Document Type
Articles
Abstract
In recent years, leaders of the Catholic Church have attempted to promote more participatory ways of operating. A few years ago, for example, Church leaders initiated what they referred to as a synodality initiative worldwide. Catholics were asked to share publicly a time the Church brought them joy and a time it disappointed them, along with a hope they have for the Church's future. One diocese organized the process around the sort of talking circles used by Indigenous groups to make decisions and connect members. This diocese also enlisted researchers to lead a systematic study of the process; they employed what the literature refers to as a participatory two-phase mixed-methods design. This paper focuses on what the study’s findings reveal about the initiative's potential to promote dialogue across differences at a time when polarization in- and outside of the Church makes it less likely that such potentially educative dialogue will occur naturally.
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Recommended Citation
Donmoyer, Robert and Galloway, Fred J.
(2026)
"Promoting Member Participation and Dialogue Across Differences: A Mixed Methods Study of One Diocese’s Implementation of the Catholic Church’s Synodality Initiative,"
Interdisciplinary Journal of Leadership Studies: Vol. 4, Article 1.
Available at:
https://scholarship.richmond.edu/ijls/vol4/iss2/1