Originally written in Spanish, the exhortation was also published in English, Italian, French, German, Portuguese, Polish, Arabic, and Chinese (both traditional and simplified characters).[1] The 16,000 words of the English translation are organized into 111 paragraphs in four chapters, each of which is dedicated to a "great dream": social, cultural, ecological and ecclesial.[1][4]
Prior to its official release, speculation arose that Querida Amazonia would allow the ordination of married men who are already permanent deacons, viri probati (Latin for 'men of proven faith')[5] to the priesthood, to address a shortage of priests in the Amazon. This proposal had been called for by the final document of the synod, and approved by a majority of the bishops in attendance, in spite of the Catholic Church's long-standing practice of clerical celibacy in the Latin Church.[6] The exhortation does not explicitly endorse married priests, instead stating that a "way must be found" for priests to bring the Eucharist to remote areas, while also calling for women to be given greater roles in the church, but not within the holy orders of the diaconate or the priesthood.[4][7] In addition, Francis makes no mention of an Amazonian rite of the Mass, despite it also being a subject of debate at the synod,[4] but states that efforts of inculturation should be made, to "respect native forms of expression in song, dance, rituals, gestures and symbols".[1]
On 15 October 2017, Pope Francis announced that a special assembly of the Synod of Bishops would be held in 2019, to "identify new paths for the evangelisation of this portion of the People of God", specifically indigenous peoples, in light of the "crisis" of the Amazon rainforest's deforestation.[8] The synod's working document (instrumentum laboris), entitled "Amazonia: new paths for the Church and for an integral ecology", was published on 17 June 2019.[9][10] The key issues of the instrumentum laboris were the ordination of married men, the role for women in the church, and environmental concerns.[11] The working document drew polarized reactions among Catholics, with Peruvian cardinal Pedro Barreto saying that it "largely expresses the feelings and desires of many representatives of the Amazon people",[12] whereas German cardinal Walter Brandmüller condemned it as "heretical" and called for it to be rejected.[13]
More than 200 participants, including 185 voting bishops, gathered in Rome from 6 to 27 October 2019 for the synod.[14] On 26 October, the concluding day of the assembly, the synod's final document was released, including an article in which the bishops proposed that married permanent deacons be considered for ordination as priests following an "adequate formation", which was approved by a vote of 128–41, satisfying the requisite two-thirds majority for it to pass. The synodal document's conclusions were then presented to Francis to issue an apostolic exhortation on the issues discussed.[15]
Contents
Francis begins Querida Amazonia by describing the exhortation as a "brief framework for reflection" in light of the synod's final document, without intending to supplant it, and urges all to read it in full. The document's introduction also sets forth the "four great dreams" that the Amazon region inspires in him, which are subsequently individually explored in the four succeeding chapters.[1][4]
In the first chapter, entitled "A Social Dream", Francis focuses on improving the quality of life of the Amazonian people, underscoring the need to assist the poor. He addresses the "injustice and crime" faced by such peoples, caused by industries in the rainforest such as timber and mining, and criticizes a conception of the region as a place to be developed, which does not respect indigenous rights.[4] Moreover, he also says that outrage needs to be felt in the face of injustice and cruelty suffered by them, and asks for forgiveness for the failings of the church and wider society in the Amazon region, noting that it is possible to overcome "colonizing mentalities" with solidarity.[16] He ends the chapter with a reflection on the "broken institutions" of civil society, and calls for dialogue to take place with the poor of the Amazon.[1][16]
The second chapter of the exhortation, "A Cultural Dream", utilizes a positive approach towards indigenous peoples,[4] emphasizing that promotion of the Amazon does not imply cultural colonialism. Describing the region as a "polyhedron", Francis deplores the exile of the indigenous from their homes into regional cities, and the subsequent loss of their cultural identities, also urging young people to assume responsibility for their roots.[1] Furthermore, he also encourages an "intercultural encounter", rejecting colonialism and indigenism, observing that a culture can "grow barren" when it isolates itself from dialogue.[4][16]
The document's third chapter, "An Ecological Dream", recalls Benedict XVI's teaching on "human ecology", referencing also Francis's own encyclical Laudato si'.[4] He again condemns multinational corporations and "powerful industries" for harming the Amazonian environment, and stresses the importance of water, referring to the Amazon River as the "spinal column that creates harmony and unity". Francis also highlights the need to learn from indigenous peoples, as well as a theological "prophecy of contemplation" for believers to encounter in the region.[16] He calls for ecological teaching to overcome modern consumerism in the region, an initiative to which, he says, the church can also contribute.[1][4]
