Those gathered for the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia are following in the footsteps of the early Christians, Cardinal John Dew said at Mass on Thursday evening.
The Archbishop of Wellington, one of the observers at the Plenary Council, was the homilist for Mass celebrated on the memorial of Blessed Peter To Rot, Papua New Guinea’s first Blessed.
Plenary Council Members have passed all six motions they considered on Thursday across parts of the agenda in the areas of Church governance and integral ecology.
Among the reforms backed were a call for the establishment of diocesan pastoral councils across the country, the hosting of diocesan synods within five years of the conclusion of the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia and the undertaking of broad consultation about the creation of a national synodal body for Church collaboration.
Due to a change in the program for the Plenary Council’s second assembly, no deliberative votes were cast on Thursday morning.
Council Members are working through four parts of the Motions and Amendments document, participating in reflection and discernment to move towards votes on the relevant motions for those parts of the document.
As Wednesday’s proceedings came to a close, Members of the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia were invited to remember the “saving unity” to which the Church is called.
The Mass for the Church was offered at St Mary’s Cathedral, after a day of further discernment following the results of the second rounds of voting. Details were published earlier in the day.
The Members of the Plenary Council have spent Wednesday afternoon working together to reconsider a pair of motions that were not passed earlier in the day.
In the first afternoon session, an overwhelming majority of Members backed a motion to reconsider the two motions from Part 4 of the Council’s Motions and Amendments document entitled “Witnessing to the Equal Dignity of Women and Men”.
Members of the Plenary Council are being invited to spend additional time to discern after two motions did not achieve a qualified majority in voting that has taken place over the past 24 hours.
The outcomes of the consultative and deliberative votes for motions of parts 3 and 4 of the Motions and Amendments document published last week have been announced. They can be found on the Plenary Council’s Motions and Voting page on the Council’s website.
Bishop Emeritus Eugene Hurley preaches the homily at the Mass for Christian Unity for the Plenary Council.
Members of the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia were encouraged on Tuesday evening to embrace the “new and demanding urgency” of ecumenism.
Bishop Michael McKenna, the chair of the Bishops Commission for Christian Unity and Inter-religious Dialogue, celebrated Mass at Sydney’s St Mary’s Cathedral for the unity of Christians.
At the beginning of the second full day of the second assembly of the Plenary Council, members received input from two of the Council’s theological advisers — or periti — on topics being considered on Tuesday.
Speaking to the theme “Called by Christ: Sent Forth as Missionary Disciples”, Fr Patrick McInerney SSC quoted from the Vatican II document Ad Gentes, which he described as “revolutionising our understanding of mission”.
The outcome of the initial rounds of voting for the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia have been announced, with all relevant motions being passed with a qualified majority.
Over the past 24 hours, Members of the Plenary Council voted on six motions from the Motions and Amendments document. The voting was staged over two rounds – the consultative and deliberative votes.
At the end of the first full day of proceedings, the Members of the Fifth Plenary Council of Australia were invited to receive more deeply the Holy Spirit “who will console us and lead us to the truth”.
The day concluded with a Votive Mass of the Holy Spirit at St Mary’s Cathedral, celebrated according to the Ukrainian Rite by Bishop Mykola Bychok CSsR.