The Synod on The Word of God
in the life and mission
of the Church

 

in the words of Silvia Sanchini
     


Rita Salerno (courtesy)

Italian version

trasp.gif (814 byte) trasp.gif (814 byte) trasp.gif (814 byte) trasp.gif (814 byte)

 
The XII ordinary general assembly of the Synod of the Bishops, dedicated to the Bible, has just been concluded. Many hints emerged from the work of the synod participated by 253 fathers of the synod together with various listeners and experts. Now the challenge must be picked up by the entire community of believers to live and to assimilate the Word of God in the daily life. A good number of religious and lay faithful participated in the work, such as Silvia Sanchini, the National president of FUCI, born in Rimini on 27th May 1983, with a degree in  Science of Formation, a degree course on professional Educator in the University of Bologna and at present student of the specialist  biennium  in the faculty of Science of Formation, University of Rome Three. She has been President of the FUCI group of Rimini from 2005 till 2007 and was appointed by the permanent Council of CEI on 21st t May 2007.  

We have addressed few questions to her on the hints emerged at the conclusion of the Synod.  


Among the most interesting hints emerged at the conclusion of the synod we find that on the  diffusion and enculturation of the Bible among all the peoples on earth. Is this a task in which the families, the missionaries, the religious and the mass media can exercise an important role?

 “The question of the enculturation of the Holy Scriptures was one of the recurring themes in the reflection of the Synod, at the centre of the interventions by many Fathers of the Synod. A specific Proposition was dedicated to this topic, which, among other things, states that “The mandate the Lord entrusts to the Church of proclaiming the Gospel to all creatures (See Mark 16, 15), implies the encounter of the Word with all the peoples on earth and their culture”, and again, “the Word of God must penetrate into many milieus so that the culture may produce original expressions of life, liturgy and Christian thought. In this area, a specific and privileged role can be fulfilled by some particular categories of believers. First of all the missionaries who by definition are called to proclaim and to witness to the Word of God in every corner of the earth, paying a particular attention to the poor and the suffering. The missionaries are called to an encounter with the religious and socio-cultural diversity, sometimes difficult, but inalienable. They must allow themselves to be guided by a listening and welcoming attitude. 
It is important for them to be guided by a non judging and imposing  style, allowing it to be born, first of all, by the knowledge and understanding of the local context (language, culture, rites…) to the end of announcing the Word in more adequate forms and instruments. It is a matter of encountering the diversity in a profitable way, without relinquishing one’s own identity.

 Together with the missionaries, all the religious live with particular intensity the task of announcing the Gospel. In fact they are called to be, using the words of Benedict XVI, “living exegetes of the Word of God”, by witnessing ceaselessly with their life how the Word of God does not stop speaking to men and women of every epoch and of the whole world.  The same concept was confirmed by the intervention by Sr. Viviana Ballarin, who was in the Synod as a “listener” like me. She underlined the special role of proclamation assigned to “a multitude of consecrated women religious who are indefatigable witnesses and dispensers of the Word of God, who is Father and mother”.   

The men and women religious experience many “frontiers” situations, living at the side of the last ones and renewing every day their audacious and courageous task as witnesses of God’s love. However, the proclamation of the Word is not realised only through active life. In fact, the contemplative dimension also offers an irreplaceable and precious contribution. The Proposition 24 states, “The monastic communities are schools of spirituality; they empower the life of the particular Churches”, remembering the words of Benedict XVI who has defined the monasteries as true “spiritual oasis”, in which the Word is welcomed, celebrated  and prayed in a particularly intense way. In the light of all this and in the awareness of the very urgent necessity of proclaiming the Word of God in every corner of the earth, as message of consolation and hope, we cannot help bringing to evidence also the fundamental role of the mass media as new occasions of announcement, in a world that keeps on being changed and transformed ever more speedily. This task has been insisted upon and forcefully underlined in the Message to the people of God, diffused at the conclusion of the Synod, “Communication extends a net that enwraps the whole globe (…). Sure, the sacred word must have its first transparency and diffusion through the printed text, with translations to be made according to the variegated multiplicity of the tongues spoken in our planet. However, the voice of the divine word must resound also through the radio, the informatics arteries of Internet, the channels of the virtual diffusion on line, the CD, DVD, pod cast and so on and so forth; it must appear on the TV and cinematograph videos, in the printing press, in the cultural and social events.    

