological research.

Me-search

There is a temptation for armchair psychologists to engage in what my professors once called “me-search.” That is, to say that while most of us will rarely, if ever, handle raw elements like mercury or viral assays outside of our high school science labs, we are all intimately familiar with human emotions and behaviors. This personal knowledge makes it tempting to consider ourselves “experts” on the human condition and to generalize our individual experiences to the world around us. Because psychology is the science of human emotions and behaviors, we are often driven to weigh-in on questions that are raised within the field but, due to our limited subject pool, our lack of experimental controls, and our tendency to conflate correlation and causation, our “me-search” frequently misrepresents those around us and leads us to erroneous and highly biased conclusions – the very things that good research is designed to avoid.

In contrast, a well-designed psychological study attempts to control selection bias within the subject pool, eliminate confounding factors that might influence results, and ensure that the number of subjects is appropriate to draw the conclusions that are being evaluated. Once such a conclusion is reached, the findings are checked by other researchers at conferences and through publications. Unlike the article that you are presently reading, which will be edited only for spelling and grammatical errors, psychological research papers are checked by experts in the field before they reach publication and are then continuously reevaluated based on knowledge gained in future studies.

While these precautions are not failproof and mistakes do happen, they give scientific (and psychological) research a level of authority which, when placed within the larger body of research, draws us closer and closer to an accurate approximation of how things really work in our world. The same is not true of “me-search.” For this reason, we should be skeptical of anyone who makes pronouncements about psychology but lacks training in the field and in the conducting and interpretation of psychological research.

Regardless of any religious knowledge, charisma or fan base they may have, a person who does not have professional training is unqualified to teach anything about the field of psychology that strays from official and current understandings within the field. They are similarly unqualified to weigh in on areas of dispute within the field in any sort of authoritative manner unless of course they qualify their opinions and identify their true area of expertise as well as the limits of their knowledge. Sadly, people with influence frequently fail to recognize their limitations in this area.

A checkered history

Another issue that often plagues the Church’s relationship with psychology lies in the history of the field. While it is in some ways a comparatively new scientific field, psychologists have had ample opportunities to suggest outrageous theories and to violate ethical principles with their research. Most undergraduates are familiar with the nightmare of the Stanford Prison Experiment and the horrors of the Milgram authority experiment that tried to make sense of the atrocities of the Holocaust. My own undergraduate research addressed some of the ethical issues raised by Asch’s conformity studies.

These and other similarly notorious experiments have tarnished the name of psychology. However, they have also led to drastic changes in oversight which make it very difficult for ethically questionable studies to occur today. In fact, many proposed studies never see the light of day due to onerous requirements for documentation and approval by ethical review boards and other such committees. This kind of scrutiny is particularly intense for any research involving children or animals, given the limits of consent that such research studies face and their vulnerable participant populations.

Atheistic theories

In addition to these broader ethical issues, many Christians are rightfully skeptical about theories of humanity that have been developed by atheists and  centered their understanding of humanity on issues like sexuality which, while important, play only a secondary role in Christian understanding of human motivation and behavior. Nonetheless, skepticism need not mean rejection and Christians can question and criticize aspects of psychological theory and even practice while valuing the contributions that the field has made.

There is no need to throw out the baby with the bathwater. Indeed, the contributions of psychology are numerous, ranging from drastic improvements in the care of the mentally ill to a better understanding of emotions and development that facilitates healing and human thriving.

Conflicting priorities

Lastly, because of the intersection and interaction between our physical, mental and spiritual health, it is all too easy for one area to be prioritized above the others. This will be discussed in greater depth in future articles but consider, for instance, the slogan “Faith Over Fear” that gained such popularity during the pandemic. At times, this phrase was weaponized and used to suggest that other believers could not have sufficient faith if they were fearful of the real physical threat that was circulating among us. This likely led to one of two disordered responses to a virus that has killed over seven million people at the time of this writing: either reckless abandon in the face of an actual threat, or shame for a natural response of apprehension and alertness that God built into our psyche for our own protection.

On the other hand, anxiety that persisted once prudent measures to avoid the spread of the virus had been taken could be indicative of a need to trust more fully in the goodness and sovereignty of God. Those of us who found ourselves lying awake at night worrying about the virus likely wrestled with the spiritual implications of our fear, and we were right to do so. For some of us, renewing our faith in God’s goodness was enough. For others, particularly those of us who struggled with anxiety disorders before the pandemic, interventions were probably necessary to help us get to a place where we could truly lean into our faith. In short, during the pandemic, a delicate balance of faith and fear was appropriate and necessary given the situation – the one tempering, motivating, and shaping the other. This recent, extreme example serves to highlight the intersection of all three aspects of ourselves: our minds, our spirit and our body. However, for those of us whose faith is central to our lives, we experience this intersection daily in countless, less dramatic situations.

Conclusion

As we embark on a new year which promises to cause emotional upheaval for many of us, I hope you will join me on my exploration of specific aspects of mental health and their relationships to our faith. The mental health crisis does not spare those within the church, and too often false teachers have taken advantage of the crisis to exploit the vulnerable in service to their own personal goals. This reality makes this exploration not only prudent but necessary for anyone who recognizes both the realities of our lives and the centrality of our faith.

Featured on Where Peter Is on December 18, 2024

Last week, the American Jewish Committee (AJC) and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) released Translate Hate: The Catholic Edition, a document that seeks to promote awareness of antisemitism and to equip Catholics to address it effectively within their communities. The sixty-three-page edition contains explanations of antisemitic caricatures, symbols, ideas, and language. In addition, it offers relevant commentary by the Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. This commentary identifies the ways in which the Church contributed to antisemitism historically and highlights how, despite these past contributions, this particular form of prejudice is in direct conflict with established Church teaching and with the very roots of our Christian faith.

In his opening letter, Bishop Joseph C. Bambera of Scranton writes:

The committee encourages all Catholics – especially those who preach or instruct others – to take the message of the Second Vatican Council’s document, Nostra Aetate, to heart: the Jewish people remain beloved of God and share with us a common spiritual heritage.

Throughout the letter, Bishop Bambera emphasizes this heritage and highlights multiple papal admonitions against antisemitism, particularly those that followed Vatican II. To highlight the importance of the issue, he quotes Pope Francis’s 2013 Address to Members of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations:

A true Christian cannot be antisemitic.

The release of the document is timely, given the increase of antisemitism within the United States. According to the Catholic News Agency’s reporting on the document’s release, the increase in hostility towards our Jewish brothers and sisters has “skyrocketed” since the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel. While much of this increase has occurred during the Israel-Hamas war, the document makes a clear distinction between antisemitism and appropriate criticism of specific government actions, particularly given the Church’s stance that the development of two independent states – Israel and Palestine – is the best solution to the conflict.

The Catholic Standard quoted Rabbi Noam Marans, who collaborated with Bishop Bambera on the release of the document. He addressed the present need for the document, saying:

We’re dealing with a three-headed monster with antisemitism…the skyrocketing toxicity of hate in the U.S. and in the world…distance from the reality and the lessons of the Shoah…and social media.

