In this presentation I intend to give a brief overview of events before and during the Extraordinary Synod held in October 2014. On March 17 2013, four days after his election as Pope and during his first Angelus address in St Peter’s Square, the Holy Father drew attention to a recently published book by Walter Cardinal Kasper and strongly praised it. He said: In these days I have been able to read a book by a Cardinal – Cardinal Kasper, a talented theologian, a good theologian – on mercy. And it did me such good, that book, but don’t think...