According to an old Vatican aphorism, “We think in centuries here.” Viewed through that long-distance lens, the most important Catholic event of 2014 was the dramatic moment when Africa’s bishops emerged as effective, powerful proponents of dynamic orthodoxy in the world Church.
The scene was the Extraordinary Synod of 2014, called by Pope Francis to prepare the Synod of 2015 on the theme, “Pastoral Challenges to the Family in the Context of Evangelization.” The dramatic tension was provided by northern European bishops (principally German) and the Synod secretariat, who worked hard to reframe Synod 2014 as an inquest on a question long thought settled by the rest of the Church: the question of admitting the divorced and civilly remarried to holy Communion. The subplot in the drama came from the fact that the Church in Africa—rich in evangelical energy, firmly committed to orthodoxy, but very poor—is funded in large part by German Catholic development agencies (themselves the beneficiaries of the “Church tax” collected by the German federal government).
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