Boston College, the University of Notre Dame and Santa Clara University hosted day-long seminars last week on the theme of “A New Momentum for Moral Formation and Pastoral Practice” in light of Amoris Laetitia. The conferences, that followed a two-day conference on the same theme last October at Boston College, were conducted in concert with the Dicastery on Family, Life and the Laity. Boston College professor Fr James Keenan SJ and Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago were the principal organisers.
Each session featured theologians and bishops presenting on different topics related to Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation on the family, with a team of theologians presenting at all three venues, although each session had different bishops among the presenters. Bishops Robert McElroy and Steven Biegler gave talks at Santa Clara, Cardinals Cupich and Joseph Tobin delivered presentations at Notre Dame; Archbishop Wilton Gregory spoke at the Boston College event, and Archbishop Bernard Hebda read a paper prepared by Cardinal Donald Wuerl, who cancelled his appearance at the last minute due to the flu.
Most of the public conversation about Amoris Laetitia has focused narrowly on Chapter 8 of the text, which treats of “irregular” unions, but these conferences aimed to broaden out that debate. “Both for last October’s conference and for these three sessions, we built on the approach taken by [former Archbishop of Paris] Cardinal Vingt-Trois at the Institut Catholique,” Cardinal Cupich told the Tablet. “It seemed to me that was a good model to follow, and so we recruited theologians who could address the document in its entirety.” On 17 October 2016 the Institut Catholique held a study day on Amoris Laetitia entitled “Discernment and the maturation of conscience”.
“If people saw who came to these sessions, I think they’d be surprised at how diverse the group was,” Fr Keenan told the Tablet. He also said the dialogical nature of the sessions was something that especially appealed to the participants. “So many bishops said ‘We have to figure out how to have more dialogues like this,’” said Fr Keenan. A total of 62 bishops have now participated in these sessions on Amoris.
PICTURE: Cardinal Blase J. Cupich of Chicago is seen in Chicago in 2017 ©CNS
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