Pope Francis is pictured next to Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, secretary-general of the Synod of Bishops, and Cardinal Kevin Farrell, head of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Laity, the Family and Life, at a pre-synod gathering of youth delegates in Rome March 19. The Synod of Bishops on young people, the faith and vocational discernment will take place Oct. 3-28 at the Vatican. (CNS photo/Paul Haring)
Father Robert Stark hopes to share stories of vulnerable, migrant youth at world assembly this month in Rome
By Patrick Downes
Hawaii Catholic Herald
At the synod in Rome this month, Blessed Sacrament Father Robert Stark hopes to tell the story of a 17-year-old boy he met this year at a church-run shelter on the Mexican-U.S. border.
“Jose was a promising young soccer player in Honduras before he fled from gang violence on a train called La Bestia which ran over his legs cutting them off at the knees,” Father Stark said.
“Somehow he still made it to the border,” he said, where the Sisters of the Eucharist, Jesuits and lay volunteers who worked at the Padre Kino shelter “welcomed and protected him, promoting his efforts to secure prostheses, discerning with him how he would forge his future.”
Jose’s story of violence, tragedy, compassion and redemption encapsulates a message that Father Stark, who is the director of the Diocese of Honolulu’s Office for Social Ministry, hopes the synod participants will hear.
Pope Francis named the Hawaii priest as one of the voting members of the Synod of Bishops Oct. 3-28 at the Vatican.
The theme for the meeting of world church leaders is “young people, the faith and vocational discernment.”
Pope Francis will preside over the synod, which will bring together more than 300 cardinals, bishops, priests, religious and lay experts, including young people.
In addition to sharing their own personal experiences, synod participants will discuss a working document based on input from bishops’ conferences, religious orders, offices of the Roman Curia and Catholic organizations; on a global online survey open to anyone 16-29 years old; and a document prepared by more than 300 young people who met in Rome in March at the invitation of the pope.
Father Stark received his synod appointment for the work he does with the Vatican Section for Migrants and Refugees, the same connection that brought him to the U.S. Mexican border earlier this year to observe the fraught situation there with immigrants and refugees, and where he met Jose.
Father Stark hopes synod participants will hear the stories of “special populations of marginalized young people around the world.”
“I hope to hear more about what they want from the church, as well as what they want to contribute. What are their needs and what are their gifts? And how will the church accompany these youths to build a better future full of hope and joy?”
“Youth are the voice of the young Christ,” who himself was a refugee and who suffered “persecution and injustice, culminating in crucifixion,” he said.
“Today Christ speaks to us through vulnerable youth on the move who offer us their unique gifts of energy, creativity, resilience, resourcefulness, imagination, hope and joy,” Father Stark said.
“Each young migrant we welcome represents an opportunity to experience God through the sharing and transformation of our vulnerabilities together,” he said.
Through the synod, “I hope the world hears that the church is genuinely interested in what the youth have to say and that they are taken seriously,” he said.
Among his synod duties, Father Stark will write a presentation in response to one of the paragraphs in the synod working document developed with the participation of youth in the pre-synod preparation process. He will give a four-minute talk based on that written response during one of the general sessions in the synod hall.
He will attend daily sessions on the working document, where members will listen to other speakers and then discuss and vote on the text.
“At the end of the assembly, we hope to produce a collaborative document inspired by the Holy Spirit that outlines ways we can improve our efforts as a church accompanying and involving ‘youth, faith, vocation and discernment,’” he said.
Pope Francis, addressing the presynod gathering in March, said that young people are the ones who can help the church fight “the logic of ‘it’s always been done this way,’” which he described as “a poison, a sweet poison that tranquilizes the heart and leaves you anesthetized so you can’t walk.”
But to equip young people to take their rightful place in the church, church leaders must listen to them, be as honest as possible in responding to their questions and pass on to them the art of discernment, he said.
Discernment, according to the synod working document, is a prayerful process that “leads us to recognize — and become attuned with — the action of the Spirit in true spiritual obedience. In this way, it becomes openness to new things, courage to move outward and resistance to the temptation of reducing what is new to what we already know.”
