* Archbishop Coleridge, The Courier-Mail, February 8, 2017. by David Timbs During the final days of the February 2017 Catholic Wrap Up at the Australian Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, the Catholic bishops made a number of...

Brain Coyne, Catholica, writes in his email, I've spent the last few days reading the report we brought to your attention on Wednesday by Professor Des Cahill and Dr Peter Wilkinson. I think this has greater potential to change things in the Church, or lay some...

(Published in The Swag, Vol. 25, No.3, Spring 2017, pp. 12-15)

This second article in the series looking at particular councils, examines the initial preparations for the 2020 Australian Plenary Council. Further articles will examine in some detail the seven particular councils  – provincial and plenary – which have been held in Australia since 1844, and a final one will attempt to imagine what the 2020 Plenary Council might hope to achieve.

A synodal church in Australia

Though the Second Vatican Council declared in 1965 that it “earnestly desires that the venerable institution of synods and councils flourish with new vigour”, in Australia since then, synods and councils have not flourished.

During the past 52 years only five of Australia’s 28 territorial dioceses have had a diocesan synod: Canberra & Goulburn in 1989 and 2004, Maitland-Newcastle in 1992-93, Brisbane in 2003, Cairns in 2008-11, and Broken Bay in 2011-12. Sydney has not had a diocesan synod since 1951 and Melbourne since 1916. Several other dioceses, including Bathurst, Hobart, Parramatta, Toowoomba and Wollongong, have had non-canonical diocesan ‘gatherings’ or ‘assemblies’, but the Holy See’s 1997 Instruction on Diocesan Synods states that all such assemblies should be formally situated within the canonical discipline of the Church. 

There have been seven particular councils – provincial and plenary – held in Australia since the Catholic hierarchy was established in 1842 (see Table 1), but no provincial council since 1907 (1st Melbourne Provincial Council) and no plenary council since 1937 (4th Australasian Plenary Council).  Worldwide, only two plenary councils have been held since 1965: in the Philippines (1991) and Poland (1993).