Translate Hate: The Catholic Edition concludes with a call for the faithful to assist in identifying and reporting antisemitism, defending those being targeted, and educating others on the dangers that such hatred poses. To this end, it provides a list of resources, including documents that address Jewish-Catholic relations, relevant Catholic social teaching, an in-depth definition of antisemitism, and contact information of agencies that will take reports of antisemitism.

Featured on Where Peter Is on November 21, 2024

Yesterday, Pope Francis announced that dates have been set for the canonizations of Blessed Carlo Acutis and Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati. Soon to become the first millennial saint, the canonization of Carlo Acutis will take place on April 27^th and will coincide with the Jubilee for Adolescents in Rome (April 25-27^th). Pier Giorgio Frassati is expected to be canonized during the Jubilee for Young People (July 28^th – August 3^rd). Pope Francis made the announcement during an audience on the International Day for the Rights of Children and Adolescents. He also announced a summit on the rights of children which will take place on February 3^rd of 2025. The summit will focus on children facing abuse, exploitation, and war.

News of the saints’ canonization is likely to generate excitement among the youth of the Church who see these saints as people they can relate to. Carlo Acutis is perhaps the best known of the two new saints. In 2021, he was patron of the first year of Eucharistic Revival approved by the USCCB. The role was appropriate for the young saint who dedicated much of his short life to spreading love and devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. One of the ways he did this was via a website focused on Eucharistic Miracles. The website he created to share these miracles is still accessible, providing a tangible link to the t-shirt wearing, Pokémon playing saint who died from leukemia in 2006 at the age of fifteen. At his death, he completed his goal:

To always be united with Christ: This is my life’s program.

Pier Giorgio Frassati, who Saint John-Paul II called, the “Man of the Beatitudes” was an avid sportsman. A photograph of the saint shows him standing on top of a mountain peak carrying an ice axe and displaying the confidence of a man who frequently enjoyed mountaineering. As a young man, Frassati participated in multiple Catholic organizations and spent much of his time and resources caring for the poor. In particular, he joined the St. Vincent de Paul Society after becoming motivated to care for soldiers returning from WWI. He loved athletics, art, music and leading his friends toward Christ. Frassati was openly and actively anti-Fascist and anti-Communist, seeing his political activism as a means of living out his faith and heeding the cry of the poor. Like Acutis, Frassati died young when, at the age of twenty-four, he died of polio which he likely contracted while caring for the poor in his hometown of Turin, Italy.

Featured on Where Peter Is on October 24, 2024

This morning, the Vatican released Pope Francis’s fourth encyclical, Dilexit nos (He Loved Us). The document was presented at the Vatican Press Office by Monsignor Bruno Forte, Archbishop of Chieti-Vasto and Sister Antonella Fraccaro, General Superior of the Disciples of the Gospel. The release date for the document was previously announced earlier this week.

The document comes four years after Pope Francis released Fratelli tutti and focuses on the Sacred Heart of Jesus and its transformative power in our lives.

Because of Jesus, “we have come to know and believe in the love that God has for us” (1 Jn 4:16).

As an encyclical, Dilexit nos is a pastoral letter from Pope Francis that is meant to guide and direct the Church. It contains authoritative teachings and it is hoped that all Catholics will welcome it with reverence and an openness to applying its teachings to their own lives and circumstances. In addition, it is a way for Pope Francis to offer his own judgment on concrete issues based upon the teachings of the Church. As Catholics, we are called to respect those judgements and to wrestle with them as part of our own individual formation of conscience, recognizing that they were given to us by the successor of St. Peter. At a time when our world is full of turmoil and often seems to roil with hatred, this document is certainly much needed and greatly anticipated by many within the Church.

In the deepest fibre of our being, we were made to love and to be loved.

You can access the official English translation of Dilexit nos here.

Featured on Where Peter Is on October 22, 2024

The Vatican announced on Monday that Pope Francis will release his fourth encyclical, Dilexit nos, on Thursday, October 24th. The document’s title is translated as “He loved us” and reflects its focus on the Sacred Heart of Jesus, a devotion which Pope Francis holds particularly dear due to its emphasis on mercy. The new encyclical will be presented at the Vatican Press Offices by Monsignor Bruno Forte and Sr. Antonella Fraccaro. Its release coincides with the 350th anniversary of the apparitions that led to devotions and reparations to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Pope Francis previously announced that he would be releasing an encyclical on the Sacred Heart of Jesus in June of this past year, the month that is traditionally associated with the Sacred Heart. At that time, the Holy Father expressed his hope that his writing would help a world that has “lost its heart” to be moved and guided by his reflections on Christ’s love. Pope Francis also spoke about the importance of reparations to the Sacred Heart of Jesus during a conference in May of this year, when he said,

Reparation is fully manifested in the sacrifice of the cross. The novelty here is that it reveals the Lord’s mercy toward the sinner.

During that talk, he addressed the role that reparations to the Sacred Heart of Jesus have in healing wounds from abuse within the Church. Many of the points made during the Pope’s talk, paralleled those made by Sr. Theresa Marie Nguyen, O.P., who wrote a reflection on the ways in which the Sacred Heart of Jesus can help us to love one another more fully. For example, during the conference, Pope Francis stated,

Reparation therefore contributes to people’s reconciliation between themselves, but also to reconciliation with God, because the wrong done to our neighbors is also an offense to God.

The Church has recognized devotions to the Sacred Heart of Jesus for centuries, dating back to apparitions that appeared to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque in 1673. During these apparitions, Jesus revealed His heart, which was crowned with thorns and surrounded by flames. He charged the young Saint to share His love, especially the love He bears for sinners. Pope Pius XII, wrote his own encyclical on the devotion, Haurietis aquas, stating that it was a “banner of salvation,” that heralds Christ’s saving grace in today’s world. Pope Benedict XVI also wrote about the devotion, issuing a letter in 2006.

Featured on Where Peter Is throughout October 2024

The second and final session of the Assembly for the Synod on Synodality began meeting last Wednesday, October 2 in the Paul VI Hall at the Vatican. The current 3-year process has been described by CNN’s Vatican correspondent Christopher Lamb as the “largest listening and consulting effort ever to be undertaken in history.” This year’s session will differ from the previous meeting because many of the more specific and highly charged issues discussed in last year’s assembly (such as polygamous families and women in the diaconate) were handed over to study groups to address. That means the focus of the current session will be synodality in the Church.

While the formal title of the initiative, For a Synodal Church: Communion, Participation, and Mission, is a bit intimidating, the actual purpose of the synod is not. According to Kim Daniels, a member of the Vatican Dicastery for Communication, the Synod on Synodality (and synodality more broadly) is “a gathering of the faithful with their pastors in order to listen to what the Holy Spirit is saying to our Church.” A Church that practices synodality, then, is one that prayerfully listens to its members and to the Holy Spirit as it seeks discernment for future action. Participants in the Second Session this month will focus on how to move forward as a Church that listens to all its members and is oriented toward effective evangelization in today’s world rather than the self-preservation of Church structures.

