“History has shown that the use of fear tactics by those who resist any kind of renewal that involves change is not new,” the archbishop said.
He cited St. John XXIII’s warning, given at the outset of the Second Vatican Council, to beware of “prophets of doom who are always forecasting disaster” in the life of the Church.
Critics of the synod “totally mischaracterize” its aims and intentions, Cupich said. The bishops at the meeting will be primarily examining how Catholics are “to remain faithful to Christ’s own plan for the Church,” he argued.
Pope Francis’ calling of the synod, Cupich said, is “in keeping with the vision of his predecessors” and with Vatican II, the cardinal argued; the concept of “synodality” itself “speaks to an ancient reality” of the Catholic Church.
The archbishop cited the Vatican International Theological Commission’s argument that “making a synodal Church a reality is an indispensable precondition for a new missionary energy that will involve the entire people of God.”
“That surely is nothing ever to be feared,” Cupich said.