German Catholics have agreed to continue their reform process in close coordination with the Vatican.
At the end of a two-day meeting of the Synodal Committee, a reform committee, in Mainz on Saturday, it was decided to set up three commissions to examine how the intended reforms can be implemented.
The Synodal Committee is to prepare a Synodal Council in which bishops and lay people will consult and make decisions together.
These plans led to a serious crisis in the German Bishops' Conference's relationship with the Vatican at the beginning of this year. The centre of the Catholic church considers such a strong involvement of the laity to be incompatible with canon law.
The crisis was finally resolved in talks between the German bishops and the Roman Curia with the Germans promising to consult the Vatican before making any important decisions or changes.
The chairman of the German Bishops' Conference, Georg Bätzing, said afterwards that this path was being taken "very consciously in conjunction with the universal church level." Bätzing, who is the bishop of Limburg, said that when the World Synod meets again in Rome in the autumn "our concerns will have been brought forward by us beforehand."
He and several other German bishops plan to travel to Rome again for talks on June 28.
Thomas Schüller, a canon lawyer from Münster who was elected to one of the commissions, told dpa that all the bishops had worked hard in Mainz, particularly with regard to the statutes for the proposed Synodal Council.
"The Vatican's requests and occasional threats of bans are having an effect and are now allowing all issues to be dealt with in a recognizably more realistic manner," he said, adding that German clergy are "no longer chasing after pipe dreams.
"The bishops are clearly keen to liaise closely with the Roman authorities on the consultations that are now underway."