As reported in the Catholic News Service’s overview of this month’s assembly, the participants will be working from the Instrumentum Laboris (working document) with the ultimate goal of enhancing “the unique contribution of each baptized person and of each church in the one mission of proclaiming the Risen Lord and his Gospel in the world today.” To do this, they will work to develop recommendations on how to:

1. Help members of the Church to listen to one another and the Holy Spirit
2. Encourage the baptized to work towards fulfilling the mission of the Church
3. Reach out to those who remain outside of or alienated by the Church
4. Increase accountability for Church leadership
5. Ensure that local church councils are representative of their parishioners and that their recommendations are heard
6. Allow women to participate more fully in the mission of the Church

While the scope of this global undertaking is vast and messy, its purpose is to ensure that the Church, while remaining rooted in Tradition, is responsive to the current situations and needs of the world we live in.

The following links offer information about the daily happenings of the Second Session:

General Links:

• The Synod’s official website in English.
• Link to Second Session page.
• Link to the latest updates posted on the Vatican website.
• Vatican News coverage (in English) of the Second Session.

Vatican News Transcripts of Father (and soon-to-be-Cardinal) Timothy Radcliffe’s retreat meditations:

• Meditation 1: ‘Resurrection: Searching in the Dark’ – Text / Video
• Meditation 2: ‘The Locked Room’ – Text / Video
• Meditation 3: ‘Resurrection Fishing’ – Text / Video
• Meditation 4: ‘Resurrection & Breakfast Conversation’ – Text / Video

Link to coverage of the Opening Mass on October 1^.

Links to the full text of the Opening Addresses on October 1:

•                Cardinal Grech
•                Cardinal Hollerich
•                Cardinal Aguiar Retes

Link to Pope Francis’ Angelus and Rosary for peace at St. Mary Major on Sunday, October 6th.

Links to the daily press briefings on the synodal proceedings:

October 3^rd (Day Two) – Emphasis was on the importance of forgiveness and mercy, “spirituality and prayer,” “paths to peace,” and the idea that the Session’s study groups are “laboratories of Synodal life” and collaborative spaces to “foster harmony without creating uniformity.”  The issue of accepting women into the diaconate was raised and it was determined that more exploration was needed (see Pedro Gabriel’s article from October 5^th).

October 4^th (Day Three) – Participants addressed the need to listen to the excluded and to be a “family of those who have no family,” as well as the idea that all the baptized share equal “dignity and co-responsibility” for the mission of the Church. They also focused on the interaction between local cultures and the Church, the rejection of the corporate model within the structure of the Church, and digital evangelization. Additionally, problems with the way that Fiducia supplicans was developed and released were discussed.

October 5^th (Day Four) – The General Assembly issued a call for all people to work as agents of peace and condemned the arms trade. They addressed specific needs throughout the world including oppression and violence in the Middle East, desperation in Haiti, migration challenges in the Philippines, the shifting away from a Western Church to one that is more heavily influenced by the Global South, the needs of the global poor, the marginalization of women and LGBTQ+ people within the Church, and the importance of combatting clericalism.

October 7^th (Day Five) – The fifth day of the session began today with prayer for those suffering in the Middle East and with a reminder that Pope Francis declared the day to be one of prayer and fasting for peace. In keeping with this focus, a fundraiser to support the only Catholic Church in Gaza was announced. Archbishop Gintaras Grušas tied the day of prayer to the larger theme of synodality by recognizing it as an opportunity to participate in solidarity with those who are suffering. During the daily press briefing, plans for the assembly this week were discussed. Additionally, presenters emphasized the importance of collaboration and dialogue with other Churches and faiths, how to build Christ’s Kingdom while valuing differences, the necessity of truly listening to one another, and the ways in which the Church can move forward as a synodal body, particularly in vulnerable areas of the globe (specifically Syria, Lebanon, Russia, Ukraine, Myanmar, Vietnam and Indonesia).

October 8th (Day 6) – When speaking of the work the assembly has done so far, the Archbishop of Abidjan said, “…we are not materially changing the Church, but we are in a process that will lead to modifying the way of living the Church in the near future.” During the daily press release, it was announced that the assembly raised 62,000 Euros which were given to the Catholic parish of the Holy Family in Gaza to support victims of the war. Additionally, three of the 21 new Cardinals announced by Pope Francis over the weekend were present at this briefing. These newly elected Cardinals – from the Ivory Coast, Japan and Brazil – each responded to questions.  According to the briefing, the assembly addressed the importance of Christian Initiation in a secular world, the necessity of healing wounds caused by scandals within the Church, the need for trust in order for any synodal process to be effective, the importance of the Church nurturing charity and mission , ongoing concerns about the role of women in the Church, the recognition of forgiveness as an aspect of Christ’s love, the role of community in the Church, the importance of baptism, and the need for the Church to accompany the newly baptized. Additionally, some members called for the Synod’s working document to be more comprehensive and to be written in language that is easy to understand.

October 9th (Day 7):  In the synod session today, the following issues were addressed: the need for better Christian Initiation for young people, greater cooperation between the laity and their priests and bishops, the participation of women as both listeners within the church and ambassador for peace in global conflicts, empowering young people to direct youth and digital ministries, accompaniment of victims of abuse, allowing the poor to become leaders of ministry rather than merely the recipients of it, alleviating the burdens of loneliness and heavy workloads for priests, and the importance of producing a Final Document that inspires action. Additionally, participants in the daily press conference described the role of deacons as bridges who bring the Church to families and the marginalized and then create pathways for them to return to the Church. They also acknowledged deacons’ roles in assisting parish priests with overwhelming administrative work. Participants emphasized the importance of synodal discernment for anyone who has responsibility within the Church, including the laity, and petitioned for assistance for the Church in Mozambique which continues to struggle in the aftermath of war.

October 10th (Day 8) – On the eight day of the synod, the focus was on Christian unity. The participants spent the morning working within their smaller groups and planned to use the afternoon to focus on Part II of Instrumentum Laboris, Pathways. During the daily briefing, participants discussed: the ties between ecumenism and synodality, the “exchange of gifts” between Churches, the experiences of non-Catholic, ecumenical participants in the synod (specifically representatives of the Orthodox, Anglican and Mennonite Churches), the challenges and promises of the ecumenical process, and the journey of seeking commonality in the hope of greater unity in the future.

October 11th (Day 9) – Today was the 62nd anniversary of the Second Vatican Council which has been credited with the birth of a “new ecumenical era” in the Church. In light of this, an ecumenical vigil was held in the evening. Earlier in the day, synod participants focused on the theme of caring for relationships within the Church and the world in general. They addressed the need for trust, transparency and accountability within the Church. Participants also highlighted the importance of listening carefully to suffering and seeking complex solutions for complex problems, rather than finding simplistic answers. Other topics of discussion included the importance of prayer in listening, openness to differences, ensuring that all are represented and that specialists are able to share their wisdom in the discernment process,  the importance of the methods and culture being developed through the synod, and the challenges facing participants as they continue to learn how to take what they hear as they listen and integrate it into their decision making. Finally, plans were made for the next several days of the synod.

