Polish bishops gathered at the 379th plenary meeting of the Conference of Polish Bishops accepted pastoral guidelines concerning the apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia. The representatives of the Conference have declined to comment the content of the document till the official publication which is supposed to happen in the nearest but indefinite time.
At a conference summing up the results of the meeting Bishop Andrzej Czaja said: “The document is addressed to priests of the Church in Poland. On the one side the document is a guideline but on the other side a sort of a letter of intent. The aim is to determine how to develop our pastoral counseling of fiancées, spouses and also people who happen to be in a difficult situation or in irregular unions.”
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The bishop added: “This is a long-awaited document. – It originated in the way we pastors, bishops, have made since the promulgation of Amoris Laetitia up to now. At first the point was: above all let’s stick to Familiaris consortio. However the situation has shown us that first of all Amoris Laetitia doesn’t contravene either the doctrine or the canon law of the Catholic Church but shows a beautiful way of getting out of trouble and making pastoral family and marriage care more efficient.”
Secondly – he added – we see that “doing what we have been doing so far we also have to take up new actions on many levels because many marriages and families are struggling with an increasing crisis of faith and love. We have to keep trying in different ways, better and closer”.
The document consists of an introduction, an ending and four clauses. “In the introduction we point out that we see in Amoris Laetitia an expression of the Pope’s concern for the healthy condition of conjugal love and Christian family. … (I)t is an inspiring update of the Gospel of the family which the Church constantly preaches and is trying to put into effect” – said Bishop Czaja.
“The first part of our document is a presentation of the key points of Pope Francis’ teaching, an outline of the teaching included in the exhortation. Then we talk about what we as the Church are already doing about the pastoral care of fiancées and marriages and what should be done to develop joy and love in marriages and families – the bishop pointed out.
He pointed out that the document describes “this way of Pope Francis: acceptance, accompanying, discernment, integration as four fundamental attitudes which the Church has to have not only in the pastoral care of marriages and families but in general in pastoral care as such.”
“The third part presents new pastoral impulses for fiancées, spouses and also people who have found themselves in difficult and irregular situations. The fourth part is a very concrete call for pastoral discernment, it shows a logic of integrating with the Church. It has a clear meaning in the light of the 8th chapter of Amoris Laetitia” – the bishop pointed out.
“We clearly talk about the need of modernization of the Directory of Family Pastoral Counseling for the Church in Poland, about the need of preparing diocesan and metropolitan directives and we also mention the need of setting up centers of marriage and family counseling in our dioceses. A very important thing is a problem of formation, developing a program for preparing priests to take up the way of accompanying and discernment in concrete situations – said Bishop Czaja.
The Bishop refrained from answering to questions concerning the details of the pastoral guidelines.
RoM, Janów Podlaski
