Australian diocese document calls for ‘inclusive church’ of ‘LGBT people,’ ‘women chaplains’An Australian Catholic archdiocese has produced a working document about the "future of the Catholic Church in Australia” which calls for “women deacons and women chaplains,” “married priests,” and a “more inclusive church” that includes “LGBT people.”
The document was put out by the Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn, led by Archbishop Christopher Prowse. It is part of the preparation for a countrywide Plenary Council to be held in 2020. The last such council was held 81 years ago.
The Plenary Council, what the bishops are calling the “highest form of gathering of local church and has legislative and governance authority,” is being held “so that we can dialogue about the future of the Catholic Church in Australia,” states the website about the event. The event is being promoted in the name of becoming a “synodal Church” called for by Pope Francis.
Among the sixteen different categories of responses were the following suggestions, quoted here verbatim:
• The ordination of married priests;
• Women deacons and women chaplains should be considered;
• Focus on developing a more inclusive church. God’s love is inclusive. The church has spent too much time excluding rather than including, eg, women, LGBT people, the divorced, people of other religions … Many people who have drifted away from the church feel intimidated to return by past traditions of the church;
• A more active social justice stance from the church, more dialogue from the pulpit, more promotion of involvement by the laity in social justice matters. Church leaders should [...] emphasis on the need to combat climate change as a fundamental social justice issue;
• Leaders of other Christian churches should be invited to provide advice to the Plenary Council, especially on matters of church governance.
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