Pope Francis’s document on the family, published on Friday, will be a call to dialogue, according to a Vatican “reading guide” sent to bishops around the world.
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The reader’s guide does not directly address the question that has prompted the greatest amount of speculation about the papal document: whether Pope Francis will open a path for divorced-and-remarried Catholics to receive Communion.
Archbishop Eamon Martin of Armagh and Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin were among those who attended last year’s synod on “The Vocation and Mission of the Family in the Church and Contemporary World”.
Then he brought bishops and cardinals together for two Synods in Rome, at which he encouraged them to debate and even to disagree over issues that divide the church in many countries. “The Pope’s vision of society is inclusive”, the guide says.
Thedse range from offering communion for the divorced and remarried, contraception and the treatment of Catholics who are gay. Conservative bishops have reportedly warned that a change in the doctrine would weaken the Roman Catholic Church.
While progressives such as Cardinal Walter Kasper of Germany, who is one of Francis’ favourite theologians, favour this approach, it is opposed by conservatives, who say it would undermine the principle of the indissolubility of marriage that Jesus established.
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The papal document, formally known as a Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation, is also expected to call for better programmes for marriage preparation and echo the synod’s stand that homosexual unions can not be equated with heterosexual marriage.
