As the Catholic bishops’ synod at the Vatican concluded last week most news organisations focused on the fact that the bishops had ‘rejected’ proposals for wider acceptance of gay people, as well as the suggestion that divorced and remarried Catholics could receive Communion.

Pope Francis, it was pointed out, had suffered a setback in his attempt to create a more open Church. Technically speaking this was true: a draft report submitted before the conclusion of the synod failed to win the backing of two-thirds of the bishops, which is the required threshold for approval.

However, more than half the bishops, that is, an absolute majority and apparently just short of a two-thirds majority, voted in favour of the original document and therefore backed the Pope. This in itself is quite an achievement and shows that the Church is open to change. It also shows that Pope Francis has had a tremendous impact on the Church and that a solid basis has been laid for further discussions and reform when the synod reconvenes in Rome in a year’s time.

There is little doubt that under Pope Francis the Church is having an open and frank discussion about families and social issues, and that despite last week’s proposals failing to receive the backing of two-thirds of the bishops (quite a high threshold) the Church is moving in the direction of reform, greater tolerance and openness.

More than half the bishops, that is, an absolute majority and apparently just short of a two-thirds majority, voted in favour of the original document and therefore backed the Pope

Proof of this is a statement issued by The New Ways Ministry, a US Catholic gay rights group, which said that while it was “very disappointing” that the synod’s final report had not retained “the gracious welcome to lesbian and gay people that the draft of the report included” it was evident that the synod’s “openness to discussion” provided “hope for further development down the road”.

Christopher Lamb, from the British Catholic journal The Tablet, told the BBC that the discussion at the synod had been a “huge achievement in itself”. He added: “We have now got an acceptance that we need a new language in the Church when talking about gay couples and homosexuality in general.”

Perhaps parts of the original draft, despite being well intentioned, went overboard in its choice of words for a number of bishops, some of whom are very conservative and come from socially conservative countries. They will need time – and convincing – to adapt to the changing environment in the Church. Furthermore, it looked like the intense media spotlight on the original draft report – which was quite revolutionary – caused the conservatives to panic, who then made sure that parts of the document were removed from the final version.

It is clear that radical change in the Church will not come overnight, especially when discussing the institution of marriage, which for the Church is the permanent union of a man and a woman. The challenge for the Church is not to abandon this core belief but to find a way of acknowledging today’s realities and welcoming divorced and remarried Catholics, as well as gays, into its fold, many of whom, after all, want to remain in the Church. Reaching a consensus on this among bishops from Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas will certainly not be easy, but is not impossible.

It is important to appreciate that Pope Francis has opened a new chapter in the history of the Church and that it would have been unheard of for some of the ideas that were openly discussed at the synod to have been debated previously.

Recently, for example, German Cardinal Walter Kasper, a leading Church liberal and the former president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, suggested that the Church should follow the Eastern Orthodox Church by allowing some people who had remarried civilly to undergo a period of penance that would eventually lift their ban on Holy Communion. This could certainly be one way of accommodating divorced and remarried Catholics.

At the start of the synod the Pope told his bishops and cardinals: “Speak clearly. Let no one say: ‘This you cannot say.’” As he concluded the synod, despite the ‘setback’ he received, he made it clear that he wanted the Church to be open to “new things”.

I do not recall any similar statements being made by any other Pope, nor do I recall proposals backed by a Pope being actually publicly ‘rejected’ by the Church’s bishops. Instead of imposing his views, as he is entitled to do, the Pope chose to have his bishops freely discuss some of the challenges facing the Catholic Church. We are truly witnessing history before our eyes.

Where does Pope Francis go from here? It is likely that he will appoint more reform-minded cardinals and bishops and that he will continue discussions among Catholics to increase support for reforms. These will once again be discussed at the next synod in October 2015, which will make its final recommendations to the Pope.

We can expect some resistance, of course, from a number of conservative bishops over the next 12 months, who will be scared of change. The challenge facing the Pope will be to convince these bishops that the Church has no intention of altering its core doctrine (it will never approve of same-sex marriage, for example) but needs to be more flexible in embracing gay people, as well as divorced and remarried Catholics.

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