By Filipe Domingues
ROME — The working document intended to guide the world’s Catholic bishops at the Synod of Bishops this fall on youth and vocations says the Church is called to lead all, without exception, to the joy of God’s love.
The Vatican released the anticipated “Instrumentum laboris” for this synod June 19. The document is the main orientation for the Synod Fathers on the synod theme, “Young people, faith and vocational discernment.” It says giving special attention to young people is not an option for the Church, “but a substantial part of its vocation and mission.” The Church “is invited to accompany all young people, no one excluded, towards the joy of love” lived in God, the document reads.
The words “accompaniment” and “discernment” permeate the whole document, released in Italian. The document speaks of the need for the Church to think of new and attractive ways to lead young people to a true, personal encounter with Jesus Christ. For this reason, new methods of “discernment,” defined as a way of “being in the world, a style, a fundamental behavior and at the same time a method of work,” will be necessary.
The text is divided into three parts — recognize, interpret and choose — following the traditional see-judge-act methodology of Catholic Social Teaching.
The theme of accompaniment is recurrent in the pontificate of Pope Francis and was central at the Synod on the Family. Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, secretary of the Synod of Bishops, acknowledged the similarity at a Vatican press conference, saying: “The accompaniment of young people already appeared in the exhortation Amoris Laetitia.”
According to Father Giacomo Costa, one of the writers of the document, “accompaniment” is an expression of the pastoral care that the pope has expressed, as in the encyclical “Laudato Si’.”
The desire for accompaniment turned up “very strongly among young people” and was therefore included in the working document,” he said.
The 60-plus-page document is a compilation of five different sources of information: a congress held in the Vatican in 2017; an online questionnaire; the pre-synodal meeting of young people in March; the final document of the same meeting; and contributions sent directly to the Secretariat.