The Synodal Committee, which was born from the Synodal Path that the Catholic Church in Germany embarked on between 2019 and 2023, has met for the first time today in Essen. The first meeting was an opportunity to discuss the statute and regulations. Indeed, the body is tasked to continue the process initiated in recent years and to pursue the reflection on the themes and texts that were not approved by the Synodal Assemblies, to work on synodality, and to prepare the creation of a Synodal Council for the Catholic Church in Germany. According to what was decided in the Assembly, the members of the Committee include 27 diocesan bishops, 27 delegates from the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZDK), and another 20 people elected by the Synodal Assembly. “A new phase in the Synodal Path is beginning”, said the President of the German Bishops’ Conference, Mgr Georg Bätzing. Its task will be “to identify new forms of cooperation and set everything on the right path”. “Pope Francis exhorts us, we are rooted in the Word. Let us move forward with boldness”, said ZDK President Irme Stetter-Karp, noting that the first meeting of the Committee was scheduled for after the World Synod. For Mgr Bätzing, “the Synodal Path of the Church in Germany can be seen as a genuine effort to develop precisely that synodality that is so important for the entire Church in the 21st century”.