Consensus versus majority

One of the differences between synodal government and (classical) democratic government is that when a minority of the community says “something is wrong”, the community needs to listen. Synodality seeks consensus, not majority.

There are topics that need time and patience. As long as there is no consensus about some controversial question, synodality means that the government must remain undecided.

Of course there are things we cannot change, and we need to accept these things. It would be a waste of energy to continuously quarrel and complain about them. And of course it is not always easy to discern the things we can change from those we can’t. If you are really the only one to see a problem, you need to humbly ask yourself whether your inner voice is right, whether that problem is really important enough and whether you really have the duty to disturb the community process with your concerns.

But if you comply with the majority against your inner voice and just because you are too humble (or maybe too lazy, too shy or too arrogant) to talk about the problem, then you just sweep the dirt under the carpet. The problem will remain and eventually grow.

Silencing down minority opinions in controversial discussions is not the synodal way of finding peace because it leads to lazy compromises, loss of motivation and increased work-to-rule.