Even the women exercise a primary role of transmitting faith in the families and catechesis. Do you share the auspice, often expressed in the final propositions, of entrusting to women the ministry of the Biblical lectorate?


“I think that the women hold a primary role in the proclamation of the Word and in the transmission of faith not only in the family and catechesis, but also in many more fields of life. I think of the many women, of the lay youths as well, committed to the ecclesial and civil fields, and capable of witnessing their experience as believers, with coherence of life and of faith, in many places and contexts: from the world of politics to that of economy, in the world of school, university and education in general, in the most different professions, like that in the study of  exegesis and theology. In all these environments, I am convinced that women know how to be heralds of the Word in a special manner, with a particular sensitivity and competence.  Seen in this optics, even the possibility of entrusting to women the ministry of lectorate is surely propitious. Of course, the evaluation of the role of the woman within the Church must not be limited to a formal recognition or to some simple concessions: it must permeate every ecclesial area and context: it must become a normal  and shared praxis”.
 
In reiterating the bond between the Word of God and liturgy, in the final list of the proposition of the Synod, they underlined the importance of the homilies inspired by the divine Word. For this reason the Fathers of the Synod auspicated the elaboration of a directory on the homily, capable of helping the preachers in the ministry of the Word of God. What do you think about it?  


“I find meaningful and very much positive the fact that the fathers of the synod have paid very much attention to the theme of the homilies, recognising the limits and difficulties that often even today we find in the homilies of many preachers. In fact, it is just in the Sunday Mass that the faithful have the main contact (sometimes unique) with the Word. Thus, we need efficacious homilies to the point, capable of favouring the comprehension of the Sacred Scriptures and of helping the faithful to see that the Word may effectively become “performative” reality, capable of incising in the existence of each person and of renewing it. In fact, the homily, as a proposition says, tries its best to see that “the proclaimed Word be actualised”, and renews the exhortation addressed to the Church of being ever more missionary. In this sense, the fundamental unbinding point is the formation of the priests. To this purpose it would suffice simply to remember the apostolic post-synod exhortation  “Pastores dabo vobis”, which reminds the priests their task of being “servants” of the Word. This theme is amply underlined in the message to the people of God, “the vertex of preaching is the homily, which even today for many Christians is the main encounter with the Word of God. In this act the minister should be transformed also into a prophet. In fact, in a limpid, incisive and substantial language, he must not only “proclaim the wonderful works of God in the history of salvation”  with authority, but also actuate it in the times and moments lived by the listeners, and cause the appeal to conversion to bloom in the hearts together with the vital commitment, “What must we do?” (Acts 2, 37).

Considering the importance and urgency of these themes and the centrality they hold in the life of our particular churches and of the universal Church, I find desirable and important the possibility of elaborating a homiletic directory as a further and specific instrument for the formation of the preachers of the Word. However, all this cannot and must not substitute the first fundamental task of te priests who are called to love the Word of God deeply and to nurture themselves with it assiduously, so tat they may know how to explain and to transmit it always better.    


How to make the Word of God familiar to the youths  was the centre of reflection in the Synod. It is a not easy objective especially today, but to approach the youths, hope of the Church, is a duty to be actuated by listening to their voice in the community and in a constant journey of accompaniment. Would you, please, explain better to us how all this can concretely be done? Through which languages and modalities?

