Fresh from the Bishops’ Synod in Rome, Gozo Bishop Mario Grech tells Kurt Sansone why the Church has to walk side by side with divorcees.

Bishop Mario Grech sits in the lobby of a Sliema hotel after attending the launch of the Church’s internet news portal. The Church could not afford to be absent from the web, he had just told his audience.

Man is such a complex reality, how can I judge anybody?

His words echoed a message that came out of the Bishops’ Synod in Rome last month, which Mgr Grech also addressed.

But now, in a less formal setting, he sits in front of a journalist trying to understand the synod’s call for a ‘new evangelisation’.

Mgr Grech smiles at the mere suggestion that his words on divorcees at the synod provided a significant opening for Catholics who have drifted away from the Church.

In what many observers of the domestic Church felt was a break from the past, Mgr Grech called for a Church that “accompanied” divorcees in a journey of faith. The Church must show them love and not condemn them, he told the gathering of bishops.

It was a message reflected in Pope Benedict XVI’s homily in the mass that closed the synod last week. The Pontiff urged for the return of “lukewarm” Catholics.

In the hotel lobby full of people moving in and out Mgr Grech speaks candidly about his reflections in Rome, which were reiterated in the synod’s final document.

“Divorce is morally wrong but we have to distinguish between the mistake and the individual,” he says, acknowledging the “fragility” of humanity.

He talks of friends who have passed through a separation and found love elsewhere, and how he felt the need to take their suffering as Catholics in search of the truth to the synod.

“In the Church we have to correct those who are too enthusiastic to judge others and those who look down on these people. This is not Christ. Man is such a complex reality, how can I judge anybody?”

His words jar with the image of a fiery bishop speaking of wolves in sheep’s clothing last year at the height of the divorce referendum campaign. Mgr Grech had, from the Church pulpit, come down heavily against divorce and those who agreed with its introduction.

It is an episode he wants to revisit. Choosing his words carefully he says his message may have been “manipulated by the media”.

“I never said those who vote for divorce were brigands but there was a group posing as Catholics speaking in favour of divorce. It was these who I referred to as wolves in sheep’s clothing. I believe in the separation of Church and State and am ready to dialogue with anyone as long as people are sincere about their intentions.”

He insists marriage breakdowns and the formation of different families not united in the sacrament of marriage are a pastoral concern. Divorcees, separated people and cohabiting couples are still members of the Church, he adds.

A question that often rises in these circumstances is the role of conscience and the individual’s belief that his actions are correct.

Mgr Grech says conscience is “the noblest faculty of man” and nobody has a right to temper with it. However, he cautions against using conscience to excuse all behaviour.

“Many bad things happened in the name of conscience but Catholics are urged to enlighten their conscience using the Church’s teachings as a guide. Everybody goes through a gradual discovery of the truth,” he says.

Referring to the synod’s conclusions he says the Church in these circumstances has to be like Jesus who visited the Samaritan woman standing next to the empty well.

“The first meeting with Christ has to be in day-to-day experiences. The pulpit is less important. What counts is the presence of the Church where people live and work,” Mgr Grech says.

He describes this as the Church’s pastoral work on the streets. Priests have to dirty their hands, he adds. “A priest has to be close to the people but sometimes we retreat to our altar in self defence because we’re scared of being dragged into other people’s muck.”

It is a frank admission of the Church’s failing to connect with contemporary Catholics, something that worries Mgr Grech.

He feels it is not enough to stop at the analysis and in Gozo, his diocese, he has encouraged parish priests to create a fund to pay for a lay administrator.

“I don’t want parish priests bogged down in administrative work. They have to be out there with the people,” he says.

He insists it does not make sense to close the churches at a time when people were still arriving home from work. “I have asked parish priests to leave at least one chapel in every locality open 24 hours a day so that anybody wanting to find space for reflection can do so.”

Mgr Grech is under no illusion of the difficulties the Church faces in a world where irrelevance is a bigger challenge than confrontation. Irrelevance is like salt gone bad, he says.

But conversion has to start within the Church, Mgr Grech points out. Priests have to discover God to be able to transmit his love to others, he adds in almost poetic terms.

“The Church is not the law or the institution. It is a family, a community for those who are searching for God,” Mgr Grech explains.

Drawing on another homily he gave last year, he says the Church must not be satisfied simply because it keeps filling its churches every Sunday or during the feast with people more interested in ritual and tradition.

In another frank admission he says there is “no fun” in the liturgy of the mass. “The liturgy has to be alive, it is a celebration and people have to understand what they are praying for. The liturgy has to be a vehicle for evangelisation.”

Clasping his hands together, he smiles and acknowledges that changing a culture takes time.

“And today we have to go one step further and understand people through a digital mind. We have to be present in the virtual pjazza,” he says, adding the news portal is a start but more will have to be done.

As Mgr Grech pronounces his last words, the hotel lobby is almost empty. In the background an Italian woman is quarrelling with someone else over her phone.

Connecting with an increasingly complex society is no easy task. But like the fresh breeze outside the hotel, Mgr Grech’s tone of voice has signalled change.

How deep the change is and for how long it will last, can only be judged over the passage of time.

The Bishops’ Synod

The synod brings together the Catholic Church’s bishops from around the world in a three-week gathering. It was held last month and Gozo Bishop Mario Grech represented the Maltese Episcopal Conference.

What the synod said on...

Different families: To all of them we want to say that God’s love does not abandon anyone, that the Church loves them too, that the Church is a house that welcomes all, that they remain members of the Church even if they cannot receive sacramental absolution and the Eucharist.

Outcasts: We must form welcoming communities in which all outcasts find a home...

Modern society: Secularisation requires the Church to rethink its presence in society without however renouncing it.

Social media: Evangelisation requires that we pay much attention to the world of social communication, especially the new media...

ksansone@timesofmalta.com