Bogoslovska smotra, Vol. 93 No. 5, 2023.
Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.53745/bs.93.5.9
Walking Together towards Renewal: the Attempt at Synodality in the Catholic Church in Czechoslovakia, 1988-1998
Katarína Russinová
orcid.org/0009-0009-1214-7767
; Faculty of Education, Catholic University in Ružomberok, Ružomberok, Slovakia
Abstract
This paper aims to present, based on the Church’s current teaching on synodality, the attempt at synodality of the Catholic Church in Czechoslovakia, which was entitled The Decade of Moral and Spiritual Renewal of the Nation. The paper briefly analyses this little-known event based on contemporary testimonies and their expert processing. It begins by clarifying the concept of synodality to gain a deeper understanding of the theological significance of this task that God asks us to do. Then we present the main actors of the Decade of Moral and Spiritual Renewal of the Nation, its content, and a summary of its effects on walking together of the Church in Czechoslovakia in the still totalitarian atmosphere of the 1980s. At the same time, the paper attempts to compare this event with the current course of the Synod on synodality. The successes and failures of the Decade of the Spiritual Renewal of the Nation, as well as the catechetical work of the so-called underground Church in Slovakia, show that it is necessary to look at man and history not as the addressees of one’s agenda, but as those with whom one wishes to have a relationship characterised by mutuality and dialogue.
Keywords
Synodality; Synod; Decade of Spiritual Renewal; Czechoslovakia; History of the Church; Pastoral
Hrčak ID:
314307
URI
Publication date:
14.2.2024.
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