October 14th (Day 10) – Over the weekend, the synod participants continued to focus on the second module of Instrumentum laboris. Particular attention was paid to decision making within the Church, Catholic schools and their roles in faith formation, accountability and abuse within the Church, resisting clericalism, the role of women and the laity in the mission of the Church, and how to learn from Churches that are already using a synodal approach. On Monday morning, participants discussed the need for transparency in the Church, methods of synodality, and the type of culture that should exist in a synodal Church. During the afternoon, working groups spent time drafting their reports. At the daily press conference, Sr. Gloria Liliana Franco Echeverri, ODN spoke on the importance of undertaking synodality and discernment with “the style of Jesus.” Bishop Edouard Sinayobye of Cyangugu, Rwanda, discussed the importance of the Holy Spirit in the synodal process and how this process is an opportunity to build unity within the Church. Then Archbishop Zbigneus Stankevics of Riga, Latvia, shared his desire for the synodal process to “involve every baptized person in the Church” as they work to “expand the Kingsom of God throughout the world.” He said that a goal of the synod was “freeing the charisms of every baptized person” in part by decentralizing and sharing responsibility within the Church. He cautioned that this should not be done in a democratic or secular way, but instead through spiritual communion. This, he said, would lead to the realization of the “final goal of the synod” which he declared to be mission and a missionary church. He encouraged participants to learn from the good fruits of the Church’s work throughout the world. On Tuesday, participants will transition to focusing on the third module of Instrumentum laboris, which is “Places.”

October 15th (Day 11) – Today’s session began with a remembrance of Jose Carlos de Sousa, a homeless Brazilian poet who resided under the colonnade in St. Peter’s Square. His funeral was held later in the day within the Vatican. Participants in the Synod shifted their attention today to the role of “places” in the Church. The morning’s prayer and meditation were led by Sr. Maria Ignazia Angelini and Cardinal Hollerich. They spoke about the ways in which human interactions allow the Gospel to be incarnate in our world. Additionally, they spoke of the dynamic and responsive nature of mission, the role that place and culture have played in the history of the Church, and the ways in which different places and cultures interact. During the daily press conference, Sr. Nirmala Alex Maria Nazareth, Superior General of the Sisters of the Apostolic Carmel shared her hope for the future that has been kindled by the synod. Cardinal Steiner, Archbishop of Manaus, Brazil, discussed the practical nature of synodality, the vital role that women have played in remote areas where they have had to carry out the roles that deacons ordinarily play, the issue of celibacy in the priesthood, and the climate crisis that is currently facing Brazil as it suffers from profound drought. Finally, Cardinal-elect Roberto Repole, Archbishop of Turin, spoke of the ways in which the Synod is a reflection of our universal Church and the discussions that have been taking place about the role of people with disabilities within the Church. The day ended with a showing of the film lo Capitano. The showing was arranged by the Dicastery for Culture and Education.

October 16th (Day 12) – Continuing with the theme of “places,” Paul VI Hall said today that the Church needs to be in “the digital world,” noting that “there is a need to be creative and to imagine, to expand the places of our Church into other realms.” Participants discussed how part of this imaginative vision involves discerning how to structure a united Church in the face of “contemporary challenges” like rapid change, migration, and technology. Decentralization of Church responsibility is one aspect of this vision. Additionally, Fr. Rush emphasized the critical role of theologians in helping “the Church to continue its living traditions. Fr. Prisco spoke about the importance of theologians and cannon lawyers working together to develop new responses to the new situations that confront the Church today. He also shared the importance of consensus in discernment, stating that if there is no consensus on an issue, then more discussion is needed. As a result, he cautioned that some issues, such as women’s ministry, will remain unresolved at the end of the synod as discussions on these topics continue. In the evening, a theological-pastoral forum was held to address the role of local churches within the universal Church.

October 17th (Day 13) – During the morning session of the Synod, participants discussed the Church’s relationship with migrants, renewing parish life, incorporating people with disabilities and creating a council for them, and structuring the connections between Rome and local churches. To this end, they suggested consulting local churches during the creation of Vatican documents and increasing the frequency of visits made by Vatican Dicastries. During the daily briefing, Sr. Samuela Maria Rigon, Superior General of the Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother shared that roughly one quarter of synod participants are laity, young people and members of religious orders. Cardinal Charles Bo, Archbishop of Yangon, Myanmar, and President of the Federation of Asian Bishops Conferences (FABC) discussed the synods process in Asia and shared that the FABC is pleased with the progress in “the Church’s commitment to listening to everyone.” Then Cardinal Gerald Cyprien Lacroix of Quebec, Canada, cautioned that the church needs to listen and adjust practices in mission, media and spiritual growth. Finally, Prefect Ruffini said that the Church has been discussing allocating greater authority to local churches for a some time. However, this discussion has accelerated since Vatican II.

October 18th (Day 14) – Today the primary focus of the assembly was on the decentralization of Church power and responsibility. This conversation involved the value of diverse churches, the idea that people who follow different rites live within the same geographic areas and territories, and the need to develop criteria to decentralize in a “healthy” way. This will involve “fidelity to the magisterium, ecclesial communion with the successor of Peter, respect for local Churches, subsidiarity and synodality.” Other issues discussed included the overwhelming administrative tasks facing parishes which “stifle missionary enthusiasm,” ways in which Church leaders can walk with the laity and the suffering, the importance of the incarnation of the Gospel throughout the world, specific strengths and needs of the Church in various geographic areas (the Mediterranean, Latin America, and South Sudan), and the danger of polarization. Bishop Luis Marin de San Martin reflected on the many challenges the world faces, saying that the Synod creates hope that the Church is “capable of addressing today’s issues.” To do so, the Church must be Christ-centered, inclusive, responsive, and embrace the brotherhood of humanity.

In the evening, a Q&A session between students and the leaders of the Synod was held. In their responses to the students, the leaders highlighted the importance of listening to others, resisting polarization, finding commonalities, and recognizing religion as a path to brotherhood as different faiths work together to solve global problems. In addition, the participants reassured students that synodality is not a threat to tradition and truth. Bishop Flores said, “The Church has been messy for 200 years, but the Spirit keeps it together…I do not worry that the faith of the Church will be compromised if we listen to each other.” The Synod leaders expressed their hope that the students would bring the synodality home with them and asked them to rembember that, “The beauty is we are not by ourselves. Pope Francis does not want to do his mission by himself; he called the whole Church to do it with him.”

On Sunday night, October 20th, the digital synod initiative concluded with an online prayer vigil for digital missionaries.

Monday morning, October 21st, Fr. Timothy Radcliffe, O.P. offered a meditation in preparation for this week’s work of drafting the Synod’s Final Document. Father Radcliffe reminded participants of the freedom which undergirds their work: the freedom to share their beliefs openly and the freedom that comes from knowing that God is not threatened by any mistakes that they might make, but will “work all for the good of those who love God.” He reassured listeners, “we need not be afraid of disagreement, for the Holy Spirit is at work in it…and even if you are disappointed by the results of the Synod, God’s providence is at work in this assembly, bringing us to the Kingdom in ways that God alone knows. His will for our good cannot be frustrated.”

