The presentation earlier this week of the so-called “mid-term report” of the extraordinary synod of bishops on the family (the Latin headline of which, relatio post disceptationem, may seem to the unenlightened to give it an authority it doesn’t in fact possess) aroused a predictable level of interest in both the Catholic and the non-Catholic media. Their general assumption has been (and the report’s half dozen authors clearly intended that the assumption should be) that what it conveys is that the Catholic Church is gearing up, not for any change in pastoral strategy, but for fundamental changes in the Church‘s teachings (hitherto immutable) on important questions to do with marriage and with sexual morality. Have a look at this from the Mail Online. The headline reads as follows: “Massive Vatican shift on gay sex: Summit on 'family life' says unmarried couples living together can be 'positive', gays and divorcees must be welcomed and contraception 'respected'.” Beneath that is a four-part standfirst: