c. 2005 Religion News Service

VATICAN CITY _ As more than 250 bishops filed into St. Peter’s Square for a Sunday (Oct. 23) Mass that concluded the first synod of Pope Benedict XVI’s reign, there were few signs of the lively debate that shook up the assembly’s launch.

After weeks of soul-searching that identified Catholicism’s global priest shortage and the sacramental status of remarried Catholics as top concerns, the bishops came full circle, reaffirming traditional teaching, based on Christ’s example, as the best answer to the challenges of modernity.

“The synodal work allowed us to deepen the salient aspects of this mystery, given to the church from the beginning,” Benedict told the synod’s bishops, who convened in Rome on Oct. 2 to merely advise Benedict, not set policy. “How can we not take up, once again, the invitation by the beloved Pope John Paul II to `start again from Christ’?”

At the start of the worldwide gathering, bishops had jockeyed to set the synod agenda and test the limits of their freshman pontiff. Issues often ducked during John Paul’s 26-year reign took center stage as bishops pondered the possibility of introducing exemplary married men known as “viri probati” into the priesthood as a means of stemming the priest shortage. One bishop even challenged the theological validity of the priesthood’s celibacy requirement.

At the Sunday Mass, Benedict offered an initial reaction to the synod while giving a clear reaffirmation of traditional church teaching.

Priestly celibacy is “a precious gift and the sign of the undivided love towards God,” Benedict said, linking the practice of celibacy to the Eucharist, the sacrament of bread and wine that was the synod’s official theme.

At the outset of the synod, bishops from some of the world’s most priest-poor regions noted that the shortage undercut their ability to distribute the Eucharist in the first place. Bishop Roberto Camilleri Azzopardi of Comayaga, Honduras, reported having one priest for every 16,000 Catholics in his diocese.

According to Catholic belief, only priests can consecrate the Eucharist, transforming it into the blood and body of Jesus Christ.

Bishop Luis Antonio Tagle of Imus, Philippines, reported that in 40 of the 60 parishes he oversees, lay people regularly distribute Communion in the absence of priests _ a fact that he said diminishes the sacramental value of the Eucharist.

“In the absence of the priest, there is no Eucharist. We should face squarely the issue of the shortage of priests,” Tagle said at a press conference at the synod’s start.

But in the end, the bishops were not ready to take dramatic action at the synod, which traditionally convenes every two years. As an advisory body, the synod prepared a list of 50 propositions that bishops presented to the pope Saturday. Religion News Service obtained a copy of the list, which has not been publicly released.

The pope is expected to reflect on the propositions and may give his official response in an “apostolic exhortation” that generally is released a few weeks after the synod.

One proposition presented to the pope Saturday acknowledged “the acute pain that is felt over the lack of priests in some parts of the world. Many faithful are deprived of the Bread of Life.”

The bishops did not propose any concrete changes to church policy. Their synod-ending document underscored the need to “sensitize families” that are “indifferent if not contrary” to letting their sons enter the priesthood. It also called for a “more equal distribution of priests” throughout the world, an idea that at least some bishops regard as a short-term measure that does not replace the need for local vocations.

Speaking at a press conference Saturday, George Pell of Sydney, Australia, described the synod as a “massive endorsement” of priestly celibacy, which he considered significant.

“When you have a synod backing this discipline of the Latin church in such a nearly unanimous way, that’s not unimportant,” he said.

(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)

The proposals also dampened hopes that divorced and remarried Catholics might be readmitted to Communion after Archbishop John Atcherley of Wellington, New Zealand, suggested the church should rethink its ban.

But in the end, bishops backed church teaching prohibiting remarried couples from taking Communion on the grounds that their sexual relations are sinful.

“According to the tradition of the Catholic Church, they cannot be admitted to Communion, finding themselves in conditions of objective contrast with the Word of the Lord,” the bishops’ document reads.

The proposal also encouraged remarried couples to abstain from sex, maintaining “a loyal and trustworthy friendship” in accordance with church teaching.

Although these affirmations will come as a disappointment to many liberal Catholics, the synod’s support for the status quo also delivered setbacks to conservative hopes.

Vatican cardinals who pushed for a crackdown on politicians who stray from Catholic morality in their legislation succeeded in having the issue addressed at length in the proposals.

“Politicians and legislators must feel themselves particularly moved in their conscience, correctly formed, about the grave social responsibility of presenting and supporting iniquitous laws,” the proposal read.

But the final document did not recommend the adoption of worldwide norms as Vatican Cardinals Julian Herranz and Alfonso Lopez Trujillo had suggested during their speeches on the synod floor.

The question of whether wayward politicians should receive Communion, the proposal said, should be left to the individual discretion of bishops who “should exercise the virtues of firmness and prudence, taking account of concrete local situations.”

The Communion parameters produced a moment of tension at a Saturday press conference when an Italian reporter asked Archbishop Rino Fisichella, chaplain to the Italian Parliament, whether he would deny Communion to Pier Ferdinando Casini, a divorced man who is speaker of the lower house of Parliament and a leader of the center-right Christian Democratic party.

Casini “knows well the rules of the church,” Fisichella replied, and does not present himself for Communion.

MO/PH RNS END