Dialogue and Unity

Insights into Some Key Episodes from Francis's Papacy

In two articles from her Substack newsletter Recovering Catholic, Sarah Carter has provided a helpful summary of how Pope Francis thinks about the process and goals of dialogue. Drawing primarily on his encyclical Fratelli Tutti and the book Let Us Dream: The Path to a Better Future, both from 2020, Carter identifies three false forms of dialogue described by Pope Francis and then outlines the characteristics of authentic dialogue, a process of what Francis calls contraposition and overflow.

Carter offers a useful introduction to Francis’s thinking on this issue, but her work has also helped me better understand some of the key episodes from Pope Francis’s papacy. As I will explain below, I think Francis sees his outreach to LGBTQ persons, including the recent declaration from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) permitting extra-liturgical blessings of same-sex couples, Fiducia Supplicans, as the fruit of authentic dialogue within the Church. His decision to set aside the vote of the majority of bishops at the Amazon Synod in 2019 to approve married clergy reflected his belief that sufficient dialogue on the issue had not yet taken place. Finally, his disciplinary actions against conservative critics like Bishop Joseph Strickland and Cardinal Raymond Burke, and his apostolic letter Traditionis Custodes limiting the use of the Traditional Latin Mass (TLM), reflect his judgment that the actions of certain members of the Church represent a repudiation of authentic dialogue and a threat to the Church’s unity.

---

As Carter points out, there are many forms of communication that are passed off as dialogue but that fall short of the mutual exchange in search of truth characteristic of the authentic specimen. She identifies three false forms of dialogue drawn from Francis’s writings, which I will briefly summarize here:

1. Debate: Francis remarks that debate, at least as it is typically practiced in contemporary culture, is not an authentic dialogue. In Fratelli Tutti (#200), he refers to debate as “parallel monologues” in which neither side listens to the other and the goal is victory rather than the search for truth. He adds that this form of debate is particularly prevalent on social media. (I offered my own critique of “debate culture” here.)

2. Compromise: Just as dialogue should not be understood as a battle in which there are winners and losers, Francis also insists that dialogue is not merely a compromise in which the two sides meet in the middle. This false form of dialogue favors comity at the expense of truth. As Carter also notes, for Francis, there are values at stake in dialogue that are non-negotiable and that can’t be compromised.

3. Relativism: Finally, authentic dialogue does not mean treating all perspectives as equally valid or equally true. Of course, dialogue requires respect for all and an open mind to their point of view, but dialogue involves a common quest to seek the truth. Francis adds that “relativism ultimately leaves the interpretation of moral values to those in power, to be defined as they see fit” (Fratelli Tutti, #206).

Having identified false forms of dialogue, what does authentic dialogue entail?

---

(Photo: Catholic Church England and Wales, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 DEED)

Carter summarizes Francis’s view of authentic dialogue in this way:

[W]hen people of different opinions and even religious beliefs come together, as long as they are open to one another and sincerely desire what is best for everyone, God can do something new and unexpected in the process.

Contrary to compromise and debate, the parties in a dialogue bring real values to the table, and there are real differences between points of view. There is a certain tension, what Francis calls contraposition. Unlike in a debate, however, the participants in a dialogue are open to discovering aspects of the truth in the perspective of the other through a process of discernment. As Carter writes,

[Contraposition] begins when there are certain things that neither side is ready to budge on. That tension, if we choose to endure it out of love for the other and out of desire for the common good, has a catalytic effect for creating new possibilities that we would have never considered before.

Francis refers to this “catalytic effect” as “overflow.” Here is how Francis describes it in Let Us Dream (as cited by Carter):

[Overflow] comes about as a gift in dialogue, when people trust each other and humbly seek the good together, and are willing to learn from each other in a mutual exchange of gifts. At such moments, the solution to an intractable problem comes in ways that are unexpected and unforeseen, the result of a new and greater creativity released, as it were, from the outside. This is what I mean by “overflow” because it breaks the banks that confined our thinking, and causes to pour forth, as if from an overflowing fountain, the answers that formerly the contraposition didn’t let us see. We recognize this process as a gift from God . . . when the ocean of His love bursts the dams of our self-sufficiency, and so allows for a new imagination of the possible. (pp. 80-81)

Does this mean that every authentic dialogue should end in a kind of Hegelian synthesis, overcoming the differences that previously divided the parties? I don’t think so. In many cases, the participants may leave the dialogue with some differences intact, but nevertheless their points of view are transformed by the encounter.

