Several U.S. bishops wrote short reports giving a general sense of the responses to a survey for the Vatican in preparation for the upcoming synod on the family. Common among the comments was that Catholics admit to a poor understanding of the church’s teachings on the family. The Rev. Dennis Gill, director of the Philadelphia Archdiocese’s Office for Divine Worship and coordinator of the project, told CatholicPhilly.com, the archdiocesan news website, that the church has its educational work cut out for it. “One thing we did learn was that we have to be much more proactive,” he said. “We cannot just depend on church teaching filtering through the cracks…. Somehow the Gospel has to be presented in a way that is compelling, engaging, insisting on a response.”

This article appears in March 24 2014.