Stephen Cardinal Brislin, the Archbishop of Johannesburg, at the 2025 Archdiocesan Leadership Conference.
I would like to thank you all for your attendance today. We gather together as the local Church and, while it is primarily at parish level that we exercise ministry and leadership and it is at parish level that the Church impacts on people’s lives, it is the Archdiocese that is the local Church. It is important that parishes, parish priests, pastoral and finance councils, ministries and associations work together with a common mind and heart to fulfil the policies and practices of the diocese.
Furthermore, the diocese is in communion with the Bishops’ Conference and, most importantly, in communion with the Holy Father. In common parlance, this means that we don’t just “do our own thing” as individuals or as parishes. We do them in communion with our brothers and sisters of the all the parishes of the diocese which keeps itself in step with the Bishops’ Conference and the Holy Father.
As you are aware the Church throughout the world has embarked on the implementation of synodality. This has been much discussed before and, by now, we are all well aware that synodality is not a programme akin the Renew or Alpha. Synodality is the way of being Church together – bishop, clergy, Religious and Laypeople. All have their own vocation and all have their own role to play in the Church. A priest has his ministry which is defined in Canon Law and in the documents of the Church, the Bishop his, The Sister hers and the married person his or hers.
Synodality does not remove the vocation from the individual nor does it eliminate her or his role, ministry or responsibility. Rather, synodality is the recognition that we all have a share in the gifts of the Holy Spirit, that we all have something to offer to the life of the Church and, indeed, we have the duty to offer it. The gifts we have been given are meant to be used at the service of the Church and of others.
The essential element of synodality is listening. It is a process, through prayer, to listen to the Holy Spirit who continues to guide us. We remember the words of Jesus, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come” (Jn 16:13). The importance of these words is that we understand that throughout the ages people, and the Church, have encountered new situations and circumstances that are beyond previous experience. Not everything is mentioned in the Bible and we would not be able to know right from wrong if it were not for the Holy Spirit who continues to teach us, guide us and enlighten us. God’s Spirit enables us to recognize the virtues, the values and the principles of Jesus’ teaching and to apply them accurately to the new situations we encounter. The continual and ongoing presence and enlightenment of the Holy Spirit is foundational to our understanding of the life of discipleship.
The Spirit, of course, reveals to us God’s will in prayer. However, the Spirit also teaches us through the words of others who are fellow pilgrims in the journey of faith, our brothers and sisters who have also received the gifts of the Spirit. They have their own perspectives and insights which aid us, as Church, to discern how we should be Church, and so another essential aspect of the synodality is to listen to each other. This is active listening which requires concentration and a willingness to understand what the other is saying, not just to hear it. There is a difference between hearing and listening. There is the tendency when listening to others to interrupt, to question, to agree or to counter-act. In active listening we do none of these – we simply listen and try to understand. The chance for sharing what has touched us or which we battle to understand, comes later but again within an environment of listening. Together we then discern what the Spirit is saying.
Those, then, are the essential elements of synodality: to pray – individually and communally. To listen to the Holy Spirit and to listen to each other. It is worth noting, as I have done many times before, that synodality is not new in the Church. It dates back to the earliest years, to the time we call the “primitive Church” meaning the beginning of the Church, and has been present throughout the Church’s history. It is present even as we speak today. The call of Pope Francis and Pope Leo is that we give emphasis to being a synodal Church today, that we strengthen it. This means that we do not enter into synodality with preconceived ideas, ideologies or even expectations of outcomes. It is not an opportunity to try and advance my own perspective over and above those of others.
It is not about forming a “new Church”, abandoning the doctrines of the Church or the tradition of the Church. This is of utmost importance because we must remain faithful to and rooted in the teachings of the Gospel and to the Tradition of the Catholic Church. We cannot abandon the Scriptures or try and re-interpret them to “fit into today’s world”. We cannot separate ourselves from the Tradition given to us by the Fathers of the Church, that is, the first teachers of the Church who succeeded the Apostles. Nor can we simply abandon the teachings of the Church that have come to us through the ages under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. It is quite the opposite – we must remain true to them and uphold them faithfully.
