UNITED KINGDOM
The Tablet
The Catholic Church is beginning a process to find out what Catholics think about matters surrounding the family – issues like divorce, cohabitation, same-sex relationships, contraception and the raising of children.
In September, The Tablet reported that a Synod of Bishops would be held to discuss matters regarding the family. There is now going to be another, Extraordinary Synod of Bishops “on pastoral challenges of the family in the context of evangelisation”. This extraordinary synod will take place in September 2014, to examine issues, then the main synod will be held in 2015 to produce guidelines.
The synod’s secretary general, Archbishop Lorenzo Baldisseri, has sent to episcopal conferences around the world a 38-item questionnaire on pastoral challenges for families and asked them to share it as widely as possible, in order to solicit responses that could be part of the working document for next year’s assembly.
By 20 December – in just a few weeks’ time – each diocese has to feed back to Rome responses to the complex questionnaire. The Bishops of England and Wales have taken the unusual step of posting the questionnaire on the conference’s website to gather responses from individual Catholics, while other countries’ bishops will use other ways to glean information.
Below are the questions. If you want to fill in the actual form, visit: www.surveymonkey.com/s/FamilySynod2014
The following series of questions allows the particular churches to participate actively in the preparation of the extraordinary synod, whose purpose is to proclaim the Gospel in the context of the pastoral challenges facing the family today.
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