Synod: Austria, results of national consultation. “There is much to preserve and much to innovate”

A ten-page report on the results of the synodal process in Austria, written by an editorial team of four persons, has now been made available. The bishops did not intervene in the corpus of the synthesis, the President of the Bishops’ Conference, Mgr. Franz Lackner, said as he presented the document to the press a few days ago, but they contributed an accompanying letter which illustrates how the synodal process took place in Austria and what it led to. The report shows that “there is much to preserve and much to innovate. The Church needs both to continue the history of salvation”, the bishops briefly explained. “In the awareness that we are part of a synodal event”, the letter goes on to read, we, bishops, “need to make our own contribution” and, on the other hand, we also need other “contributions to complement us”, as we are aware that “before God and the people we have a responsibility to do our part to grow in synodality”. The bishops are grateful for the broad participation and for the opportunity to listen to many voices, although “not all adequately”. While this is a deficiency, it is also “our task to continue the synodal process and to establish synodal understanding as a working method in the Church in Austria”.
Valentina Bombelli