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Proclaiming the Gospel with families today. This is the title of the Oct. 7-14 conference at the Vatican, which is bringing together the heads of national bishops’ conferences worldwide, as well as the heads of Eastern Catholic Churches, to mark the 10th anniversary of the post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Amoris Laetitia. Amoris Laetitia is 256 pages long and covers many issues discussing family life in the Catholic Church. For many in the secular press, the main interest is a footnote in Chapter 8 of Amoris, on “Accompanying, Discerning and Integrating Weakness,” which addresses couples in what the Catholic Church has often called “irregular situations,” usually canonically invalid marriages. “Because of forms of conditioning and mitigating factors,” Pope Francis wrote in paragraph 305, “it is possible that in an objective situation of sin – which may not be subjectively culpable, or fully such – a person can be living in God’s grace, can love and can also grow in the life of grace and charity, while receiving the Church’s help to this end.” But the controversy was in a footnote attached to that paragraph, footnote number 351. “In certain cases,” the footnote read, “this can include the help of the sacraments,” an assertion many observers took to be essentially vacating the long-standing Catholic rule according to which invalidly married couples could not receive the sacraments so long as they remained sexually active. RELATED: Footnotes and tea leaves with Pope Leo and Amoris Laetitia In the assembly beginning this week, there are five thematic areas: Theme 1 – “Families today: reality, beauty and challenges” Theme 2 – “Young people and the discovery of the vocation to marriage” Theme 3 – “Married life. The early years of marriage: A decisive time” Theme 4 – “In the difficulties of life: Accompanying and supporting” Theme 5 – “Christian families, agents of the Church’s mission” Speaking to journalists in the Vatican on Oct. 2, Jesuit Father Giacomo Costa said participants “will seek to highlight points of convergence, as well as differences, tensions, unresolved issues and possible steps to be taken.” “We shall not seek to erase differences in order to reach a consensus: even a better-understood divergence can be a fruit of listening,” the priest said. Costa is a consultant to the Vatican’s General Secretariat of the Synod. The press conference didn’t mention the controversial footnote, and the speakers didn’t even mention divorce. However, that does not mean the issue won’t come up. Czech Bishop Tomáš Holub of Plzeň met with Pope Leo on Sep. 30. Although he is not president of the Czech Bishops’ Conference, Holub said the two men discussed Amoris Laetitia. “They also discussed accompanying people who cannot fully live the Eucharistic life, such as individuals who are divorced or same-sex couples. In this context, the Holy Father referred to the apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia and emphasized the need to accompany these individuals and not overlook them,” reads a statement from the Diocese of Plzeň. The Vatican does not publish accounts of private audiences. But the diocese’s own account of the meeting – which speaks of people who “cannot fully live the Eucharistic life” – hardly suggests a door opening to Communion. Pope Leo has never directly spoken about giving the Eucharist to the divorced and remarried, but he has warned against “false mercy.” Speaking on Nov. 21, 2025, to participants in an international course run by the Roman Rota – the Vatican court that deals mostly with marriage annulments – Leo said: “It is true that in God’s judgment on salvation, His forgiveness of the repentant sinner is always at work, but human judgment on the nullity of marriage cannot, however, be manipulated by false mercy.” Any activity “contrary to the service of the process of truth must certainly be deemed unjust,” he added. “The ecclesiological and juridical dimensions, if truly lived, reveal the pastoral dimension,” Leo said, noting a growing awareness in recent times that the Church’s judicial activity in marriage falls within the overall pastoral care of the family. “This pastoral care cannot ignore or underestimate the work of ecclesiastical tribunals, and the latter must not forget that their specific contribution to justice is a piece in the task of promoting the good of families, with particular reference to those in difficulty,” he said. Addressing the Rota on Jan. 26, 2026, Pope Leo said that sometimes there is a risk that “excessive identification with the oft troubled vicissitudes of the faithful may lead to a dangerous relativization of truth.” “In fact, misunderstood compassion, even if apparently motivated by pastoral zeal, risks obscuring the necessary dimension of ascertaining the truth proper to the judicial office,” he explained. “This can happen not only in cases of matrimonial nullity – where it could lead to pastoral decisions lacking a solid objective foundation – but also in any type of proceeding, undermining its rigor and fairness,” Leo added. Speaking at the press conference, Professor Gabriella Gambino – Under-Secretary for Family and Life for the Dicastery for Laity, Family, and Life – said that for some time now, the world’s bishops have been expressing concern about the difficulties encountered in pastoral work and the challenges families face in their relationships and daily lives. “Some statistics, moreover, help to illustrate the scale of the cultural changes taking place: In Poland, the number of church weddings celebrated over the last five years has fallen by 45 percent. In Australia, between 1970 and 2024, the figure dropped from 88 percent to 16 percent,” she said. “These are signs which, across diverse contexts, highlight the urgent need to accompany the decision to marry and to provide more decisive support for the transmission of the faith within the family,” Gambino added. In other words, bishops are more concerned about Catholics getting married at all than whether the divorced are getting remarried. Ten years ago, the story was a footnote. This week, the Vatican might say the real story is the weddings that never happen. Follow Charles Collins on X: @CharlesinRome

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