Synod: Ecclesial Assembly in Sight for 2028

The announcement was made by Cardinal Mario Grech, Secretary General of the Synod, in a letter sent to all the bishops, eparchs (Eastern bishops), patriarchs, and major archbishops of the Eastern Churches, on March 15, 2025.

It seems to be a question of vocabulary. It has been said time and again that "synod" means "the path followed together." What is the difference between this and the path of accompaniment? One would have to be very naive to think that the clergy and faithful would be misled by this formulation. This is indeed a synod that we are being promised, but wit different packaging.

Moreover, Cardinal Grech makes no secret of the fact that this is an implementation phase. The vocabulary, for those who have experienced the Second Vatican Council and the post-Council period, is immediately recognizable. This phase, according to Cardinal Maltais, should not be understood as "a simple application of directives from above," but rather as "a process of receiving the Final Document."

This path of accompaniment, intended to last nearly three years, will help adapt the Final Document "to local cultures and the needs of communities," while always maintaining the objective of "implementing" exchange and dialogue "between the Churches and within the Church as a whole."

After four years—as long as the Council itself—the synodal teams (priests, deacons, consecrated persons, lay people, men and women, as well as their bishops) must return to work. To do this, they must be "strengthened, reactivated, and adequately integrated."

It is within this general framework that the "results of the work of the study groups and the contributions of the Canonical Commission" will be placed. As a reminder, "the ten study groups were established by Pope Francis in March 2024 to examine specific questions that arose during the first session in 2023."

The Canonical Commission, according to the Instrumentum Laboris of the second session of the Assembly, was created in 2023 "in agreement with the Dicastery for Legislative Texts, at the service of the Synod."

Ecclesial Assembly

The term "ecclesial assembly" is a legal innovation. Anyone can verify that the term does not exist in the 1983 Code of Canon Law (CIC). In the Code, an assembly is always that of an existing group: parish, religious order, diocese, synod of bishops, etc. But there is no assembly of the Church.

This innovation—which is therefore not legal—allows anyone to gather together, however they want. This is exactly what the German bishops did for the Synodal Path with their "sui juris" assembly, which was sharply criticized by Rome.

This innovation is rooted in the conception by Cardinal Gianfranco Ghirlanda—yet another Jesuit—whose view is that ecclesiastical jurisdiction should be entirely encapsulated in the Pope, who distributes it to whomever he wishes (including the laity), ultimately without taking any account of the hierarchical structure of the Church. But no one can be fooled: this "ecclesial assembly" has (will have) no ecclesiological legitimacy.

Stages of the Accompaniment Process

March 2025 saw the announcement of the process; in May, the support document for the implementation phase will be published, along with guidelines for its implementation. From June 2025 to December 2026, the process will be carried out in local Churches and their groupings; October 24-26, 2025, will mark the Jubilee of the synodal teams and participating organizations.

In the first half of 2027, Evaluation Assemblies will be held in the dioceses; in the second half of 2027, Evaluation Assemblies will be held in the national and international Episcopal Conferences, Eastern Hierarchical Structures, and other Church groupings.

In the first half of 2028, the Continental Evaluation Assemblies will be held. In June 2028, the Instrumentum Laboris for the work of the October 2028 Ecclesial Assembly will be published. The latter will be celebrated in October 2028.

It is a journey that bears a striking resemblance to the synodal process that took place from 2021 to 2024. And there is no need to imagine the future: it has already been written, with post-synodal decisions, just like the post-conciliar texts.