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Synod - Final Document

The Synod Document is a gift to the People of God

Pope Francis highlighted how the final document, written over the course of the 2nd Session of the Synod on Synodality that began on the 2nd October following a process of listening and dialogue, is the fruit of over three years of listening to the People of God. It reveals, he noted, a shared path forward toward a "synodal Church" that embodies the Gospel not merely through words but through every act and interaction.

Pope Francis described the document as a gift with multiple dimensions, serving as both guidance for the Church and as a symbol of unity and shared mission.

Highlighting the Church's role as a peacemaker in a broken world, the Pope said "In our time marked by wars, we must be witnesses of peace, even by learning how to live out our differences in conviviality." The Spirit, he reminded the assembly, is the unifying force of the Church across all cultures, challenges, and hopes, and thanking the assembly for their participation, Pope Francis encouraged all Synod participants to carry gifts of the Spirit into the world as a Church that listens, prays and acts with humility.

Download the Final Document of the Synod 2024.   

Diocese Of Galloway Synod Document

The response to the Synod from the Diocese of Galloway is available to download.

Scottish Church Responds To Pope's Synod Call
 
The Catholic Church in Scotland has submitted its response to the call from Pope Francis in 2021 to participate in a two-year process called “a synod on synodality,” which will inform discussion and debate in the coming year on the life and priorities of the global church. The Scottish church submitted its response to the Vatican on 10 August 2022. Each diocese in Scotland participated in the Synodal process, while efforts were made to engage pastorally with the various dimensions of Church life in Scotland beyond diocesan and parish boundaries, including; Prison Chaplains, the Scottish Catholic Education Service, Catholic schools and SCIAF. Meetings and events held across the country, reported a post-pandemic climate of hope and optimism, with the final document describing “the first shoots of new ecclesial life”. Parishes and communities, unable to celebrate Mass and the Sacraments together in person, have discovered new ways of being parish, whether in online celebrations, reaching out to the most vulnerable members of their communities, providing foodbanks etc. For the first-time new volunteers have become involved in the daily parish life, while a new ministry of welcome was instituted in many parishes. Please click here to download the document. If you can’t download it at home, let the Parish Office know and we will print out a copy for you.
 
Galloway Diocese Synod Summary Now Available
 
In September 2021, a Diocesan Synodal Team was formed, consisting of three lay women, one lay man, and one diocesan priest whose primary role was to provide spiritual direction to the lay team. A period of intense preparation followed as the format of synodal encounters was prayerfully decided on and developed, facilitators for these encounters were identified and trained, and the ten thematic nuclei provided by the Vatican were circulated with short reflective videos to encourage participation across the diocese. The Summary of all the hard work and efforts is now available. You can download the document here. If you need paper copy, please ask in the Sacristy. Thanks!
 
What is Synodality ?
 
‘Synodality’ is about ‘walking together’. How is our ‘walking together’ in synodality realised today in the Church? What steps does the Holy Spirit invite us to take in order to grow in our ‘walking together’? To help people explore this fundamental question more fully, these themes highlight significant aspects of ‘lived synodality’. Download here.
 
Synod 2021-2023

Pope Francis has asked us, the people of St Bride’s and St Peter’s Parishes, to help him. Not just us, of course, but every parish in every diocese across the world. He wants us to spend some time listening to each other in our parishes. He wants us, individually and together with our families and friends, to ask ourselves what the Holy Spirit wants our  church to be in this Third Millennium. Why us? Our Catholic Faith teaches us that the Holy Spirit speaks through all the members of the Church, lay-people, religious, deacons and priests, bishops and the Pope. Each of us have something to say and he wants to listen. That’s why he recently said “In the one People of God let us journey together, in order to experience a Church that receives and lives this gift of unity, and is open to the voice of the Spirit.”

Pope Francis seeks a Church where all can feel at home and participate. He wants us to become a listening Church, to break out of our routine in order to stop and listen, firstly to the Spirit in adoration and prayer, and then to our brothers and sisters, their hopes, the crises of faith around the world, the need for renewed pastoral life. So, Pope Francis needs us, each and everyone of us, priests and people, women and men, young and not so young, church-goers and non-church-goers. Let us all help Pope Francis to fulfil his ministry as our Holy Father......Father Duncan, Parish Priest.