October 21st (Day 15): The fifteenth day of the Synod session began with a Mass that was celebrated in St. Peter’s Basilica. The homily was given by Cardinal Grech. Participants were later given copies of the draft of the Final Document which was presented by Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich. He emphasized that the text of the document is provisional and that it is currently confidential. This confidentiality is necessary so that discussions can continue freely as the assembly works on the document. The document is understood to be based on both discussions from the current session of the Synod and those that occurred during previous sessions in the past years. The morning session ended with prayer for Fr. Marcelo Perez, who was murdered on Sunday in Chiapas, Mexico. In the afternoon, participants met in their small groups to discuss their initial responses to the document. During the daily briefing, Cardinal Zuppi stated that dialogue is “foundational to the Church itself” and Bishop Manuel Nin Guell, Apostolic Exarch for Byzantine Rite Catholics in Greece, explained that the Synod has raised awareness of Eastern Catholic Churches within the Assembly.

October 22nd (Day 16): Today, the assembly focused on discerning changes to the final document which, while written in Italian, has been unofficially translated into multiple languages. Participants and groups made proposals for modifications that were then voted on. Those proposals that received an absolute majority of votes were accepted. So far, the topics addressed have included youth, women, the laity, those in consecrated life, Bishops’ conferences, priests, and a rejection of war. Poor Francis attended the meeting of the General Congregation. Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Beskngu offered the reminder that the Synod was not focused on addressing a particular problem, but rather on “imagining a new way of being Church” which can then be applied to the specific challenges we face. During the daily briefing, Archbishop Andrew Nkea Fuanya of Cameroon spoke about the contributions that African Catholics have made to the Synod. He noted that the current focus in Africa is on keeping Churches full. Franz-Josef Overbeck, Bishop of Essen in Germany then spoke about the challenges he sees in a country that is largely not religious. He expressed the need for a “new evangelization” within post-secular nations. Finally, Fr. Clarence Sandanaraj Davedassan from Malaysia shared that the minority status of Catholics in Asia makes dialogue “a matter of survival…within a pluralist culture.” He noted that a particular challenge is learning how to evangelize in places where speaking publicly about faith is illegal.

October 23rd (Day 17): As of today, more than 1,000 modifications to the Final Document have been proposed. Nine hundred of these changes were recommended by small working groups and roughly one hundred by individuals participating in the Synod. The assembly will vote on the Final Document at the end of the session on Saturday of this week. During the day, members voted for new members of the Ordinary Council. The new council members will begin their work after the conclusion of the current session and will help to implement the synodal process going forward and prepare for the next Synod. During the daily briefing, speakers discussed the bishops’ role as pastors and the need to serve local parishes, the importance of bishops welcoming the marginalized to participate in the Church, relationships and building bridges, accountability and transparency within the Church, and hope for an end to the war in the Holy Land. Additionally, the role of Bishops’ Conferences was clarified as one in which Bishops concretely apply the teachings of the Church to the specific needs and circumstances of a particular group of people, not to make or propose new dogmas.

October 25th – There was no news briefing today, however, the Vatican released the audio of a meeting regarding women in ministry that occurred yesterday afternoon. The contents of the audio suggests that the goal of the Church is to enrich the role of women in ministry and to explore options for expanding the role of women within the Church. To do this, the Church must consider various cultures and opinions. Additionally, it must examine women who are already engaged in ministry and leadership roles, particularly in places like the Amazon, Africa and Asia. Moving forward, one avenue that the Church is considering involves allocating more powerful roles to women without clericalizing these roles. Additionally, the possibility of woman deacons will continue to be explored. In the meantime, the Church can begin to move forward by taking concrete steps to empower women within the Church.

October 26^th and 27^th (Final Days of the Synodal Assembly): On Saturday, October 26^th, the Assembly adopted the Final Document. It is composed of five parts:

1. 1. An exploration and explanation of the synodal process as well as its necessity
   2. The importance of relationships at all levels of Church and the need to renew them and subject them to the teachings of the Gospel
   3. The importance of trust and discernment in the decision making processes that exist within the Church – this involves accountability
   4. The shared journey of the diverse and changing people of the Church who are bonded together through relationship and communion
   5. The importance of spiritual formation within the Church, specifically the shared responsibility for this formation among all Church members, making the Church a safe place for all people, and sharing Church social doctrine more widely

The document concludes with a prayer entrusting its implementation to the Virgin Mary. In its article describing the document, the Vatican described it as a step towards the implementation of the Second Vatican Council. It shared the Assembly’s vision of the Church having the sole purpose of making an encounter with Jesus possible. Everything else (Church structures, bureaucracies, world standing, etc.) are valuable only for the ways that they advance this purpose. The Vatican also made it clear that the document embraces a Church community in which all are welcome and there is space for everyone within “a community of forgiven sinners who experience God’s love and want to communicate it to everyone.”

In his final address to the Assembly, Pope Francis described the document as a gift to the Church that has a “threefold” nature: guidance, a symbol of unity, and a shared mission. He emphasized the need to listen to one another and the role of the Church as a people who open doors, rather than erecting walls. He called the church to be a witness to peace through listening and reconciliation and noted that the Holy Spirit is the force that drives unity within the Church.

At the Vatican Press Conference that followed the release of the document, Synod leaders said that the document requires of a shift in our understanding of the Universal Church from a “multinational corporation” to a “communion of Churches.” They acknowledged that the document calls for greater roles for women and the laity but cautioned that the idea of a female diaconate remains under consideration. The leaders clarified that the document is part of the magisterium and, therefore, serves as guidelines for the Church moving forward. They also explained that, while the Synod’s ten study groups are expected to finish their work by June of next year, there will be an additional time of discernment following the conclusion of their work.

The Synodal Assembly was finally concluded on Sunday, October 27^th with a Mass officiated by Pope Francis. Now that this aspect of the synodal process has concluded, the synod moves onto the implementation phase. At the present time, the Final Document is only available in Italian.

Featured on Where Peter Is on September 27, 2024

A Reflection on Today’s Readings

Recently, I was playing a form of Bible roulette. If you have not heard the term before, it is a reference to when someone points to a random verse in the Bible and tries to apply it to their life. Usually, the verse is applied literally since there is no other context to guide interpretation. I know that this approach is based on terrible theology at best and magical thinking at worst. I am also fully aware of the risks of taking Bible passages out of context. As a result, I am generally not one to engage in this sort of activity, but I was feeling anxious about an upcoming surgery and anxiety sometimes pushes us to do things we know we ought not to do.

In that anxious moment, I thought me in the lectionary verses that are assigned to the day of my procedure. So, anticipating the reassurance of a passage along the lines of Isaiah 41:10 (“Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand”) I eagerly flipped through the missal to September 27, 2024. Rather than promises of protection, I looked down upon the words of Ecclesiastes 3:1-2:

There is an appointed time for everything,
and a time for every thing under the heavens.
A time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to uproot the plant.

“Okay,” I thought, “let’s try the next reading instead.” Turning to Psalm 144:3-4, I read:

LORD, what is man, that you notice him;
the son of man, that you take thought of him?
Man is like a breath;
his days, like a passing shadow.

I could not help but chuckle to myself at this clear example of why Bible roulette does not work. If we read a verse with the intention of applying it to our lives without viewing it in the larger context of the Word and teachings of the Church, then we run the risk of getting ourselves into serious trouble.

