The beauty that feeds us. Imagine the change of the Catholic Church with the synodal method

Reflections by Mara Grassi and Antonio De Caro of the Association La Tent di Gionata sull 'National assembly of the synodal network (Assisi, 22-23 February 2025)

What follows is the report of the work done in Assisi on the afternoon of Saturday 22 March 2025, during the national meeting of the synodal network.

In particular, Mara and Antonio De La Tenda di Gionata, led the work of one of the two groups on Vision of sexuality and presence of LGBT+ people in the Church, in which LGBT+people participated, parents, educators, teachers, priests and a nun.

The work followed the synodal method: nobody proposed pre -established solutions, but the proposals were born spontaneously from the story of people's experiences. We believe, in fact, that every human story is a sacred place, where the divine Ruah He reveals himself and speaks to us.

That's why we want, through personal experiences, to land in a renewed faith to be donated to the Church. From it we expect no more messages of repentance for the errors it has made in the past, but a real change, because it becomes more and more a mother who recognizes the infinite dignity of each of her daughters and each of her children and does not lose anyone .

This hope supports our path together, our Synod, towards a change that is actually a return to the universal fraternity announced by the Gospel. We want to be the disciple and disciples who, when the excluded seeks Jesus, or even when they stopped doing it, bring them closer and invite them to the canteen.

Synod means transforming the hierarchical order and starting from the base, not from the top of the pyramid. Consequently, the way of doing theology must be changed and elaborating the thought and teaching of the Church starting from the stories and relationships between people, whose experience is the bearer of existential competence.

The Catholic Church is called to listen, to welcome, learning from the people of God, to whom prophetic dignity must be recognized. Only in this way can it say "here I am!" and become a place that hosts good relationships and takes care of the weakest people exposed to the violence of power (as are, for now, especially young people and young people with gender variance).

From the Catholic Church we expect pedagogical force and protection, the fear of this time is the most disturbing, the more disturbing is more disturbing; We expect that he rejects and condemn, without ambiguity or hesitation, every form of marginalization, exclusion and attack on all people and, in particular, LGBT+people, especially in countries where their condition is a cause for arrest, threat, torture and condemnation - also to the capital penalty.

The real scandal is when the Church fails to this task, in full contrast with the commandment of love and with the spirit of the beatitudes: for example when an LGBT+person, young or not, is removed and deprived of his positions at the service of the community; Or when it is addressed to the ferocious and devastating "reparative therapies" which, dismissed of any scientific foundation, are configured as real forms of moral, psychological and spiritual abuse.

We expect that the Catholic Church abandones every expression forever, oral or written, which offends and humiliates the dignity of the faithful and LGBT+people. It is a language and a mentality that hurt and instigate to hatred. The language of the curse must be replaced by the language of the blessing, which sees in sexuality not a sin, but a gift, to be welcomed and integrated into the identity of the person.

And the condition of LGBT+ people must no longer be considered or defined intrinsically bad or disorderly, but a dimension that opens them to construction and self -gift, even reaching a full and healthy sexual intimacy. This entails a revision of sexuality, which never must be reduced to the merely biological or genital aspect, but must be traced back to the inviolable dignity of the human person.

The Magisterium, overcoming the cultural conditioning that is no longer acceptable, must change, in order not to contradict itself with itself and above all in order not to mistreat people more.

An essential passage is that of the formation of priests, nuns, catechists, Catholic educators, religion teachers: coherent and uniform formation in the national dioceses, which takes into consideration human sciences, evolved biblical exegesis, free theology from conditioning and authoritarianisms.

We no longer accept that the Church Temporeggi, references, hides behind the non -existent and opportunistic ghost of ideology gender And it is hindered with the fundamentalist movements that, disturbingly, intend to bring political projects of discrimination and violence back to life, incompatible with the Gospel.

The path to inclusion must be constant, coherent and daily, in a serene conversation also with human sciences and civil society. Only in this way will it be possible to conceive and practice an inspired pastoral care not to a paternalistic deign (pastoral care for LGBT+people) but to an authentic dialogue with faithful adults and mature (pastoral with LGBT+people), which must be welcomed definitively, as individuals, as couples and as families. Love and family project must always be blessed and celebrated as a gift from God to the community.

Finally, we would like to keep three pearls of this beautiful work together in memory. The mother of a child in transition that remains close to him despite all the resistance and waste. A priest who, despite his eighty years, turned to us with his eyes full of tears, saying "I feel guilty, I would like to learn and do more for you".

A lesbian woman who, while deploring the errors of the Church, with a wonderful smile added that for her to believe in Jesus it means not dispersing the beautiful part, the part that nourishes us.

This wonderful, moving, stubborn love, despite all the suffering suffered also because of the Church, is a gift from God, is a powerful testimony, in which the faith of the Syro-Fenic woman will echo willing to collect even the crumbs from the table of grace .

We hope that, after the synodal path, the synodal style remains as the style of the Church to continue the dialogue and the co-construction of new communities. This is what we have experienced in conviviality and in the Eucharist of Assisi, in which the mutual welcome was gratitude for the gift that each* is and I invite you to always be and still for all, with the strength of the Risen.