In the Catholic Site, News Here and Now, a priest with the Korean Institute of Christian Thought helps us understand the problems that arise and the efforts at solutions to make the gospel understandable to the changing environment. The following briefly summarizes the article published on the Web Site.
This goal of the Institute cannot be accomplished by anyone alone, consequently, the institute is run by volunteers, sponsors, and church scholars who support and accompany the academic, cultural mission, and pastoral work.
However, the research institute is where memories and norms are background. He faces difficulties due to misunderstandings and conflicts that arise— discord over words used, disagreements in opinions, and emotional issues whose reasons are unknown. As a director, meeting each person involved, listening to their stories, and making sense of the situation is not an easy task.
In a parish, problems might resolve themselves or settle down over time, but here, the entire community suffers a significant blow. The reason for the issues among people is simple: "It's because they do not think or act according to my wishes."
Because he was feeling upset due to the hostility and conflict within the community, he went to a town near the research center on Sunday afternoon to get his hair cut. In the town were many factories where foreign workers lived; it was crowded with people from the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Southwest Asia, and China. A lot of interesting things for sale on the street. He bought sugar cane juice, a coconut drink made on the spot, and ate Turkish kebabs for dinner. Not only was it good to see different faces, but the food was delicious and reasonably priced. After escaping from the monotonous routine and worries at the research institute and encountering diverse cultures and people, he felt more relaxed. On the way back, he remembered Procrustes from Greek mythology.
Procrustes was a villain who lived in the hills outside Athens and engaged in robbery. He laid the people he kidnapped while robbing them on an iron bed he made, if taller than the bed, he cut their limbs to fit the bed and if shorter than the bed, he forcibly stretched them to death. The problem is that the size of this bed was not fixed, but increased and decreased through a device known only to Procrustes. Of course, there was no one whose height would fit into the bed. Eventually, Procrustes' misdeeds reached the ears of the Athenian hero Theseus, who captured Procrustes, laid him on a bed, and cut off his head and legs in the same manner. Procrustes' bed is used to attack others with an arbitrary standard to which others are made to agree if they speak differently from what one thinks and believes.
An important concept in Synodalitas ecclesiology is the “people of God” declared by the Second Vatican Council. God's people are all baptized Christians who are equally noble before the Lord, and all of them are members of the Lord and become a gathering of people who carry out the Lord's mission in their respective positions in the church. The Synod Church, advocated by Pope Francis, is a reform movement aimed at embodying the meaning contained in this concept of the People of God within the culture of the Church. God's people recognize the value of the diversity of the world and human beings.
People are different depending on where they were born, their experiences, education, and their lives have helped form them. Believers, priests and religious within the church are also diverse, each with their own unique characteristics. Synodalitas is about renewing the church by listening to all. In other words, “each person does his/her own part in his/her own position.”
The calling each member of the church receives from God is unique, and various callings come together to create the kingdom of God. Nevertheless, we set ourselves as the standard for church life and try to bring others into our own worldview. Insisting that our thoughts are objective and the correct tradition of the church.
In other words, we prepare our own Procrustes bed, and we place others in it. We call this behavior ‘clericalism’. Clericalism does not only mean the authoritarianism and self-righteousness of priests but is a metaphor for all acts of oppressing others according to one's own standards. It is time to destroy the Procruste's bed within us to create a synodalitas church.