This does not mean that there is no growth in doctrine. Doctrine develops much like a baby develops into an adult. All the essential parts are present when a baby is born, but these grow, develop strength; yet they remain the same is essence – an arm is an arm, a foot a foot.St John Henry Newman explained the growth of doctrine is his “Essay on the growth of Christian Doctrine”. Some points he made are these:Newman viewed doctrine as an “idea” that grows and develops over centuries, akin to a tree growing from an acorn.This growth is a natural process of unfolding the implicit meaning of the original revelation.
Healthy developments are those that maintain the original “type” and “principles,” and are consistent with the original form. True development involves the assimilation of external influences, such as philosophical concepts or cultural practices, without changing the core identity of the faith.These external elements are transformed by the doctrine, not the other way around. Development is a historical and social process that involves reflection, the engagement of individual thinkers, and the response of the community, all under the guidance of theChurch. Newman wrote his essay to demonstrate that the development of doctrine was a proof of the Catholic Church’s continuity with the early Church, an essential aspect that must always be preserved.
It is therefore necessary to understand that any new insight or thought does not nullify the authenticity of the past. For example, we sometimes hear people criticise the Council of Trent and the teachings that came for that Council. For some, these were misguided teachings that have now been “corrected” by the Second Vatican Council. This is clearly a wrong perspective – the Second Vatican Council does not “overrule” the Council of Trent but builds on it, presenting it in appropriate current culture and language. Others, of course, interpret the Second Vatican Council as being a heretical council since they feel it was not faithful to the Council of Trent – such thinking is similarly erroneous.
There are certain tensions – such as the tension of a rope stretched between two points – or poles in the our Christian knowledge that are sometimes difficult to balance sufficiently and, at times, become unbalanced. The first of these is the two attributes we know of God. God is, firstly, transcendent. That is to say, that God exists beyond and outside the normal limits of our world, experience, or understanding. God is separate from humanity. God is way beyond our understanding and our capacity to imagine. He is supreme above all else, the creator not only of humankind, but also of the galaxy and cosmos. We think of the words from the Prophet Isaiah, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts and your ways are not my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are as high above earth as my ways are above your ways, my thoughts above your thoughts” (Is 55:8-9). St Therese of Avila constantly referred to the “majesty of God”, as the Church still does today. This was to try and encapsulate the glory of God and his might which is beyond human comprehension. God is far from us and unattainable.
Yet, God is close to us – he is immanent. He is within and inherent in within us, present and operating within the material world. We have only to think of the words of Jesus as recorded by St John in his Gospel, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him” (Jn 14:23).
Another “tension” in our faith is that between truth and love. We all know that “God is love”, as we hear in St John’s First Letter (1Jn 4:7ff). We also know that “God is truth”, as Jesus prayed in the garden of Gethsemane, “Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth”, (Jn 17:17) and of course Jesus said, “I am the way the truth and the life” (Jn 14:6). St Paul encourages us to “speak the truth in love” (Eph 4:15). The Church cannot compromise on truth. However, truth without love – and all its constituent parts such as compassion, mercy and forgiveness – betrays God’s love. Similarly, love without precepts is a betrayal of God’s truth.
In certain circumstances we find it difficult to keep the balance right of upholding truth while ensuring love, and this impacts directly on our relationship with others and our life of discipleship. In those circumstances, we need to discern what is the right, moral and ethical thing to do. We know that Jesus always spoke the truth, and yet he was abundant in his forgiveness and love of others while reserving his harshest judgement precisely for those who judge and condemn others, those who lack love and who pay lip service to truth.
What are the implications of these tensions for the Christian community. A true Christian community is one that has three “marks” or responsibilities. Firstly, it is an evangelizing community, secondly it is a liturgical community, and thirdly it is a community of humble service” that reaches out, in justice, to those who suffer – captured in the word “diakonia”. To be an authentic Christian community those three “marks” must be present and visible. As Pope Benedict wrote in his first encyclical, Deus Caritas est: “The Church’s deepest nature is expressed in her three-fold responsibility: of proclaiming the word of God (kerygma-martyria), celebrating the sacraments (leitourgia), and exercising the ministry of charity (diakonia).
