REPORTS ON CHURCH STATUS (Loan and Swap)

by Brian Coyne , LINDEN, NSW, Tuesday, December 08, 2009, 21:03 (1290 days ago) @ kaythegardener

That's interesting, Kay. I remember before the Australian ad limina before the Jubilee Year, or was it the Oceania Synod, our Archbishop in Perth, encouraged people to write in with their thoughts. I was involved in the media at the time and gave a lot of publicity to it and through my position as President of the Newman Graduate Society provided a lot of encouragement there as well and I know there was a good response. I'd never heard of anything like that previously in my life and had been involved actively at parish or diocesan level. There's been an Australian ad limina since then but I can't remember much, or any, noise being made calling for submissions from the laity. Perhaps I am confused and it was associated with the Oceania Synod rather than the pre-Jubilee ad limina which occurred around the same time.

I do know there was great disappointment afterwards because a lot of people put effort into preparing their submissions. The strong impression in the professional and informed lay echelons of the Church was that JPII and the Curia weren't interested in listening to the opinions of our bishops let alone anything the laity might have had to say. The sense was that it was a massive waste of energy putting in the effort we had put in.

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Brian Coyne
[Editor & Publisher]