The next one is to take place in October in Rome. But there should be bishops and cardinals who are really free.
Freedom of speech is an absolute condition for good management of the church.
Cardinal Danneels, archbishop of Brussels, was one of the few cardinals who felt free to talk to reporters about the meeting. Others said another Belgian cardinal, Jan Pieter Schotte, the Vatican official in charge of the synods, had told them to keep their discussions private. Today was the last working day of a four-day consistory, a meeting of more than 150 cardinals called by Pope John Paul II to address concerns like ecumenicism, poverty in the age of globalization, the family, and collegiality, a code word for less rigid Vatican control over local churches. All of those topics and more were broached. It divides top church officials and mobilizes lay Catholic groups.