The phrase
"national bishops" refers to religious leaders known as bishops who oversee and provide guidance to the members of a specific country's or region's branch of a particular faith, such as Christianity. These bishops are responsible for ensuring the spiritual well-being of the people in that country or region and often play a significant role in making important decisions within their religious community.
Full definition
And, of course, there is much dispute about the «magisterial» status of
national bishops conferences, with the Holy See tending to downplay their teaching authority.
Other voting participants (priests, bishops and cardinals, known as synod fathers) include 114 representatives
of national bishops» conferences; 13 heads of Eastern Catholic Churches; 25 heads of Vatican Congregations and Councils.
Even the Catholic Church uses this anthropology in a few of its official statements like the Second Vatican Council's Gaudium et Spes, and statements
by national bishops conferences in Peru and the Netherlands, as well as the Vatican's 1986 Instruction on Liberation Theology.
But the symbolic significance of an
entire national bishops» conference resigning en masse because they covered - up for pedophiles marked a historic moment in the decades - long saga.
Well before the Vatican released Thursday's document,
a national bishops» conference in Germany and Switzerland said their surveys exposed a wide gap between church teaching and lay Catholics» personal views.
The youth leaders of
the national bishops» conferences started to say: «It is not up to the Vatican to get involved in our youth.»
The national bishops» conference recently underwent across - the - board cutbacks due to financial difficulties.
National bishops» conferences also needed Papal authority.
And this time, unlike in the past, some local bishops, including representatives of
the national bishops» conference, had had enough.
Archbishop Chaput: Those issues are decided by the Holy See and
the national bishops» conference.