Church must acknowledge ‘defects’ in order to rebuild

Bishop Brendan Leahy has warned that to rebuild the Church there first needs to be “an acknowledgement in humility of its defects”.

Speaking ahead of Limerick’s diocesan synod due to take place this weekend, the bishop said the assembly will be an opportunity to take both the good and the bad of Church life and “do our part to repair and remedy, to improve things, and thereby radiate Christ in our communities and our families, in our schools and social projects, among our young people and in our liturgy”.

Dr Leahy also said the synod, the first in Ireland in half a century, is a chance for the whole diocese to take significant steps to “help us begin together again in mission”.

Failure

“We need to acknowledge the failure and disappointment we see in our own wounds, those at the heart of the Church, in all that has not been right in the Church, in the complex situations of the world around us,” he said.

The three-day gathering will see delegates consider over 100 proposals across six separate themes to help map out the future of the Church and how it serves in Limerick.

The proposals and themes have emerged out of a lengthy and detailed engagement with over 5,000 people covering all demographics from across the diocese in 2015.

Looking ahead to the synod, Bishop Leahy said “we are at a really important juncture in the lifetime of the Church”.

“There continues to be incredible work done but we have also come through turbulent times. There are challenges ahead but we will embrace them as opportunities,” Dr Leahy said.

“We have to confront the decline in vocations, for example, but this issue also makes us see the Church as a people, with clergy and laity working side by side to ensure the Church delivers spiritually, pastorally and, indeed, socially in the way it can,” he said.