The heads of the Church's continental bodies have gathered in Rome this week for three days of meetings dedicated to the next phase of the Synod on Synodality, according to a press release issued by the General Secretariat of the Synod on Monday.
The meeting, taking place on June 23-25, brings together representatives of continental ecclesial organizations from Latin America, Africa, Asia, Europe, Oceania, the Middle East, and North America, accompanied by coordinators of the continental synodal teams.
From the National Catholic Register:
Critics contrasted the [January 2026] meeting with earlier extraordinary consistories and papal consultations, which allowed broad discussion, direct listening by the Pope, and open exchanges among cardinals without filters or intermediaries.
The June consistory partially answers these procedural and collegial criticisms. In a leaked June 3 letter to the cardinals later confirmed in a published program, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the dean of the College of Cardinals, disclosed that a final session of “free dialogue” with three-minute interventions would take place, thereby giving the cardinals space to raise their own concerns rather than only react to pre-set themes.
The final discussion, expected to last no more than 90 minutes, will come at the end of four phases of controlled discussions: The first will offer each cardinal an opportunity to speak for three minutes, but only answering questions set out in the consistory program. A second “shared listening” phase will permit the cardinals to speak for two minutes, though no new proposals will be put forward; only significant points from the listening phase will be discussed. In a third phase, the groups and their secretaries will summarize their discussions which will then be entered into the final report.
Does this sound like a free and open discussion or a controlled meeting using the Delphi technique? If you aren't familiar with the DT here's a bit about how it works [Source]:
How does the process take place? The techniques are well developed and well defined. First, the person who will be leading the meeting, the facilitator or Change Agent must be a likeable person with whom those participating in the meeting can agree or sympathize with. It is, therefore, the job of the facilitator to find a way to cause a split in the audience, to establish one or a few of the people as “bad guys” while the facilitator is perceived as the “good guy.” Facilitators are trained to recognize potential opponents and how to make such people appear aggressive, foolish, extremist, etc. Once this is done, the facilitator establishes himself or herself as the “friend” of the rest of the audience. The stage is now set for the rest of the agenda to take place.
We all know who the "bad guys" are these days, Catholics who adhere to Sacred Tradition and the faith of the fathers. We know who the "good guys" are too: led by the pornographer running the Dicastery for the Fatih and Doctrine, Tucho Fernandez, and Cardinals like Cupich, McElroy, etc. who all have the pope's ear.
The Register article describes how the groups are arranged, each one with a chairman and secretary who will draft the final report, ostensibly with the input from the group. How honest do you think that process will be? In addition to the meeting, the cardinals may send an email limited to two pages to a dedicated address. The Register points out that "much depends on who has been given responsibility for managing the email responses so that the cardinals can be sure the Pope will read them."
Consistories used to involve a more open system instead of small group discussions which can be so easily manipulated. But no matter how things proceed does anyone really think many Catholics around the world are paying attention? How many are listening and care? Perhaps only those of us who know from past experience that nothing good is likely to come out of this meeting which ignores the major issues affecting the faith and has spokesmen introducing the topic like porn-bishop Cardinal Fernandez.
It's more than ho-hum; it's likely one more assault on the faith.
God save the Church!
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