Bishop Rudolf Voderholzer criticized the Synodal Path for postponing a debate on gender-neutral language.

The “Faith Manifesto,” signed by around 6,000 people, sharply criticizes the demands of the Synodal Path, which amount to a “self-secularization of the church,” Bernhard Meuser said.

Like many parish churches built in the 1970s and ’80s, the Notre-Dame redesign seems to take its inspiration from sensibilities unique to our own decades, rather than drawing on time-tested understandings of God.

“Here democracy was born,” Pope Francis said. “Yet we cannot avoid noting with concern how today — and not only in Europe — we are witnessing a retreat from democracy.”

“The European continent needs reconciliation and unity; it needs courage and enthusiasm, if it is to move forward. For it will not be the walls of fear and the vetoes dictated by nationalist interests that ensure its progress.”

The pope sees his visit here as another way to get people in Europe and elsewhere to understand that the greatest humanitarian crisis since World War II requires a global solution.