Fr. Alois, prior of the Ecumenical Community of Taize, and auditor Michele Falabretti, leader of the youth pastoral care office at the Italian bishops' conference are also part of the group selected to write the message.
Contrary to what was communicated to journalists earlier in the week, names of the members of each small language group, called "circoli minori" will not be released, the Vatican's chief of communication, Paolo Ruffini, said Oct. 18.
The reason for this, he said, "is to seek to show forth the spirit of the synod, which is a spirit of communion" and to reflect the desire of the synod's General Secretariat "to not transform the synod into a debate about 'who said what' but to tell it for what it is: a communal reflection of the Church."
During the press conference, veteran Vatican journalist Sandro Magister noted that the names of members of each small group were published by synod organizers at the 2015 synod on the family, to which Ruffini replied that he would share the suggestion, though "each synod has its rules."
Ruffini told journalists the small groups are now discussing the third part of the Instrumentum laboris, and the final document is well under way. Among those who spoke at the press conference was Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev, a bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church who is participating in the synod as a "fraternal delegate."
Topics of discussion and speeches inside the synod hall the last two sessions included the importance of sanctity, reading the Bible, prayer, and community for young people. The importance of fasting was also brought up as a practice which is mostly abandoned in western culture and should be rediscovered.