“I think that the youths must be educated ever more to an encounter with the  Word that may be realised in a double dimension: personal and communitarian. Personal, because the authentic encounter with the Word is really capable of renewing and transforming the existence; nothing can substitute this intimate and private encounter with the Holy Scriptures. The first fundamental step is that each believer, the youths first of all, may have and safeguard the Bible, reading it daily and praying it, following the rhythm and breath of the universal Church, as St. Augustine wrote, “The Bible must be read  on the knees of the Church”. A useful instrument can be that of favouring and stimulating the prayer of the liturgy of the hours. This aspect leads us to the necessity that our approach to the Scriptures may assume also a communitarian form. The role of the adults here becomes fundamental, as well as that of the educators who must be “true passionate witnesses of the Word of God” (Proposition 34). It is necessary that the experience of contact with the Word may hold a central role also in the youth groups and associations, through the practice of the Lectio Divina or other listening experiences and prayer of the Word. We say this so that the role of the Word, as indispensable instrument  of discernment, may be more and more acknowledged,  particularly in the years of youth, time of serious and important choices, needful of being enlightened by the light of the Gospel. This fundamental horizon has been  recently indicated also by Benedict XVI, “Dear youths, I exhort you to acquire familiarity with the Bible, to have it at easy reach, so that it may be for you like the mariner’s compasses indicating the way to follow”.

The proposition 22 is fundamental. It recommends the practice of the Lectio Divina and asks that the communitarian  prayerful reading of the Scriptures  be followed by a commitment to charity. Does it recommend this old practice also to the youths?

“As already mentioned in the previous answer, the Lectio Divina (personal and communitarian) is probably one of the most efficacious documents  for the Biblical animation of the youths. In fact, the reading of the Holy Scriptures cannot be a simple hermeneutic and intellectual  exercise; it must necessarily open to a prayerful and spiritual dimension. Only like this the experience of our encounter with the readings can change into an unceasing dialogue with God, who through the Scriptures  speaks to us and shows us more clearly the journey to be made, helping us to re-read the events of our life through his vision. It is possible to fetch from the prayerful reading the necessary strength for our own service, in every area. In this sense, I think that the sensitivity of the youths for the commitment to charity is particularly strong. In fact, many youths reveal themselves attentive and desirous of committing themselves to themes like peace, justice, safeguarding of creation, attention to the poor and the needy. Therefore, a concrete and coherent commitment must be in syntony with the listening to the Word. This is why, in his homily at the conclusion of the Synod, the Holy Father stated, “it is necessary to understand the needs of translating the Word listened to into gestures of love, because it is always like this that the proclamation of the Word becomes credible”.

At the conclusion of the works, can you tell us something of your experience in the Synod  and, if it has been positive, why? How will this experience be profitable in your daily commitment?


“As far as it concerns me, the participation in the Synod has been an extra-ordinary experience of sharing and ecclesial communion, a unique occasion to feel the breath and the heart-beats of the universal Church. In fact, the Synod has seen the participation of the Bishops, of experts, of listeners from all parts of the world. To this confrontation dimension among various cultures, the possibility of dialogue with the fraternal delegates of other churches was added.  The Synod has been for me also an extra-ordinary and instructive opportunity of education to the inter-religious and ecumenical dialogue. At the conclusion of the synod I feel a strong responsibility  and a desire of narrating, of sharing this experience and of transmitting it to many coetaneous, so that youths may learn always more how to re-discover  the primacy of the Word of God in their existence. The true challenge of the Synod, therefore, starts today, with the necessity and the duty to translate many developed reflections into concrete and visible experience


The synod has underlined also the importance of forming the readers for the readings. In practice,  one must know how to read during the liturgy. Those who read during the Holy Mass must do it well, so that the whole assembly may hear the Word of God well. Moreover, it must be avoided that the Word might go lost because of the poor acoustic or because the reader does not read well.  Would you narrate to us your experience in this sense?


“The first simple remark that I allow myself to underline is the necessity of avoiding improvised readers during the celebrations. Before reading in a celebration, the reader should have already tasted and meditated the readings in advance, possibly during an entire week, to the end of transmitting the love for the Biblical text also through the reading and to proclaim it in as clear, efficacious and comprehensible way, in the optics of a precious service to the assembly gathered in prayer”.

 Torna indietro