When the Vatican’s synod on synodality concluded in 2024 — if synods can ever really come to an end — among the remaining tasks to be taken up in Rome was a commission to suggest changes to the Code of Canon Law occasioned by the Church’s experience of universal synodality.
After years of quiet work on the subject, the commission released a final report this week, ripe with proposals intended to enshrine the commission’s understanding of synodality’s lessons into the Church’s positive law.
The concrete suggestions have been met with mixed reactions by canon lawyers, and some represent particularly controversial viewpoints in long-contested questions about the power of orders and the nature of ecclesial authority.
But the very existence of the report poses a challenge for Pope Leo — himself a canon lawyer. And how the pontiff responds to the suggestions will give a clear indication of whether the canonical momentum of the Francis era was a flash in the pan for the Church, or the start of a new chapter in the Church’s legal
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