One point I would like to add to Carter’s excellent analysis is that Francis sees dialogue as connected to unity. In his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, Francis describes a process of dialogue similar to what Carter has outlined, but making the connection with unity clear:

When conflict arises, some people simply look at it and go their way as if nothing happened; they wash their hands of it and get on with their lives. Others embrace it in such a way that they become its prisoners; they lose their bearings, project onto institutions their own confusion and dissatisfaction and thus make unity impossible. But there is also a third way, and it is the best way to deal with conflict. It is the willingness to face conflict head on, to resolve it and to make it a link in the chain of a new process. “Blessed are the peacemakers!” (Mt 5:9).

In this way it becomes possible to build communion amid disagreement, but this can only be achieved by those great persons who are willing to go beyond the surface of the conflict and to see others in their deepest dignity. This requires acknowledging a principle indispensable to the building of friendship in society: namely, that unity is greater than conflict. Solidarity, in its deepest and most challenging sense, thus becomes a way of making history in a life setting where conflicts, tensions and oppositions can achieve a diversified and life-giving unity. This is not to opt for a kind of syncretism, or for the absorption of one into the other, but rather for a resolution which takes place on a higher plane and preserves what is valid and useful on both sides. (## 227-28, also cited in Fratelli Tutti, #245).

One might say that the commitment, discipline, and patience needed for dialogue already presuppose a certain kind of unity, even something as basic as a shared sense of humanity or common quest for what is true and good. But likewise, dialogue is a quest for greater unity, a process of building solidarity, ultimately expressed in the unity of the Body of the Christ. This connection between dialogue and unity will be important for understanding how Francis’s sense of dialogue can help interpret some of his actions as pope.

---

In Fiducia Supplicans, the DDF opens the door for priests to offer blessings to same-sex couples and couples in irregular unions (e.g., divorced and remarried couples or, in some cultures, spouses in polygamous marriages). These blessings, however, should be extra-liturgical and “spontaneous” in nature, not offered in a formal, liturgical setting to avoid any confusion or conflation of these relationships with marriage as understood by the Catholic Church, the lifelong, indissoluble partnership of a man and woman, open to the procreation of children.

The declaration, therefore, holds to the traditional teachings about the nature of marriage and human sexuality that have led the Church’s Magisterium to consider homosexual activity sinful and same-sex attraction as “objectively disordered,” in the words of the Catechism (#2358). As many have noted, however, Fiducia Supplicans, in a way that is new for the Magisterium, treats LGBTQ persons as children of God with authentic spiritual needs and longings and seeks to find ways to include them in the life of the Church more than is presently the case.

These positions are not contradictory, but in the concrete reality of the Church today, they are certainly in tension. Those who hold to the Church’s traditional teachings on sexuality too often make moral perfection (at least on certain issues) a precondition for being received into the Church’s bosom, and efforts aimed at greater inclusion of LGBT persons in the Church are often linked to calls for a more or less radical revision of the Church’s teachings.

Fiducia Supplicans, then, can be understood as a fruit of ongoing dialogue on this issue within the Church, an unexpected solution emerging from the contraposition of values. It does seem that Pope Francis’s approach to ministering to LGBTQ persons, exemplified by but not limited to Fiducia Supplicans, is an illustration of what he means by overflow: something that is unexpected and that defies customary categories, but that nonetheless reconciles truths thought to be in tension. One also gets the sense that one purpose of Fiducia Supplicans is to bring Catholics with diverging views on questions of sexuality into closer unity, while allowing for a certain diversity, although it remains to be seen whether it will have that effect in the long term.

---

Before the 2019 Amazon Synod (formally the Synod of Bishops for the Pan-Amazon Region) met, the possibility that the bishops might permit the ordination of married men to the priesthood as a way to respond to the shortage of priests in the region generated a great deal of controversy, overshadowing other issues facing the Church in the region, such as ecological destruction, the rights of indigenous people, and the inculturation of the Gospel among the region’s many cultures.