In my case, if I honestly thought that this verse had direct implications for my surgery, I would have a difficult time going through with it even though I know that it is a routine and relatively low-risk procedure. After all, who would willingly lie down on an operating table if, when they asked the doctor how the procedure was expected to go, they got the reply, “There is an appointed time for everything… A time to scatter stones, and a time to gather them; a time to embrace, and a time to be far from embraces,” or, perhaps worse, “Human life, a mere puff of wind, days as fleeting as a shadow.” Certainly not me.

Yet, on the day this article is being published, I am in fact going into surgery and I do it with the comfort of the entire Gospel teaching, not just a verse that was cherry-picked from here or there.

That same comfort is woven through each of the passages that we read today, though we may have to strain a bit to see it. In the first reading (Eccl 3:1-11), we are reminded of the many seasons that compose our lives and of the fact that we are powerless to hold onto or extend any one of them. As challenging and even painful as this reality may be, at the end of the reading we are told that, while we do not always know what God is doing as our lives change, we do know that He is at work in that change.

We are also told in verses like Romans 8:28 (“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose”) that whatever work God is doing in our lives will be good. I take great comfort in this knowledge — particularly today since, because of my operation, my life will change. While I look forward to getting it over with and being able to heal, part of me grieves for the changes that will come. Still, God is working.

The Psalm for the day (Ps 144:1-2, 3-4) begins with imagery of war before progressing to reflect on the transience of human life. Our life on earth is a “mere puff of wind” and then we are gone. I love that visual of something that suddenly is, then is no more, leaving no trace of having been here except perhaps a few changes it made to the world while it existed. Yet, in the middle of the reading, we are asked to ponder how amazing it is that God – the eternal Creator of all – would care about us.

This is an outrageous belief, really, but it is also precisely the message that God gives us throughout His word. In fact, even at the beginning of this reading, we find that, during the chaos and tumult of war, God is a fortress, shelter, and shield amid the rapidly passing lives of His people. We see it in its fullest sense through the sacrifice of Christ on the cross and in our participation in this sacrifice at the Eucharist: God not only cares about us, He also gives Himself for and to us.

In the Gospel reading for today (Lk 9:18-22), we see St. Peter recognize Jesus as the Savior who God sent to deliver and protect His people. In this passage, St. Peter calls Jesus “the Christ” which means the anointed, holy one of God, the one whom God has chosen as the appointed ruler of all. Jesus must have been pleased with this answer since His disciples get His questions wrong on so many other occasions. But rather than praise St. Peter’s insight, Jesus throws him a curve ball.

He tells His followers that He, the Christ, will have to suffer and die. Surely, the disciples were perplexed by this. Why would the Chosen One have to go through such agony? Just as we cannot always see the way that God is working through the seasons of our own lives, the disciples must have struggled to understand what God was doing with the life of His Son. Yet, as a resurrection people who have the benefit of living on the other side of Christ’s three days in the grave, we know that He was indeed doing something powerful, something amazing, and something worth all the pain required to accomplish it.

So, taken in context, the readings today teach us that life is fleeting and changes are inevitable. Yet, throughout change, God’s goodness and His work in our lives remain constant. What great comfort that is on this and every day!

Featured on Where Peter Is on September 14, 2024

For the first time in almost a year, Pope Francis held a press conference aboard the papal airplane this past Friday. During the conference, he was asked to offer guidance to United States voters in the upcoming presidential election as they are “faced with a candidate who supports ending a pregnancy and another who wants to deport 11 million migrants.”

Pope Francis responded that both candidates “are against life: the one that throws out migrants and the one that kills children.” He added, “ I can’t decide; I’m not American and won’t go to vote there.”  went on to say, “One must vote. And one must choose the lesser evil. Which is the lesser evil? That lady or that gentleman? I don’t know; each person must think and decide according to their own conscience.” Here he reiterated Church teaching that, in a situation where both candidates hold views that are opposed to Catholic beliefs, each person must vote in accordance with his faithfully formed conscience.

He also emphasized the importance of voting and said, “In political morality, it is generally said that not voting is ugly, it’s not good.” (Courtney Mares’s article “Pope Francis: U.S. presidential election a choice between ‘the lesser evil’” offers a more detailed summary of the conference and highlights the other topics that Pope Francis addressed.)

While the Pope’s words are likely disappointing to supporters of both candidates who would have preferred a more direct endorsement, they follow the Church’s precedent of leaving the act of voting in the hands of the faithful. His words also align with the document of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) on voting, Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship, which highlights multiple issues that voters should consider when determining how to vote.  These include abortion, migration, the right to fair living wages, the right to join unions, euthanasia, racism, international relations, gun violence, climate change, protection of and support for the family, and limits of governmental power. Each of these issues falls under one of the interrelated categories of Human Dignity of the Person, The Common Good, Solidarity and Subsidiarity.

The document, which last underwent a major revision in 2015, also recognizes that voters “must consider not only candidates’ positions on these issues, but their character and integrity, as well.” This, too, is a very serious and often underappreciated consideration, which must be submitted to the prudence of an informed conscience.

In its new November 2023 introduction to the document, the USCCB suggests that the faithful should approach this election with the spirit of the Good Samaritan, who bound the wounds of his enemy thus forming social bonds and connections. The bishops admonish American Catholics to forego fear and hostility and to instead show mercy to one another while engaging in open and honest dialogue. They suggest that voters take time away from social media and news channels that tend to fuel anger and division. Instead, they ask voters to spend their time in prayer, service for others, adoration, reflection on the Bible and the study of Church teachings – all of which will help to strengthen and form conscience.

Fittingly, they close their introduction to the document with the following prayer:

“May God bless you as you consider and pray over these challenging decisions. May God bless our nation with true wisdom, peace, and mutual forgiveness, that we may decide together, through our democratic processes, to uphold the dignity of life and the common good.”

Featured on Where Peter Is on May 2, 2022

In the first part of this series, I shared my own story of miscarriage and infant loss, and how grieving those children brought me into contact with parents whose children died in very different circumstances. While the pro-whole-life movement addresses an array of issues, my experiences have taught me that there are specific things that we can and should be doing as a Church to address the needs of parents who are facing a terrifying diagnosis for their unborn child or pregnancy. 

We must be relational

We follow a relational Savior. While Jesus certainly gave sermons to large groups of people, many of the Gospel accounts involve very personal encounters with those around Him. The woman at the well and the story of Zaccheus (Luke 19:1-10) are perfect examples of this, but we also see it in the way that Jesus abided with His disciples and healed the sick who sought His help. Jesus was not someone who just made a declaration and moved on. Real, meaningful human interactions were important to Him. In fact, they were so important to Him that He touched an untouchable leper (Matthew 8:1-4) and took time out of a life-saving mission to speak to a chronically bleeding woman (Matthew 9:18-26). Even the Mass itself was born out of a dinner of fellowship (Luke 22:7-38). 

In the same way, the Church, as Christ’s representative on earth, must be a relational Church. We cannot just make pronouncements about what is right and wrong and expect people to follow us. Instead, we need to be able to identify with and understand those around us and engage with them in dialogue as we build relationships with them. As Pope Francis has said, “If there is one word that we should never tire of repeating, it is this: dialogue. We are called to promote a culture of dialogue by every possible means and thus rebuild the fabric of society.” 