These duties presuppose each other and are inseparable. For the Church, charity is not a kind of welfare activity which could equally well be left to others, but is a part of her nature, an indispensable expression of her very being….The Church is God’s family in the world. In this family no one ought to go without the necessities of life. Yet at the same time caritas- agape extends beyond the frontiers of the Church”(28). As a community we serve not only the family of God but also the human family. By extension, the way in which we live our life of discipleship should also be marked by those three responsibilities.
Now when we speak of a synodal Church and we embark on the journey of synodality, we are not starting something new, we are not negating the past, we are building on the rich tradition of the Church, the Gospel and the teaching of the Fathers and the Church and the Magisterium down the ages. The need to remain rooted in this is essential. If we try to be otherwise then we are just doing our own thing. We should never forget that there is nothing superficial about our faith, it is deep and rich in its teaching, wisdom and truth. Similarly we remember the comparison of doctrine to a baby or an acorn – as it grows, all the essential elements remain, and yet there is growth. We also maintain the elements of our faith while allowing it to develop, deepen and lead us closer to God.
In the context of what I have said synodality cannot neglect the truths I have spoken about that at times seem to be in tension with each other, namely an immanent God who is also transcendent, and that God is both the God of love and truth and how these tensions are expressed in the three responsibilities of the Church, namely evangelization, liturgy and diakonia or humble service.
Through baptism we are all called to be missionaries, to witness to Christ. The world is thirsty to hear the voice of Christ – as witnessed by the greater number of young people in many parts of the world who are turning to faith and the Church. We are in a time of turmoil in the world – as one author titled his book “Unruly” to describe the present state of affairs in the world where there are chasmic shifts in geopolitical relationships, where the rule of law is disintegrating and the law is used irresponsibly as a weapon against opponents. In addition we face the future of an AI world which can be used to do much good, but could also result in joblessness and manipulation through deceit.
In all of this we continue to preach Christ -crucified to the world, Christ who is the source of all life, Christ in whom every human being finds his/her meaning and purpose. Our evangelization is Christo-centric, to bring others into a relationship with Christ. We do not preach ourselves or a populistic religion. We preach God who is Trinity, the Creator of all that is, the Saviour who offers us life and the Light which guides and strengthens us. We preach the God who is all powerful, over whom there is nothing which has dominion, and yet a God who is among us and in our hearts, who loves and cares for each of us.
We witness to the way of life that calls us to virtue and uprightness, to godliness, through a life that promotes justice and fairness, peace and unity and, above all, love. We cannot evangelize a partial picture of what we know of God. He is love but he is also truth. He is merciful but there will still be judgement, a judgement that is based on whether we fed him when he was hungry, whether we gave him water when he was thirsty. We preach a God who has created us with purpose and who gives meaning to life, and invites us to change, to transform, to become who we are meant to be. The question we should ask ourselves what must we do for our parish to become an evangelizing community?
Our praise and thanksgiving is expressed in the liturgy, most importantly the Eucharist which is the source of our energy, our life and our hope. It is also the summit of when we return to God in thanksgiving, offering ourselves and our works to him. Liturgy is beyond simply prayer. It is a foretaste, an experience of the heavenly banquet, a glimpse of God’s Kingdom. Why does the liturgy have rituals that are followed; why do priests, deacons and those who serve at the altar wear special vestments? Why is their incense, candles, processions? It is all because the liturgy is meant to take us beyond our human reality and experience and allow us to have that taste of encounter with God which come in it fullness when Christ returns to finally accomplish his Kingdom. It is to assist us to be in awe at God’s presence and to understand that God is mystery.
