Pope, Bishops, Curia. The Reforms That Are Coming

[Apotheoun]

Pope, Bishops, Curia. The Reforms That Are Coming

 

A "council of the crown" around the pope, with cardinals from the five continents. A drastic trimming of offices. A shakeup for the IOR. Novelties and unknowns of the pontificate of Francis 

 

by Sandro Magister

 

ROME, March 21, 2103 – John XXIII appointed his new secretary of state on the very evening of his election as pope. And he was the great diplomat Domenico Tardini, at the time an ordinary priest, not yet bishop or cardinal.

 

But that is prehistory, compared to the earthquake of today.

 

Pope Francis has arrived in Rome “from the ends of the earth,” and he is innovating the manner of governing the Church from on high, starting with himself. The reform of the curia will come. And many other things will come as well. But after “a certain time,” he has cautioned.

 

Meanwhile, he has told all of the heads of the curia whose mandates ended with the resignation of his predecessor to get back to work. “Temporarily,” and “donec aliter provideatur," until he, the new pope, decides. Since March 13 the Vatican curia has been a tremulous army of functionaries without a certain future.

 

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At his first appearance on the loggia of the basilica of St. Peter, the newly elect Jorge Mario Bergoglio wanted two cardinals at his side. At his right his vicar for the diocese of Rome, Agostino Vallini, and at his left his Brazilian friend Cláudio Hummes, a Franciscan. A pair that personifies his program.

 

The new pope wants to be the bishop of Rome for all intents and purposes, as he implied immediately on the first Sunday of his pontificate, with the Mass celebrated in the parish of St. Ann on the border of the Vatican and the Borgo, amid a rejoicing crowd. He will go from church to church, he will visit center and periphery, “for the evangelization of this city that is so beautiful.” In direct contact with the people of the diocese which now is his “bride.”

 

Above all, Pope Francis loves to call himself “bishop of Rome.” But he also holds firm, and said so immediately, that “the Church of Rome is that which presides in charity over all the Churches.”

 

They are the words of Ignatius of Antioch, a bishop and martyr of the second century, which since then have served as a guide for the difficult balance of power between the successor of Peter, the bishop of Rome, and the successors of the college of the twelve apostles, the bishops of the whole world, between the exercise of papal primacy and the exercise of episcopal collegiality. At the beginning of the second millennium this balance was toppled and schism divided the Church of Rome from the Churches of the East.

 

But within the Catholic Church as well papal primacy, pushed to the limit, is waiting to be balanced by the college of bishops. This was called for by Vatican Council II, so far with scarce practical application, and again forcefully by Benedict XVI in one of his last discourses as pope, a few days before his resignation. His successor Francis has already made it known that this is precisely what he means to do. 

 

To do this he has available to him a rough and ready implement, the synod. It consists of the approximately two hundred bishops, the elite of the almost five thousand bishops of the whole world, who every two years meet in Rome to discuss an issue of particular urgency for the life of the Church.

 

Its powers are purely advisory, and its twenty-eight editions so far, since the first in 1967, have risen only rarely above tedium. Pope Francis could make it deliberative, naturally “together with and under” his power of primacy.

 

But above all he could transform into a proper and permanent “council of the crown” that restricted group of bishops, three for each continent, which every synod elects at the end of its work, to act as a bridge to the following synod.

 

For a pope like Francis, who wants to feel from Rome the pulse of the worldwide Church, this group is the ideal instrument. Suffice it to say that among the twelve elected by the last synod are almost all of the outstanding names of the recent conclave: the cardinals Timothy Dolan of New York, Odilo Scherer of São Paulo, Brazil, Christoph Schönborn of Vienna, Peter Erdö of Budapest, George Pell of Sydney, Luis Antonio Gokim Tagle of Manila.

 

By gathering around himself a summit of the worldwide episcopate of such a high level, once a month or even more frequently, physically present in Rome or by videoconference, Pope Francis could govern the Church just as Vatican Council II wished: with stable collegial support for his ultimate decisions as successor of Peter.

 

 

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[EmilyAnn]

I'm impressed that this is being bought to us from the future.

[Apotheoun]

I'm impressed that this is being bought to us from the future.

Sandro Magister clearly needs a better copy editor.  :)

[Amppax]

Two winters ago came the blatant and almost successful surprise attack intended to wrest approval from Joseph Ratzinger for the bizarre liturgies of the Neocatechumenals. The pope found out and thwarted everything in extremis. He was saddened to see that among the architects of the maneuver was a cardinal in whom he had placed the greatest trust, the prefect of the congregation for divine worship Antonio Cañizares Llovera. He ordered the congregation for the doctrine of the faith to put the liturgies of the Neocatechumenals under examination. The results are now sitting in a drawer.

 

 

This brings back memories.  

 

 

[qfnol31]

I've had an odd feeling about Cañizares ever since he missed the consecration of his secretary, for which he was to be a co-consecrator. I really like his secretary though. DiNoia is pretty awesome.

[Didacus]

I keep waiting for our new papa to start giving algebra and calculus lessons in Rome.

A course on thermodynamics would be nice too!