In the case of abortion for medical reasons (abortions that are sought at the recommendation of a doctor due to severe prenatal diagnoses or grave risks to the lives of the mother or her baby), we can only foster these relationships by entering families’ profound grief and agony without judgment. Many parents grieve profoundly following abortion, even when apparently freely chosen, and this grief is often downplayed or dismissed. We must grieve with them for their children, just as Jesus wept with the crowd that gathered outside of Lazarus’s tomb. By connecting with families in this way, we not only witness to the dignity of their children’s lives, but we ourselves can become sensitive to the ways that our communication about abortion might trigger extremely painful emotions for others. We will also better understand the decisions parents face and be able to help them problem-solve for better solutions. We will be more able to gently identify and define any fundamental differences in the ways that we understand abortion so that everybody is able to “speak the same language” and true dialogue can occur. In short, we will become more empathic, which, rather than ceding ground, will make us more capable of love. Out of that love, meaningful relationships and dialogue become possible. 

Drawing near to families who face horrific diagnoses is essential if the Church is to have any moral authority. As Pope Francis said early in his papacy, “…the thing the Church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity.”

We must teach the whole truth

Our glorious and powerful Christian faith holds the answers to all our questions and is the balm for all of our wounds. But too often, we focus narrowly on the things that we “can” and “cannot” do and allow our faith to become something that is limiting rather than fulfilling and liberating. We lay a heavy legal burden on our neighbor’s shoulders when Jesus has said that His yoke is easy and light. Pope Francis recognizes this which is why he said in the same interview, “We have to find a new balance; otherwise even the moral edifice of the church is likely to fall like a house of cards, losing the freshness and fragrance of the Gospel. The Gospel must be more simple, profound, and radiant. It is from this proposition that the moral consequences flow.” When we focus on making arguments about how abortion is wrong, we lose sight of the wonder of God’s right and holy plan – a plan for all lives to glorify Him and to be made beautiful through His redemptive love. 

When families face grave medical diagnoses for their unborn children, our communications with them should be lovingly Christ-centered and rooted in the confidence that Jesus offers the only answer to the pain they face. When Noemi died, I told my childhood pastor, “If Jesus’ salvation and Resurrection aren’t real, then I don’t think I can handle this.” For parents who are facing their child’s disability or imminent death, the words of St. Peter are profoundly true, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” (John 6:68) The Gospel provides families with the strength to face what seems impossible. It offers them the reassurance that their child’s suffering is not in vain. It gives them the comfort of a God who walks with them through their grief and who guides them on the paths they should take. Perhaps most significantly, it provides them with the hope that whatever life their child has will be meaningful, precious, and unending.

When we share the Good News with families who are suffering, we are offering them so much! We are revealing an infinitely good God who works all things together for good – even the nightmare that they are currently living. Rather than imposing our belief that abortion is wrong, we are sharing the joy of our Lord who guides us to all that is good and who gives the strength to entrust even our most vulnerable children to Him. 

The Christian faith is the foundation of the idea that the life of each child is, in the words of Pope Francis, “a gift that changes the history of a family…and this child needs to be welcomed, loved and cared for.”  It is also the well from which suffering families can draw the strength they need to embrace that life in all of its forms. St. Zelie Martin was keenly aware of this. It was only because of her faith that she was able to write:

When I closed the eyes of my dear children and buried them, I felt the sorrow indeed, but it has always been resigned sorrow. I did not regret the pain and cares I had borne for them. Several people said to me, ‘It would have been better if you had never had them,’ but I could not endure this sort of language. I did not think that the sufferings and anxieties could be weighed in the same scale with the eternal happiness of my children. Then they were not lost forever; life is short and full of miseries, and we shall find them again up yonder.

When we share Christ, we direct grieving families to the same means of choosing life that enabled St. Zelie to discount her own suffering in light of the heavenly joys of her children. 

We must all go through the “dark night”

While we know that God has unimaginable blessings in store for families that choose to give birth to children with serious medical conditions, we cannot deny that these families pay a heavy price when they choose to protect that child’s life. There is a huge emotional and physical toll on all members of the family. This emotional cost is compounded when families lack the resources to provide their infants with appropriate medical care – whether that care takes the form of life-sustaining treatments or the ability to have a peaceful, painless death. 

Additionally, the financial cost of having a child with severe medical issues is high, even when the babies do not live for long. While many families receive support from their communities and charities, funeral costs alone can overwhelm many families’ finances. My family experienced this firsthand, when we discovered that we had exhausted all of our savings within a month of our daughter’s death, despite the immense generosity of our family and community during that time. 

For families whose children survive but live with life-impacting disabilities, these costs grow exponentially and they last for the duration of many children’s lives. This is also the case for families of mothers who choose to sacrifice their own lives for that of their unborn child. These mothers leave behind a mother-less family that feels her absence in every imaginable way. Deciding to give birth is not the endpoint for these families, but the starting line; we need to be prepared to run the rest of the race with them through ongoing emotional, practical, and financial support. 

While some of the difficulties that these families face are unavoidable, many can and should be alleviated. Doing so demands we recognize that pro-life ministry to these families does not end with a successfully avoided abortion. Pope Francis describes the role that we must play thus: “The ministers of the Gospel must be people who can warm the hearts of the people, who walk through the dark night with them, who know how to dialogue and to descend themselves into their people’s night, into the darkness, but without getting lost.” When families see that they will not be alone if they birth their infant, no matter the cost, they are freed to choose life for their child, rather than feeling driven by fear to abortion. When they know that their child will be welcomed and integrated into their community, they are better able to welcome their child themselves. And when gravely ill mothers know that their family will be enveloped in the care of their communities, it is easier for them to say goodbye. 

As a Church, we can be instrumental in supporting these families in systemic ways: by advocating for universal and comprehensive health insurance, a living minimum wage, flexible work hours, quality childcare options, better access to mental health care, and paid family leave. We can also support them by promoting perinatal hospice and palliative care, bereavement resources for all family members, and programs that offer respite breaks for families that are providing round-the-clock care. However, we can also do it in smaller, more personal ways like ensuring that all areas of our churches and Catholic schools are truly handicap-accessible, with adequate facilities (including family restrooms and other areas) to address the needs of people with disabilities at all ages. We can do it by welcoming the “joyful noises” of all children, but especially those with disabilities, in our Masses. We can even support these families by promoting environments that protect their children’s health through vaccination and other basic public health measures. Additionally, those of us who are privileged to know families with medically fragile and disabled children can be intentional about reaching out to and including those families in our activities and lives. 

The benefits of living in relationship with families whose children face medical challenges and disabilities are manifold. Most relevantly, many families within our parishes have never encountered the kinds of disabilities that families face when their infants are given grave prenatal diagnoses. When these same families find themselves faced with such a diagnosis, they have no model for how to parent such children and no way to envision how their child might fit into and bless their families and communities. The more we make our churches places where the disabled and medically fragile are embraced, the more all of our families will be able to witness God’s work through these individuals and their families. We will be better and stronger communities and we will help families who face similar diagnoses to imagine the good that could be, rather than being trapped by the fear of their child’s needs. At the same time, we will create a space for families to communicate more freely about complex and difficult topics like end-of-life care and caregiver burn-out.

