Ecclesial Learning & Synodality as the Liberation of (Not from) Magisterium

“I hope this means we can finally put the ghost of God’s Rottweiler back in its kennel.” This striking comment from a friend on the Synod of Synodality encapsulates the hope among many disaffected Roman Catholics that the Synod 2021-2024 might usher in a new era of ecclesial freedom. For some, this hope is centered on liberation from decision-making and decision-taking structures bound by clericalism and divorced from the lived experience of the faithful. But perhaps more profoundly, the turn to synodality has raised the hope of liberation from doctrinal rigidity—a freedom from a dogmatism often perceived in official Church teaching.

Such hopes are understandable, given the Synod’s reconsideration of theological questions previously judged to be definitively closed, such as the ordination of women to the diaconate. At the heart of synodality is a posture of ecclesial learning that could permit ‘liberation’ from current positions on doctrine and discipline. The Synod documents actively affirm that the Catholic Church can (and must) learn from the peripheries of the People of God, including those not in full communion with Rome. 

This emphasis on ecclesial learning might be interpreted as a de-emphasis on magisterial authority. However, such interpretations fundamentally misunderstand the vision of ecclesial freedom that oriented the Synod 2021-2024 and the Church’s overall turn to synodality. The freedom fostered by the synodal path is not liberty from magisterial authority but rather a liberation of the Church’s magisterial mission—a freedom that empowers the Church to teach with more confidence and authenticity, not less.

In this paper, I argue that synodality offers a vision of positive ecclesial freedom by reimagining the relationship between the ecclesia docens (the teaching Church) and the ecclesia discens (the learning Church). Within a synodal ecclesiology, these are no longer two distinct components in a static relationship, with the hierarchy teaching and the laity learning. Rather, teaching and learning become mutually constitutive movements of the magisterial ministry of the whole Body of Christ. To elaborate on how this synodal vision of learning and teaching liberates the Church’s magisterium rather than constraining it, I turn to the models of pedagogy evident in early monastic literature. 

In Cassian’s descriptions of the Desert Fathers and Benedict’s portrait of the abbot, monastic instruction figures as a dynamic process, characterized by concepts like condescensio, discretio, and conversatio. The abbot teaches his disciples by walking in solidarity with them (condescensio), noticing the particularities of their personalities and experiences (discretio), and providing direction through both word and example as he himself grows in God (conversatio). The abbot learns and grows alongside the disciples. And rather than undermining the weight of monastic pedagogy, this pursuit of continual learning is integral to its authority and efficacy.

These defining features of early monastic pedagogy resonate deeply with themes running throughout contemporary discourse on synodality. The Vademecum for the Synod on Synodality repeatedly stresses the imagery of accompaniment (condescensio), the importance of genuine, prayerful listening (discretio), and the necessity of our openness to ongoing conversion (conversatio). While the rhetoric of the Catholic Church’s synodal journey might currently lean towards emphasizing learning, the parallels between synodality and monastic pedagogy show how synodal learning can inform and empower a mode of synodal teaching. Rather than being locked in a static, hierarchical relationship, the ecclesia discens and the ecclesia docens can be set free as the dynamic activity of the whole People of God learning and teaching together.

The results of this mode of teaching and learning can be uniquely compelling, as the Synod 2021-2024 has already showcased. Many of the Synod’s documents entirely forwent references to previous magisterial texts promulgated by the hierarchy. Instead, they grounded their authority in the synodal listening process itself, articulating the fruits of the Church’s learning. However, this did not lessen their magisterial significance, as evidenced by Pope Francis’ wholesale adoption of the final synod document as part of the body of his own magisterium. A document inherently rooted in ecclesial learning was recognized as having magisterial authority. 

This confirms that synodality’s vision of ecclesial freedom does not involve throwing off the ‘constraints’ of the Church magisterium. Instead, synodality frees the Church’s teaching ministry from a static and artificially bifurcated conception of magisterial authority. By recovering an integrated vision of learning and teaching, synodality frees and empowers the whole Church—as ecclesia discens et docens—to teach with greater confidence and efficacy. In short, synodality does not unleash “God’s Rottweiler” but neither does it muzzle the Church in her teaching. Rather, synodality liberates the magisterium to be the authentic voice of a listening Church—one that teaches, not despite its openness to ongoing learning, but because of it.