First Things fortsetter artiklene fra bispesynoden (under pseudonymet Xavier Rynne II), og de er nokså kritiske. I et utdrag fra nr. 13 leser vi bl.a.:
JOHN PAUL II, YOUTH MINISTER
Pole that he was, Karol Wojtyła had a well-developed sense of historical irony. So from his present position in the Communion of Saints, he might be struck by the ironic fact that the Synod on “Youth, Faith, and Vocational Discernment” currently underway in Rome coincides with the fortieth anniversary of his election as Pope John Paul II on October 16, 1978. What’s the irony? The irony is that the most successful papal youth minister in modern history, and perhaps all history, was largely ignored in Synod-2018’s working document. And the Synod leadership under Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri seems strangely reluctant to invoke either his teaching or his example.
Følgende artikler er blitt publisert siden sist jeg nevnte dette:
Les kommentar nr. 10 – 16/10
Les kommentar nr. 11 – 17/10
Les kommentar nr. 12 – 18/10
Les kommentar nr. 13 – 19/10
Les kommentar nr. 14 – 22/10
Les kommentar nr. 15 – 23/10
Les kommentar nr. 16 – 24/10
Her er også et utdrag fra nr. 14:
The testimonies from successful young adult ministries that LETTERS FROM THE SYNOD has been privileged to publish for the past two and a half weeks all bear witness to a fact that both the Synod’s managers and some bishops can’t seem to grasp: In today’s cultural environment, at least in the West, young people are looking for the gospel, for friendship with Jesus Christ, and for communities in which the young and their spiritual mentors challenge each other to lead countercultural lives of integrity. They are not looking for more pandering in a world that already tells them they’re wonderful; they know they’re not, and they sense (and some know) that there are empty spaces in their lives the world cannot fill. That’s why the most vibrant young adult ministries in the 21st-century Church make religious and behavioral demands, even as they offer a hand of friendship, a supportive community, the Word of God in the Bible, and the grace of the sacraments.
More than one participant inside the Synod Hall and “Off Broadway” has observed that a lot of what’s been said by those the Synod managers evidently wanted in Rome for Synod-2018 sounds as if the Church had taken a trip back to the Seventies. … Cross-free, evangelically anorexic, soothing, Seventies-talk didn’t work in that lost decade. And it isn’t going to work now, when the cultural pressures on the young to conform to self-assertion rather than to embrace self-gift are even greater. …
Det skriver han, men stemmer det? Jeg har en mistanke om at det snarere er et forsøk på å skape «journalistikk» av en synode som etter hva jeg kan lese av reportasjer fra andre katolske nyhetskanaler samt fra biskoper som faktisk deltar i synoden, forløper uten de store konfliktene. Står mye bra og interesssant i First Things, men av og til er det trettende å høre om det samme narrativet igjen og igjen.