The working document written in preparation for the Synod raised the possibility of ordaining married men. As the Synod concluded, the bishops proposed, by a vote of 128 in favor and 41 against, the idea that married permanent deacons could be ordained as priests. The proposal was intended to be limited to the Amazon region, but of course such a change would open the door for similar changes throughout the Latin Church.

Given the lopsided vote, it was expected that Pope Francis would approve this proposal. In his 2020 apostolic exhortation Querida Amazonia, however, he did not even mention the issue. Pope Francis did not explain this decision until several months later, in a note published in La Civiltà Cattolica. He writes that, while there was a discussion of the issue at the Synod, there was not sufficient discernment or prayerful reflection on the issue. Authentic dialogue had not sufficiently taken place. He goes on to say that a Synod is not a parliament, and a majority vote is not sufficient for moving forward. He suggests that what was missing was precisely a process of listening to those who disagree, of conversion and purifying one’s own positions in search of a larger truth. We can see Pope Francis’s insistence on the importance of deep listening and discernment in the great attention given to process in the more recent Synod on Synodality this past October.

---

Lastly, in recent months, Pope Francis has disciplined two outspoken American critics of his papacy. This past November, Francis removed Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas from office after the latter refused to resign at Francis’s request. This action came after an investigation, or “visitation,” of Strickland’s diocese in June. Presumably, Strickland was removed for calling into question Pope Francis’s fidelity to the Magisterium, although his leadership style was also questioned during the visitation.

Less drastically, in the same month, Pope Francis revoked Cardinal Raymond Burke’s right to a salary and subsidized apartment in Rome. Burke, who had previously served as the Archbishop of St. Louis and, prior to that, as Bishop of La Crosse, Wisconsin, had recently participated in a symposium critical of the then-forthcoming Synod on Synodality and earlier that summer had written the forward to a tract condemning the synodal process as a “Pandora’s box.” Over the years, Burke has likewise criticized several aspects of Francis’s papacy.

At first glance, these efforts to discipline his critics may seem to run counter to Francis’s commitment to dialogue, even with those with whom one has deep disagreements. Carter’s analysis of how Francis thinks about dialogue, however, helps explain how there is no contradiction. For one, the criticisms made by figures like Strickland and Burke are not made in a spirit of dialogue, but rather one of confrontation and polarization. They have come through social media posts, press events, and public pronouncements rather than through the channels for dialogue and discernment available in the Church. They have also been polemical in nature, intended to generate conflict and controversy rather than an authentic search for truth and unity.

It’s worth noting that this sensitivity toward public polemics is nothing new. For example, the Congregation (now Dicastery) for the Doctrine of the Faith’s 1990 Instruction on the Ecclesial Vocation of the Theologian, or Donum Veritatis, considers the situation of a theologian who has difficulties with a teaching of the Magisterium:

If, despite a loyal effort on the theologian's part, the difficulties persist, the theologian has the duty to make known to the Magisterial authorities the problems raised by the teaching in itself, in the arguments proposed to justify it, or even in the manner in which it is presented. He should do this in an evangelical spirit and with a profound desire to resolve the difficulties. His objections could then contribute to real progress and provide a stimulus to the Magisterium to propose the teaching of the Church in greater depth and with a clearer presentation of the arguments.

In cases like these, the theologian should avoid turning to the "mass media", but have recourse to the responsible authority, for it is not by seeking to exert the pressure of public opinion that one contributes to the clarification of doctrinal issues and renders service to the truth.

It can also happen that at the conclusion of a serious study, undertaken with the desire to heed the Magisterium's teaching without hesitation, the theologian's difficulty remains because the arguments to the contrary seem more persuasive to him. Faced with a proposition to which he feels he cannot give his intellectual assent, the theologian nevertheless has the duty to remain open to a deeper examination of the question. (## 30-31)

Here the CDF seems to have in mind theologians like Charlie Curran and Hans Küng who used press events and other forms of publicity to express their dissent from magisterial teaching, much as contemporary papal critics like Strickland and Burke have in more recent times, just from a traditionalist perspective. Like Pope Francis, the CDF instead recommends a more dialogical process aimed at clarifying the truth, and conducted with an openness to finding truth in opposing perspectives (whether the Vatican has adequately made such dialogical processes available to theologians could certainly be debated—I mean, subject to dialogue).

