The Archdiocese of Madrid has launched a process called Convivium, presented as an itinerary of ecclesial reflection and pastoral participation. However, the surprise is not in promoting dialogue, listening, or community discernment—something legitimate in itself—but in the type of contents that have been introduced into the official circuit as working material.
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The preparatory documentation itself shows the dimension of the process: it is a workbook that incorporates, among other materials, a synthesis of responses from various diocesan sectors—with 137 responses from Parish Pastoral Councils—along with contributions from deaneries, consecrated life, and other instances. In addition, it includes internal data on the clergy of Madrid (November 2025), which reinforces its character as an “official” instrument and not a simple informal compilation.
The most disturbing thing is that this dynamic has already been seen in other recent processes, especially in the so-called German “synodal way”: under the rhetoric of listening, proposals that are doctrinally inadmissible end up being given legitimacy. And now, under the governance of Cardinal José Cobo, Madrid seems to be sliding toward the same pattern: normalizing the unacceptable as if it were part of a legitimate ecclesial debate.
In the document distributed to the assembly participants, within the section “synthesis of other ecclesial realities,” some proposals are selected for emphasis under the title “ ‘Peculiar’ Proposals.” But what the document calls “peculiar” are not extravagant or marginal proposals, but statements of an openly heretical nature, presented in an institutional framework of normality.
The problem is not only that there are heterodox currents of thought in ecclesial environments—that has always happened—but that an official diocesan process collects them, organizes them, includes them, and projects them as discussable elements within a pastoral dynamic.
Heresies Presented as “Peculiarities”
The gravity of the matter increases when the concrete content of those proposals is analyzed. The document does not present them as doctrinal errors that must be corrected or as approaches alien to the Catholic faith, but as a sort of striking contributions that are integrated into the general framework of work. And it does so with language that functions as anesthesia: calling them “peculiar” amounts to downplaying their gravity, suggesting that they are simple opinions in a plural spectrum, and not statements radically incompatible with the deposit of faith.
“Peculiar” Proposals.
– We believe that the imposition of celibacy on priests (and on future women priests) is an unjust and anti-evangelical law that produces victims and contributes to a dominant clericalism that produces inequality in the community. (MOCEOP (Movement for Optional Celibacy)
– The possibility of optional celibacy, not understood as a subtraction of attention or energy from priestly service but, for those who feel called, as a form of stimulus and propulsion (Lay Community Kédate)
– We believe that free celibacy can help the priest to be closer to social realities. To propose the possibility of a temporary priesthood, not for life. Both laypeople and religious go through different vital stages. (The Loyola Catholic Groups)
“Future Women Priests”: Doctrinal Rupture Normalized
The mere inclusion of the expression “future women priests” is not an anecdote or a rhetorical provocation. It involves introducing as a “possible” horizon a claim incompatible with the Catholic doctrine on the sacrament of Holy Orders. Even more: it is not formulated as a question or as a theological discussion, but as an expected future, as a natural evolution. That is not a “peculiarity”: it is a heresy presented under a framework of apparent normality.
When a diocese allows such a formulation to circulate in an official working document, the damage is double: for the content and for the implicit message. The ground shifts: what was unacceptable becomes “debatable”; what was doctrinal error becomes “contribution”; and what should be corrected appears as just another sensitivity.
“Temporary Priesthood”: Holy Orders Turned into a Vital Stage
No less serious is the proposal of a “temporary priesthood, not for life.” This phrase attacks the core of the Catholic priesthood, which is not a provisional assignment or a function subject to biographical cycles, but a sacrament with a definitive character. Proposing it as temporary implies emptying it of its nature, reducing it to a reversible role, and adjusting the ordained ministry to the contemporary mentality of “everything is revisable.”
In practice, this idea pushes toward a functionalist conception of the ministry: the priest would no longer be “priest” by a stable sacramental gift, but “minister” for a stage. The consequence is a disfigurement of the priesthood and, with it, of the sacramental and ecclesial life that depends on that priesthood.
The Pastoral Effect: Doctrine Degraded to Opinion
The result of including these statements in an institutional framework is devastating. Because not only are heretical ideas whitewashed, but the mental framework of those who participate is altered: what appears in the official document is understood as legitimate, as part of the journey, as material on which to “discern.” And thus, faith ceases to be the criterion to become just another element of the conversation.
A diocese can and should listen to its people, welcome concerns, accompany weaknesses, improve its structures, and purify its dynamics. But it cannot—without disfiguring itself—turn into a matter of pastoral debate that which denies essential elements of the Catholic priesthood. In a process presented as community discernment, faith cannot be reduced to “proposal.” Doctrine cannot become opinable material. And heresy cannot enter through the back door as “peculiarity.”
The Position of the Archdiocese
Following the consultation carried out by infovaticana, the Archdiocese of Madrid has responded by stating that, “in the interest of transparency,” it was deemed appropriate to collect all the contributions received, although this “does not imply that they will be the subject of debate,” and emphasizing that “precisely the issues” related to temporary priesthood or the ordination of women “are not scheduled for treatment.” The diocese adds that these are not proposals formulated by the Archdiocese itself, but a synthesis elaborated from “more than 800 pages” of contributions from parishes, deaneries, consecrated life, and other “non-formalized ecclesial realities,” insisting that said contributions have been “listened to and collected with respect,” but that some, for coherence with the criteria established from the beginning, will not be addressed because Convivium “is not” a process to discuss doctrinal issues.
Madrid Should Not Import the German Script
The great danger of these processes is not only what is said, but the method with which it is inoculated: first, an amiable framework is introduced (“listening,” “conversation,” “welcome”); then incompatible proposals with the faith are slipped in; and finally, the rupture is attempted to be presented as “pastoral evolution” because “it has emerged from the process.” It is the script we have seen unfold in Germany, and it is the script that now emerges in Madrid.
The Church does not “discern” about what it has already received as the deposit of faith. Discernment is not subjecting doctrine to sociological debate, nor turning sacramentality into laboratory material. If the Archdiocese of Madrid desires an authentic pastoral renewal, the first act of charity—and of responsibility—is not to confuse the faithful and not to accustom the diocese to treating heresy as if it were a mere extravagance. Calling the heretical “peculiar” is not neutrality: it is normalization. And the normalization of heresy always ends up costing a price.