"An Ecclesial Dream", the final chapter, comprising almost half the document,[17] examines the role of the Catholic Church in the Amazon. Francis affirms the Great Commission of preaching the gospel in order to confront the region's problems, underlining the importance of kerygma.[4] He also explores paths of inculturation in the Amazon, to bring goodness in existing cultures to "fulfilment in the light of the Gospel", extolling pre-Columbian cultures and the tradition of Christian wisdom. Despite this, he does not discuss a new Amazonian rite of the Mass, but supports the inclusion of elements of indigenous culture in the liturgy. Furthermore, he calls for the church to "offer understanding, comfort and acceptance", instead of turning people away.[16] On the topic of priests in the region, Francis states that the process of priestly formation should be revised, but makes no mention of the ordination of viri probati in providing isolated communities access to the Eucharist. Instead, he accentuates the role of the laity in spiritual formation, while emphasizing that priests remain necessary to preside over the liturgy. In addition, Francis addresses the "strength and gift" of women, praising their role in the Amazon, but asserts that efforts to ordain them would be reductionist and lead the church to "clericalize women, diminish the great value of what they have already accomplished, and subtly make their indispensable contribution less effective".[4] He underlines the traditional importance of priests being male, and provides the example of the Virgin Mary as a model for women. In briefly exploring the possibilities arising from ecumenism and "interreligious coexistence", he invites believers to seek opportunities to talk to each other.[16] The exhortation concludes with a prayer addressed to Mary, under the title of "mother of the Amazon region".[1]
Reception
Querida Amazonia drew mixed reactions from Catholic commentators, with those regarded as conservative generally approving of Francis's approach, while those considered progressives largely expressed disappointment at the lack of major announcements of changes to church practice.[18]
Traditionalist Catholic journalist Matthew Walther said the correct response to the encyclical should be joy, writing:
Here at last is a return to the great intellectual themes of Laudato si', the 2015 papal encyclical in which the Holy Father first articulated his critique of the neoliberal revolution in economics, the globalized regime of spoliation, exploitation, infertility, and distractedness that make possible the supposed "economic miracle" of consumerism. For Francis all of these things — the climate crisis, wage slavery, the mirage of technological progress, greed — exist along a sinuous continuum of immiseration; the planet is being destroyed because we are destroying one another because we are destroying ourselves. In fact, I think it would even be a mistake to consider this exhortation a teaching document in any narrowly pedagogical sense. Instead it should be welcomed on the terms in which it is presented: as a dream, one that all persons of good will can dream together.[21]
On the other hand, American-born Colombian bishop Robert Herman Flock disapproved of Francis's words, stating that he "simply kicked the can down the road".[18]Jesuit priest James Martin said that, while Querida Amazonia did not explicitly mention the ordination of married priests or women, such proposals may still be up for discussion due to Francis "officially presenting" the synod's final document together with the exhortation.[22]
The Women's Ordination Conference, a U.S. organization advocating the ordination of Catholic women, accused Francis of "willfully turning his back on the calls of women",[18][23] while the Central Committee of German Catholics, a lay group, expressed disappointment with his "lack of courage to pursue real reforms". English writer Catherine Pepinster objected to a perceived suggestion that "clericalism is automatically part of the priesthood".[18]
Related Research Articles
Raymond Leo Burke is an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He is a bishop and a cardinal, and was a patron of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta from 2014 to 2023. He led the Archdiocese of St. Louis from 2004 to 2008 and the Diocese of La Crosse from 1995 to 2004. From 2008 to 2014, he was the prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura.
Familiaris consortio is a post-synodal apostolic exhortation written by Pope John Paul II and promulgated on 22 November 1981.
The Paschal mystery is one of the central concepts of Catholic theology relating to the history of salvation. According to the Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, "The Paschal Mystery of Jesus, which comprises his passion, death, resurrection, and glorification, stands at the center of the Christian faith because God's saving plan was accomplished once for all by the redemptive death of himself as Jesus Christ." The Catechism states that in the liturgy of the Church "it is principally his own Paschal mystery that Christ signifies and makes present."
Clerical celibacy is the discipline within the Catholic Church by which only unmarried men are ordained to the episcopate, to the priesthood in the Latin Church, and similarly to the diaconate. In other autonomous particular churches, the discipline applies only to the episcopate. According to Jason Berry of The New York Times, "The requirement of celibacy is not dogma; it is an ecclesiastical law that was adopted in the Middle Ages because Rome was worried that clerics' children would inherit church property and create dynasties." For several hundred years after the imposition of celibacy on secular (non-monastic/religious) clergy the sale of church offices continued. The first male issue of non-married concubines of celibate clergy became set to continue the dynasty. To curtail this clerical abuse, the Latin Church imposed a ban on the ordination of bastards. This policy ended almost 800 years later in the 20th century.
