By UCA news reporter
IN a changing trend across the Church in Asia, the number of lay academics with expertise on the region’s Catholics is increasing, taking such studies out of the clerical dominance, shows a new survey.
The increased involvement of non-clerics in studying Asian Catholics illustrates “how this field of research is gradually migrating into the public domain,” according to the survey result released on June 14 by the Singapore-based Initiative for Study of Asian Catholics.
The survey “aimed to evaluate the involvement of academics with knowledge of Asian Catholicism in the Synod on Synodality,” lay theologian Michel Chambon, the principal investigator of the survey.
It was the “first attempt to map out the state of the field of research on Asian Catholicism from an interdisciplinary perspective,” Chambon said.
The survey was conducted in May as the second session of the 16th Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, popularly called Synod on synodality, is scheduled for October in the Vatican.
The survey report,Synodality and Academics of Asian Catholicism, said it invited 292 academics working on Asian Catholics to participate, and 119 responded, registering one-third participation.
An overwhelming 75 percent (90 respondents) were lay people, with priests and nuns forming only 25 percent (29 respondents).
“In 21st-century Asia, knowledge and research on Asian Catholics are produced by a diversity of actors, with most of them positioned outside of the clerical sphere,” the survey report said.
Some lay people were not practicing Catholics, it added.
Most respondents (79 percent) had doctoral qualifications, which indicates that most academics of Asian Catholicism “have achieved high educational attainment and have the professional expertise,” the report said.
Men dominated (65 percent) among the academics, with five percent refusing to reveal their gender.
Most academics were aged between 64 and 45, but 27 percent were below 45, suggesting that scholarship “has been built over multiple decades and continues to attract the interest of the next generation of scholars.”
These academics came from varied disciplines, such as social sciences (34), theology (28), history (18), and religious studies (17). The report said the presence of only one canon lawyer suggested that the “contemporary making of Canon Law barely intersects with ongoing research on Asian Catholicism.”
Most of these academics were based in Asia and Western countries, with just one respondent from Africa and Latin America. The study indicates that, despite having a strong Catholic presence in these regions, they “remain underrepresented in scholarship on Asian Catholicism.”
“There is very little, if any, research on Asian Catholics in Latin America and Africa,” the report said.
Wide ranging consultation
The Asian hierarchy has involved various academics in its Synod consultations, cutting across gender, age, and clerical status, according to the study.
Academics — priests, nuns, laymen, and women –with expertise on Asian Catholics “were not simply external analysts of the Catholic Church but also participant observers,” said the survey.
Among the 49 academics who contributed to the Synod on Synodality, 23 were priests, of the total 30 members of priests who participated in the survey.
This indicated that three-quarters of ‘clerical academics’ (76 percent) “took the initiative to join activities related to the synod.”
However, of the 89 lay respondents who identified as laity, 26, or less than one-third, took the initiative to join activities related to the Synod on Synodality.
“The Synod on Synodality appears to attract higher interest from scholars who are members of clergy or religious order than those of the laity,” the report said.
The survey results show that roughly a quarter (30 out of 119) were consulted by ecclesiastical bodies such as bishops’ conferences, national teams, continental structures, international movements, and pontifical committees.
Theology over social science
Among the 89 academics who were not consulted, a majority (87 percent) said that they would have been “willing to contribute to the synod if consulted.”
The survey analyzed the five key points about the 30 consulted academics.
The survey revealed that gender identity has “apparently not influenced the selection of consulted academics.”
Among consulted academics, 66.6 percent identified as male while 23.3 percent identified as female, “which is close to the gender ratio of the general population of academics on Asian Catholicism,” the survey said.
Another factor considered was the clerical effect among the respondents. Of the consulted academics, 40 percent were priests and nuns, but only a quarter of the general population of academics are clerics or nuns.
“Academics who are clergy members are more likely to be consulted by the Catholic Church for matters related to synodality,” the report added.
The survey also revealed that both established and emerging academics have been consulted. Academics who have published more than 11 papers (47 percent) and those who have published between one and five papers have been consulted for the synod.
Over half (16 respondents) who participated in the synod consultations said they did not receive compensation in any form. Ten of them said they are still active in this collaboration.
Theologians comprised only 19 percent of the 119 academics of Asian Catholicism who participated in the survey.
It shows that theology is prioritized over social sciences, and academic background plays “a role in the selection of consulted academics.”
However, among 30 academics who were approached for input, some 14.5 percent were theologians. – UCA News
