Synodality: “The Tedium is the Message”

The 'synodal process' goes on and on. To what end?

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The Tedium is the Message

The 'synodal process' goes on and on. To what end?

PHIL LAWLER MAY 21 ∙ PREVIEW

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The Synod on Synodality, which Pope Francis loosed on the world back in 2021, is still going strong— even if, after five prolix years, only a handful of Catholics outside the ecclesiastical bureaucracy know what the word “synodality” means.

If you’re a member of that ignorant majority, don’t feel bad. You’ll have many more opportunities to catch the drift of the conversation, which is fated to continue at least through October 2028. This week the Vatican’s Synod office released a document outlining the latest plans for the 3-year review process following the 5-year process that culminated in the 2-year process of general meetings of the Synod of Bishops.

Did I say “outlining” the plans? That “outline” runs to 18 pages and about six thousand words; the organizers of the synodal process are nothing if not wordy. And did I say “process”? That particular word occurs more than 35 times in the new Vatican document. (I cannot provide a definitive count because when I try to concentrate on the text, my eyes lose vertical hold.)

Synodality is a process; that much has become evident. In theory this process brings together Catholics— and others; everyone is welcome— to talk about the process. These conversations begin at the parish level, then extend to dioceses, to countries, to continents, and finally culminate in the grand finale in Rome.

You might think that we’ve already been through this process, and you’d be right. Except that the “finale” was not final. After the first meeting of the Synod bishops (and others; see above) in Rome, Pope Francis called for a second plenary meeting. And after that meeting, the Synod office announced that the Pope had authorized the aforementioned 3-year review of the process...

More:

https://open.substack.com/pub/pflawler/p/the-tedium-is-the-message?r=2x82t4&utm_medium=ios

Spanish Priest Turns WhatsApp Matchmaker, Claims Record of 340 Marriages, Zero Divorces

340 marriages. ZERO divorces. 💍❌

Meet, a priest from who has become famous for helping Catholics find lifelong spouses using nothing more than simple WhatsApp messages. 🇪🇸📱

Nicknamed the “Tinder Priest,” Father Fernando rejects modern dating apps and algorithm-driven matchmaking. Instead, he relies on detailed questionnaires exploring a person’s virtues, flaws, values, and most importantly, the role God holds in their life.

His matchmaking principles are surprisingly strict:

📍 Strong faith compatibility

📍 No long-distance relationships

📍 Shared life goals and vocation

📍 Even practical compatibility, including height preferences

Once both individuals approve the profiles, he simply shares their phone numbers and steps aside completely.

Decades into this unusual ministry, Father Fernando claims that none of the couples he matched have separated, an extraordinary record that has drawn attention across the Catholic world. ❤️

For many, his success points to something deeper: relationships rooted in shared faith, commitment, sacrifice, and spiritual purpose may offer a stronger foundation than surface-level attraction alone.

Andrea Grillo agrees with me

@M_P_Hazell;

“Well, well, well: Andrea Grillo, described as the "mind behind TC", has come up with what he calls "a different, but realistic proposal" for liturgical peace: just make the Novus Ordo look as much like the TLM as possible. Only a few decades late to the party...! 😅”

N.B. Grillo here describes exactly what a certain Sunday Mass I know well looks like every week:

We were made well aware from the very beginning of formation that the novus Ordo was a Mass of “options”. Some of us opted all along for a TLM look-alike. It isn’t more complicated than that. And we certainly don’t need an intellectual to tell us that. End of story.

Pope Leo refuses to visit chapel desecrated by Rupnik mosaics in Almudena Cathedral

Josh Mansfield:

“This has VERY much flown under the radar.  While visiting the Almudena Cathedral today, Pope Leo refused to visit the Blessed Sacrament Chapel, which is covered in Rupnik mosaics. During his address, while discussing the miracle of Our Lady, he also quietly addressed the issues.”

N.B. Perhaps the bishop will take the cue and soon tear out the overpriced offensive tesserae glorifying a monster and sacrilegious (allegedly) rapist predator.