An instrumentum laboris is a type of Vatican official document used at a General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops. The first such document was drafted for the Synod on evangelization in 1974.
An apostolic exhortation is a magisterial document written by the pope. Some experts regard it as third in importance among papal documents, after apostolic constitutions and encyclicals. Exhortations generally encourage a particular virtue or activity. Apostolic exhortations are frequently issued following a Synod of Bishops, in which case they are known as post-synodal apostolic exhortations. They do not define Church doctrine and are not considered legislative.
Christianity in the 21st century is characterized by the pursuit of church unity and the continued resistance to persecution and secularization.
In the liturgical traditions of the Catholic Church, the term ordination refers to the means by which a person is included in one of the holy orders of bishops, priests or deacons. The teaching of the Catholic Church on ordination, as expressed in the 1983 Code of Canon Law, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and the apostolic letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis, is that only a Catholic male validly receives ordination, and "that the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church's faithful." In other words, the male priesthood is not considered by the church a matter of policy but an unalterable requirement of God. As with priests and bishops, the church ordains only men as deacons.
Erwin Kräutler C.Pp.S. is a Roman Catholic bishop who headed the Territorial Prelature of Xingu from 1981 until 2015.
In the Catholic Church, the Synod of Bishops, considered as an advisory body for the pope, is one of the ways in which the bishops render cooperative assistance to him in exercising his office. It is described in the 1983 Code of Canon Law as "a group of bishops who have been chosen from different regions of the world and meet at fixed times to foster closer unity between the Roman Pontiff and bishops, to assist the Roman Pontiff with their counsel in the preservation and growth of faith and morals and in the observance and strengthening of ecclesiastical discipline, and to consider questions pertaining to the activity of the Church in the world."
The Fourteenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, popularly referred to as the Synod on the Family, took place from 4 to 25 October 2015 with the theme of "the vocation and mission of the family in the Church and in the contemporary world." It was "reflect[ing] further on the points discussed" at the 2014 Third Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops "so as to formulate appropriate pastoral guidelines" for the pastoral care of the person and the family. The 2014 assembly of the synod, called to define the status quaestionis and to collect the participants' experiences and proposals, can be understood as a preparation for the 2015 assembly, but they are meant to "form a single organic unity." It took place in the Synod Hall in the Paul VI Audience Hall in Vatican City.
The first Study Commission on the Women's Diaconate was established in August 2016 by Pope Francis to review the theology and history of the ministry of women deacons (deaconesses) in the Roman Catholic Church. The commission report was not published. After the Amazonian synod, Pope Francis promised to re-open this commission. He established a second commission instead in April 2020.
The 15th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, commonly referred to as the Synod on Young People, is a Roman Catholic synod that took place 3–28 October 2018 and had as its theme "Young People, Faith, and Vocational Discernment". Its aim was to "accompany young people on their way of life towards maturity so that, through a process of discernment, they can discover their life project and realize it with joy, opening the encounter with God and with men, and actively participating in the building up of the Church and society".
Mario Grech is a Maltese prelate of the Catholic Church who was Bishop of Gozo from 2005 to 2019. He was Pro-Secretary General of the Synod of Bishops from October 2019 until he became Secretary General in September 2020.
The Synod of Bishops for the Pan-Amazon region, commonly referred to as the Amazon synod, met in Rome from 6 to 27 October 2019. Pope Francis announced on 15 October 2017 that a special assembly of the Synod of Bishops would work "to identify new paths for the evangelization of God's people in that region", specifically the indigenous peoples who are "often forgotten and without the prospect of a serene future".
Pedro Ricardo Barreto Jimeno,, is a Peruvian prelate of the Catholic Church who was Archbishop of Huancayo from 2004 to 2024. He has been a cardinal since 2018.
Christus vivit is a post-synodal apostolic exhortation of Pope Francis, written in response to the Fifteenth Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, on young people, faith and vocational discernment, held from 3 to 28 October 2018.
The Synodal Way was a series of conferences of the Catholic Church in Germany to discuss a range of contemporary religious, spiritual and theological and organizational questions concerning the Catholic Church, as well as gender issues and possible reactions to the sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic Church in Germany.
The 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, commonly referred to as the synod on synodality, is an ongoing synod of bishops of the Catholic Church which will conclude in October 2024 and has as its theme "For a synodal Church: communion, participation and mission". It has been described as the culmination of Pope Francis's papacy and the most important event in the Church since the Second Vatican Council.
Karel Martinus Choennie is a Surinamese Roman Catholic bishop. As of 2016, he is the current Bishop of Paramaribo. He is the first bishop in Suriname of Indian descent.
References
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Pope Francis (2 February 2020). "Querida Amazonia". The Holy See (Apostolic exhortation). With links to translations in many languages.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
