Detroit — Archbishop Allen Vigneron returned from the Synod of Bishops for the Middle East with hope for improvement in the situation of the Middle East’s Christians.
The archbishop said the Vatican synod, which concluded Oct. 24 after two weeks of deliberations, laid two foundations for hope — first, a call for solidarity among all the Middle East’s Christians; and second, a commitment to build coalitions with non-Christians in the region who are also concerned about such issues as human rights and freedom of religious practice.
“Muslims, Jews and Christians need to work together,” he said.
The Christian presence in the Middle East, which was already a minority, has been shrinking in recent decades. The region’s wars and religious conflicts have led many Middle East Christians to seek new lives in Europe, the United States or elsewhere
In some cases, the lack of civil peace has made it difficult or dangerous to live a normal family life, while in others the governments fail to protect — or actively violate — the rights of Christians. In some countries, Christians whose ancestors have lived peacefully with Muslims for centuries now find themselves facing increased restrictions, threats or violence.
Most of the bishops at the synod were from dioceses in the Middle East or those that serve the diaspora of Eastern Christians outside the Middle East, such as Bishop Ibrahim N. Ibrahim of the Southfield-based Eparchy of St. Thomas the Apostle (the diocese for Chaldean Catholics in the eastern half of the United States).
Archbishop Vigneron and Cardinal Roger Mahony of Los Angeles were among a handful of Latin Catholic bishops from around the world who were invited to attend and participate in the synod.
“We were chosen because we have so many Christians from the Middle East in our dioceses,” Archbishop Vigneron said.
Besides being home to the largest concentration of Chaldeans (Assyrian Catholics from Iraq) in the United States, southeast Michigan also has Palestinian and some other Latin Catholics from the Middle East and Melkite, Maronite and Armenian Catholics.
And it also has non-Catholic Middle East Christians of the Antiochan Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic and Coptic Churches, as well as of the Ancient Assyrian Church of the East.
As a full, participating member of the synod, Archbishop Vigneron took part in its deliberations, speaking on the need to make more religious order priests available to serve in Middle Eastern countries and convincing his fellow prelates to give the synod’s final report a more “Christological character.”
Finding the draft report focused too much on “practical” aspects of the challenges facing Middle East Christians, he persuaded them to put the issues “in the context of our faith in Christ,” the archbishop explained.
Although private remarks by a couple of the participating bishops sparked criticism from Jewish leaders and Israeli government officials, Archbishop Vigneron stressed that the synod’s final report endorsed the enforcement of United Nations resolutions concerning the region and condemned any form of anti-Semitism or anti-Judiasm.
All Catholics should be concerned about the plight of Middle East Christians, the archbishop said, because, in the first place, “Christians should be concerned about all of their brothers and sisters, no matter how far away.”
But over and above that general concern, there is also another reason, he continued: “Jerusalem is the mother for all of us, and we owe a particular loyalty to the Christian community that has been there since the Apostles.”
Archbishop Vigneron recounted how St. Paul, in his travels, urged support for the Church in Jerusalem.
“Christ is not just an idea, but came from that very place and was a citizen of that place,” he added.