Pope Leo in Spain: “If life ceases to be recognized as a fundamental value, what future can our societies have?”

Leo XIV in address to the Spanish Cortes Generales (Parliament) and in front of abortion-obsessed Prime Minister Sánchez: “If life ceases to be recognized as a fundamental value, what future can our societies have? Can a community that leaves in the shadows the child not yet born, the elderly person, the sick, those who suffer in silence, or those who depend entirely on the care of others truly be called fully just? The defense of human life is not a matter of particular or confessional interest: it is a goal of civilization. Every human life must be recognized and safeguarded from conception until its natural sunset, in every circumstance of its existence. When this certainty grows dim, the most vulnerable are the first victims, and the law loses its deepest meaning: to serve and protect every person. For this reason, the moral greatness of a nation is manifested, above all, in its ability to accompany, protect, and love those lives marked by greater fragility."

His remarks were met with a standing ovation.

‘Europe is Christianity’: Müller says the West must return to the faith to defeat Islam, globalism

Without faith in Christ, Europe becomes 'a lifeless body' ripe for takeover by its ‘strongest neighbor,’ Cardinal Gerhard Müller warned amid Islamic migration and ‘Orwellian’ globalism.

Cardinal Gerhard MüllerWikimedia Commons/Elke Wetzig

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Andreas Wailzer

Mon May 18, 2026 - 11:42 am EDT

(LifeSiteNews) — Cardinal Gerhard Müller has warned that the West is threatened by Islamic migration and “Orwellian” globalist elites and will not survive without a return to Christianity.

In an essay published by kath.net, the German cardinal detailed the political and religious problems the West is facing and traced them to their philosophical roots in the anti-Christian Enlightenment.

He said the Western world cannot survive without the Christian faith because “the West is nothing other than the cultural community of the Germanic and Slavic tribes and nations, which emerged from the legacy of the Western Roman Empire and are united in their faith in Christ, the Son of God and universal Savior of humanity.”

“Thus, Europe is Christianity in its synthesis with Greek metaphysics and the Roman will for order according to the principle of justice – that is, the will to give to each his due: suum cuique (Ulpian) or, to put it theologically, the inviolable dignity of every human being as the image and likeness of God.”

“Outside of this definition, Europe loses its formative soul and becomes a lifeless body that, like an ownerless territory, falls into the hands of the nearest and strongest neighbor,” he argued.

Citing the late Pope Francis, Müller said that “we are already in the midst of a Third World War, in stages.” Explaining, he said:

If we consider the global context, we see civil wars, the collapse of the rule of law in many states, the Orwellian surveillance state envisioned by Brussels (the Digital Services Act, the bureaucratic erasure of national identities), the migration of millions who can no longer be integrated into Europe but instead establish competing Islamic societies, hunger and poverty affecting half of humanity, global terrorism perpetrated by criminal gangs and rogue states alongside organized crime, the unstable political conditions in traditional democracies falling into the hands of globalist elites with their project for a One World entirely under their control – a Brave New World à la Aldous Huxley (1922).

“Only the conceit of Western superiority remains alive,” Müller mused. “Should our secularism and materialism – as in the days of colonialism – be imposed as a panacea on the supposedly backward East and South, under the motto: Development aid only on the condition of legalizing same-sex marriage and the killing of children in the womb, euthanasia, and assisted suicide – and all of this for the sake of drastically reducing the population due to climate protection and the scarcity of material resources?”

More: https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/europe-is-christianity-muller-says-the-west-must-return-to-the-faith-to-defeat-islam-globalism/

“If the world hates you…”

Beloved: Do not be surprised if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love the brethren. He who does not love abides in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. In this we have come to know His love, that He laid down His life for us; and we likewise ought to lay down our life for the brethren. He who has the goods of this world and sees his brother in need and closes his heart to him, how does the love of God abide in him? My dear children, let us not love in word, neither with the tongue, but in deed and in truth.

I John lll. 13-18