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In his mission of fostering a dynamic, open and missionary communion, he [the bishop] will
have to encourage and develop the means of participation proposed in the Code of Canon
Law …and other forms of pastoral dialogue, out of a desire to listen to everyone and not
simply to those who would tell him what he would like to hear. Yet, the principal aim of
these participative processes should not be ecclesiastical organisation but rather the
missionary aspirations of reaching everyone.

It is absolutely against the New Testament data, tradition, and teachings of Vatican II to suggest in
any way that the span and gamut of the Church's mission is absolved within the structures of
ordained ministry. Lumen Gentium cautions against any such reduction of the Church's mission
within the clerical world. It says, "They [ministers] also know that they were not ordained by Christ
to take upon themselves alone the entire salvific mission of the Church towards the world” (LG 30).
Implied therein is that the mission involves the entire people of God, their participation and
cooperation. Hence the organisation within the Church and the process of decision-making should be
such that a system of cooperation and mutuality is set in place. That is precisely what the principle
and practice of synodality is. In other words, we are not dealing only with organisational efficiency
in the governing of the Church, but with the realisation of the mission of the Church to which goal
synodality is an indispensable means.

We have become an excessively sacramental Church. Faith has many other expressions than the
sacraments. The world itself is the sacrament of God, and the questions and issues it poses need to be
faced in faith. The response to the burning questions and issues of society requires a process of
discernment and involvement. Often the pusillanimity and tardiness of evasive leadership in
responding to the problems could be challenged by the people of God, and wisdom could come out
of the mouths of babes. Hence the importance of allowing the many voices of the people of God in
the work of mission vis-à-vis the larger society. In today‟s circumstances standing for justice and
human rights, for peace and integrity of creation calls for concerted action on the part of the Church
community. In a conflicting and highly complex mission situation, there is a need to think, deliberate
and act together. However, the understanding of mission in the Preparatory Document appears to me
scanty, and one needs to cast the net wider and dive deeper than just reduce its treatment to a single
paragraph (no. 29).

The interrelationship of synodality and mission is crucial in our Indian context. However, among the
ten thematic issues to be explored their figure “Coresponsibility in Mission” and “Dialogue in
Church and Society” (no. 30). In this context, the document has raised a very relevant question
which we need to take up seriously in India and respond to. The question is this: “How does
collaboration work in territories where different sui iuris Churches are present? (no. 30). We are
witnessing today how the energy and time of the ritual Churches are sapped by such issues as to
whether to celebrate the Eucharist facing the people or facing the wall - an issue which has been
reported widely in the secular press of the country. Could we expect greater synodality among the
present three rites with a focus on the burning issues of the country, mission, and witness to the
larger society?

Shared Synodal Journey in a World of Uncertainties
We live in a world in which there are more uncertainties than certainties. The uncertainty principle is
deeply ingrained in the physical world as science tells us, and we are becoming aware that the same
principle is even more at work in the social world wherein we need to cope with what is
unpredictable, unimagined, and address new issues and questions often disturbingly chaotic. The
experience of the pandemic covid- 19 gave us a little taste of what is in store - a world that is not
going to move along clearly predictable lines (which is the Enlightenment arrogance), but instead
will disconcert us, disrupts our set pattern of thoughts and modes of action.

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