We must dream

There are many things that we, as a Church, can do to walk alongside families that are struggling with terrifying medical diagnoses in their children. However, if we are going to do so in a way that changes lives and hearts, we are going to have to be dreamers. Our society is not set up to allow children with severe disabilities and their families to thrive. The endless pursuit of progress and growth, even in our own spiritual lives, is not conducive to integrating children whose progress is often hard to see. Our drive to succeed keeps us from valuing the beauty of those whose energy is directed more towards day-to-day survival. The fast pace of our lives keeps us from savoring those who journey more slowly. Our belief that our possessions are things to be earned and deserved, prevents us from recognizing the blessing of uplifting one another. 

We must change. We must reorient ourselves towards the value of whole lives. We must become a place where the first is really last and the last truly comes first. We need to foster a world where those who suffer are embraced and supported and where hope is kindled. We must build bridges between one another and foster true, deep, impactful relationships that lead us to action. In short, we can do what Pope Francis calls us to in his book, Let Us Dream: “We can reorganize the way we live together in order better to choose what matters. We can work together to achieve it. We can learn what takes us forward, and what sets us back. We can choose.” 

If we want to help families that are wrestling with a serious prenatal diagnosis, we must choose to dream about what can be and keep on dreaming. 

Featured on Where Peter Is on April 27, 2022

Content Warning: This article includes personal stories of miscarriage and infant loss as well as discussions of abortion which may be difficult for some readers. 

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I was a child the first time I heard the Christian band 2nd Chapter of Acts sing, “My God, they’re killing thousands. Killing thousands, without blinking an eye.” I still remember my horror when my mother explained what the lyrics referred to: that sometimes people kill babies before they are even born.

That was my introduction to abortion. As I grew, my lessons continued. Raised an evangelical Christian, I could have been the poster child for the pro-life movement. I helped gather items for baby showers at the pregnancy care center and I organized pro-life walks at my public high school. I engaged in lengthy debates with a close family member, whose nursing career had shown her the horrors of pre-Roe v. Wade botched abortions. In my spare time, I read books about abortion survivors and mothers who chose to fight for their sick infants’ lives at great cost to their own. My carefully crafted homeschool sexual education curriculum even involved a meeting with the director of our local pregnancy care center.

When, as a young adult I became Catholic, many would have assumed that I might become even more immersed in the pro-life movement. However, while the reality of abortion continued to upset me, I found myself becoming uneasy about some of the tactics that the pro-life community was using to fight the battle against it. At first, my concerns were theoretical. I reasoned that confronting a pregnant mother as she entered an abortion clinic was probably not terribly effective. Living in the city, I had plenty of opportunities to see how universally avoided and ignored any unsolicited “street preaching” was, and I began to suspect that protests at abortion clinics were met with similar responses. 

Later, my doubts became more personal. I began to see friends who had previously been open to Christianity turn away from it because of the often loveless presentation of pro-life arguments. I heard people who I care deeply about tell me that they could not believe in Christianity because of the hypocrisy they perceived in people who were pro-life. They were scandalized by Christians who professed to value an unborn baby but simultaneously devalued so many other lives (immigrant lives, Black lives, prisoners’ lives, and the lives of those living in poverty, for example). I watched as Catholics walked away from the Christian faith and I began to grieve as people I loved moved further and further from Christ, pushed away by zealous people who were so focused on the lives of the unborn that they had forgotten the precious souls of the born. 

While I was experiencing this growing unease about the pro-life movement’s methods, I lost one daughter at birth and another at 10 weeks gestation. Later, I found myself journeying alongside other bereaved parents, some of whom had made the heart-wrenching decision to terminate a medically compromised pregnancy that they had eagerly anticipated because they wanted to spare their child from future suffering. A common theme for these parents was their fear that even their closest family members would judge their decision harshly and without listening. As a result, many of them had never spoken openly of their losses prior to joining a confidential support group. Instead, they were grieving alone – sometimes for years. 

I sat with these parents who were desperately grieving the loss of their babies and remembered my own daughters’ vastly different deaths. I reflected on the times that I have worried that the first one, Noemi, suffered as she died. When we met to discuss her autopsy results with my doctor, I desperately asked him, “How long did it take for Noemi to lose consciousness without oxygen?” I needed him to say it took seconds, but he could not honestly give me the answer I sought. Instead, he quietly said, “Because she had not started breathing on her own yet, I really don’t know.” My maternal heart broke all over again. For weeks, I lay awake at night wondering if my baby knew to panic when she could not breathe, even though she had never taken a breath before. Was the fear of suffocation learned or instinctual? I worried that she must have experienced terrible pain as her lungs became so eaten by bacteria that they broke apart and adhered together again in all the wrong places. I felt so guilty that she had suffered all alone under a bright light while the NICU team broke her tiny ribs and stuck tubes in her sides to release the air escaping from her ruptured lungs. I grieved that my husband and I were not with her as she died, since my own blood pressure began crashing shortly after she was delivered. 

In contrast, I remembered the peaceful death that my miscarried baby, Marianka, must have had because of her Turner Syndrome. I thought about her passing away silently in the warm embrace of my womb, never knowing cold or panic. I was comforted to know that her little misshapen body never knew the pain of destruction; it simply could not function and grow in the way that it had been knitted together. I agreed with my doctor when she said, “It is a blessing it happened so early because usually it happens later with Turner Syndrome.” I smiled to think that Marianka was never alone–not for a moment. She went straight from safely inside her mother into the arms of God.

With these memories of my worries about my children’s suffering crowding my mind, I find I cannot blame parents who try to give their sick babies a quicker and more peaceful death, even if abortion may not actually provide such a death. Some of these parents face diagnoses that will make their child’s life extremely difficult, if not impossible. Others experience pregnancy complications that put their life or the life of their unborn child in grave danger. Often, doctors recommend the termination of their pregnancies as the only real option for them. When I consider what it must be like to find myself in such a situation, I realize that if I did not believe that God alone holds our lives in His hands, then I suspect that I too would choose to end my child’s life before he or she suffers. If I did not believe that God would redeem even our most terrible suffering, then I would give anything to limit my child’s pain. I understand these parents; I share their grief from losing a child. I am angry that Christians, who should be walking with these parents through their terrible suffering, are magnifying it by alienating and vilifying them as “murderers.”

For a long time, these experiences caused me to hesitate when someone asked me if I was pro-life. Even now, my convictions and my reflections on both my early experiences and my maternal ones still  make this a challenging question to answer. Instead of answering with a simple “yes” or “no,” I have begun to respond that I am “pro-whole-life.” By providing us with a “consistent ethic of life,” I believe that the whole-life approach offers a way out of the gridlock of pro-life versus pro-choice and towards a more meaningful dialogue that can protect the lives of the unborn while simultaneously caring for God’s precious children who have already been born.  

In the next installment of this series, I will explore some practical suggestions, rooted in our Catholic faith, for how we can offer support to families who have faced abortion decisions due to prenatal diagnosis.