Second, both Strickland and Burke have been highly critical of the recent synodal process and last October’s Synod on Synodality. As I already alluded to, Pope Francis sees synodality as the Church’s process of dialogue and discernment. Resistance to the very idea of synodality, then, is a rejection of engaging in authentic dialogue. It replaces the search for unity inherent to authentic dialogue with contention and division. Synodality is a non-negotiable value for the Church. Therefore, it’s reasonable to conclude that Francis’s disciplining of Strickland and Burke was not a punishment for disagreeing with the former, but rather a response to what he perceives as a threat to the unity of the Church.

One could see Traditionis Custodes in the same light. The document was not issued out of opposition to the TLM per se. Rather, the Vatican perceived that many of the communities that had developed around the TLM were hostile to the magisterial teachings of the Second Vatican Council and therefore a source of disunity and contention in the Church regarding non-negotiable values. Although Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI had hoped that the re-introduction of the TLM would lead to a process of dialogue, mutually enriching both the Ordinary Form of the liturgy introduced after Vatican II and the TLM, in reality, the TLM has become a source of division.

---

One could certainly raise objections to any of the points raised above. For example:

• Was Fiducia Supplicans really the fruit of dialogue, or is it a top-down imposition on the Church on the part of the Vatican, without a truly synodal process of discernment? Will the declaration contribute to unity in the Church, or will it, as the differing interpretations and implementations by bishops around the world might suggest, be a source of disunity?

• It may be the case that Strickland and Burke were disciplined, not for disagreeing with Francis, but for the threat to Church unity their approach entails, but what of, for example, bishops in Western Europe who continue to offer formal liturgical blessings for same-sex couples, in open defiance of the directives of Fiducia Supplicans? Will they likewise be disciplined, or be silently tolerated by the Vatican?

These are valid questions that ought to be discussed openly—in a spirit of authentic dialogue. Still, I believe it is important to see the underlying patterns behind Francis’s actions, and I think his understanding of dialogue, so skillfully outlined by Carter, is one of the keys for doing so.

---

Of Interest…

• I’m a month overdue, but I want to point readers to an article by my colleagues Dan DiLeo and Erin Lothes in the National Catholic Reporter on the efforts of the Catholic Theological Society of America (CTSA) to divest from fossil fuels. I served with DiLeo and Lothes, among others, on the committee that proposed this step to the Society’s board. I wrote a similar article for Window Light back in May of last year, but DiLeo' and Lothes’s article puts the CTSA’s decision in the context of the global climate crisis, as well as the Church’s evolving teaching on care for the environment.

• Frances D’Emilio, writing for the Associated Press, has a fascinating profile of Fr. Paolo Benanti, an Italian Franciscan friar and theologian who is Pope Francis’s adviser on the issue of artificial intelligence. He must be doing his job well since, as I noted earlier this month, Pope Francis demonstrates a sharp understanding of the technical details of AI and the difficult ethical issues raised by the technology. I was also intrigued by Benanti’s profile because I have argued that the Franciscan theological tradition, particularly the work of John Duns Scotus, provides an especially helpful lens for making sense of our contemporary technological reality, and so it makes me curious how much that tradition has shaped Benanti’s thinking, and therefore indirectly the pope’s.

• Finally, I have previously written about the role of some prominent contemporary African church leaders as peacemakers and advocates for democracy. Crux recently published a profile of Archbishop Philippe Fanoko Kossi Kpodzro, from the African nation of Togo, who died earlier this month at the age of 93. Kpodzro was unusually active as a political figure in his native country, serving as the president of a transitional parliament from 1991 to 1994 in the midst of a politicial crisis, and more recently leading the political resistance to President Faure Essozimna Gnassingbé after a disputed election in 2020, and he was forced into exile in 2021. Kpodzro’s legacy, therefore, includes not only shepherding the Church, but the promotion of democracy and human rights.