The second report focused on guidelines for the formation of future priests and includes a call for more women to play a role. Seminaries should include ‘well-prepared and competent women as co-responsible at all levels of formation, also within the formation team, in order to benefit from their indispensable contribution to vocational discernment and to the accompaniment of candidates to the priesthood’.
In one of the examples, the report points to how almost all seminaries in France now include at least one woman on their seminary council with voting rights, after a 2021 directive from the country’s bishops. In one French seminary, a marriage counsellor and her retired husband, married 39 years with six children, live in the seminary as an integral part of its formation team alongside six priests.
Among its key guidelines, the report called for priestly formation to be immersed in the life of the Christian community, with the possibility of alternating traditional seminary residence with periods living in parish communities or other ecclesial environments, particularly during later stages of formation. The document specified this should not prolong the overall formation period.
The final reports are to be understood as working documents, a point of departure rather than arrival.
Responsibility for the formation of future priests, the document said, ‘cannot remain limited to the Bishop and those directly given the task of formation, but requires the contribution of the entire People of God.’ It called for bishops to promote listening and interaction among people of different vocations in drafting national formation plans.
The document includes 26 real-world, best-practice examples from seminaries around the world. Among those highlighted are a US program focused on healing wounds caused by the excessive use of technology and family breakdown, and a Nigerian seminary that requires seminarians to perform all maintenance work and cleaning of their seminary building to ‘experience the dignity of human labour’.
The report also outlined a three-year action plan under the supervision of the Dicastery for the Clergy, in which each episcopal conference could establish a working group to oversee implementation of synodal elements in its seminaries.
The secretary general of the Synod of Bishops, Cardinal Mario Grech, noted the final reports ‘are to be understood as working documents, a point of departure rather than arrival,’ but said they ‘already contain valuable indications … from which local Churches and various ecclesial realities may draw inspiration from this very moment.’
The proposals drawn from all of the final reports will be submitted to Pope Leo XIV, who will evaluate and may approve them, the secretariat said.