Reflections on Kilkenny: Re-igniting the flames of synodality in Ireland

“Leaving the meeting I felt strangely flat and disappointed”

I was privileged to be a participant at the recent (October 18th) pre-synodal National Assembly in Kilkenny. It was good to be there, as many people said in the course of the day. The meeting had been meticulously prepared and was smoothly run on the day. There were over 230 people present, including the local Church of Ireland bishop Adrian Wilkinson, and the Rev Karen Campbell from the Irish Inter-Church Meeting. Senior students from local schools sang beautifully in well prepared prayer sessions. There were many lively, informal conversations throughout the day and the main business of the meeting, the adoption of seven priorities for the Irish Catholic Church going forward towards the full synodal Assembly in 2026, was successfully concluded.

And yet…leaving the meeting I felt strangely flat and disappointed. And talking with others I discovered that this collective sense of deflation was more widespread. People seemed genuinely at a loss to know what had happened. The lack of energy and excitement was palpable. The fire and elation of Athlone in 2022 were conspicuous by their absence. What had gone on? It is as if we were in a fog and had lost our way. We had talked a lot, been engaged in ‘holy huddles’ with good people, but the outcome seemed a bit woolly and diffuse, there seemed to be a lack of focus and sharpness.

Discernment

Perhaps all the talking has also involved an unconscious avoidance of tough decisions? Perhaps we may, again unconsciously, be operating out of different models of mission – one, the so-called ‘Benedict option’ which sees the Church as a small, counter-cultural resistance movement to the surrounding secular culture, and one which prefers a Church in dialogue with the world, and by means of discernment learning from what is good there and respectfully challenging what is incompatible with the gospel? Perhaps, after all, our expectations were unrealistic, and solid if limited progress had been achieved?

It is part of a good discernment to reflect prayerfully and honestly when things seem to go awry, as well as when things go clearly well. Desolation can be a great teacher. Our task now, it seems to me, is to name honestly our responses to Kilkenny, to try to understand what they signify, and then to seek to re-set our course accordingly. It is quite usual for this to happen in enterprises that are so demanding. We do well to hold our nerve, count the real blessings that have accrued over the last 5 years or so, and see this latest mile-stone as an invitation from the Spirit to take stock, to avoid going down any cul-de-sacs and to resume our journey with greater focus.

It is still early in the reception of Kilkenny but I would like to offer my own suggestions as to next steps. I do so, I hope, as one among voices who will speak out at this time.

People seemed genuinely at a loss to know what had happened. The lack of energy and excitement was palpable. The fire and elation of Athlone in 2022 were conspicuous by their absence”

As already noted by several at Kilkenny, I think it will be helpful for 2026 if we further reduce our focus to one or two priorities. In a sense all 15 priorities from Athlone, and the two added since, reduced to 7 for Kilkenny, remain relevant and are mostly inter-connected and often over-lapping. So, for example, the priority of Baptism is an enduring insight (with all that it implies about our faith encounter with Jesus and the formation which is required to actualise this), and the healing response to abuse must always be prominent on our agenda. But for purposes of manageability, I would suggest taking just two priorities for next year:  these could be co-responsibility (which is very much at the heart of the concern of the Universal Synod), and women (which is also mentioned strongly in the Universal Synod and has particular resonance in Ireland).

Furthermore, I would suggest a refinement to the ‘conversation in the spirit’ process. I think it would be helpful for 2026 if we came up with two sharply focussed proposals and allowed for debate and discussion on these, as well as help from theology and the human sciences, alongside to the ‘conversation in the spirit’ process and  the taking of votes at the synodal assembly. In the Assembly itself there might be brief presentations in a factual mode of the pros and cons of each proposal, as well as a combination of ‘conversation in the spirit’ with more free-flowing discussion. To pass, proposals would require more than a simple majority: we need to hold on to the wisdom that consensus does not require unanimity, but neither is a simple majority sufficient.

This suggested procedure is a version of what occurred over a longer time-span at the recent Synods. It raises the stakes – participants before, during and after the synodal Assembly know that there will be concrete decisions of considerable significance deriving from the process.

Women

On the proposal concerning the role of women, one might envisage a proposal with two parts. First, a recommendation that we adopt  what the Final Synod taught about the need to avail of all opportunities under current law to enhance the visibility and decision-making role of women in our church at all levels And secondly, because the ordination question inevitably casts a long shadow over any attempt to establish baptismal equality in this matter, a request from the Irish Catholic Church that the Universal Church revisit its current teaching on ordination and, in particular, the reasons behind this teaching.

This stark insistence, as noted, hangs like a shadow over all other attempts to realise the baptismal equality of women, and the reasoning behind it are unpersuasive to many in Ireland”

All this would need to be carefully explained, in particular the latter piece. While there may be some understandable differences about the pastoral appropriateness and timing of ordaining women (why not, some would say, wait until they declericalise the role of priest?), there is little acceptance in Ireland of the notion of a permanent glass ceiling, which arises from the theological insistence by the Chruch that a women can never be ordained simply because she is a woman. This stark insistence, as noted, hangs like a shadow over all other attempts to realise the baptismal equality of women, and the reasoning behind it are unpersuasive to many in Ireland. It is altogether orthodox for the faithful and their bishops to request a review of this, which may then lead to a clarification, a reformulation or even a revision (see ‘The Sense of Faith in the Life of the Church’, 2014, a document of the International Theological Commission signed off on by Cardinal Mueller). It would give energy to people to know that we in Ireland were accepting responsibility for our own situation, while of course maintaining communion with the universal church. It would represent continuity with Athlone.

Ordination

One other remark on the issue of ordination. I had the honour recently of co-launching the memoir of Soline Humbert, who has felt called by God for most of her adult years to be a priest. Her main argument is based not on justice or human rights, but on precisely that –her call from God. I am reminded here of the so-called Gamaliel principle from Acts 5: “…If this enterprise…is of human origin it will break up of its own accord; but if it does in fact come from God you will not only be unable to destroy them, but you might find yourselves fighting against God” (Acts 5, 38-39).

A similar proposal would be drafted on co-responsibility, with attention to the real questions which many priests in particular bring to the table on this one. It would envisage concrete changes on the ground in parish life, with the sharing of good practice, since the first steps have already been taken.

We need to fan the flames again (the “embers beneath the ashes” that Karl Rahner and Cardinal Carlo Martini so often spoke about)”

We owe a great deal of gratitude to the National Synodal Team for getting us to this point. And to the Irish Bishops who initiated this journey back in 2021. But Kilkenny has shown us that we can take nothing for granted. The synodal turn of the Church has been a beacon of hope and promise to many in Ireland, at a time of crisis for our Church, a time when many are (still) hanging on by their finger nails. We need to fan the flames again (the “embers beneath the ashes” that Karl Rahner and Cardinal Carlo Martini so often spoke about). This will entail risk, but unless we really do wish to circle the wagons and settle for a version of the ‘Benedict option’ (in the words of former Archbishop of Dublin, Diarmuid Martin, a church of “a culturally irrelevant minority”), then we do well to launch out ‘into the deep’ again.

We will need a little more time to let things settle, and what I have offered here is an initial take, as a contribution to a more mature reception over the next short while. The Spirit is in this ferment and it is good to renew our hope that we are being led in the direction of a Church that is renewed and reformed and is a source of hope for our world. This was the synodal vision of Pope Francis, now endorsed by Pope Leo XIV.