The liturgy is prayer from its very beginning to its very end. It is Biblical because the words used throughout the liturgy are taken from the Bible and proclaim God’s Word. The liturgy is oriented towards God the Father, as we pray through the Son in the power of the Holy Spirit. God is the focus at all times – not the priest who has his role, of whatshername who has read the First Reading and has just had her hair done, or the choir with their beautiful singing. It is about God, and the Mass incorporates in one celebration different aspects of prayer – praise, repentance, thanksgiving, intercession, petition and responding to God’s Word. It is joyful, sorrowful, musical and silent, it flows through all these different aspects of prayer and also all the different modes of human experience. It expresses uniquely the transcendence of God while welcoming and enjoying his immanence.
Regrettably we are so often influenced by prayer services of other denominations and services that are confined to the Word, that we neglect the importance and flow of liturgy. An important challenge is to form Catholics into the meaning of the liturgy, especially the Mass, so that there is an understanding of what is happening and to ensure that our liturgies do not become misguided and focussed on ourselves rather than on the God who is both transcendent and immanent.There is a well-known Latin saying, “Lex orandi, lex credendi” meaning that “the law of prayer is the law of belief”. It expresses the principle that the way Christians pray shapes what they believe, and the way they worship influences their theology and understanding of faith. In our journey of synodality we need to be observant and vigilant that we pray in a way that is consistent with what we believe and that it encapsulates the mysteries of our faith in their entirety. If we have shallow liturgies we shall have shallow theology. The question to be asked is how we can form our parishes in liturgy so that parishioners understand the liturgy and their faith can be deepend by it?
We can add lex vivendi (“the law of life”) to the saying Lex orandi, lex credendi, meaning that prayers shapes belief and, in turn, belief shapes how we live our lives. This brings me to the last point, that of diakonia or humble service to the Body of Christ (the family of God), but also to humanity itself. The third responsibility goes beyond almsgiving or sharing material resources with the “less fortunate”. As Pope Benedict XVI noted, “A just society must be the achievement of politics, not of the Church. Yet the promotion of justice through efforts to bring about openness of mind and will to the demands of the common good is something which concerns the Church deeply” (DCE 28).
What our faith asks of us is generosity – generosity of giving ourselves as a living sacrifice to God (cf. Rom 12:1), generosity in almsgiving (cf. Lk 12:33) but also a generosity of spirit, of being open and available to others, as St Paul writes “Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfil the law of Christ” (Gal 6:2). Diakonia is to have the vision of the family of God to which we have responsibilities since these are our closest brothers and sisters, and also to understand that we belong to the family of humanity since all are created in the image and likeness of God. Diakonia means that we cannot turn in on ourselves, to become elitist or simply to find security in a closed group. The Gospel challenge is to “go out”, to overcome our fears, to build bridges among people and to allow ourselves to be evangelized by others. Pope Francis frequently said that when we help the poor it is not a relationship of the “haves helping the have-nots” – we must allow the poor to evangelize us through their life-experience, their world-view and their encounter with God who loves all people.
In a time when it seems there is a tendency to be “safe”, “to be among ourselves” we need to have to courage to unite people across faith lines, or political or economic lines. It does not mean that the differences go away, differences must be acknowledged. But it does mean that there is a common base of humanity that helps us accept others as brothers and sisters no matter how different they are from us. Our question here is how can we, as a parish, strengthen solidarity with the vulnerable? Furthermore, how can we be more ecumenically-minded and find ways for inter-faith dialogue?In conclusion, we are blessed to have this time of strengthening synodality and finding ways in which it can be better expressed. We do so with the recognition that we are links in the chain uniting the long history of the propagation of our faith with those who will come after us. We embark of this journey knowing that we are stewards of the mysteries of faith to which we must be faithful and to which we must hand on in a trustworthy manner. We are not the innovators of the Church. The Church has been given to us by Christ and it is founded on him. Our pilgrimage of synodality invites us to be the Church that Christ wishes us to be, by seeking his will and by discerning how we will live the Gospel more authentically, personally and communally. We invoke the Holy Sprit to guide and enlighten all of us and we use the means available to us to open our hearts to that enlightenment – prayer, liturgy, the Word and deeds that serve Christ in those who are in need. May God help us and bless all our efforts.
+ Stephen Cardinal Brislin
Archbishop of Johannesburg – 18 October 2025
