Francis tilts balance of family synod

In a powerful signal of the direction in which he wants the October Synod on the Family to be guided, Pope Francis has reportedly named Chicago Archbishop Blase Cupich as a special delegate to the Synod. Catholic News Agency and other sources reported the appointment, which has yet to be confirmed.

The US bishops in November named a four-person synod delegation that included the conservative archbishops Charles Chaput of Philadelphia and José Gomez of Los Angeles, as well as the president and vice-president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, Archbishop Joseph Kurtz of Louisville and Cardinal Daniel DiNardo of Galveston-Houston.

When the bishops chose their delegation at a closed-door session of their plenary last November, they also named as alternates Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, the bishops’ main spokesman in their fight against same-sex marriage, and Archbishop Cupich, a strong advocate of social justice whose appointment to Chicago was seen very much as a personal choice of Pope Francis.

Boston cardinal and the US church leader closest to Pope Francis, Sean O’Malley, was reportedly an unappointed nominee in November. The Pope could still appoint him as a delegate.

After last year’s extraordinary synod, when issues regarding the kind of welcome that should be given to gays in the Church, and whether divorced and remarried Catholics should receive Communion, were fiercely disputed, Archbishop Chaput said that, because of some of the reporting, “the public image that came across was one of confusion” and “confusion is of the devil”.

As well as Archbishop Cupich, Pope Francis has reportedly appointed another US bishop to the Synod, George Murry of Youngstown, Ohio. An African-American, Bishop Murry is a Jesuit like Pope Francis. If these appointments are confirmed, they will show a tilt in the kind of balance Pope Francis is looking for at the summit.

Murry and Cupich took part in a conference on “solidarity and faith” on 15 June, at the headquarters of the AFL-CIO (the largest federation of trade unions in the US), along with the Archbishop of Washington D.C. Cardinal Donald Wuerl and other bishops seen as supporters of the Francis approach to social justice. Cardinal Wuerl serves on the body that plans the Synod, and is expected to attend in that capacity.

Wuerl told trade union leaders on 15 June that organised labour is recognised by the Church as one of the “instruments of solidarity and justice”. The conference was the first in years that featured prominent Catholic leaders.

The 4-24 October synod will follow Francis’ first visit to the US next month, a trip that is expected to highlight many of the issues that generated heated debate last October. But he will apparently have a warm welcome from the trade unions. “The American labour movement is at the disposal of the Pope,” AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka told the June meeting. “We will do anything that he needs to be done to make his visit a total success.”